Tuesday, May 14, 2024

 1972


Jessica’s shoulders gleamed
her torso wrapped in a warm towel
posed on a wooden table
while a kettle steamed
still damp from her bath
legs astride dangling by the dowel

she had auditioned for a TV series
outside in the street
the edge of a shilling
scraped a Rolls Royce
as a photographer created
mise-en-scene

a scratch left a scar 
on not just any car
that door opened onto luxury
a slight scratch on its paint
Jess would notice if she got in

a few years before
Blow Up was showing
in the cinema, in London
when hot pants were in style
photography was in

Jess got the part
Bob Ellis photographed rock bands
young men were in London
back from Vietnam
Nixon and Kissinger
bombs, defoliants, war

when Sen had the idea
of translating Chinese poems
and I helped him
revise them
then took them to Roughside
where I worked on them more

*

I was alone at Roughside walking the moor
atop the crags over abandoned quarry shafts
with a view towards Smales several miles further
a short-eared owl swooping to stop nearer approach,
towards owlets out of their nest on Roughside moor.
descending the steep slope to the banks of the Cleugh
on sunny days though grass was dry to lie upon
its roots were damp with dew if your fingers felt there.
sound didn’t carry once you stepped over the edge,
down among memories of what happened before.
towards a gnarled and stunted leafless tree bereft
by the banks of a stream running through a ravine
past an untended spring aware only of silence

back at Roughside
a view from the stone cottage window 
across saplings not high enough then to spoil the views
of tree lined Chirdon Burn or Stonehaugh Crag

overlooking an ash tree thrice as tall now as then
seldom movement below in the valley beyond
except birds, deer, an adder disturbed.

at night one lamp two miles away
an unfriendly farm beyond The Bower
otherwise, darkness 

except moonlight
starlight

and Li Po wrote:

A jug of wine         among flowers 
in the moonlight      nobody close

so I raised my cup to the bright moon
bade it drink with me

just the three of us
bright moon     my shadow     and me

shadows only imitate
the moon cannot comprehend

in spite of that we were happy
you must enjoy life in Spring

I sang   the moon listened
I danced   my shadow capered about

we were all      strangers once
now    we are such good friends

we drink    we laugh

we laugh    we drink

though we’ll part
we'll meet once more

I raise my cup to the bright moon
to journey beyond time

*       
            
working from an anthology
of an earlier tradition
translated by Sen
rearranged by Russell
a process of endless revision 
admiring the brushwork
of admired court poets 
only a copier not a copyist

once there was music
once there were friends
we didn’t feel outdone by Dylan
less popular than McKuen
we were all friends

once upon a time
back then

*

Now in these times of strife*
famines follow disasters
lands unploughed and wasted
our inheritance goes empty

brothers   sisters   are drifting
going east going west

while this war continues 
they cannot meet   or
direct their steps home
where doors bang in the wind
gardens lie ruined

they are my flesh and blood
yet they drift down strange roads
dragging their lonely shadows
through far countries
unable to lean on a friend

like a solitary bird
blown thousands of miles
like uprooted grass
scattered in the wind
I am alone
cut off from home

now we all look up at the moon
in five different places
the same thought clouds our eyes

and we weep
                        Po-Chu-Yi
T'ang Dynasty
translated by David Sen, Dick Russell

Published in 2nd Aeon, Wales, 1971
                        and in Chapman, Dick Russell issue, Vol III. No. 4, 1975


Dick Russell (C) Richard M Russell
                     2014

Friday, May 10, 2024

 Excerpt from Ballade


     second movement



I had a dream
that the fire should be kept going
that I was alone in the world
that I had to do it alone
hoping someday someone would assist me
& to keep the fire alight
I had millions of matches
all the matches in the world 
were piled behind me
like the great Chinese wall
curving over the horizon
& I threw matches at the fire
to keep it burning
& I used up the matches
I went further and further to get them
& I did it
I ran back and forth along the wall
bringing matches
& I didn't eat
I didn't sleep
I drank nothing
in the dream I went on forever
keeping the fire alight
till somebody came
then there were arguments  
about the procedure
to be followed

*

broken sound fall on stone
from the waste pipe above
water splashes

sound of separation
of distance between objects

between the noise of things
an essential silence
of movement
                      of limbs
(
before   light   dark
at the center towards which
air swirls   is warmed
falls back   re-enters

and always before that
warmth
light
air

then dust brought

then warmer   faster
then breeze   wind
darkness
)

in my beginnings

were wind myth
myth carnal
bee rhythms
stem sway

wing fall

organic mulch 
feeds the sycamore trees

but one wing
wing of myth
with bones    joints
a thumb

let go
forego
the primates thumb
indulge in chimerical inconabulum

breeze
sway 
touch 
all pollinate me
but my species?
hostile
since my beginnings

*
& always a dangling sleeve
that touched the table brushed the table
in one movement a beard pointed Cortez
aware of attention   eyes lifted above ocean
eyes piercing white sclera
wind drilling the pupil
scratch of ivory on bone...
then movement again
piano keys tinkling
nails tapping trills on the ivory

before the music of the song
five lines danced in a wide void
the hub of a chorus of voices
gouged a groove in tunnel walls
nothing ever appeared in the octave
save eight shredded eels
& the fumes of a gill

such does the loom unweave
conversation talk down the wall
talk each brick back to the pile

in freshness of silk falling
silk billowing
in lichen moist on the windowframe
uninvolvement
like an uncoiled spring

meaningfullness
the whole dividing
halves multiplying
& the swimming organisms
heads talking above fluid things

& always a dangling sleeve
sleeve sinking
silk billowing
& that moist emanence of closely approached odor
the chemicals of low volatility
which may not be smelt from far off




Dick Russell(C) Richard M Russell
                2024



The full poem was published by Chapman
Vol. III.  No. 4 Dick Russell Issue
Edinburgh 1975





Wednesday, May 8, 2024

 

One Day In Early May


In bright spring sunshine
tidily swept by rinsing rain
pink petals edge driveways
creamy white apple blossoms
tinged with red 
nipple 
boughs
brighter green new growth
on evergreen trees
over wintering lettuce 
swiss chard, sorrel
everywhere life forms are alive
                                          and growing
living out their DNA

and our species?
so clever
so smart
so civilized

still no word of peace
just havoc. 




Dick Russell (C) Richard M Russell
                         2024


Sunday, May 5, 2024

 For Sylvia Inoue
     1927-2024

Away faraway
hark their faint calls
those that have left us
those that have gone
lost in the onrush
as time gallops along

Now Sylvia's gone 
these words intone
she lived a long time
alive no more
to nickel and dime
at the goodwill store

She'll send no more gifts 
books from her shelf
Greek tragedies, plays
classical myths
Yule tree ornaments
Batchelder's china

She listened to 
right-wing radio
hated to pay tax
kept chickens in her yard
loved watching birds
while life went slack

She argued more than most
Contrarian, why was that?
why was she so stubborn?
her activist parents
Kenneth and Yvonne
taught her all that.

She leaves a daughter 
four sons as well
five grown grandchildren
a great grandchild
so, she lives on
regeneration

Away faraway
hark their faint calls
those that have left us
those that have gone
lost in the onrush
as time gallops along.


Dick Russell (C) Richard M Russell
                           2024


Thursday, May 2, 2024

  Harkaway Faraway

For Joanna



When we last saw Joanna, we brought fresh flowers
a long-stemmed bouquet to give our hostess
whose hospitality a life embowered
with radiant remembered warmth that won't grow less

Away faraway, someone I haven’t seen
except in daydreams 
now more rare
she moves me now as when 
she asked me
why?
why was it 
I was there?
 
I did as she asked
wrote her a poem
on
leave-takings 
fond farewells

Away faraway, more urgent now to return
to those times when friends were alive

to that table, those chairs
those
bottles of myth
we
poured nightly       

She died suddenly, so did Yvonne.
David H lingered with cancer too long
he seemed tired of it
when we saw him last

Harkaway faraway, hark their faint calls
as they travel onward into our past


Dick Russell © Richard M Russell
                    2024

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