Gloom Breaker – an ode on the tale of the heart-healing power of the songs of the birds of Rhiannon
I
At dim-lit dawn on Platform 1 in sombre throng
we stand forlorn in flat, sense-numb routine
until from trackside trees bright breaks the redbreast song:
clear, lucent water in a crystal stream
We tend to think that we’ll not hear
such music at this time of year
yet chiffchaff, thrush and finch brave Winter’s squall
Untensing, in my mental eye
I spread my wings; I rise and fly
upon the soothing sound set free, and then recall
II
how Branwen’s hope lay likewise in her feathered friend
as she in miniature set down her news:
‘Come soon! I, Queen of Eire am by brute force detained
Your sister, Bran, they torture and abuse’
She ring-wise rolls her chosen words
and gently takes the docile bird’s
frail form and round a tiny leg she ties
the note. A kiss, to wish it well
then through the window of her cell
releases it and skyward, swift the starling flies
III
It lands, it sings, they read, they sail, but sail in vain:
A fire claims her child – she can’t but grieve
and though Bran’s fleet a wood had seemed upon the main
Just queen and seven soldiers live to leave
Eleven leagues from their departure
Branwen dies of broken heart.
So on in gravest grief the Seven sail
Yet, over the ensuing years
they’re healed in Harlech, through their tears
like me – by bird and bard: sweet song and well-wrought tale.
Bird is Spring
If you go down to the woods today
you’re in for a big surprise
as dozens of darling dinosaurs
compete for their opera prize
A phrase from one may establish its rhythm, but
then it’s lost as another phrase cuts blithely across it
with all the informality of free verse, in rich cacophony
And then that rhythm you heard before
will suddenly reappear
in a moment of ordered harmony
as if made for the human ear
Then it’s gone again, but the sounds still delight – heaven-storming chitterings
pulsing scintillating emanations through the sap-irrigated matrix of the Chloromyriad
The Old Romantics oh!’d and ah!’d
for they found it uplifting and freeing
and now the science is backing them up:
It bolters our mental well-being
So bathe in the forest and smell the earthy humus for even now
the Star-lungs are warming up their vox-boxes in readiness – may we likewise
prep our auro-tubules for sensitive apprecio-resonance with this ancient treasure of our planet!
If you’re on the road to Chitterfest
you’d better keep moving fast
for tomorrow’s the day the developers come
so this chance may be your last
Sing on, sweet birds, sing on your spasmodic gutterations of brain-brightening liquid light!
Star-lungs: stars are flowers; flowers is bird; bird is Spring…. No bird, no Spring
Should every bird that ever there was
stare mute from under glass –
just dozens of dry, dumb dodos –
we’ll despair that this came to pass
Stay Songbird, Stay
O key ingredient of the harmony
Of Spring, dear Songbird stay, we beg you, stay!
The dead must feel an equal agony
To hear you not, nor see the light of day
Should silence fall within the woodland dells
We’d mourn as if the Sun had left the sky
Or all the flowers lost their honey smells
As from their petals drained the coloured dye
We love those trills that irrigate the mind
With water from a laughing, babbling stream
Your calls explore a secret sylvan space
And by the echoes somehow is defined
Within our human thought a painted scene
Of all that’s filled with natural, verdant grace
Sweet Songbird stay and ever, ever sing for once you’re gone it never could be Spring
We’ll take whatever course for you is best
Ensure the fields from poisons are kept free
Keep dogs instead of cats, to spare your nest
And anywhere you need it plant a tree
We’ll plant such bowery covert as you need
We’ll plant so you can shelter, roost and call
We’ll plant the plants that give you food to feed
We’ll plant them if we value Spring at all
We love each sound you sing, o darling bird
All notes that issue from your quavering throat
Each lilting warble, chirrup, cheep and coo
By which the silent sleeping air is stirred
These sounds now through my open window float
To broach the Gates of Dawn, and bring the New!
Sweet Songbird stay and ever, ever sing for once you’re gone it never could be Spring
Barnes’ Owl in the Snow
(rhymes written after reading Simon Barnes’ blog post Barn owl in the snow)
Across the marsh, white passing over white
the silent hunter flies then loses height
descending to a favoured perch to stand
and view with icy gaze an icy land
Stray snowflakes catch my fancy, frivolous
but never his; his hunt is serious.
Across the marsh, white passing over white
Outside the stables, freezing at the sight
I let my busy, muck-filled spade fall still
A thought occurs that gives a further thrill:
this, and the pellet found the other day
suggest the owls have come back here to stay!
Across the marsh, white passing over white
Fight on! Though cold Spring breeding left its blight
The pellet, when with tweezers prised in two
revealed the fine-boned relics of a shrew
strange artefacts of Lilliputian size
a fascinating wonder for young eyes.
Across the marsh, white passing over white
he signifies to me a world put right
Will future generations ever know
that world? To them, and our own souls we owe
our best attempt to turn the tide around
so nights then still awe-shiver at his sound.
Across the marsh, white passing over white
A treasured moment; may a poet write
some verses that will eloquently share
this plea and make the world more keenly care
and feel, if all is lost, how dear the price.
For now, the humble lines here must suffice.
ROCK ART 4 REWILDING 