POEM: Go the Long, Long Way Home by Sylvia Townsend Warner (#9 for National Poetry Month)

 
  The name of the poet seems very familiar, but I can't seem to recall where I've seen it. 

  However, I was browsing my Poetry Please book again and this caught my eye. 


  

Go the Long, Long Way Home by Sylvia Townsend Warner

Go the long way, the long way home.
Over this gate and that lean, at the three lanes’ meeting delay,
Look well at that field of hay, eye closely the drilled loam,
Finger the springing corn, count every petal
Of the hedge rose and the guelder rose.
Under the bosom of the blossomed elder stay,
Delay, linger, browse deep on all this green and all this growing,
Slant cheek to the sweet air, with deep greeting survey
The full-leaved boughs like water flowing,
The corn-waves hurrying uphill as the wind blows.
Look overhead into the blue, look round,
Watch this bird fly and that bird settle,
With slow treading and sure greet the assuring ground:
Go slowly, for slowly goes this midsummer day,
And this is the last time you will come this way.

Go the long way, the long way home.
Aye, and when you’ve arrived and the sighing gate falls to,
Go slowly, go heedfully your garden through.
Breathe in the spice pinks, turn face up to the soft
Ripe rose that wags aloft,
Nod to the old rake, rub thumbs along the spade’s edge,
Measure the potato hills and the tall bean rows,
Pledge cherry and currant bush, pledge lily and lily leaf spear
And rebel the nettles waving along the hedge;
Look closely, look well,
See how your garden grows,
Ponder yourself even into the secret cell
Of this year’s honeycomb:
Look long, for long has this been yours and long been dear,
And this is the last time you will stand here.

Go the long way, the long way home.
Though you are weary, hasten not ghost to ground,
Tarry this last hour out, take your last look round,
Greet finally the earth, greet leaf and root and stock.
Stand in your last hour poised, like the dandelion clock-
Frail ghost of the gaudy raggle-taggle that you were-
Stand up, O homing phantom, stand up intact and declare
The goodness of earth the greatest good you found,
Ere the wind jolts you, and you vanish like the foam.

From: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/panmeditation/message/147

Date: 1938

By: Sylvia Townsend Warner (1893-1978)

  Goddess watch over us all, 

  

  Kerk TehKek

POEM: Winter Walk by Lynette Roberts (#10 for National Poetry Month in Canada and the US)

 
  Today has seen the deaths of two famous Welshman; ( Gareth Thomas )

 who most will probably know best as Roj Blake in Blake's 7; which was my first fandom, and a former National Poet of Wales ( Prof. Gwyn Thomas )

  - I found out about the latter because I was searching for a poem by or about Wales; penned by someone from Wales preferably. 

  I did not realise it would be such a frustrating task. 

  For a land of bards the work of their poets is very hard to find; certainly nothing by Gwyn Thomas could be had. Eventually though I found this by an Argentinian-born poet who lived in Wales; which also happens to describe this year as it is unfolding. Winter here is a spiritual thing for me; I love Winter, but the winter of the spirit is a much harsher creature. 


  Winter Walk by Lynette Roberts 

  
  She left the hut and the bright log fire at noon 
  And walked outside on crisp white winter snow 
  To find the iced slopes shadowed like the moon, 
  The wild wood desolate and bare below; 
  The red trees wet, adrift with icy flow, 
  The evergreens with glassy needled leaves; 
  A bloodstone veined red and white this view weaves. 

  But lifted off the path like crystal spheres 
  There lay cut prints of glinting stylized forms 
  Of birds not seen, large sparkling twig-like spears, 
  And squirrel pricks where fox's paw transforms 
  White single roses out of petalled storms; 
  While keltic scrolls transcribe where birds had been: 
  Then stamped in ice another track was seen. 

  A slight right turn of foot. She sensed him there, 
  Tree like with rain coat shouldered, fine large looks, 
  A four-armed god. From this sweet honeyed snare 
  She turned, upspraying, Marsh Tits, Finch, and Rooks, 
  Through brushwood hills, seeing by frosted brooks 
  His foot prints: these she retraced like a bride 
  With loaves and wood returned to his keen side. 

  
  
  
 
   Goddess watch over us all, 

   

   Kerk TehKek 

POEM: O Captain! My Captain! (#11 for National Poetry Month in Canada and the US)

 
  Not new, but this struck me as soon as I saw it in a new way. The first Captain of my first Fandom is gone. There with him go all illusions of a rebirth of Blake's 7; never real, I thought, but apparently there all the same. 

  What will it be like when William Shatner goes to the great holodeck in the sky? 

  And there is a parallel, because I never really liked Blake; just as I never really liked Kirk. This it seems makes little difference. 



  O CAPTAIN! MY CAPTAIN! (From Memories of President Lincoln) 

O CAPTAIN! my Captain! our fearful trip is done,

The ship has weather'd every rack, the prize we sought is won,

The port is near, the bells I hear, the people all exulting,

While follow eyes the steady keel, the vessel grim and daring;

   But O heart! heart! heart!
     O the bleeding drops of red,
       Where on the deck my Captain lies,
         Fallen cold and dead.

O Captain! my Captain! rise up and hear the bells;

Rise up—for you the flag is flung—for you the bugle trills,

For you bouquets and ribbon'd wreaths—for you the shores 
a-crowding,

For you they call, the swaying mass, their eager faces turning;

   Here Captain! dear father!
     This arm beneath your head!
       It is some dream that on the deck,
         You've fallen cold and dead.

My Captain does not answer, his lips are pale and still,

My father does not feel my arm, he has no pulse nor will,

The ship is anchor'd safe and sound, its voyage closed and done,

From fearful trip the victor ship comes in with object won;

   Exult O shores, and ring O bells!
     But I with mournful tread,
       Walk the deck my Captain lies,
         Fallen cold and dead. 


   And here is the complete poem from Leaves of Grass http://www.whitmanarchive.org/published/LG/1891/poems/192 




   Goddess watch over us all, 

   

   Kerk TehKek