Very glad to read this exceptional poem, which I missed in the LRB, but I
don't quite see why it should be used as an arm against (or reproach to) the
'mainstream'.
Best,
Jamie
----- Original Message -----
From: "[log in to unmask]" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Friday, October 07, 2011 12:28 PM
Subject: Re: Forward for RFL
If you're interested:
http://www.lrb.co.uk/v32/n22/rf-langley/to-a-nightingale
Test (missing some italics) below:
Nothing along the road. But
petals, maybe. Pink behind
and white inside. Nothing but
the coping of a bridge. Mutes
on the bricks, hard as putty,
then, in the sun, as metal.
Burls of Grimmia, hairy,
hoary, with their seed-capsules
uncurling. Red mites bowling
about on the baked lichen
and what look like casual
landings, striped flies, Helina,
Phaonia, could they be?
This month the lemon, I’ll say
primrose-coloured, moths, which flinch
along the hedge then turn in
to hide, are Yellow Shells not
Shaded Broad-bars. Lines waver.
Camptogramma. Heat off the
road and the nick-nack of names.
Scotopteryx. Darkwing. The
flutter. Doubles and blurs the
margin. Fuscous and white. Stop
at nothing. To stop here at
nothing, as a chaffinch sings
interminably, all day.
A chiff-chaff. Purring of two
turtle doves. Voices, and some
vibrate with tenderness. I
say none of this for love. It
is anyone’s giff-gaff. It
is anyone’s quelque chose.
No business of mine. Mites which
ramble. Caterpillars which
curl up as question marks. Then
one note, five times, louder each
time, followed, after a fraught
pause, by a soft cuckle of
wet pebbles, which I could call
a glottal rattle. I am
empty, stopped at nothing, as
I wait for this song to shoot.
The road is rising as it
passes the apple tree and
makes its approach to the bridge.
At one level this is RFL being more mainstream than a mainstream poet would
dare to be. Some will remember "The song of the chiffchaff" as part of
Willans/Searle 1950s-era satire of soppy English teachers in Down with
Skool. So maybe it's fitting that the poem should be a Forward winner!
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