Between which we walk

Let us go then you and I *

Down these many corridors of stone,

Open to the winter stillness,

A thaw in motion, somnambulant in mood.

I have seen all things pass and all men go

In the hall of the Royal Dûnn at Tara

Under the shadow of the drifting leaf.Listen!

The rocks and trees are whispering.

And slowly, very slowly,

Like a world caught in breath, we wait to exhale.

Caught between the present and future,

At the height of expectation

Exhilaration is the moment

Of sweet release.

I have heard you calling, Dalua, Dalua!

Arise from your dreams on Mount Amara **

And walk with me, tripping down the nights and days,

Mind and muse, moving together, 

A marriage of true minds, intoxicating one another, 

Drinking from that conjugal cup,

A silent communion, a willing communication.

And in the eternal landscape of the here and now,

In the post-glacial history, lies an archive in the granite rock.

Layer upon layer of stored fable and fact,

Between which we walk, between the stones,

Amidst the lithological annals, over the pebbles,

Over the grit, touching the quivering branches,

The vibrant mosses, the glistening webs.

Navigate through this inner landscape, 

Polyhymnia you are my guide. 

Tread carefully across the boulders,

Across the numinous ride of the track,

Across the Earth's sweet cleavages.

And we, each of us upon the last and sharpest height, ***

Feel the air is thin and oblivion not far away. 

VH 2009

* TS Eliot

** Milton

*** Tennyson

A dream is a dream

Claudia aged 6

A dream is a dream and nothing can change your thoughts of a dream come true!

A patternless thought of a dream is like a blank sky with blobs of blue and a drop of rain once and a while!

Dreams are dreams, thoughts are thoughts, and nothing can change that!

Black Rook in Rainy Weather

Black Rook in Rainy Weather - Sylvia Plath

On the stiff twig up there

Hunches a wet black rook

Arranging and rearranging its feathers in the rain.

I do not expect a miracle

Or an accident

To set the site on fire

In my eye, nor seek

Any more in the desultory weather some design,

But let spotted leaves fall as they fall,

Without ceremony, or portent.

Although I admit, I desire,

Occasionally, some backtalk

From the mute sky, I can't honestly complain:

A certain mirror light may still

Lean incandescent

Out of kitchen table or chair

As if a celestial burning took

Possession of the most obtuse objects now and then - 

Thus hallowing an interval

Otherwise inconsequent

By bestowing largesse, honor,

One might say love.  At any rate, I now walk

Wary  (for it could happen

Even in this dull, ruinous landscape); skeptical,

Yet politic; ignorant

Of whatever angel may choose to flare

Suddenly at my elbow.  I only know that a rook

Ordering its black feathers can so shine

As to seize my senses, haul

My eyelids up, and grant

A brief respite from fear

Of neutrality.  With luck,

Trekking stubborn through this season

Of fatigue, I shall

Patch together a content

Of sorts.  Miracles occur,

If you care to call those spasmodic

Tricks of radiance miracles.  The wait's begun again,

The long wait for the angel,

For that rare, random descent.

Sylvia Plath Collected Poems, Faber & Faber 1981

The Banished Gods

Near the headwaters of the longest river
There is a forest clearing.
A dank, misty place,
Where light stands in columns
And birds sing with a noise like paper tearing.

Far from land, from the trade routes,
In an unbroken dreamtime
Of penguin and whale,
The seas sigh to themselves,
Re-living the days before the days of sail.

Where the wires end and the moor seethes in silence,
Scattered with scree, primroses,
Feathers and humus,
It shelters the hawk and hears
In dreams the forlorn cries of lost species.

It is here that the banished gods are in hiding.
Here they sit out the centuries,
In stone, water
And the hearts of trees,
Lost in a reverie of their own natures.

Of zero growth, economics and seasonal change,
In a world without cars, computers,
Or chemical skies.
Where thought is a fondling of stones,
And wisdom a five minute silence at moonrise.

by Benjamin Grafton 2007

For Ben, 1948-2015,  from Claudia

We'll catch our fish and watch the birds,

And hunt for mushrooms in the earth,

And if there's a name you haven't yet heard,

It'll be story after story and our souls, they won't get old.

We'll joke around and start up fights,

And tell long tales into long bright nights,

And if theres's a wrong you set to rights,

There'll be story after story, and our souls, they won't get old.

We'll wear out our bodies and we'll use all our heart,

We'll take in every moment, the bright ones and the dark,

We'll cash in every chip, and we'll play every card,

And it'll be story after story, and on our souls you leave your mark.

A Winter Walk with Polyhymnia (second version - a bit more posy)

Merryvale January 2009

Let us go then you and I * 

Down these many 

Corridors of stone,

List'ning to the roaring silence,

A thaw in motion  - in somnambulant mood.

And I have seen all things, 

And all men that dwell, 

In the Hall of Royal Dûn,

At Tara, under the shadow 

Of the drifting leaf.

The rocks and trees 

Share our vision,

And like a world caught in breath 

We wait to exhale, and at the height of exhilaration 

There is sweet release.

And I have heard you calling, 

Dalua, Dalua!

Arise from your dreams on 

Mount Amara,

Polyhymnia, come and walk with me.

Come tripping down 

The nights and days,.

Mind and muse moving together, 

Intoxicating one another, 

Drinking from that conjugal cup, in silent communion,

In this eternal landscape, forever casting shadow on the past and beyond

Our present is between.

Shall we walk ?  

Shall we be amidst the feast of stones, 

The gift of pebbles, the dust of grit, 

Between the quivering branches, 

The vibrant mosses, the glistening webs?

What vaster dream can we inhabit and be amidst,

This love of earth.

V Hemingway 2009

* TS Eliot

Between Which We Walk

Merrivale January 2009

Let us go then, you and I *
Down these many corridors of stone,
Open to the winter stillness,
A thaw in motion, somnambulant in mood.
I have seen all things pass and all men go
Under the shadow of Tara's Halls,
Misting on the drifting leaf.

Listen! The rocks and trees are whispering,
And slowly, very slowly,
Like a world caught in breath we wait to exhale.
Caught between the present and future,
At the height of expectation,
Exhilaration is the moment
Of sweet release.

I have heard you calling, Dalua, Dalua!
Arise from your dreams on Mount Amara **
And walk with me, tripping down the nights and days,
Mind and muse, moving together,
A marriage of true minds
Intoxicating one another,
Drinking from that conjugal cup.

And in the eternal landscape of the here and now,
In the post-glacial history,
Lies an archive in the granite schist.
Layer upon layer of stored fable and fact,
Between which we walk, between the stones,
Over the pebbles, over the grit,
Touching the quivering branches, the soft luxuriant mosses.

Come, let us navigate through this inner landscape Polyhymnia,
You are my guide,
Tread carefully across the boulders,
Across the skeletal track,
Across the Earth's sweet cleavages.
And we, who are each of us upon the last and sharpest height,  ***
Feel the air is thin and oblivion not far away.

VH 2009

* TS Eliot

** Milton

*** Tennyson

In search of Zeus

Greece 2013

Welsh Buzzards

Welsh Buzzards
October 2009

I am sick of being old
And I pang for the ridges of Eyri
Bellowing down to the crag and cwm
Under a grey sky
Where buzzards fly.
And I long for Beudy Mawr,
With it Welshness trickle of a stream,
Staring out into a wild and barren cwm
Where buzzards ply.
I am sick of being old,
And I long for the Welsh peaks,
With their crags and cwms,
Under a grey sky
Where buzzards cry.
Keith Treacher 1923-2012

Treen

Looking towards Treen Oct 2008

We are standing on the battlements of Treen

One night, with moon full, pregnant with life,

Not a breath of wind, spellbound.

Distant sounds trail back and forth across the headland,

Winding up the veined valleys, cresting the tops,

Brushing the rocks that gaze across the concourse

Rising proud against the shadowed night.

And they are numinous still,

Eastern heads lifting to the glinting lights In distant coves,

While deep in mounds of earth, souls sleep silent,

Quickening in their slumber as they dream.

And mighty Morgawr, curled on his seat of storms,

Death and memory like the sea swirling and breaking in his thoughts,

Gigantine, his body, curled and tattooed, plays out a siege 
Against the men of means.

And they have eaten his sacred words.

And they have had their fill of sweetness.

And more -  green and sunset flushed we see, beyond far outstretched Bolerium,

Beyond the pulpit rock beckoning towards Pen-von-las,  Britannia. 
Resolutely swift, striding the cliffs, skirts billowing,

Tresses trailing deep in the darkened waters.

Seductive and secretive, nubile and ancient, maid and hag,

She is the mother and whore to the  dark-eyed seaman,

Mother and whore to the ancient tin miner; mellifluous and sweet

She sings her siren song.

And with mind of eye, with height and stature,
With mystic portent, we glimpse ancient Emain Ablach,
Liminal land, holding against converging seas.
And Manannan, weaving court in midsummer,
Asks of the women, who, with their silken threads
Join in the game of the woven dance, 
'Do you recall the palimpsest?
Give to Bran a rowan tree, let him clasp the silver apple branch, 
With blossoms white and leaves of green.
Sing to him a song no poet yet has chanted'. 

And the words are myriad, the workmanship of souls.

I sing to the ocean of past and future.

I sing to the night and all that is holy.

I sing to the mourners who gather in grief.

I sing to the saint as he exalts the almighty.

As he stands in transcendence reaching alone on his windblown island,

That glorious moment amongst seagulls and spume.

This is my moment - I defy you to see...

Weep you no more

Weep you no more, sad fountains;
What need you flow so fast?
Look how the snowy mountains
Heaven's sun doth gently waste.
But my sun's heavenly eyes
View not your weeping,
That now lies sleeping
Softly, now softly lies
Sleeping.

Sleep is a reconciling,
A rest that peace begets:
Doth not the sun rise smiling
When fair at even he sets?
Rest you then, rest, sad eyes,
Melt not in weeping,
While she lies sleeping
Softly, now softly lies
Sleeping.

Anon

The Feast of St Crispian

25th October

This day is called the feast of St Crispian
And we are apt to promise much.
Glorious this golden soft October,
Fallen and fermenting
Plunging deep into the Kentish Shire.
We begin at Cranbrook with sign and portent good,
Passed thicket and sweet brook,
With chestnut meat and apple red.
To follow the greenwood canyon is our desire.
And you will say today is St Crispian,
And we in it shall be remembered, we happy two,
On Oxney at Wittersham, Ebony and Stone.
And what of the bowman of England.
Called upon to fight at Agincourt on this day,
Raising the two fingered salute,
Defiant and victorious to the end,
This day is victory too, this time in 2009.
For them, still breathing, still golden,
Still feasting , scented mellow,
Citadels of parasols in meadows sweet,
Flowers of the forest, field in seasonal praise.
And the Lamb beckons with its ghostly rooms,
And the night is falling with the crescent moon,
And the last bus to Rye is silently borne,
Night lighted, to the coast.



VH and MW Walk, 25 October 2009

The Waves

In senescence -  I harbour and float;

In a universe of light I drift.
There is no sound
Save the lifting breath of fabric,
There is no movement,
Save the glinting warming sun.
There is no sound
Save the thrum of my blood.

Light and waves
Dapple against the glass,
The curtain, printed limpet
With flowers, blows easily
Across the warmth of light,
Lazy and blue, sighing,
"Back and forth, back and forth".

And so the blossoms bloom,
And on the opaque blue
The spangle of tangled fishies
Are shiny with light, flitting
And lilting on the lisp of cotton.
Time flows and I dream.
And in this fishy mead, this meadow heaven -

I close my eyes to see my dreams.

In appreciation of Virgina Woolf
VH 2009

Thanet Adventure

Richborough Towers - Beside the River Stour, 8th June 2009

Stolen time it is when summer flowers
And glistens in the morning sun.
Down to the Stour we trip,
Under the sun and the strawberry moon,
Breaking bread among the flags,
Trampling over the rushes,
Feeling the surge of the on-coming tide,
Sensing another field of vision.

June, the gateway to the 'other',
It would serve us well to pay attention.
'Dies Natalis' for Mens Bona.
Good God, good mind, personification
Of Thought's day, we salute you.
This trip to some other side takes our breath away.
Sleepy now, as lambs they dream
Hyperboloids of Shukhov,
Thanet's dark towers,
Tucked up beside the Stour.

Three million tons of coal and Richborough
Lays bare its bones in peace and soon,
With the rain gently falling,
We take cover to watch flotsam floating.
Inspired by Grotowski we drift into the drip,  drip, drip of the play.
Our figs are cornucopic.
We leave and follow the actors downstream.
Softly falls the rain.

And running down to Pegwell Bay by bus,
We hunger - wondering about Hengist and Horsa,
Asking how St Augustine landed his boat,
How he converted the rough islanders of Ruoihm
With his zeal and cruel judgements,
And did he notice in the eventide,
With its skies blossoming from green to pink.
The pretty multicoloured parrots?
The famous Thanet parrots of the wayside trees.

Goodnight! Sleep tight!
You that dream of palms and exotic fruits.
We find the pathway home and take our leave.


VH 2009

Middum Sumera

In the Eye of the White Horse

Solstice, we walk under the midday sun.
Breathing in the cloudless skies,
Smiling round, catching minty blue,
Brimming beach-like and drawing fresh,
Our teeth glinting, bared to face
The Westering breeze.

Summer, and we, drifting lightly
To daisy down, to stay afloat,
High to the eye of the Uffington horse
Cut rich in the thick leaf-green sward,
Pearly spell of chalk, blanching white
Against the tide of time, take our time.

Standing cool on the equine summit,
With the day luxurious long, the immutable dot
Casts glances to the edge beyond all human knowing.
And we, who stand in a haze of dreams,
Feel your beading eye casting beams across the land.

Let's saddle your scudding form now
To ride far and wide across the curving vale,
High above the bloom of wayside brides
That line the fields
And lace the lanes.

Time rolls on, and with each wave
We cast our nets high up to the rounded beech.
Looking down we see them,
They that dance to the water's edge,
Caught up in a maze of rhythm,
Swaying across the hill to the soft edge of the vale.
Play the turfs a tune my dear and see the grasses dance.

We are insouciant,
Lost in the fullness of things, we look,
Glimpsing into the world pool,
Poised, not dancing now, but skimming shadow stones
Across the twilight of the next generation.


VH 25th June 2009

Summer Rain

Early this morning when the sky
Darkened from azure to grey
We sensed the gathering imminence
Of rain, and built our rough cover over.

Last night, talking late on the phone, we noticed
The holes, renting larger and more gaping,
Rotting our foundations
And letting in the damp.

Was it Caesar who went to war
Stepped over the Rubicon.
Is it now we know
The river has changed its course,
The vital line is not so absolute.

In a clap of thunder the air is broken.
And, cold as the shower in the back room bath,
Against the darkening green,
Lines of tears run down.

Stepping over the line you have to find it first.
A Rubicon indeed.

VH 2009

This Night Has Stretched

This night has stretched its long delays and won.
The creatures that abhor a yearning, slap me down.
Too late the morning star's forever hung too high,
With mercury flitting on his winged feet about the place,
Busy with lifes messages while his venus waits.

This venial journey has to end so why not now?
No poet of a former age contests to win
The cosy dwelling with cosy mate to snuggle down.
Slavering in pint pots, patting belly in chimney pots,
Tucked up in bed.

Pain has come first to learn the lesson.

VH May 2009

Comely Order

Flames that know no homelier hearth than yours
Expend their warmth in vibrant light.
Readily given are the flowers of undying colour;
The youthful years of sacrifice are not forgotten.
This is your gift to your children and your children's children.

This woman's realm is full of soft extensions,
One womb, two births ,
Two fruits nourished by creative order.
Motherhood recalls the mind, gently soothing away
The stresses from the outside world.

Inside you created a garden of sorts, a solice.
Blending rich rosied fragrance into pictures resplendent.
Yielding form and shape, calm and secure.
This was your generous world enriched and filled
With love for your little daughters.

You should never have left the ethereal sphere,
Yours is forever the world of the child.
Too late it was to save your tender soul
From violent intrusions of the male world.
Too late to save your grown up daughters from your actions.

Long ago and far away - we learn to forgive...

VH 1980

The Hours

Horae - Goddess of the order of nature and the seasons, stationed at the doors of Olympus.

The Cocktail of Mutuality...

Why two people need each other, why they will each be better together than either of them would be on their own. 'Your observant gaze which rests so still and pure on things, never leads you to the errors to which speculations, guided by capricious imagination and merely obeying its own rules, so easily falls prey' ( Schiller to Goether 1794)

Political progress can occur only if there is a transformation of people's inner lives, otherwise factions are merely the voices of human fragments seeking dominance over society...

Waiting

To be in dialogue is strength itself,
Communicating verse by verse
Between us seems so natural, so good;
The industry of two people.

Sitting here amongst the clutter of paper and
Dog earred remnant un-success, I am satisfied to be alone.
To hear my inner voice in a noiseless world, and
The darting thoughts and humming dreams continue

Seventy post weary miles away you are also writing,
A reply in kind, choosing your words with care for me,
Waiting for type written inspiration,
In anticipation we are expectant of what we shall find.

In time we shall be rich indeed with writing,
In time we shall have our success.
In my minds eye we are both watching,
Two spirits waiting for the sun to shine.

V.H. Colveston Crescent London, March 1986