Brr, Footrest

 

Matthew Brady

 

Brr, Footrest

(Robert Frost)

This ottoman is in my way.

I tripped on it again today;

It chills me with a nameless fear

To think it sees me as its prey.

My loving wife must think it queer

That I am always falling here

As I am walking past the chair.

How comical I must appear.

When I remember to beware

The wicked footrest lurking there,

I do not stumble in a sprawl,

And yet such instances are rare.

My house is cozy, warm , and small,

With just one thing that wrecks it all:

The ottoman that makes me fall,

The ottoman that makes me fall.

Francis Heany

 

 (Sometimes I just can't find the image I want to match the poem. This one will have to do for now.) My last post made me think of "Stopping By Woods On a Snowy Evening" by Frost, which in turn made me think of this poem - a wonderful imitation/parody of that poem. It cracks me up. There are some excellent parodies out there, I should include more.

 

November

Ernest W. Watson

November


The hills and leafless forests slowly yield
To the thick-driving snow. A little while
And night shall darken down. In shouting file
The woodmen's carts go by me homeward-wheeled,
Past the thin fading stubbles, half concealed,
Now golden-grey, sowed softly through with snow,
Where the last ploughman follows still his row,
Turning black furrows through the whitening field.

Far off the village lamps begin to gleam,
Fast drives the snow, and no man comes this way;
The hills grow wintery white, and bleak winds moan
About the naked uplands. I alone
Am neither sad, nor shelterless, nor grey,
Wrapped round with thought, content to watch and dream.

Archibald Lampman

 

Word by word, line by line, Lampman builds the scene. Layer on layer, his description of the  sights and sounds accumulate to create a moment so real it feels like I could step right in. 

"Far off the village lamps begin to gleam,

Fast drives the snow, and no man comes this way..."

 

Each poet has their strong points, and Lampman is wonderful with drawing the reader right into the scene. If I were going to choose desert island poetry, I would take Lampman - round about noon a poem like this would cool me right down. This particular poem has a lovely slow rhythm I find mesmerizing, a little like Robert Frost's "Stopping By Woods On a Snowy Evening". The mood is similar. Maybe it's a snowfall effect, lulling and drowsy.

"I alone

Am neither sad, nor shelterless, nor grey,

Wrapped round with thought, content to watch and dream."

Shadows

Linda Bennett

Shadows

And if tonight my soul may find her peace
in sleep, and sink in good oblivion,
and in the morning wake like a new-opened flower
then I have been dipped again in God, and new-created.

And if, as weeks go round, in the dark of the moon
my spirit darkens and goes out, and soft strange gloom
pervades my movements and my thoughts and words
then I shall know that I am walking still
with God, we are close together now the moon’s in shadow.

And if, as autumn deepens and darkens
I feel the pain of falling leaves, and stems that break in storms
and trouble and dissolution and distress
and then the softness of deep shadows folding,
folding around my soul and spirit, around my lips
so sweet, like a swoon, or more like the drowse of a low, sad song
singing darker than the nightingale, on, on to the solstice
and the silence of short days, the silence of the year, the shadow,
then I shall know that my life is moving still
with the dark earth, and drenched
with the deep oblivion of earth’s lapse and renewal.

And if, in the changing phases of man’s life
I fall in sickness and in misery
my wrists seem broken and my heart seems dead
and strength is gone, and my life
is only the leavings of a life:

and still, among it all, snatches of lovely oblivion, and snatches of renewal
odd, wintry flowers upon the withered stem, yet new, strange flowers
such as my life has not brought forth before, new blossoms of me

then I must know that still
I am in the hands of the unknown God,
he is breaking me down to his own oblivion
to send me forth on a new morning, a new man.

 

D.H. Lawrence

 

 "...then I shall know that I am walking still/ with God we are close together now.."

There are so many distractions and stresses, there always have been - coming in from in so many directions. These days I look for the constants, the things that don't change. I find so much comfort there. Like the speaker in this poem, I go to sleep at night committing my existence into the hands of the God I trust with everything. The God who remains Himself no matter what dark cloud I find myself under, no matter what I don't know and can't control. The God who knows me fully and loves me entirely and who is able (and willing) to re-create me, transform me, lift me up beyond cloud or circumstance. The God with whom all good things are possible. "

"New blossoms of me." for instance, 

"strange flowers such as my life has not brought forth before."