POETRY BLOG MAY 25th 2020
POETRY GROUP BLOG
MAY 26TH 2020
RAGWORT
I found this polemic in defence of ragwort which is worth reading if only to mock Lord Tebbit. I quote from the article for those who avoid links
“In 2014, former
Conservative minister Lord Tebbit said youngsters should be “required as part
of their contribution to the society which finances them, or which they have
abused… to uproot
this weed.” He told our fellow nature charity Buglife that pulling
up ragwort should be a low-cost form of National Service for “young people who
are not in education, work or training and low-level criminals”.
WILDING
Friends of the Earth’s defence
seems to fit in with what Mary said about the book Wilding by Isabella
Tree described by Waterstones as “ An inspiring story of the resilience of the
land and the diversity of British wildlife, it reveals in eloquent detail what
happened when Tree and her husband gave their clay farmland back to nature. As
both an experiment in ecological innovation and a personal journey into the
realities of farming in the 21st century, Wilding soars with passion,
enthusiasm and an undying faith in the virtues of conservation.
Forced to accept that
intensive farming on the heavy clay of their land at Knepp was economically
unsustainable, Isabella Tree and her husband Charlie Burrell made a spectacular
leap of faith: they decided to step back and let nature take over. Thanks to the
introduction of free-roaming cattle, ponies, pigs and deer - proxies of the
large animals that once roamed Britain - the 3,500 acre project has seen
extraordinary increases in wildlife numbers and diversity in little over a
decade.
Extremely rare species,
including turtle doves, nightingales, peregrine falcons, lesser spotted
woodpeckers and purple emperor butterflies, are now breeding at Knepp, and
populations of other species are rocketing. The Burrells' degraded agricultural
land has become a functioning ecosystem again, heaving with life - all by
itself.
Personal and
inspirational, Wilding is an astonishing account of the beauty
and strength of nature, when it is given as much freedom as possible."
Publisher: Pan
Macmillan
ISBN: 9781509805105
JOHN CLARE
In June 2019, I missed a session
and Barbara took notes of questions people had raised. The chosen poem was by
John Clare and I wrote the following in answer to the group’s questions which
hopefully serves as a brief biography– please forgive my idleness as I have
only added in a few things.
Why did John Clare’s poems fall out of fashion?
That is a particularly complicated question
because it has to begin by looking at the reasons his poems became fashionable
in the first instance. John Taylor, the publisher of Clare’s first book of
poems in 1820 marketed Clare as a Peasant Poet. There was a brief vogue of
“Ploughboy and Peasant Poets”. I read a few many years ago when I was studying
Clare.
My favourite was Stephen Duck (known as the Thresher Poet) who in 1830
published a poem called The Thresher’s Labour which describes life as a
farm labourer, and the intense hard work associated with haymaking. In my opinion the poem lacks merit but he has
remained in a dusty file in the cramped attic that is my mind because of his
risible name and his scathing attack on female labourers which included
“Ah! were their hands as active as their tongues
How nimbly then would move the rakes and prongs!”
How nimbly then would move the rakes and prongs!”
Clare was at the very tail end of this so his fame
in his lifetime was short lived and he was not “rediscovered” until the early
twentieth century. His first book Poems Descriptive of Rural Life was
even published as by “John Clare A Northamptonshire Peasant Poet.”
Taylor
writes of him as “the Poet as well as the Child of Nature” and “sold” his work
as childlike and uneducated to a sentimental reading public whose visions of
rural life bore little or no resemblance to John Clare’s experience of
unremitting labour and poverty.
I think what is more interesting
is why he never became included with the “major poets”. Despite the hardships
of his life, his mental ill health and
his many experiences of personal loss, which included the destruction of the
rural England he loved, he wrote nature poetry which was not only rooted in the
most precise, knowledgeable and intense observation but was wholly magnificently joyous.
Did he continue to write nature poetry in the Northamptonshire asylum?
In the last twenty years of his
life in the asylum, he continued to write poetry encouraged and supported by the
asylum’s Superintendent, Dr Prichard. However, he was often in an acute psychotic
state believing that he was sometimes Queen Victoria's father, Lord Byron, Shakespeare,
a prize-fighter; or perhaps most poignantly and sadly that he was Wellington or
Nelson and had had his head shot off in battle, and so all the words inside had
dribbled out leaving him with none.
He wrote the letter below in response to an
enquiry in 1841, the same year he was admitted to the care of the benign Dr
Pritchard (in the Epping Asylum at High Beeches he was denied access to writing
materials by Dr Allen who believed his writing exacerbated his mania)
“I am in a Mad house and quite forget your Name or who you are you must
excuse me for I have nothing to communicate or tell of and why I am shut up I
don’t know I have nothing to say so I conclude
yours respectfully
yours respectfully
John Clare”
He did however write a long and
rather disordered poem called Child Harold (presumably when he imagined
that he was Lord Byron) which is a collection of songs and ballads (he had
collected folk songs and ballads –both tunes and words- when he was well) and
love poems to Mary. This very long poem is worth reading because throughout
there are characteristic observations of nature and the seasons. Also you can
buy for the very un-princely sum of £1.24 his complete poems for your Kindle,
if you have one. I am not sure how difficult it would be to find it in print.
I highly recommend the Paris
Review article below which is about Clare and Christopher Smart (who was
confined in Mr Potter’s Madhouse in Bethnal Green at one stage).
I think the Group also asked
about the link between poetry and madness and I suggested we did a whole session
on the topic which is both lengthy and complicated. I have not forgotten and
when the Group can continue in some happier and less “mad” time we can look at
the subject. (It is not my intention to belittle mental ill-health – I do
believe the constraints, anxieties and confusing absurdities of lock down have
impacted on everyone’s mental health).
EXTRA POEM
YELLOW
When they turn the sun
on again
I'll plant children
under it,
I'll light up my soul
with a
match and let it sing. I'll
take my
bones and polish them, I'll
vacuum up
my stale hair, I'll
pay all
my neighbours' bad debts, I'll
write a
poem called Yellow and put
my lips
down to drink it up, I'll
feed
myself spoonfuls of heat and
everyone
will be home playing with
their
wings and the planet will
shudder
with all those smiles and
there
will be no poison anywhere, no plague
in the
sky and there will be a mother-broth
for all
of the people and we will
never
die, not one of us, we'll go on
won't we?
Anne Sexton
November 1928 – October 1974
It seems to fit the times and like John Clare with his
marvellous yellow ragwort suns, Anne Sexton struggled with mental ill health.
John Clare wrote of himself “I have a greater compass of mirth and melancholy
than another” and modern biographers have sometimes used that statement to give
him a Bipolar Disorder diagnosis and Anne Sexton was given a “Manic Depression”
diagnosis (as it was then called until fairly recently) although a great deal
of controversy and criticism surrounds her experiences of the Mental Health
system.
FINALLY
Rosemary has chosen the poem for Wednesday May 27th
2020. I hope everyone thrives.
Best Wishes, Elizabeth
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