Ever the message
Along the shore the pebbles shift
Unnerving under foot
The sea moves in the sea moves out
But dread is pulsing loud
As flotsam jetsam time and tide
In lunar circle turn
So salt to sea to shell to sand
The soothing rhythm pounds
Hiss and shush the pebbles shift
Tug and undertow
This is constant this will last
For all eternity
Ever the message in and out
But still no comfort found
18th March 2010, Tavistock
Hi Sally, This is very powerful, very vivid, and as with all your poems, very reliably takes us into the place and the moment. But then there are two uncharacteristic surprises: the dread and the "no comfort". Do these inhere in the sea on the shingle, or in something else? You seem to say the latter, but maybe the flotsam and jetsam seems ominous too?
ReplyDeleteI am reminded of Teresa of Avila and her brother, as children, reciting with awe and dread,
"para sempre,sempre, sempre".....
My goodness Jenny, just time for me to have a look on your blog to see if anything new, and there you were! What is more, you have ABSOLUTELY hit the nail on the head. I wrote it after reading Iris Murdoch's husband John Bayley writing about what swimming in the Oxford rivers meant to them, and how soothing and comforting he found it even when she was well into dementia. I wrote this when feeling full of worry and anxiety and as you say, what comes through is what I felt ie the comfort of the eternal which is still pierced by the dread of the moment. Tell me more about the interesting quote.
ReplyDeleteI misquoted, I'm afraid, forever is "par siempre" in Spanish. The quote comes from a super book by Shirley du Boulay called simply "Teresa of Avila": "The brevity of life was all too apparent. So the questions came early. What lay beyond death? Would it be the pain of hell or the bliss of heaven? The children had been told that pain and bliss would last forever, a thought that astonished them. They would discuss this curious idea, chanting 'para siempre, siempre,siempre.....' Perhaps, if they followed the exampke of the saints they would reach heaven quicker? Then they would live in endless bliss rather than risk endless pain?"
ReplyDeleteI think our modern worry is what comes immediately before death? I shall remember to take good care NOT to read John Bayley's book- I am already strung out waiting for every new book from Terry Pratchett, and I was so distressed to see that he wants to be able to control the moment of his death so that he can have "a good death". Poor man!
Reading what Jenny writes I realised how my own feelings of worry were badly exacerbated by my reading about Iris's Alzheimer's, and I did stop reading the book at this point. Again I think Jenny is right to say we worry now about what comes before death rather than after.
ReplyDeleteFrom Sue Pascoe
ReplyDeletere poem....it is extremely good. less is more in my book, and this is so 'spare' and precise. it works so well. and rings many a personal bell.