With Our Great Pleasure

If the chanting of  'Cargoes'  was the opening of a door at primary school, then hearing the voice of Dylan Thomas at grammar school was another epiphany.  We enjoyed the privilege of having Mr Leadbetter as our English Lit and Language teacher at St Bede's all the way through to GCEs: a happy, self assured chap with a determination and need to show us what English was capable of. He was one of those teachers who had a natural authority because of his intelligence and manifest good nature: he knew his worth to us and we recognised it in return. Early on, with the help of the latest technology of the time (a gramophone) he played a recording of 'Fern Hill' and the world has never been the same since.  It comes to mind as I was sorting out the last of my vinyl records today - on their way to the Oxfam shop in Ulverston if you are interested. 'Fern Hill' is on the 'A Child's Christmas in Wales' album.  FERN HILL Now as I was young and e...

I am going to duck out on an introduction for these most famous words and leave it to Aubrey Lewis via Anthony Clare. I will put my own sixpennorth in at the end though for what it is worth. Professor Clare appeared on Radio Four's 'With Great Pleasure' in 1985. Some of you will remember his long running series 'In The Psychiatrist's Chair'? Here are his concluding remarks to his own collection that also included Eliot's 'Journey of the Magi', 'The Second Coming' by Yeats, John Clare's 'Written in Northampton County Asylum'. "I intended to end my selection with Emily Dickinson, a poet who more than once concerned herself with medicine and madness. It was she who wrote: Faith is a fine convention For gentlemen who see; But microscopes are prudent In an emergency. As fine a comment on the limits of belief and usefulness of science as I know. But my last choice is Shakespeare. Having once seen Gielgud as Prospero, ...

Tomorrow night (12th August) weather permitting, we will sit out in the garden on our loungers to watch the big night of return of the Perseid shower - an annual ritual of ours.  This is the sort of thing that can happen. Stargazing The night is fine and dry. It falls and spreads the cold sky with a million opposites that, for a spell, seem like a million souls and soon, more, and then, for what seems a long time, one. Then of course it spins. What is better to do than string out over the infinite dead spaces the ancient beasts and spearmen of the human mind, and if not the real ones, new ones? But try making them clear to one you love, (whoever is standing by you is one you love  when pinioned by the stars): you will find it quite impossible, but like her more for thinking she sees that constellation. After the wave of pain, you will turn to her and, in an instant, change the universe to a sky you were glad you came out to see. This is the act of the ...

These lines are Ms Le Guin's version of those  I posted here  not long ago. It is from her translation of the  Tao Te Ching : I downloaded the Kindle edition the other day. If you compare the two, I have to confess that I prefer the original if only for its idea of 'things that happen naturally' than the simple 'we did it?  What do you think? Eleanor introduced me to Le Guin's marvellous 'Earthsea Quartet' - a sort of 'Lord of the Rings' you imagine at the start, that ends up being a compelling, dark, morally complex contemplation of universal challenges and rites of passage - and I have been a fan of hers ever since. I was almost put off because Ms Le Guin is described as a 'science fiction writer', the section in a bookshop I usually walk straight past, but make no mistake she is simply just a great writer full stop. Try a collection of her short stories to kick off with. I am also reading a collection of her essays, talks, revie...

Remember that you first heard of Chloe on my Blog. I am sure that she is going to write a lot more excellent poems like this one dedicated to her new cousin, Connie.  A Poem for Connie There is a land of remembered toys Which is full of laughter and full of joys And there stands a willow tree  Full of happiness and full of glee And down come rainbows of beautiful shapes And there sits a sea of gentle waves So remember - there are always happy days! Chloe Evans, age 7 Thank you for the Potter and Evans family for allowing me to publish it.  Inevitably I recall her Grandad's famous poem with its pathos and elegiac quality... An accident happened to my Uncle Jim, Someone threw a tomato at him; Tomatoes are soft and they don't hurt the skin, This one was different - it was wrapped in a tin. by Allan Potter, age 94

I typed out a copy of this poem on 23rd March 1993. Two years after visiting Berlin as a guest of an old Army friend, Bob Lloyd, who was commander of the British garrison after the Wall came down, as I typed I would have been thinking of particular angels and my pilgrimage to visit as many scenes as possible from Wim Wender's wonderful film 'Wings of Desire' released thirty years ago last May. A lot of the places in the film I visited have long been built over, including of course, the site of Hitler's bunker that was in no man's land between the two walls. It was quite something to follow in the footsteps of Bruno Ganz and Otto Sander across the Potsdamer Platz, around the National Library and other locations. I wonder if this Michael Roberts is related to Michael Symmons Roberts featured  here?  There is a similar style and an affinity for the unseen, implacable and remorseless. Just checked the younger Roberts entry on  'Wikipedia'  but it doesn...

Thank you Martin, for reminding me of another old favourite: TO MY FRIENDS Dear friends, and here I say friends the broad sense of the word: Wife, sister, associates, relatives, Schoolmates of both sexes, People seen only once Or frequented all my life; Provided that between us, for at least a moment, A line has been stretched, A well-defined bond. I speak for you, companions of a crowded Road, not without its difficulties, And for you too, who have lost Soul, courage, the desire to live; Or no one, or someone, or perhaps only one person, or you Who are reading me: remember the time Before the wax hardened, When everyone was like a seal. Each of us bears the imprint Of a friend met along the way; In each the trace of each. For good or evil In wisdom or in folly Everyone stamped by everyone. Now that the time crowds in And the undertakings are finished, To all of you the humble wish That autumn will be long and mild. 

There was a general murmur of appreciation and anticipation when the leader of the Spooky Men's Chorale announced their penultimate song based on Tennyson's famous poem at their performance in Kendal last night (21st July) In contrast to most of the rest of the their show which is fabulously clever, brilliantly arranged and sung and very, very funny indeed, this one held the throat until long after the performance ended. If you get chance to see them, sell everything to get a ticket: they were sold out last night and every seat was occupied an hour before they kicked off. Plug in the earphones to catch the chaps singing the song  here. The Aussie maestros are at Womad this weekend. Crossing the Bar Sunset and evening star,   And one clear call for me! And may there be no moaning of the bar,   When I put out to sea. But such a tide as moving seems asleep,   Too full for sound and foam, When that which drew from out the boundless deep, ...

From my commonplace book again, copied out from a newspaper about fifteen years ago. What I Say's Just a Rough Draft What I say's just a rough draft - whispered since it isn't time yet. Only heaven lifts the trophy, whose heft of victory is all our blood and sweat. And under purgatory's provisional sky to have grown forgetful's not so rare- not seeing that heaven's in our custody already - the lifelong home we have carried with us everywhere.

I stumbled across 'The Book of the It' in the medical library at Furness General Hospital a long time ago. One of those volumes that creeps onto the shelves, the purchase requested by an enthusiast and read by hardly anyone else - 'Psychosynthesis' by Assagioli was one I recommended and when no one else had taken it out after fifteen years or so, I brought it home as a remainder.  Groddeck's thinking would fit well with the analytical psychology model structured into a distinct discipline by Assagioli. For the 'It' read the 'Self' archetype - the central organising psychic principal. A ghost in the machine if you like. Groddeck is considered to be a pioneer of psychosomatic medicine.  I was amused to find that his  Wiki article  says that this book is 'an unusual work in which each chapter is form of a letter to a girlfriend, addressed as 'my dear'. Health, disease, talent, action and thought, but above all, perception and will and...

Knowing the character I am talking about will give you an added appreciation of this introductory anecdote, Potter and Narey, but I hope the sheer imagination and wisdom of 'Sambo' Duckworth will also shine like the brightest of night skies to the rest of my audience. Anyway, one night me and Sambo were walking back from the pub on a massive clear winter night, putting the world to rights, when he paused, looked up at the cosmic display, utterly transfixed: 'You know Des..... it is times like this.... when I look up and contemplate all that universe, all that space.... the enormity of it all... it just makes me realise..... just how tiny.... how minute.... trivial .... how meaningless..... how insignificant it all is compared to me...' Maybe this is what Auden is getting at? Or maybe something else. The More Loving One Looking up at the stars, I know quite well That, for all they care, I can go to hell, But on earth indifference is the least We have to d...

Oh Taste and See Because of a kiss on the forehead in the long Night's infirmary, through the red wine let light shine deep. Because of the thirtysix just men that so stealthily roam this earth raise high the glass and do not weep. Who says the world is not a wedding? Couples, in their oases, lullabye. Let glass be full before they sleep. Toast all that seems to vanish like a rainbow stared at, those bright  truant things that will not keep; and ignorance of the last night of our lives, its famished breathing. Then, in the red wine, taste the light.

Thank you Martin for  'Clearances' by Seamus Heaney.   Completely unknown to me until now.

"If you do not bring forth what is within you, what you do not bring forth will destroy you"- Gospel according to Thomas. Below is a short quotation from an excellent article  in today's 'Observer' by Nicci Gerrard which anticipates the report of an all party parliamentary group into 'arts, health and wellbeing' to be launched next Wednesday 19th July. OK it's not a poem, but it is my blog, my rules. In health, we live in a world rich with meanings that we can call upon as a conductor calls upon the orchestra, and are linked to each other by a delicate web of communications. To be human is to have a voice that is heard (by voice I mean that which connects the inner self with the outer world).....To be trapped inside a brain that is failing, inside a body that is disintegrating, and to have no way of escaping (is a form of torture). If evidence is needed, this report robustly demonstrates that the arts can come to our rescue when traditional lang...

An early Xmas present suggestion? I can't remember the last time I found such an exciting, sustained and even collection as 'Drysalter', winner of the 2014 Forward Prize. I found it in Ulverston Library after discovering Roberts in a recent number of the 'London Review of Books'.  Going through a volume I always make a note of the poems I particularly like but I have clocked fifteen already and I am only half way through the book. There is something plain wilful about public libraries: it just doesn't make any economic sense in today's global system that an old geezer on his way to the bus stop in the rain with a bagful of shopping can simply walk into a building and walk off it with a treasure like this - scot free!  There's a loophole somewhere. You can't have austerity and free poetry. It is heartening that there is still evidence of an public spirit - a commitment to the common good: I must take it back after I have filleted it with a ...

Another poem from my commonplace book, dated 4th April 2004.  I suppose the central theme that appeals to me is how, in the final section, the poet compares such a simple and straightforward and easily understood set of ideas - quantum physics - with the infinitely more complicated facts of awareness, recognition and reflection: consciousness.  In these curious times where contemporary science posits the bizarre and risible idea that 'consciousness' is a by-product (epiphenomenon) of the most advanced bit of kit in the universe: the human brain.  The poet leads us gently away from the madness of an anthropomorphised cosmos? Or have I got it wrong? Here is Pat's  website. Waving As a child I waved to people I didn't know. I waved from passing cars, school buses, second floor windows, or from the street to secretaries trapped in offices above. When policemen motioned my father on past the scene of a crime or an army checkpoint, I waved from the ba...

Yesterday I went to the final day of the 'Britain in Focus' exhibition at the Science and Media Museum (formerly the National Photographic Museum) in Bradford. The items were curated and presented by Eamon McCabe, a reflection of his own favourites and influences: a spin off from the BBC Four series.   Fay Godwin's work with the camera and as an environmental campaigner was highlighted. From Godwin's beautiful collaboration with Ted Hughes, 'Elmet', I have had difficulty selecting just this one poem and its corresponding photo. Incidentally, in Mytholmroyd, where Hughes came from, the only public memorial I have come across (apart from the 'blue plaque' in Aspinall Street) are the title and first two lines of this poem inscribed around the sculpture in the small car park near the church. Moors Are a stage For the performance of heaven. Any audience is incidental. A chess-world of topheavy Kings and Queens Circling in stilted majesty Tremble...

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...

I am surprised that Professor Sir John Tooke, former President of the Academy of Medical Science ( on this morning's edition  of  Radio 4 'Today' programme) was himself surprised how the majority of patients trusted the opinion of relatives or friends more than their doctors. Don't get me wrong: tablets are keeping me alive (and very grateful I am to you all for paying for them) but the public is very wise to have in mind the various relations and frank conflicts of interest between doctors, big pharma and the man (or woman) in the waiting room. The act of giving a medicine was, until recently, most powerful in its symbolic function than any inherent active ingredients.  I was given a very important lesson in this fact in my first house physician appointment.  My boss, Dr Davidson, was the archetypal, elegant, grey haired and white coated 'Doctor in the House' physician coming to the end of his career - an extremely astute and kindly man, adored by staff a...

I've started to wear some posh Italian sandals recently. Very comfortable and they have helped to sort out my Athlete's Foot a treat. Athlete's Foot as well as advanced cancer - well you can't say that God doesn't have a sense of humour? Actually another reason was a trip to Hadrian's Wall with Sam and Elias at Easter. In the Roman Army Museum there were some lovely well preserved sandals including the most delightful and delicate pair that would fit a two year old. The ones for adults made me realize that this perhaps above any other technology of the day allowed the Roman Army extend their empire from Rome to Asia Minor and to Carlisle via North Africa. I imagine the soldier in this poem contemplating the vagaries of fortune: his pleasure in new durable and fashionable footwear while at the same time reading his posting order: 'Oh fucking hell...... Wallsend on Tyne, for fuck's sake...  Again...' I've told Teresa I will be wearing sandals...