Talk -- Yevgeny Yevtushenko

Guest poem submitted by Rama Rao:

(Poem #1776) Talk You're a brave man they tell me. I'm not. Courage has never been my quality. Only I thought it disproportionate so to degrade myself as others did. No foundations trembled. My voice no more than laughed at pompous falsity; I did no more than write, never denounced, I left out nothing I had thought about, defended who deserved it, put a brand on the untalented, the ersatz writers (doing what anyhow had to be done). And now they press to tell me that I'm brave. How sharply our children will be ashamed taking at last their vengeance for these horrors remembering how in so strange a time common integrity could look like courage. -- Yevgeny Yevtushenko

        Translated by Robin Milner-Galland and Peter Levi.

What can be more representative of the times we live in than these lines?
Although perhaps referring to the pre-Khruschev times of the Soviet Union,
the poem is equally valid when we face the distortion and humbug prevalent
in so many places. And nothing is more powerful than the last line:
 "common integrity could look like courage".

Yevtushenko is already on the Minstrels and profiled also [see Poem #850,
Poem #1532, Poem #1561 for examples -ed.].

Rama Rao.

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The Wasp -- John Kendall

Guest poem submitted by Philip Watson:

(Poem #1775) The Wasp Of those uncertain creatures Who take a simple joy In swelling up one's features On purpose to annoy, Things void of natural sweetness, Aggressive and inhosp. (Pardon the incompleteness) You are the first, O wasp. There is no place we visit In England's pleasant land (It isn't your place, is it?) But you must take a hand; You set the nerves a-jangle, You turn the tan to chalk Of anglers when they angle, Of walkers when they walk. In no uncertain manner You bid the bather flee; You foil the caravanner Who merely wants his tea; You raid the earnest hopper, You break upon our sports, And are, I'm told, improper To river girls in shorts. We slap at you and swat you; We fell you as we may (The rapture when we've got you Is more than words can say); One may see great deeds daily When men unused to strife Brave you, albeit palely, For screaming child or wife. And we have learnt to fashion A lure that cannot fail, Born of a lasting passion That you confess for ale; An artful jar that cozens You in and, when you're tight, Drowns you in drink by dozens, A most immoral sight. But when the day is sinking And you retire to rest That, to my private thinking, Is where man comes out best; Armed with his apparatus He tracks you to the comb Whence you come forth to bait us; Then, when the last wasp's home, Bring forth, O man, your funnel; With oil and poison come; Take heed lest haply one'll Pass down a warning hum; Insert with care the former; Pour down the latter thick; That should have made things warmer; That will have done the trick. Thus with discreet defiance We tackle you, and yet, For all the arts of science, You don't seem much upset; Alert and undiminished You still appear to prosp.; I leave the word unfinished To rhyme with you, O wasp. -- John Kendall

Listening to the wireless the other day, I heard an item wherein the BBC
told us that this had been 'a bad year for wasps'.

I thought this a somewhat ambiguous statement.  For instance, if one were to
hear that it had been a 'bad year for cholera', it would be logical to
assume that there was a lot of it about lately, to the detriment of
humanity.  This was not, it transpired, what they meant.  Instead, after a
cold snap in the springtime, the wasps themselves has suffered a serious
decline in numbers.  To my way of thinking (which I grant may be criticised
as selfish), that made it an entirely splendid year for wasps.

Lest any of your English readers fail to appreciate the alleviation of our
torment this year, I thought that the following would be apposite.  The poem
was written by Captain John Kendall under the pen name Dum-Dum.  It appears
in an anthology of his work entitled 'Short Doses', published in London by
Constable & Co Ltd in 1932: it may have appeared previously in the
periodical 'Punch'.

I believe that you have only one other of Kendall's works posted on your
site, which drought I hope the above may help to remedy.

A critical reviewer must, I think, question whether such material would
still amuse a contemporary audience.  Given that humour is so very much
embedded in its original cultural context, it frequently neither travels nor
ages well.  For, if 'the past is another country', then the England of 1932
must seem to today's English reader, as altogether another planet.  The more
humour is culturally specific, the more ephemeral its appeal; and I suppose
vice versa (whence the continuing popularity of a large body of execrable
slapstick).

With kind regards, and much appreciation of your excellent work,
Philip Watson.
Luppitt, Devonshire, England

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The Invaders -- A D Hope

Guest poem sent in by William Grey

(Poem #1774) The Invaders Coming by night, furtively, one by one They infiltrate according to the Plan, Their orders memorized and their disguise Impenetrable. With the rising sun Our citizens welcome them. Nobody can Think that such charming creatures might be spies. So feeble, so helpless, no one could suspect They come to make this commonwealth their prey; So few, they pose no threat; their cohort grows So imperceptibly that we neglect To notice how it musters day by day And, unalarmed, we watch as they impose Themselves, make friends in all directions, take Impressions of all keys. They gain access To all our secrets; learn to speak our tongue Like natives; profit by each false move we make; Work on our weaknesses; observe and guess The sources of power and study them to be strong. And when it happens, there will be no fuss, No streets running with blood, no barricade. We shall simply wake one morning to discover, As those who ruled this city before us Found by each door a headstone and a spade, That a new generation has taken over. -- A D Hope

This poem by Australian poet A.D. Hope (1907-2000) is based on an utterly
simple idea, with an underlying tension (even menace) beautifully developed,
and brilliantly resolved in the final line. Like Hope's "Ode on the Death of
Pius the Twelfth" [1] this poem deals with the issue of age and death, which
are recurrent themes for Hope (see also [2]) -- as they are, of course, for
many poets.

The poem is from A.D. Hope, A Late Picking: Poems 1965-1974. (Sydney: Angus
& Robertson, 1975)

William Grey

[1] Poem #1764, Ode on the Death of Pius the Twelfth -- A.D. Hope
[2] Poem #571, The Death of the Bird -- A.D. Hope

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Introduction To Poetry -- Billy Collins

Guest poem submitted by Carl Beck:

(Poem #1773) Introduction To Poetry I ask them to take a poem and hold it up to the light like a color slide or press an ear against its hive. I say drop a mouse into a poem and watch him probe his way out, or walk inside the poem's room and feel the walls for a light switch. I want them to waterski across the surface of a poem waving at the author's name on the shore. But all they want to do is tie the poem to a chair with rope and torture a confession out of it. They begin beating it with a hose to find out what it really means. -- Billy Collins

This poem makes me smile, only because it wasn't until I stopped trying to
understand poetry that I was able to open the gate to the wonderful
playground that poetry can be.

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Gitanjali (excerpt) -- Rabindranath Tagore

Guest poem sent in by Firdaus Janoos

(Poem #1772) Gitanjali (excerpt) The song that I came to sing remains unsung to this day. I have spent my days in stringing and unstringing my instrument. The time has not come true, the words have not been rightly set; only there is the agony of wishing in my heart. The blossom has not opened; only the wind is sighing by. I have not seen his face, nor have I listened to his voice; only I have heard his gentle footsteps on the road before my house. The livelong day has passed in spreading his seat on the floor; but the lamp has not been lit and I cannot ask him into my house. I live in the hope of meeting with him; but this meeting is not yet. -- Rabindranath Tagore

       from the Gitanjali (1923)

Cloying is not the first epithet that springs to mind when reading
Tagore.[1] Re-reading the Gitanjali (song offerings), one begins to realize
an intriguing profundity underlying its apparent simplicity. It is not
without good reason that this work won the 1923 Nobel prize for literature.
This poem is just an example of the textured, layered quality that permeates
the Gitanjali. At first it seems like the pensive song sung by a lover
cleaving for her beloved. But one becomes aware of an ineffable mysticism to
it - a yearning for a re-uniting with God, but without the morbidity that is
the usual adjunct of fatalism.

-firdaus

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Doggerel by a Senior Citizen -- W H Auden

Guest poem submitted by William Grey:

(Poem #1771) Doggerel by a Senior Citizen Our earth in 1969 Is not the planet I call mine, The world, I mean, that gives me strength To hold off chaos at arm's length. My Eden landscapes and their climes Are constructs from Edwardian times, When bath-rooms took up lots of space, And, before eating, one said Grace. The automobile, the aeroplane, Are useful gadgets, but profane: The enginry of which I dream Is moved by water or by steam. Reason requires that I approve The light-bulb which I cannot love: To me more reverence-commanding A fish-tail burner on the landing. My family ghosts I fought and routed, Their values, though, I never doubted: I thought the Protestant Work-Ethic Both practical and sympathetic. When couples played or sang duets, It was immoral to have debts: I shall continue till I die To pay in cash for what I buy. The Book of Common Prayer we knew Was that of 1662: Though with-it sermons may be well, Liturgical reforms are hell. Sex was of course -- it always is -- The most enticing of mysteries, But news-stands did not then supply Manichean pornography. Then Speech was mannerly, an Art, Like learning not to belch or fart: I cannot settle which is worse, The Anti-Novel or Free Verse. Nor are those Ph.D's my kith, Who dig the symbol and the myth: I count myself a man of letters Who writes, or hopes to, for his betters. Dare any call Permissiveness An educational success? Saner those class-rooms which I sat in, Compelled to study Greek and Latin. Though I suspect the term is crap, There is a Generation Gap, Who is to blame? Those, old or young, Who will not learn their Mother-Tongue. But Love, at least, is not a state Either en vogue or out-of-date, And I've true friends, I will allow, To talk and eat with here and now. Me alienated? Bosh! It's just As a sworn citizen who must Skirmish with it that I feel Most at home with what is Real. -- W H Auden

This poem is a lot of fun. It was written by Auden (1907-1973), for Robert
Lederer, when he was getting old and curmudgeonly, and it's about getting
old and curmudgeonly. Writing engaging doggerel is more challenging than it
seems. Auden often expresses his values by dialectical opposition --
Arcadian versus Utopian ('Vespers'), or Hermetic versus Apollonian ('Under
Which Lyre', Poem #1082) -- in this one his prejudices are articulated
simply and directly.

William Grey.

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A Hard Rain's A-Gonna Fall -- Bob Dylan

Guest poem sent in by "Aseem"

(Poem #1770) A Hard Rain's A-Gonna Fall Oh, where have you been, my blue-eyed son? Oh, where have you been, my darling young one? I've stumbled on the side of twelve misty mountains, I've walked and I've crawled on six crooked highways, I've stepped in the middle of seven sad forests, I've been out in front of a dozen dead oceans, I've been ten thousand miles in the mouth of a graveyard, And it's a hard, and it's a hard, it's a hard, and it's a hard, And it's a hard rain's a-gonna fall. Oh, what did you see, my blue-eyed son? Oh, what did you see, my darling young one? I saw a newborn baby with wild wolves all around it I saw a highway of diamonds with nobody on it, I saw a black branch with blood that kept drippin', I saw a room full of men with their hammers a-bleedin', I saw a white ladder all covered with water, I saw ten thousand talkers whose tongues were all broken, I saw guns and sharp swords in the hands of young children, And it's a hard, and it's a hard, it's a hard, it's a hard, And it's a hard rain's a-gonna fall. And what did you hear, my blue-eyed son? And what did you hear, my darling young one? I heard the sound of a thunder, it roared out a warnin', Heard the roar of a wave that could drown the whole world, Heard one hundred drummers whose hands were a-blazin', Heard ten thousand whisperin' and nobody listenin', Heard one person starve, I heard many people laughin', Heard the song of a poet who died in the gutter, Heard the sound of a clown who cried in the alley, And it's a hard, and it's a hard, it's a hard, it's a hard, And it's a hard rain's a-gonna fall. Oh, who did you meet, my blue-eyed son? Who did you meet, my darling young one? I met a young child beside a dead pony, I met a white man who walked a black dog, I met a young woman whose body was burning, I met a young girl, she gave me a rainbow, I met one man who was wounded in love, I met another man who was wounded with hatred, And it's a hard, it's a hard, it's a hard, it's a hard, It's a hard rain's a-gonna fall. Oh, what'll you do now, my blue-eyed son? Oh, what'll you do now, my darling young one? I'm a-goin' back out 'fore the rain starts a-fallin', I'll walk to the depths of the deepest black forest, Where the people are many and their hands are all empty, Where the pellets of poison are flooding their waters, Where the home in the valley meets the damp dirty prison, Where the executioner's face is always well hidden, Where hunger is ugly, where souls are forgotten, Where black is the color, where none is the number, And I'll tell it and think it and speak it and breathe it, And reflect it from the mountain so all souls can see it, Then I'll stand on the ocean until I start sinkin', But I'll know my song well before I start singin', And it's a hard, it's a hard, it's a hard, it's a hard, It's a hard rain's a-gonna fall. -- Bob Dylan

As the death toll from the recent flooding of Bombay climbed higher each
day, and I sat half way across the world, surfing the images of tragedy and
despair (feeling strangely guilty, somehow, for not being there) this is the
song that kept playing in my head.

There are many stories that came out of that fateful day - indeed, as
someone said, everyone has a story to tell. There are many different
emotions in these stories - some are filled with hope, others with despair;
some speak of small miracles, others of senseless misfortune; some allow us
to celebrate the brotherhood, the fundamental decency of man towards man,
others highlight the world's indifference to the plight of the victims.

Dylan's song captures perfectly that sense of a fractured world, the
reduction of the truth into a series of images, the impossibility of taking
in exactly what has happened. At one level this is a confused, restless
song. It moves from phrase to phrase, vision to vision, leaving you with the
sense of some sweeping, momentous message, combined with a sense of dread.
But it is also a song of great courage - a song that grits its jaw and braces
itself for the devastation it knows is coming. There are some beautiful phrases

here - lines that demonstrate how true, how fine a poet the young Dylan really
was - but the overall message of this song is that we shall face the whole of
our sorrow and not be defeated by it.

Aseem

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