In Retrospect The world asks a great deal of the poppies, insists they carry the wounds of war and shoulder the weight of remembrance. Such flimsy, wavering plants; we painted their flowers the colour of blood and punched dark holes in their heads as if bullets had passed through, then trimmed them with green sprigs … Read More
Poetry
In the Bleak Midwinter: Rosetti & Holst
In the Bleak Midwinter – words by Christina Rossetti and music by Gustav Holst (it has to be Holst for me) – is my favourite Christmas carol. I have a memory of singing it as a child beside my father in the gallery of the church we used to walk to. It always makes me cry because it’s so very beautiful – the giving of our hearts – and because of that long-ago memory.
A Blessing for our times
Jan Richardson wrote this Blessing for her blog The Advent Door in 2014. It’s included in her book Circle of Grace published in 2015. Elsewhere Richardson talks about wild and stubborn hope. I love that phrase. A friend of mine sent Blessing when the World is Ending to me a few days ago. It feels … Read More
Ask not what trees can do for us, but what we can do for trees
Last weekend I walked through a wood. Sunlight filtered through the leaves and made me think how medieval stonemasons must have been inspired by the branches of trees gathered in arching vaults above them when they imagined their cathedrals. In a modern reversal, in Italy, near Bergamo, there’s a tree cathedral: And, at the entrance … Read More
When This Is Over … and some Christmas Lights for the dark Winter Nights
When this is over, may we never again take for granted a handshake with a stranger, full shelves at the store, conversations with neighbours, a crowded theatre, Friday nights out, the taste of communion, a routine check-up, the school rush each morning, coffee with a friend, the stadium roaring, each deep breath, a boring Tuesday, … Read More
Deborah Alma’s Poetry Pharmacy: Poetry Prescriptions
Last week I had a telephone consultation with a pharmacist. Not an unusual thing to do in these corona-times, but this pharmacist doesn’t dispense drugs. Deborah Alma is a Poetry Pharmacist. Before corona I’d planned to go to The Poetry Pharmacy in Bishops Castle, in June. But by the end of March I realised I … Read More
Clean Air: Act. And a poem and a chat
If you’re not as ancient as me you won’t remember the pea-soupers in London: and I’d only been breathing for just under two years at the time so it’s not exactly a memory for me either, but by 1956 The Clean Air Act had been passed to reduce air pollution in the city. It was a … Read More
Poems for these Coronavirus Times
Read by Christopher Eccleston, written by Matthew Kelly for his partner, Jill Scully, who is a district nurse. And here’s one from our poet laureate, Simon Armitage, which, as explained in this Guardian article, moves from the outbreak of bubonic plague in Eyam in the 17th century, when a bale of cloth from London brought fleas carrying … Read More
Wise and kind words for the Coronavirus pandemic by Adrie Kusserow
This poem for these strange times is written by Adrie Kusserow after Mary Oliver’s Wild Geese : it speaks for itself. Mary Oliver for Corona Times, thoughts after the poem Wild Geese, by Adrie Kusserow, ethnographic poet You do not have to become totally zen, You do not have to use this isolation to make your marriage … Read More
How Doctors use Poetry, and a blue-green stone
Recently I spent a night in hospital and the thing that struck me about the nursing staff, as I watched them admit new patients to the ward, was their infinite kindness; their ability to explain exactly the same things to each new, slightly-groggy patient as she was wheeled in, as if she was the only … Read More
Creativity and Patience; and walks with Mental Health Mates
Being an artist means … ripening like the tree which does not force its sap and stands confident in the storms … summer [will] come. But it comes only to the patient … patience is everything! from Rainer Maria Rilke’s advice to Franz Xaver Kappus from Letters to a Young Poet. Quotation found here. Patience. Now there’s a thing to … Read More