Peaceful windings

Wereover many a stile neeth willows grey
The winding footpath leaves the public way
Free from the dusty din & ceasless chime
Of bustling waggons in the summer time
Crossing a brook—were braving storms in vain
Two willows fell & still for brigs remain
Corn field & clover closes leading down
In peacful windings to the neighbouring town

I will be speaking: 11am Saturday, 28th March 

At the John Clare Cottage in Helpston

to the title, “The Woke John Clare”

#poetry #environment 

#honesty

Comments welcome below

Patty

To mark Patty Clare’s 226th birthday today, some simple lines Clare wrote to Patty around 200 years ago: 

O once I had a true love
As blest as I could be
Patty was my turtle dove
& Patty she loved me
We walked the fields together
By roses & woodbine
In Summers sunshine weather
& Patty she was mine

We stopped to gather primroses
& violets white & blue
In pastures & green closes
All glistening with the dew
We sat upon green mole-hills
Among the daisy flowers
To hear the small birds merry trills
& share the sunny hours

I will be speaking: 11am Saturday, 28th March 

At the John Clare Cottage in Helpston

to the title, “The Woke John Clare”

#poetry #environment 

#honesty

Comments welcome below

The Gipsy

Sometimes I watch a film or read a book, come-to and tell myself, 'But I was there! I heard it, I saw it.' It is a not uncommon experience. It occurs when I read John Clare on the gypsies. He both hobnobbed with them and was fastidious where they were concerned, was prejudiced and unprejudiced at the same time. He wrote many poems about them which envied their lot, their freedom, their women, and one poem which envied them nothing.

The snow falls deep; the Forest lies alone:
The boy goes hasty for his load of brakes,
Then thinks upon the fire and hurries back;
The Gipsy knocks his hands and tucks them up,
And seeks his squalid camp, half hid in snow,
Beneath the oak, which breaks away the wind,
And bushes close, with snow like hovel warm:
There stinking mutton roasts upon the coals,
And the half-roasted dog squats close and ribs,
Then feels the heat too strong and goes aloof;
He watches well, but none a bit can spare.
And vainly waits the morsel thrown away:
'Tis thus they live- a picture to the place;
A quiet, pilfering, unprotected race.

It is masterly in its realism. Though one observation would not be ours- 'a picture to the place'. Today's Travellers' encampment has swapped the vardo for the mobile home, horses for horse-power and horse-dealing for scrap metal, and is anathema in our twinked countryside. We, the council, intended the Traveller (is 'gypsy' P.C.?- or not? - it is all rather worrying) to just winter on the official site, then push on, not to purchase them and turn them into messy caravan additions to our village. We like the gypsies best at the horse-fairs, when they return to being their colourful selves, painted wagons, fortune tellers, dark-eyed beauties, lively yearlings and all. Appleby Fair is where they should be. No scrap-dealing there.

‘John Clare and the Gypsies’
An excerpt from 'A Writer's Day-Book', by Ronald Blythe,
published by Trent Editions, 2006

I will be speaking: 11am Saturday, 28th March 

At the John Clare Cottage in Helpston

to the title, “The Woke John Clare”

#poetry #environment 

#honesty

Comments welcome below

War

As we often find, John Clare has summarised our feelings, line 8-10 says it all for me today:

Gone is my Jemmy that threw his arm round me
& bore home my milk pails & milked my cow
The tempest may blow & the rain storm may drownd me
Theres ne’er a kind heart to be meeting me now

Like the odd larking upon the bleak meadows
& lorn mopeing quail on the hard frozen lea

Which the Gun of the hard hearted swain has made widows
I meet the sad trouble that war bringeth me

All hopes they are vain while the grim war is scowling

Its fate may already alight on him now

Thus sighd a lorn maid to the winter winds howling
Whose eyes swum wi tears as she rose from her cow

(From ‘The Milkmaids Lament’)

I will be speaking: 11am Saturday, 28th March 

At the John Clare Cottage in Helpston

to the title, “The Woke John Clare”

#poetry #environment 

#honesty

Comments welcome below

Shines like the sun

Under hedges the violets are coming in bloom 
& the Pilewort it shines like the Sun 
The Spring it is bursting from the winters cold Tomb 
& the sun of Lifes smiles has begun 
Tis February end to morrow fair maid 
& the Snowdrops are looking for thee 
The Crocus has got his gold suit ready made 
& hopes thy companion to be 
So out of two sweethearts be sure & chuse one 
While chusing is left to thy choice 
For Valentine day only came to be gone 
& then true love is left without voice

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Hazel bowers

Untoucht by frowning tempest howling high 
Their terrors thro the oak twigs melting green 
That bows the daisey down upon the green 
& threatens much the cowslaps trembling flow[er]s 
Thou ere dwelst peacful in thy lonly scene 
Thy oaks high towering & thy hazel bowers 
Thou lowly hermit flower of Solitude 
Thou plainly tellst a lesson unto me 
The naked hill bears all the tempest rude 
That wind decends to touch such thing as thee

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Pudgy paths

O for a pleasant book to cheat the sway 
Of winter—where rich mirth with hearty laugh 
Listens & rubs his legs on corner seat 
For fields are mire & sludge—& badly off 
Are those who on their pudgy paths delay 
There striding shepherd seeking driest way 
Fearing nights wetshod feet & hacking cough 
That keeps him waken till the peep of day 
Goes shouldering onward & with ready hook 
Progs off to ford the sloughs that nearly meet 
Accross the lands—croodling & thin to view 
His loath dog follows—stops & quakes & looks

For better roads—till whistled to pursue 
Then on with frequent jump he hirkles through

Follow me for daily #JohnClare postings

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Comments welcome below