Bard's life

The month of March in Guernsey has been behaving like April with an unpredictable mixture of sunshine and showers.  This poem seems a fitting one to welcome April itself. RAINBOW A dappled frog croaks a prayer for rain. Rain falls. We set out walking in the afternoon with small provisions and light waterproofs in sturdy boots because the ground was rough. We climbed uphill, below we saw red roofs, and stopped to eat when it was opportune, then off again when we had had enough. As we walked on, the rain was left behind:  a rainbow spread before us like an arc. The day grew bright, I felt my spirits rise. the air was charged by some elusive spark. We clung together, fingers intertwined. The world seemed new. We viewed it with surprise .

Here's a poem for Easter week.  An earlier version of it can be found in my Strange Journey collection, published in 2012 . RIDER A man rides into town ... he’s a good man and this used to be a good town but the bad guys have taken over and the townsfolk are weak so it’s a bad town now with bad problems. The rider will change things.  Valiantly, he’ll make a stand against hopeless odds. He’ll confront the bad guys, inspire loyalty, teach the timid townsfolk to confront evil. I told you, remember, that the odds were hopeless, so the bad guys win in the end and the rider dies alone in the sun, as the townsfolk look on, helpless. But his death’s not the final reel .   Ri ght now, he rides into town on a swaying donkey as cheering townsfolk cast palm-fronds at his feet.

Jane and I have been staying in our friends' house situated high above Fermain Bay, one of the most scenic locations in Guernsey, whilst looking after their dogs. As always on a Saturday, we buy newspapers to read, in greater depth, of the events reported by online news sources. Daily, report s from the world beyond this little island grow more and more depressing, yet in this tranquil place, chicanery and conflict seem foreign in every sense .  FERMAIN Today, at noon, newspapers read, we step outside. A world of grass, of trees and sky, seems free from dread or jeopardy. How it contrasts with the grim newsprint world of grime, skullduggery and petty crime. We walk, with dogs, down to the bay, through conifers, on well-worn tracks, watch small boats carve their zig-zag way. None of that other world impacts, no angst, no overspill of war, here by Fermain, where tide meets shore.  

This poem, from my Strange Journey collection (2012), was written following the untimely death of a friend's mother. Obviously, therefore, it's factual, but I hope it manages to transcend mere reportage. Old Postcard of Torteval Church   FUNERAL AT TORTEVAL The heart beats, now, a mourning drum behind the coffin held aloft. Head bowed, you step, back ramrod-straight, blue light, through stained-glass, falling soft, from the black car beyond the gate into the congregation’s hum. Grief carves a beauty in your face   or highlights what was there before, unrecognised.  You seem to shine, to have become not less but more, while others’ faces, at this shrine to gracefulness, lack any grace. The hedgerow birds, today, seem dumb as one by one the black cars leave: you by your crumpled father’s side, consoling him, holding his sleeve, so full of elegance, dry-eyed, with redefined years yet to come.

Guernsey's Reflections on Occupation begins tomorrow in the Greenhouse Gallery at Candie Museum and will run until 3rd June.  I urge you to see it if you can. A fascinating mixture of art forms is on display, each reflecting, in its own way, that traumatic period in the island's history. This thought-provoking exhibition coincides with the release of the film version of Mary Ann Shaffer's best-selling novel, The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society starring Lily James, which is set during the Occupation. Poetry feature s strongly among the submissions and one of the poems on display i s A Letter Home , which I wr o te from the perspective of a young German soldier stationed on the island during World W ar Two .   A LETTER HOME         This is not proper soldiery, no proud thrust for the Fatherland: instead we police, unwillingly, people we do not understand. They are an island race, apart: intransigent, shrewd, stubborn, smart...

Unlike the homicide in my previous post, this murder didn't quite fit into twelve lines. If my wife happens to read this: relax Jane, it's purely fiction.     TILL DEATH US DO PART I cannot stand my ghastly wife: instead, I love her sister, dear. The former one pollutes my life. The latter woman I revere. I’ve hatched a plot to rid me of my wife, I’ve simply had enough. I’ve put rat-poison in a cake: my wife is fond of sweets and treats. One slice is all she’ll have to take: rich cream will guarantee she eats then she’ll be gone and I’ll have Maud. It’s simple: just give fate a prod. Maud’s phoned me to my work and said she’s at our house to tend my wife who’s got the sniffles, gone to bed:  there’s germs around and flu is rife. I fear I’ve made a great mistake: Maud’s brewed some tea and scoffed the cake.

Staying with comic verse, albeit of the blacker persuasion, here's a grisly tale of murder in just twelve lines. BLADE RUNNER Bright stiletto in the sternum. On the parquet, blood is spreading as she mutters, That’ll learn him ... then she’s through the doorway heading for the Ford and then the State-line in the Californian sunshine. Bright stiletto, polished handle: icicle of death and danger.   D ead, he's like a snuffed-out candle: half her lover, half a stranger. She, a victim of his lust, is now a fugitive from justice.

Here's a lighthearted piece of verse to counteract the winter blues. THE PARROT The Parrot has a tiny brain but what he has works fairly well He’ll perch all day, will not complain, and now and then he’ll ring his bell then, with a smiling, open beak, he’ll twitch his tongue, commence to speak. Now you might think the words he squawks are fascinating and profound: what he comes out with when he talks won’t half impress you and astound until you stop and think, this bird is just repeating what he’s heard, he hasn’t really got a clue, decisions are beyond his ken, it’s all a load of ballyhoo, he’s like that fool at Number 10. Despite his feathers and his poise, he’s simply making pointless noise.

I missed Monday's Open Mic due to an unusual event in Guernsey's weather calendar, the arrival of snow. It's not something we have to contend with often: once every four or five years on average, but when it happens the island grinds to a standstill.  Schools close, shops become denuded of provisions and businesses limp along with only those few die-hard staff who manage to brave our treacherous, ungritted roads. I'd planned to read this bit of light verse on Monday because the chosen subject for Open Mic was "Words".  Maybe I'll give it an airing next month if the snow's gone by then.   WORDS Spray-can taggers in the street
  obey the law of graffiti. 
Musicians, with a hip-hop beat,
 legiti m ise depravity. 
Con-men, chat-show hosts and hacks
  stick words, like daggers, in our backs

.  The Internet, email, smart phones,  breed words that wildly reproduce
 like cancer-cells within our bones ...
 a narrative, verbose, diffuse.
 Words, nowadays,...