16TH DECEMBER
"Strange Meeting" by Wilfred Owen
It seemed that out of battle I escaped
Down some profound dull tunnel, long since scooped
Through granites which titanic wars had groined.
Yet also there encumbered sleepers groaned,
Too fast in thought or death to be bestirred.
Then, as I probed them, one sprang up, and stared
With piteous recognition in fixed eyes,
Lifting distressful hands, as if to bless.
And by his smile, I knew that sullen hall,—
By his dead smile I knew we stood in Hell.
With a thousand fears that vision's face was grained;
Yet no blood reached there from the upper ground,
And no guns thumped, or down the flues made moan.
“Strange friend,” I said, “here is no cause to mourn.”
“None,” said that other, “save the undone years,
The hopelessness. Whatever hope is yours,
Was my life also; I went hunting wild
After the wildest beauty in the world,
Which lies not calm in eyes, or braided hair,
But mocks the steady running of the hour,
And if it grieves, grieves richlier than here.
For by my glee might many men have laughed,
And of my weeping something had been left,
Which must die now. I mean the truth untold,
The pity of war, the pity war distilled.
Now men will go content with what we spoiled.
Or, discontent, boil bloody, and be spilled.
They will be swift with swiftness of the tigress.
None will break ranks, though nations trek from progress.
Courage was mine, and I had mystery;
Wisdom was mine, and I had mastery:
To miss the march of this retreating world
Into vain citadels that are not walled.
Then, when much blood had clogged their chariot-wheels,
I would go up and wash them from sweet wells,
Even with truths that lie too deep for taint.
I would have poured my spirit without stint
But not through wounds; not on the cess of war.
Foreheads of men have bled where no wounds were.
“I am the enemy you killed, my friend.
I knew you in this dark: for so you frowned
Yesterday through me as you jabbed and killed.
I parried; but my hands were loath and cold.
Let us sleep now. . . .”
Definitely not Christmassy, but my favourite Wilfred Owen poem. And it seems appropriate while it's still 2014, the centenary of when WW1 began.
17TH DECEMBER
An Extract from "Howl I" by Allen Ginsberg
I
I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by madness, starving hysterical naked,
dragging themselves through the negro streets at dawn looking for an angry fix,
angelheaded hipsters burning for the ancient heavenly connection to the starry dynamo in the
machinery of night,
who poverty and
tatters and hollow-eyed and high sat up smoking in the supernatural
darkness of
cold-water flats floating across the tops of cities
contemplating jazz,
who bared their brains to Heaven under the El and saw Mohammedan angels staggering on tenement
roofs illuminated,
who passed through
universities with radiant cool eyes hallucinating Arkansas and
Blake-light
tragedy among the scholars of war...
I love Howl, and this is a very very brief extract from the opening of its first part. It's a great poem that caused uproar at the time it was written (always a good thing in my opinion), and Ginsberg is one of my favourite poets.
18TH DECEMBER
An Extract from "Goblin Market" by Christina Rossetti
Morning and evening
Maids heard the goblins cry:
“Come buy our orchard fruits,
Come buy, come buy:
Apples and quinces,
Lemons and oranges,
Plump unpeck’d cherries,
Melons and raspberries,
Bloom-down-cheek’d peaches,
Swart-headed mulberries,
Wild free-born cranberries,
Crab-apples, dewberries,
Pine-apples, blackberries,
Apricots, strawberries;—
All ripe together
In summer weather,—
Morns that pass by,
Fair eves that fly;
Come buy, come buy:
Our grapes fresh from the vine,
Pomegranates full and fine,
Dates and sharp bullaces,
Rare pears and greengages,
Damsons and bilberries,
Taste them and try:
Currants and gooseberries,
Bright-fire-like barberries,
Figs to fill your mouth,
Citrons from the South,
Sweet to tongue and sound to eye;
Come buy, come buy.”
Again, this poem goes on for longer, but this extract contains the wonderful rhythm that goes on throughout. There are some really good moments later on, and once more, it's worth a read of the whole thing.
19TH DECEMBER
"The Oxen" by Thomas Hardy
Christmas Eve, and twelve of the clock.
“Now they are all on their knees,”
An elder said as we sat in a flock
By the embers in hearthside ease.
We pictured the meek mild creatures where
They dwelt in their strawy pen,
Nor did it occur to one of us there
To doubt they were kneeling then.
So fair a fancy few would weave
In these years! Yet, I feel,
If someone said on Christmas Eve,
“Come; see the oxen kneel,
“In the lonely barton by yonder coomb
Our childhood used to know,”
I should go with him in the gloom,
Hoping it might be so.
It's quite hard to find poems actually about Christmas, and although I'm pretty sure I've done Hardy already in this countdown, this seems to fit well. My (brief) Times subscription is paying off, and informs me that this poem shows Hardy perfectly balancing his agnosticism. So there you go.
20TH DECEMBER
"They Flee From Me" by Thomas Wyatt
They flee from me, that sometime did me seek
With naked foot, stalking in my chamber.
I have seen them gentle, tame, and meek,
That now are wild, and do not remember
That sometime they put themselves in danger,
To take bread at my hand; and now they range,
Busily seeking with a continual change.
Thanked be fortune it hath been otherwise
Twenty times better; but once, in special,
In thin array, after a pleasant guise,
When her loose gown from her shoulders did fall,
And she me caught in her arms long and small,
Therwith all sweetly did me kiss,
And softly said: “Dear heart, how like you this?”
It was no dream: I lay broad waking.
But all is turned, thorough my gentleness,
Into a strange fashion of forsaking;
And I have leave to go of her goodness,
And she also to use newfangleness.
But since that I so kindly am served:
I would fain know what she hath deserved.
I'm not a great fan of Wyatt by any means, but this is yet another poem I studied last year. It's got a bit more flair than the average poem by Wyatt, and there's much less hyperbole in this than his other poems. Incidentally, there is a pretty interesting hypertext somewhere (where you choose your own journey through a story online) of Wyatt watching Anne Boleyn's execution, and its tied into the poetry he wrote on the subject.
21ST DECEMBER
"Sad Ones" by Max Harris
The gentleness of Jesus
And the meekness of the child
Are false ideas. Christ was fierce
And we breed our children wild.
The spring girl who is dreaming
In the branches of a tree
Knows something of the charnel-house
And modern psychiatry.
The poor old ancient dribbler,
Cigar ash on his vest,
Thinks his seventh stage of life
Not much worse than the rest.
There is an ache of discontent
In milktooth and aged gum,
So let's give praise for coming days,
For Kingdom-Bloody-Come.
I discovered Max Harris's poetry yesterday and it's pretty awesome. This is one of his most powerful ones, and I'd recommend reading more stuff by him (there's a website with a whole list of it on).
"The Oxen" by Thomas Hardy
Christmas Eve, and twelve of the clock.
“Now they are all on their knees,”
An elder said as we sat in a flock
By the embers in hearthside ease.
We pictured the meek mild creatures where
They dwelt in their strawy pen,
Nor did it occur to one of us there
To doubt they were kneeling then.
So fair a fancy few would weave
In these years! Yet, I feel,
If someone said on Christmas Eve,
“Come; see the oxen kneel,
“In the lonely barton by yonder coomb
Our childhood used to know,”
I should go with him in the gloom,
Hoping it might be so.
It's quite hard to find poems actually about Christmas, and although I'm pretty sure I've done Hardy already in this countdown, this seems to fit well. My (brief) Times subscription is paying off, and informs me that this poem shows Hardy perfectly balancing his agnosticism. So there you go.
20TH DECEMBER
"They Flee From Me" by Thomas Wyatt
They flee from me, that sometime did me seek
With naked foot, stalking in my chamber.
I have seen them gentle, tame, and meek,
That now are wild, and do not remember
That sometime they put themselves in danger,
To take bread at my hand; and now they range,
Busily seeking with a continual change.
Thanked be fortune it hath been otherwise
Twenty times better; but once, in special,
In thin array, after a pleasant guise,
When her loose gown from her shoulders did fall,
And she me caught in her arms long and small,
Therwith all sweetly did me kiss,
And softly said: “Dear heart, how like you this?”
It was no dream: I lay broad waking.
But all is turned, thorough my gentleness,
Into a strange fashion of forsaking;
And I have leave to go of her goodness,
And she also to use newfangleness.
But since that I so kindly am served:
I would fain know what she hath deserved.
I'm not a great fan of Wyatt by any means, but this is yet another poem I studied last year. It's got a bit more flair than the average poem by Wyatt, and there's much less hyperbole in this than his other poems. Incidentally, there is a pretty interesting hypertext somewhere (where you choose your own journey through a story online) of Wyatt watching Anne Boleyn's execution, and its tied into the poetry he wrote on the subject.
21ST DECEMBER
"Sad Ones" by Max Harris
The gentleness of Jesus
And the meekness of the child
Are false ideas. Christ was fierce
And we breed our children wild.
The spring girl who is dreaming
In the branches of a tree
Knows something of the charnel-house
And modern psychiatry.
The poor old ancient dribbler,
Cigar ash on his vest,
Thinks his seventh stage of life
Not much worse than the rest.
There is an ache of discontent
In milktooth and aged gum,
So let's give praise for coming days,
For Kingdom-Bloody-Come.
I discovered Max Harris's poetry yesterday and it's pretty awesome. This is one of his most powerful ones, and I'd recommend reading more stuff by him (there's a website with a whole list of it on).
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