'Born Yesterday' by Philip Larkin

Two for the price of one this week for the excuse to promote this favourite Larkin poem - and end the week on another hopeful note for younger people!!

 Congratulations to Judith and John plus Berni and Neil on the advent of their new grand-daughters. May they both learn a lot about the  'catching of happiness'.

Born Yesterday

 Tightly folded bud,
I have wished you something
None of the others would:
Not the usual stuff
About being beautiful,
Or running off a spring
Of innocence and love -
They will all wish you that,
And should it prove possible, 
Well, you're a lucky girl.

 But if it shouldn't, then
May you be ordinary;
Have, like other women,
An average of talents:
Not ugly, not good looking,
Nothing uncustomary
To pull you off your balance,
That, unworkable itself,
Stops all the rest from working.
In fact, may you be dull -
If that is what a skilled,
Vigilant, flexible,
Unemphasized, enthralled 

Catching of of happiness is called




Not a family man himself of course, there is something a bit unfortunate about this photograph: you would only ask him to babysit if Himmler couldn't make it because of a quiz night down the pub.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

'Fanfare for the Makers' by Louis Macneice

Image
Another poem that has lasted the course: first read in my 1967 copy of the 'Oxford Book of English Verse', it never fails to create a sense of optimism and purpose. FANFARE FOR THE MAKERS A cloud of witnesses. To whom? To what? To the small fire that never leaves the sky. To the great fire that boils the daily pot. To all the things we are not remembered by, Which we remember and bless. To all the things That will not notice when we die, Yet lend the passing moment words and wings. So fanfare for the Makers: who compose A book of words or deeds who runs may write As many who do run, as a family grows At times like sunflowers turning towards the light. As sometimes in the blackout and the raids One joke composed an island in the night. As sometimes one man’s kindness pervades A room or house or village, as sometimes Merely to tighten screws or sharpen blades Can catch a meaning, as to hear the chimes At midnight means to share them, as one man In ol...
Read more

'The Truisms' by Louis MacNiece

Image
My Dad was a treasury of truisms (or maxims?) the majority of which he would be very proud  to acknowledge would be banned as being totally unsuitable material for the internet. Mephistopheles by choice but Faust by fate in Goethe's account of the reconciliation of man's divided nature. The one he lived by though was 'profess only evil, but do only good'.  Too easy to get that the wrong way round for me.  Lofty thoughts, noble purpose, universal benevolence, marvellous aspirations, pious hopes, the best of intentions and the grandest of plans are all to be applauded, but what counts, what makes the difference, what makes a man is what he actually does.  The rules are strict on this, there is no court of appeal. Sorry it took me so long to work that one out Dad, but thanks for the tip. Make a mental note of the last line because I have a poem to come shortly from Hermann Hesse that will have relevance. THE TRUISMS His father gave him a box...
Read more

'Walking Away' and 'On Not Saying Everything' by Cecil Day Lewis

Image
Some of you will be newcomers to the poem and for the rest I hope it is a happy/sad reminder of its eternal truths, re-enacted in every single separation where love and care taking have been involved- in uncountable instances at every moment. WALKING AWAY For Sean It is eighteen years ago, almost to the day – A sunny day with leaves just turning, The touch-lines new-ruled – since I watched you play Your first game of football, then, like a satellite Wrenched from its orbit, go drifting away Behind a scatter of boys. I can see You walking away from me towards the school With the pathos of a half-fledged thing set free Into a wilderness, the gait of one Who finds no path where the path should be. That hesitant figure, eddying away Like a winged seed loosened from its parent stem, Has something I never quite grasp to convey About nature’s give-and-take – the small, the scorching Ordeals which fire one’s irresolute clay. I have had worse partings, but none that so ...
Read more