If as Herod, we fill our lives with things and again things;
If we consider ourselves so important that we must fill
Every moment of our lives with action;
When will we have the time to make the long slow journey
Across the burning desert as did the Magi;
Or sit and watch the stars as did the shepherds;
Or to brood over the coming of the Child as did Mary?
For each one of us there is a desert to travel,
A star to discover,
And a being within ourselves to bring to life.
I read “The Road to Bethlehem” online and saved a copy of the poem but not the URL of the website where I found it. The poem was attributed to Anonymous, and I haven’t been able to find the author’s name. If you know who wrote it, please send the name and, if possible, other documentation in a comment, so I can give the poet credit for his creation and can seek information about copyright. Until I know more, I will assume the poem is in the public domain.
The Owl and the Pussy-Cat went to sea
In a beautiful pea-green boat:
They took some honey, and plenty of money
Wrapped up in a five-pound note.
The Owl looked up to the stars above,
And sang to a small guitar,
“O lovely Pussy, O Pussy, my love,
What a beautiful Pussy you are,
You are,
You are!
What a beautiful Pussy you are!”
II
Pussy said to the Owl, “You elegant fowl,
How charmingly sweet you sing!
Oh! let us be married; too long we have tarried,
But what shall we do for a ring?”
They sailed away, for a year and a day,
To the land where the bong-tree grows;
And there in a wood a Piggy-wig stood,
With a ring at the end of his nose,
His nose,
His nose,
With a ring at the end of his nose.
III
“Dear Pig, are you willing to sell for one shilling
Your ring?” Said the Piggy, “I will.”
So they took it away, and were married next day
By the turkey who lives on the hill.
They dined on mince and slices of quince,
Which they ate with a runcible spoon;
And hand in hand, on the edge of the sand,
They danced by the light of the moon,
The moon,
Once upon a time, a few days before Halloween, my friend EM called and said, “There are thirteen men under my house. They’re leveling it. For the second time in five years.” She then asked whether David and I would go with her and her husband to see the Edgar Allan Poe exhibit at the Harry Ransom Center, on the University of Texas campus. The next day, I presented EM, via email, the following verse. Mr. Poe would probably be horrified, but since EM is my Muse, the end product is bound to be a bit quirky.
The copyright holder of this file allows anyone to use it for any purpose, provided that the copyright holder is properly attributed. Redistribution, derivative work, commercial use, and all other use is permitted.
THE MAVEN
To G and EM, in celebration of their tenth trimester of home improvement, with gratitude and affection
Forgive me for making mirth of melancholy
Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered weak and weary
Over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore,
While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a rapping,
As of someone gently tapping, tapping at my chamber floor.
“‘Tis some armadillo,” said I, “tapping at my chamber floor,
Only this, and nothing more.”
Ah, distinctly I remember it was in the dry September,
And my house was sinking southward, lower than my bowling score,
Pier and beam and blocks of concrete, quiet as Deuteron’my’s cat feet,
Drooping like an unstarched bedsheet toward the planet’s molten core.
“That poor armadillo,” thought I, “choosing my house to explore.
He’ll squash like an accordion door.”
“Tuck,” I cried, “and Abby, come here! If my sanity you holddear,
Go and get that armadillo, on him all your rancor pour.
While he’s bumping and a-thumping, give his rear a royal whumping,
Send him hence with head a-lumping, for this noise do I abhor.
Dasypus novemcinctus is not a beast I can ignore,
Clumping ‘neath my chamber floor.”
While they stood there prancing, fretting, I imparted one last petting,
Loosed their leashes and cried “Havoc!” then let slip the dogs of war.
As they flew out, charged with venom, I pulled close my robe of denim.
“They will find him at a minimum,” I said, “and surely more,
Give him such a mighty whacking he’ll renounce forevermore
Lumbering ‘neath my chamber floor.”
But to my surprise and wonder, dogs came flying back like thunder.
“That’s no armadillo milling underneath your chamber floor.
Just a man with rule and level, seems engaged in mindless revel,
Crawling ’round. The wretched devil is someone we’ve seen before,
Measuring once and measuring twice and measuring thrice. We said, ‘Senor,
Get thee out or thee’s done for.’”
“Zounds!” I shouted, turning scarlet. “What is this, some vill’nous varlet
Who has come to torment me with mem’ries of my tilting floor?”
Fixing myself at my station by my floundering foundation,
Held I up a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore.
“Out, you cad!” I said, “or else prepare to sleep beneath my floor,
Nameless there forever more.”
Ere my words had ceased resounding, with their echo still surrounding,
Crawled he out, saluted, and spoke words that chilled my very core.
“I been down there with my level, and those piers got quite a bevel.
It’s a case of major evolution: totter, tilt galore.
Gotta fix it right away, ma’am, ‘less you want your chamber floor
At a slant forevermore.”
At his words there came a pounding and a dozen men came bounding
From his pickup, and they dropped and disappeared beneath my floor.
And they carried beam and hammer and observed no rules of grammar,
And the air was filled with clamor and a clanging I deplore.
“Take thy beam and take thy level and thy failing Apgar score
And begone forevermore.”
But they would not heed my prayer, and their braying filled the air,
And it filled me with despair, this brouhaha that I deplore.
“Fiend!” I said. “If you had breeding, you would listen to my pleading,
For I feel my mind seceding from its sane and sober core,
And my house shall fall like Usher.” Said the leader of the corps,
“Lady, you got no rapport.”
“How long,” shrieked I then in horror, “like an ominous elm borer,
Like a squirrely acorn storer will you lurk beneath my floor?
Prophesy!” I cried, undaunted by the chutzpah that he flaunted,
And the expertise he vaunted. “Tell me, tell me, how much more?”
But he strutted and he swaggered like a man who knows the score.
Quoth the maven, “Evermore.”
He went off to join his legion in my house’s nether region
While my dogs looked on in sorrow at that dubious guarantor.
Then withdrawing from this vassal with his temperament so facile
I went back into my castle and I locked my chamber door.
“On the morrow, they’ll not leave me, but will lodge beneath my floor
Winter, spring, forevermore.
So the hammering and the clamoring and the yapping, yawping yammering
And the shrieking, squawking stammering still are sounding ‘neath my floor.
And I sit here sullen, slumping in my chair and dream the thumping
And the armadillo’s bumping is a sound I could adore.
For those soles of boots from out the crawlspace ‘neath my chamber floor
Shall be lifted—Nevermore!
Detail of the statue of a raven on the grounds of the Edgar Allan Poe National Historical Site in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania (USA). (Photo credit: Wikipedia) By Midnightdreary (Own work) [Public domain], via Wikimedia CommonsReposted from Whiskertips.
I’m watching Patterns, a movie written by Rod Serling. Van Heflin plays a young production engineer hired by a ruthless industrialist to replace his vice-president, whose ethics and integrity make him, in his superior’s eyes, a liability to the company. The new executive finds himself caught in a pattern he’s determined to break.
The movie’s name reminded me of the Amy Lowell poem, in which a woman trapped in a different pattern wishes to break free.
PATTERNS
Formal Garden, Quarry Bank Mill This section of the former mill-owners garden is laid out in a formal pattern. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
I walk down the garden paths,
And all the daffodils
Are blowing, and the bright blue squills.
I walk down the patterned garden-paths
In my stiff, brocaded gown.
With my powdered hair and jewelled fan,
I too am a rare
Pattern. As I wander down
The garden paths.
My dress is richly figured,
And the train
Makes a pink and silver stain
On the gravel, and the thrift
Of the borders.
Just a plate of current fashion,
Tripping by in high-heeled, ribboned shoes.
Not a softness anywhere about me,
Only whalebone and brocade.
And I sink on a seat in the shade
Of a lime tree. For my passion
Wars against the stiff brocade.
The daffodils and squills
Flutter in the breeze
As they please.
And I weep;
For the lime-tree is in blossom
And one small flower has dropped upon my bosom.
And the plashing of waterdrops
In the marble fountain
Comes down the garden-paths.
The dripping never stops.
Underneath my stiffened gown
Is the softness of a woman bathing in a marble basin,
A basin in the midst of hedges grown
So thick, she cannot see her lover hiding,
But she guesses he is near,
And the sliding of the water
Seems the stroking of a dear
Hand upon her.
What is Summer in a fine brocaded gown!
I should like to see it lying in a heap upon the ground.
All the pink and silver crumpled up on the ground.
I would be the pink and silver as I ran along the
paths,
And he would stumble after,
Bewildered by my laughter.
I should see the sun flashing from his sword-hilt and the buckles
on his shoes.
I would choose
To lead him in a maze along the patterned paths,
A bright and laughing maze for my heavy-booted lover,
Till he caught me in the shade,
And the buttons of his waistcoat bruised my body as he clasped me,
Aching, melting, unafraid.
With the shadows of the leaves and the sundrops,
And the plopping of the waterdrops,
All about us in the open afternoon —
I am very like to swoon
With the weight of this brocade,
For the sun sifts through the shade.
Underneath the fallen blossom
In my bosom,
Is a letter I have hid.
It was brought to me this morning by a rider from the Duke.
“Madam, we regret to inform you that Lord Hartwell
Died in action Thursday se’nnight.”
As I read it in the white, morning sunlight,
The letters squirmed like snakes.
“Any answer, Madam,” said my footman.
“No,” I told him.
“See that the messenger takes some refreshment.
No, no answer.”
And I walked into the garden,
Up and down the patterned paths,
In my stiff, correct brocade.
The blue and yellow flowers stood up proudly in the sun,
Each one.
I stood upright too,
Held rigid to the pattern
By the stiffness of my gown.
Up and down I walked,
Up and down.
In a month he would have been my husband.
In a month, here, underneath this lime,
We would have broke the pattern;
He for me, and I for him,
He as Colonel, I as Lady,
On this shady seat.
He had a whim
That sunlight carried blessing.
And I answered, “It shall be as you have said.”
Now he is dead.
In Summer and in Winter I shall walk
Up and down
The patterned garden-paths
In my stiff, brocaded gown.
The squills and daffodils
Will give place to pillared roses, and to asters, and to snow.
I shall go
Up and down,
In my gown.
Gorgeously arrayed,
Boned and stayed.
And the softness of my body will be guarded from embrace
By each button, hook, and lace.
For the man who should loose me is dead,
Fighting with the Duke in Flanders,
In a pattern called a war.
Christ! What are patterns for?
Fern Bisel Peat illustration for Wynken, Blynken, and Nod (Photo credit: Crossett Library Bennington College)
Wynken, Blynken, and Nod one night
Sailed off in a wooden shoe —
Sailed on a river of crystal light,
Into a sea of dew.
“Where are you going, and what do you wish?”
The old moon asked the three.
“We have come to fish for the herring fish
That live in this beautiful sea;
Nets of silver and gold have we!”
Said Wynken, Blynken, and Nod.
The old moon laughed and sang a song,
As they rocked in the wooden shoe,
And the wind that sped them all night long
Ruffled the waves of dew.
The little stars were the herring fish
That lived in that beautiful sea —
“Now cast your nets wherever you wish —
Never afeard are we”;
So cried the stars to the fishermen three:
Wynken, Blynken, and Nod.
All night long their nets they threw
To the stars in the twinkling foam —
Then down from the skies came the wooden shoe,
Bringing the fishermen home;
‘Twas all so pretty a sail it seemed
As if it could not be,
And some folks thought ’twas a dream they’d dreamed
Of sailing that beautiful sea —
But I shall name you the fishermen three:
Wynken, Blynken, and Nod.
Wynken and Blynken are two little eyes,
And Nod is a little head,
And the wooden shoe that sailed the skies
Is a wee one’s trundle-bed.
So shut your eyes while mother sings
Of wonderful sights that be,
And you shall see the beautiful things
As you rock in the misty sea,
Where the old shoe rocked the fishermen three:
Wynken, Blynken, and Nod.
~ Eugene Field
“Wynken, Blynken, and Nod” is one of the poems my mother read to me from the Bumper Book every night at bedtime when I was very young. I didn’t want to sleep then any more than I do now, so she read a lot of poems. I heard this one so many times that I was reciting it from memory when I was two years old. I’ve always had a tape recorder in my head.
Since the first of the year, I’ve written for an hour a day, one of the suggestions I made for myself for the first week of ROW80. But I continue a slave to my habit of night-owling.
I’m not the only one.
“I write this from a swivel chair at 4.17 a.m.,” says Matt Shoard. “Twitter has gone quiet. There is darkness for miles. I can hear a watch tick. It’s the longest night of the year, and if I time things carefully, I could avoid daylight for 48 hours. What’s more, research suggests it won’t just be me. There’s a mislaid family of readers and writers at night, and at this hour there’s nothing else to do but search for them.” He goes on to list writers who worked at night: Robert Frost, Charles Dickens, JD Salinger, Stephanie Meyer, Danielle Steel, Barak Obama, Kafka, Proust.
But there our similarities end. The people Shoard names are personages. They’ve demonstrated their ability to lose sleep and yet do fine work. I’ve demonstrated my ability to go lose sleep and then run aground. I’m not a personage. I’m still the ornery child whose mother made me take naps and go to bed early at night because she said without enough sleep, I was grouchy.
I’m way past grouchy now. Restraining myself, but teetering on the verge of crotchety, cross, and choleric.
Furthermore, the flu has hit town with a vengeance. One more late night and my ravelled sleave of care won’t be worth knitting up. Neither will my flu shot.
So good night. I’m off to sail on that river of crystal light and rock in the misty sea.
Dear March — Come in —
How glad I am —
I hoped for you before —
Put down your Hat —
You must have walked —
How out of Breath you are —
Dear March, Come right upstairs with me —
I have so much to tell —
I got your Letter, and the Birds —
The Maples never knew that you were coming — till I called
I declare — how Red their Faces grew —
But March, forgive me — and
All those Hills you left for me to Hue —
There was no Purple suitable —
You took it all with you —
Who knocks? That April.
Lock the Door —
I will not be pursued —
He stayed away a Year to call
When I am occupied —
But trifles look so trivial
As soon as you have come
That Blame is just as dear as Praise
And Praise as mere as Blame —
~ Emily Dickinson
*****
Image of daffodil by Nanda93 (Own work) [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons
Out on the porch it’s August,
But it’s cool inside and dim, one bulb suspending from a cord.
A slim brunette holding a bottle of Royal Crown Cola
Smiles down from above the mirror.
In the back, where it’s dark and you’ve never been,
Sit two small, dusty tables and four delicate chairs.
Once, flappers and their beaus
Sipped sodas there and flirted,
But now they’re ghosts.
Behind the marble counter stands Dick Ward,
Eighty years old to your seven, and deaf, and wiry as the chairs,
Blue eyes dancing.
“Chocolate, please,” you say.
He leans down, tilts his head.
“What?”
You stand on tiptoe, breathe deep, shout.
“Chocolate!”
Of course, it’s just a game, because
He knew before he asked.
He dives down, disappears into the marble, rises with a cone,
Huge, double-dipped,
And proffers it.
You hand him your nickel.
“Thank you.”
As you turn to leave, Mr. Perry shuffles in.
“Bugler!” he rasps,
And as Dick reaches for the tobacco
You know that’s wrong,
Because your grandfather smokes Bull Durham,
And anyway,
How could anyone pass up chocolate?
~~~~~~~~~~
“W. F. Ward, Confectioner, 1958” first appeared in the 2008 issue of True Words Anthology, a publication of Story Circle Network.
M. K. Waller 