Back in 2007

As I get older, I always become sad as the year draws towards its end.

GRACKLES, GOODBYE

Black of grackles glints purple as, wheeling in sun-glare,
The flock splays away to pepper the blueness of distance.
Soon they are lost in the tracklessness of air.
I watch them go. I stand in my trance.

Another year gone. In trance of realization,
I remember once seeing a first fall leaf, flame-red, release
Bough-grip, and seek, through gold light of the season's sun,
Black gloss of a mountain pool, and there drift in peace.

Another year gone. And once my mother's hand
Held mine while I kicked the piled yellow leaves on the lawn
And laughed, not knowing some yellow-leaf season I'd stand
And see the hole filled. How they spread their obscene fake lawn.

Who needs the undertaker's sick lie
Flung thus in the teeth of Time, and the earth's spin and tilt?
What kind of fool would promote that kind of lie?
Even sunrise and sunset convict the half-wit of guilt.

Grackles, goodbye! The sky will be vacant and lonely
Till again I hear your horde's rusty creak high above,
Confirming the year's turn and the fact that only, only,
In the name of Death do we learn the true name of Love.

Robert Penn Warren (1905 - 1989)

N.B. A 'Grackle" is a species of American blackbird

Today is "Boxing Day" and it is traditionally celebrated in the United Kingdom and the Commonwealth as the day when gifts, often money, are given to tradesmen, employees and the poor and needy.

Give generously to all those charity appeals?

Good King Wenceslas looked out on the Feast of Stephen,
When the snow lay round about, deep and crisp and even.
Brightly shone the moon that night, though the frost was cruel,
When a poor man came in sight, gathering winter fuel.

“Hither, page, and stand by me, if you know it, telling,
Yonder peasant, who is he? Where and what his dwelling?”
“Sire, he lives a good league hence, underneath the mountain,
Right against the forest fence, by Saint Agnes’ fountain.”

“Bring me food and bring me wine, bring me pine logs hither,
You and I will see him dine, when we bear them thither.”
Page and monarch, forth they went, forth they went together,
Through the cold wind’s wild lament and the bitter weather.

“Sire, the night is darker now, and the wind blows stronger,
Fails my heart, I know not how; I can go no longer.”
“Mark my footsteps, my good page, tread now in them boldly,
You shall find the winter’s rage freeze your blood less coldly.”

In his master’s steps he trod, where the snow lay dinted;
Heat was in the very sod which the saint had printed.
Therefore, Christian men, be sure, wealth or rank possessing,
You who now will bless the poor shall yourselves find blessing.

John Mason Neale (1853)

I heard the bells on Christmas day
Their old familiar carols play,
And wild and sweet the words repeat
Of peace on earth, good will to men.

And thought how, as the day had come,
The belfries of all Christendom
Had rolled along the unbroken song
Of peace on earth, good will to men.

Till ringing, singing on its way
The world revolved from night to day,
A voice, a chime, a chant sublime
Of peace on earth, good will to men.

And in despair I bowed my head
“There is no peace on earth,” I said,
“For hate is strong and mocks the song
Of peace on earth, good will to men.”

Then pealed the bells more loud and deep:
“God is not dead, nor doth He sleep;
The wrong shall fail, the right prevail
With peace on earth, good will to men.”

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Although I may be dreaming of a White Christmas, we won't have one this year - at least not where I live.

When men were all asleep the snow came flying,
In large white flakes falling on the city brown,
Stealthily and perpetually settling and loosely lying,
Hushing the latest traffic of the drowsy town;
Deadening, muffling, stifling its murmurs failing;
Lazily and incessantly floating down and down:
Silently sifting and veiling road, roof and railing;
Hiding difference, making unevenness even,
Into angles and crevices softly drifting and sailing.
All night it fell, and when full inches seven
It lay in the depth of its uncompacted lightness,
The clouds blew off from a high and frosty heaven;
And all woke earlier for the unaccustomed brightness
Of the winter dawning, the strange unheavenly glare:
The eye marvelled - marvelled at the dazzling whiteness;
The ear hearkened to the stillness of the solemn air;
No sound of wheel rumbling nor of foot falling,
And the busy morning cries came thin and spare.
Then boys I heard, as they went to school, calling,
They gathered up the crystal manna to freeze
Their tongues with tasting, their hands with snowballing;
Or rioted in a drift, plunging up to the knees;
Or peering up from under the white-mossed wonder!'
'O look at the trees!' they cried, 'O look at the trees!'
With lessened load a few carts creak and blunder,
Following along the white deserted way,
A country company long dispersed asunder:
When now already the sun, in pale display
Standing by Paul's high dome, spread forth below
His sparkling beams, and awoke the stir of the day.
For now doors open, and war is waged with the snow;
And trains of sombre men, past tale of number,
Tread long brown paths, as toward their toil they go:
But even for them awhile no cares encumber
Their minds diverted; the daily word is unspoken,
The daily thoughts of labour and sorrow slumber
At the sight of the beauty that greets them, for the charm they have broken.

Robert Bridges

Joni Mitchell is a noted Canadian musician, folk singer, writer, and painter.

She has been described as "the "female Bob Dylan"

At the age of nine she contracted polio and her first performances were to her fellow hospital patients.

She also took up smoking at the same age - which probably explains the unique texture of her voice.

Here are the lyrics from one of her songs.

Self-portrait

RIVER

It's coming on Christmas
They're cutting down trees
They're putting up reindeer
And singing songs of joy and peace
Oh I wish I had a river
I could skate away on
But it don't snow here
It stays pretty green
I'm going to make a lot of money
Then I'm going to quit this crazy scene
I wish I had a river
I could skate away on
I wish I had a river so long
I would teach my feet to fly
Oh I wish I had a river
I could skate away on
I made my baby cry

He tried hard to help me
You know, he put me at ease
And he loved me so naughty
Made me weak in the knees
Oh I wish I had a river
I could skate away on
I'm so hard to handle
I'm selfish and I'm sad
Now I've gone and lost the best baby
That I ever had
Oh I wish I had a river
I could skate away on
I wish I had a river so long
I would teach my feet to fly
Oh I wish I had a river
I made my baby say goodbye

It's coming on Christmas
They're cutting down trees
They're putting up reindeer
And singing songs of joy and peace
I wish I had a river
I could skate away on

Joni Mitchell

Here is perhaps one of the longest poem I have ever posted here.

This original version is quite innocuous.

IN THE WORKHOUSE - CHRISTMAS DAY
by
George R. Sims ( 1847 - 1922 )

It is Christmas Day in the workhouse, and the cold, bare walls are bright
With garlands of green and holly, and the place is a pleasant sight;
For with clean-washed hands and faces in a long and hungry line
The paupers sit at the table, for this is the hour they dine.
And the guardians and their ladies, although the wind is east,
Have come in their furs and wrappers to watch their charges feast;
To smile and be condescending, putting on pauper plates.
To be hosts at the workhouse banquet, they've paid for with the rates.

0h, the paupers are meek and lowly with their 'Thank'ee kindly, mums'
So long as they fill their stomachs what matter it whence it comes?
But one of the old men mutters and pushes his plate aside,
"Great God!" he cries, "but it chokes me; for this is the day she died!"
The guardians gazed in horror, the master's face went white;
Did a pauper refuse their pudding? Could that their ears believe right?

Then the ladies clutched their husbands, thinking the man would die,
Struck by a bolt, or something, by the outraged One on high.
But the pauper sat for a moment, then rose 'mid silence grim,
For the others had ceased to chatter and trembled in every limb:

He looked at the guardians' ladies, then, eyeing their lords, he said;
"I eat not the food of villains, whose hands are foul and red;"
"Whose victims cry for vengeance from their dark, unhallowed graves."
"He's drunk," said the workhouse master, "or else he's mad and raves."
"Not drunk or mad," cried the pauper, "but only a haunted beast,
Who, torn by the hounds and mangled, declines the vulture's feast."

"I care not a curse for the guardians, and I won't be dragged away;
Just let me have the fit out, it's only on Christmas Day...
That the black past comes to goad me and prey on my burning brain;
I'll tell you the rest in a whisper, I swear I won't shout again.
"Keep your hands off me, curse you! Hear me right out to the end.

You come here to see how paupers, the season of Christmas spend;
You come here to watch us feeding, as they watched the captured beast;
Here's why a penniless pauper, spits on your paltry feast."
"Do you think I will take your bounty and let you smile and think
You're doing a noble action with the parish's meat and drink?

Where is my wife, you traitors, the poor old wife you slew?
Yes, by the God above me, my Nance was killed by you."
"Last Winter my wife lay dying, starved in a filthy den.
I had never been to the parish, I came to the parish then;
I swallowed my pride in coming! for ere the ruin came
I held up my head as a trader, and I bore a spotless name.

"I came to the parish craving, bread for a starving wife
Bread for the woman who'd loved me thro' fifty years of life;
And what do you think they told me, mocking my awful grief,
That the house was open to us, but they wouldn't give out relief."
"I slunk to the filthy alley, 'twas a cold, raw Christmas Eve
And the bakers' shops were open, tempting a man to thieve;
But I clenched my fists together, holding my head awry,
So I came to her empty-handed and mournfully told her why."

"Then I told her the house was open; she had heard of the ways of that
For her bloodless cheeks went crimson, and up in her rags she sat,
Crying, 'Bide the Christmas here, John, we've never had one apart;
I think I can bear the hunger, the other would break my heart."

"All through that eve I watched her, holding her hand in mine,
Praying the Lord and weeping till my lips were salt as brine;
I asked her once if she hungered, and she answered 'No.'
The moon shone in at the window, set in a wreath of snow."

"Then the room was bathed in glory, and I saw in my darling's eyes
The faraway look of wonder, that comes when the spirit flies;
And her lips were parched and parted, and her reason came and went.
For she raved of our home in Devon, where our happiest years were spent."
"And the accents, long forgotten, came back to the tongue once more.
For she talked like the country lassie I wooed by the Devon shore;

Then she rose to her feet and trembled, and fell on the rags and moaned,
And, 'Give me a crust, I'm famished... for the love of God,' she groaned.
"I rushed from the room like a madman and flew to the workhouse gate,
Crying, 'Food for a dying woman!' and the answer came, 'Too late!'
They drove me away with curses; then I fought with a dog in the street
And tore from the mongrel's clutches a crust he was trying to eat."
"Back through the filthy by-ways... back through the trampled slush!
Up to the crazy garret, wrapped in an awful hush;

My heart sank down at the threshold, and I paused with a sudden thrill.
For there, in the silv'ry moonlight, my Nance lay cold and still."
"Up to the blackened ceiling, the sunken eyes were cast
I knew on those lips, all bloodless, my name had been the last;
She called for her absent husband... Oh God! Had I known--
Had called in vain, and, in anguish, had died in that den alone."

"Yes, there in a land of plenty, lay a loving woman dead.
Cruelly starved and murdered for a loaf of the parish bread;

At yonder gate, last Christmas, I craved for a human life,
You, who would feed us paupers, what of my murdered wife?"

"There, get ye gone to your dinners, don't mind me in the least,
Think of the happy paupers eating your Christmas feast
And when you recount their blessings in your parochial way,
Say what you did for me too... only last Christmas Day."

There is an alternative version at:

But do not go there if you are easily offended!

I have discovered Australia!

Anyway, here is the poem.

The bishop sat in lordly state and purple cap sublime,
And galvanized the old bush church at Confirmation time.
And all the kids were mustered up from fifty miles around,
With Sunday clothes, and staring eyes, and ignorance profound.
Now was it fate, or was it grace, whereby they yarded too
An overgrown two-storey lad from Tangmalangaloo?

A hefty son of virgin soil, where nature has her fling,
And grows the trefoil three feet high and mats it in the spring;
Where mighty hills uplift their heads to pierce the welkin's rim,
And trees sprout up a hundred feet before they shoot a limb;
There everything is big and grand, and men are giants too --
But Christian Knowledge wilts, alas, at Tangmalangaloo.

The bishop summed the youngsters up, as bishops only can;
He cast a searching glance around, then fixed upon his man.
But glum and dumb and undismayed through every bout he sat;
He seemed to think that he was there, but wasn't sure of that.
The bishop gave a scornful look, as bishops sometimes do,
And glared right through the pagan in from Tangmalangaloo.

"Come, tell me, boy," his lordship said in crushing tones severe,
"Come, tell me why is Christmas Day the greatest of the year?
"How is it that around the world we celebrate that day
"And send a name upon a card to those who're far away?
"Why is it wandering ones return with smiles and greetings, too?"
A squall of knowledge hit the lad from Tangmalangaloo.

He gave a lurch which set a-shake the vases on the shelf,
He knocked the benches all askew, up-ending of himself.
And so, how pleased his lordship was, and how he smiled to say,
"That's good, my boy. Come, tell me now; and what is Christmas Day?"
The ready answer bared a fact no bishop ever knew --
"It's the day before the races out at Tangmalangaloo."

You won't tell it, will you?

little tree
little silent Christmas tree
you are so little
you are more like a flower

who found you in the green forest
and were you very sorry to come away?
see i will comfort you
because you smell so sweetly

i will kiss your cool bark
and hug you safe and tight
just as your mother would,
only don't be afraid

look the spangles
that sleep all the year in a dark box
dreaming of being taken out and allowed to shine,
the balls the chains red and gold the fluffy threads,

put up your little arms
and i'll give them all to you to hold
every finger shall have its ring
and there won't a single place dark or unhappy

then when you're quite dressed
you'll stand in the window for everyone to see
and how they'll stare!
oh but you'll be very proud

and my little sister and i will take hands
and looking up at our beautiful tree
we'll dance and sing
"Noel Noel"

E.E. Cummings

I don't think any of you will need any introduction to the English writer and poet John Betjeman, who was Poet Laureate from 1972 until his death in 1984.

This one is typical of his style - and the middle-class culture that it portrays, with talk of the "Lagonda', and the "Hupmobile Delage", "crunching over private gravel"

"O that dark and furry cupboard"

INDOOR GAMES NEAR NEWBURY

In among the silver birches,
Winding ways of tarmac wander
And the signs to Bussock Bottom,
Tussock Wood and Windy Break.
Gabled lodges, tile-hung churches
Catch the lights of our Lagonda
As we drive to Wendy’s party,
Lemon curd and Christmas cake

Rich the makes of motor whirring
Past the pine plantation purring
Come up Hupmobile Delage.
Short the way our chauffeurs travel
Crunching over private gravel,
Each from out his warm garage.

O but Wendy, when the carpet
Yielded to my indoor pumps.
There you stood, your gold hair streaming,
Handsome in the hall light gleaming
There you looked and there you led me
Off into the game of Clumps.

Then the new Victrola playing;
And your funny uncle saying
"Choose your partners for a foxtrot.
Dance until it's tea o'clock
Come on young 'uns, foot it feetly."
Was it chance that paired us neatly?
I who loved you so completely.
You who pressed me closely to you,
Hard against your party frock.

"Meet me when you've finished eating."
So we met and no one found us.
O that dark and furry cupboard,
While the rest played hide-and-seek.
Holding hands our two hearts beating.
In the bedroom silence round us
Holding hands and hardly hearing
Sudden footstep, thud and shriek

Love that lay too deep for kissing.
"Where is Wendy? Wendy's missing."
Love so pure it had to end.
Love so strong that I was frightened
When you gripped my fingers tight.
And hugging, whispered "I'm your friend."

Goodbye Wendy. Send the fairies,
Pinewood elf and larch tree gnome.
Spingle-spangled stars are peeping
At the lush Lagonda creeping
Down the winding ways of tarmac
To the leaded lights of home.

There among the silver birches,
All the bells of all the churches
Sounded in the bath-waste running
Out into the frosty air.
Wendy speeded my undressing.
Wendy is the sheet's caressing
Wendy bending gives a blessing.
Holds me as I drift to dreamland
Safe inside my slumber wear.

John Betjeman

The Irish writer Sigerson Clifford (1913-1984) grew up in Cahirciveen on the Ring of Kerry and attended the Christian
Brothers school in that town.

That they should show a preference for the roads of rural Ireland was accepted as a given!

THE KERRY CHRISTMAS CAROL

Brush the floor and clean the hearth,
And set the fire to keep,
For they might visit us tonight
When all the world's asleep.

Don't blow the tall white candle out
But leave it burning bright,
So that they'll know they're welcome here
This holy Christmas night.

Leave out the bread and meat for them,
And sweet milk for the Child,
And they will bless the fire, that baked
And, too, the hands that toiled.

For Joseph will be travel-tired,
And Mary pale and wan,
And they can sleep a little while
Before they journey on.

They will be weary of the roads,
And rest will comfort them,
For it must be many a lonely mile
From here to Bethlehem.

O long the road they have to go,
The bad mile with the good,
Till the journey ends on Calvary
Beneath a cross of wood.

Leave the door upon the latch,
And set the fire to keep,
And pray they'll rest with us tonight
When all the world's asleep.

Sigerson Clifford

Edgar Albert Guest (1881 - 1959) was a prolific American poet popular in the first half of the 20th century.

This simple charming poem describes something that I am sure most of us have done in the days leading up to Christmas.

It’s guessing time at our house; every evening after tea
We start guessing what old Santa’s going to leave us on our tree.
Everyone of us holds secrets that the others try to steal,
And that eyes and lips are plainly having trouble to conceal.
And a little lip that quivered just a bit the other night
Was a sad and startling warning that I mustn’t guess it right.

“Guess what you will get for Christmas!” is the cry that starts the fun.
And I answer: “Give the letter with which the name’s begun.”
Oh, the eyes that dance around me and the joyous faces there
Keep me nightly guessing wildly: “Is it something I can wear?”
I implore them all to tell me in a frantic sort of way
And pretend that I am puzzled, just to keep them feeling gay.

Oh, the wise and knowing glances that across the table fly
And the winks exchanged with mother, that they think I never spy;
Oh, the whispered confidences that are poured into her ear,
And the laughter gay that follows when I try my best to hear!
Oh, the shouts of glad derision when I bet that it’s a cane,
And the merry answering chorus: “No, it’s not. Just guess again!”

It’s guessing time at our house, and the fun is running fast,
And I wish somehow this contest of delight could always last,
For the love that’s in their faces and their laughter ringing clear
Is their dad’s most precious present when the Christmas time is near.
And soon as it is over, when the tree is bare and plain,
I shall start in looking forward to the time to guess again.

Edgar Albert Guest

Over the next week I shall be posting poems with a seasonal theme.

The title "White Christmas" has a dual meaning!

WHITE CHRISTMAS

My folks think I’m a serving maid
Each time I visit home;
They do not dream I ply a trade
As old as Greece or Rome;
For if they found I’d fouled their name
And was not white as snow,
I’m sure that they would die of shame . . .
Please, God, they’ll never know.

I clean the paint from off my face,
In sober black I dress;
Of coquetry I leave no trace
To give them vague distress;
And though it causes me a pang
To play such sorry tricks,
About my neck I meekly hang
A silver crufix.

And so with humble step I go
Just like a child again,
To greet their Christmas candle-glow,
A soul without a stain;
So well I play my contrite part
I make myself believe
There’s not a stain within my heart
On Holy Christmas Eve.

With double natures we are vext,
And what we feel, we are;
A saint one day, a sinner next,
A red light or a star;
A prostitute or proselyte,
And in each part sincere:
So I become a vestal white
One week in every year.

For this I say without demur
From out life’s lurid lore,
Each righteous woman has in her
A tincture of the whore;
While every harpy of the night,
As I have learned too well;
Holds in her heart a heaven-light
To ransom her from hell.

So I’ll go home and sweep and dust;
I’ll make the kitchen fire,
And be a model of daughters just
The best they could desire;
I’ll fondle them and cook their food,
And Mother dear will say:
“Thank God! my darling is as good
As when she went away.”

But after New Year’s Day I’ll fill
My bag and though they grieve,
I’ll bid them both good-bye until
Another Christmas Eve;
And then . . . a knock upon the door:
I’ll find them waiting there,
And angel-like I’ll come once more
In answer to their prayer.

Then Lo! one night when candle-light
Gleams mystic on the snow,
And music swells of Christmas bells,
I’ll come, no more to go:
The old folks need my love and care,
Their gold shall gild my dross,
And evermore my breast shall bear
My little silver cross.

Robert Service

"Very free flowering with some repeats later. Deservedly well loved. Vigorous."

GLOIRE DE DIJON

When she rises in the morning
I linger to watch her;
She spreads the bath-cloth underneath the window
And the sunbeams catch her
Glistening white on the shoulders,
While down her sides the mellow
Golden shadow glows as
She stoops to the sponge, and her swung breasts
Sway like full-blown yellow
Gloire de Dijon roses.

She drips herself with water, and her shoulders
Glisten as silver, they crumble up
Like wet and falling roses, and I listen
For the sluicing of their rain-dishevelled petals.
In the window full of sunlight
Concentrates her golden shadow
Fold on fold, until it glows as
Mellow as the glory roses.

"Gloire de Dijon" is an old variety of climbing tea rose, which is said to have a scent of myrrh.

In the lead-up to Christmas, I shall have less time to devote to my blogs - so I am looking for shorter poems.

Here is her poem - short and sweet.

LOVE POEM

Sharing one umbrella
We have to hold each other
Round the waist to keep together.
You ask me why I'm smiling -
It's because I'm thinking
I want it to rain for ever.

Vicki Feaver

The singer and songwriter Alvaro Peña-Rojas was born in 1943 in Chile.

Here is a charming little example of his lyric writing.

GREEN VELVET SUIT

She was on the tube
I got on at Charing Cross
And like everyday
She didn't look at me
I even had a Green Velvet Suit
And a yellow bow tie
To make myself even more noticed
I dyed my hair really red

And I hope tomorrow
She will give me a glance
It's my very last chance
For the long week-end

Alvaro

I'm really very fond of you,
he said.

I don't like fond.
It sounds like something
you would tell a dog.

Give me love,
or nothing.

Throw your fond in a pond,
I said.

But what I felt for him
was also warm, frisky,
moist-mouthed,
eager,
and could swim away.

if forced to do so.

Alice Walker

First, an apology.

When I realised my mistake, I deleted it - and here, in substitution, is a poem by Elizabeth Jennings.



ONE FLESH

Lying apart now, each in a separate bed,
He with a book, keeping the light on late,
She like a girl dreaming of childhood,
All men elsewhere - it is as if they wait
Some new event: the book he holds unread,
Her eyes fixed on the shadows overhead.

Tossed up like flotsam from a former passion,
How cool they lie. They hardly ever touch,
Or if they do it is like a confession
Of having little feeling - or too much.
Chastity faces them, a destination
For which their whole lives were a preparation.

Strangely apart, yet strangely close together,
Silence between them like a thread to hold
And not wind in. And time itself's a feather
Touching them gently. Do they know they're old,
These two who are my father and my mother
Whose fire from which I came, has now grown cold?

Elizabeth Jennings

What is the difference between poetry and prose?

It addresses a situation we all have been in - Do we tell the truth, or continue living the lie?

MY HAIR SHIRT

On the fringe of Nothingness lies a choice: tell the truth or live the lie. The lie is inviting but empty – a ballet of fear and curiosity. The truth is inviting and full as an autumn barrel. Just as river currents speed up here and there, so memories part and stream around us. My eyes pullulate with big gummy tears. We hang suspended in the heart, skulking in the jumble of each other's foibles.

'Tell the truth or live the lie.'

With a big clumsy boot heel, the life we dreamed of often is scraped in the dust. The familiar turns a stranger. Night falls and buries us alive.

'Tell the truth or live the lie.'

I stumble on, a wind from nowhere pushing me. Turning back into the corridor of our lives – a station on the underground of intimacy – I cling to your face like a fly. Your eyes are little crucibles.

"Perhaps we could adapt to a new life," you reflect, "free from all this language."

Across the blush of obscure dawn, we stare at each other like decorative bookends.

Andy Brown

I have been asked to give some more information about the writer of yesterday's poem - so here are a few notes and comments culled from the internet:

I hope you will like today's poem.

A FLYING SONG

Last night I saw the sword Excalibur
It flew above the cloudy palaces
And as it passed I clearly read the words
Which were engraven on its blade
And one side of the sword said Take Me
The other side said Cast Me Away

I met my lover in a field of thorns
We walked together in the April air
And when we lay down by the waterside
My lover whispered in my ear
The first thing that she said was Take Me
The last thing that she said was Cast Me Away

I saw a vision of my mother and father
They were sitting smiling under summer trees
They offered me the gift of life
I took this present very carefully
And one side of my life said Take Me
The other said Cast Me Away.

Adrian Mitchell

This is a performance poem - in more than one sense of the word.

Well, here is a poem that most men can identify with - from their teenage days.

A PUPPY CALLED PUBERTY

It was like keeping a puppy in your underpants
A secret puppy you weren't allowed to show to anyone
Not even your best friend or your worst enemy

You wanted to pat him, stroke him, cuddle him
All the time you weren't supposed to touch him.

He only slept for five minutes at a time
Then he'd suddenly perk up his head
In the middle of school medical inspection
And always on bus rides.

So you had to climb down from the upper deck
All bent double to smuggle the puppy off the bus
Without the buxom conductress spotting
Your wicked and ticketless stowaway.

Jumping up, wet-nosed, eagerly wagging-
He only stopped being a nuisance
When you were alone together
Pretending to be doing your homework
But really gazing at each other
Through hot and lazy daydreams.

Of those beautiful schoolgirls on the bus
With kittens bouncing in their sweaters.

Adrian Mitchell

Thom Gunn was born in Gravesend, Kent in 1929.

In 2004 he died in his sleep in San Francisco, where he had lived since 1960.

THE HUG

It was your birthday, we had drunk and dined
Half of the night with our old friend
Who'd showed us in the end
To a bed I reached in one drunk stride.
Already I lay snug,
And drowsy with the wine dozed on one side.

I dozed, I slept. My sleep broke on a hug,
Suddenly, from behind,
In which the full lengths of our bodies pressed:
Your instep to my heel,
My shoulder-blades against your chest.
It was not sex, but I could feel
The whole strength of your body set,
Or braced, to mine,
And locking me to you
As if we were still twenty-two
When our grand passion had not yet
Become familial.
My quick sleep had deleted all
Of intervening time and place.
I only knew
The stay of your secure firm dry embrace.

Thom Gunn