Hi Sally,
I like this version. It's still got that spooky Dickensian/Gothis feel to
it. I still shiver!
Does the phrase: "in our day" and the "we" of the poem imply you were one of
the Brownies? Could more be made of who the narrator is? (I'm asking because
I'm not sure... what do you think?)
But I'd still trim some things... I've put some markers/comments in the
text.
Bob

>
>>From: Sally Evans <[log in to unmask]>
>>Reply-To: The Pennine Poetry Works <[log in to unmask]>
>>To: [log in to unmask]
>>Subject: Mr Ford  revision
>>Date: Fri, 10 Dec 2004 19:27:34 +0000
>>
>>Revision -
>>some of your suggestions taken on board (thanks) , but where are we now?
>>
>>
>>Mr Ford
>>
>>Mr Ford's spectre paced his basement room.
>>His window opened on a hollow green
>>below his garden of collected trees,
>>his cases NOW empty of his calf-bound books, (ADD A WORD)
>>his fireplace rarely brought to life with flame.
>>That's who he was: VIctorian, gardener,
>>cleric, and father (I think it was of ten).
>>He claimed peace to study there and then,
>>the spacious chamber entered from the kitchen
>>by stone steps. The room was used in our day
>>only on Wednesdays by the Brownies.
>>
>>A post-Victorian, heavy billiard table (ALL BILLIARD TABLES ARE HEAVY!!!)
>>slunk to one side, unused (there was a cue).
>>The boarded floor was dry, the rug threadbare.
>>We sometimes put ice-cream blocks on a stair
>>to keep them cool. The sweet green smell
>>of apples on the ledges, and a wine rack,
>>cobwebby, unused. A locked old door
>>led to a room with a frightful secret
>>we couldn't ask about, were stone-walled
>>if we tried. A flicker of silence
>>was seen in our parents' eyes.
>>
>>In old houses, unknown secrets sleep.
>>To live above them, can we waken them?
>>Did Mr Ford, who kept this library
>>beside a dungeon, hidden from his children
>>by stairs and keys, conceal hard facts from them
>>in kindly wisdom or hypocrisy, (THIS & THE NEXT LINE - TOO MANY ABSTRACT
>>THINGS! SO...
>>in sympathy, guilt or conspiracy,   PERHAPS DELETE THIS LINE???
>>or could he summon no words, did he think
>>the cold and fear that lingered  and produced
>>a young girl's shadow, should be warmed by fire,
>>shelved and planted with a garden?
>>
If you deleted the suggested line above then it might be possible to say
something ese in the stanza, too. Something more about "old houses" perhaps?
>>Sally Evans