Favourite Poetry - The Four Quartets

The last lines of the Four Quartets on the wall of Salisbury Cathedral

At the still point of the turning world. Neither flesh nor fleshless;

Neither from nor towards; at the still point, there the dance is,
But neither arrest nor movement. And do not call it fixity,
Where past and future are gathered. Neither movement from nor towards,
Neither ascent nor decline. Except for the point, the still point,
There would be no dance, and there is only the dance.



I said to my soul, be still, and wait without hope

For hope would be hope for the wrong thing; wait without love,

For love would be love of the wrong thing; there is yet faith

But the faith and the love and the hope are all in the waiting.

Wait without thought, for you are not ready for thought:

So the darkness shall be the light, and the stillness the dancing.

East Coker III

And all shall be well and

All manner of thing shall be well

When the tongues of flame are in-folded

Into the crowned knot of fire

And the fire and the rose are one.

Little Gidding

And hear Jeremy Irons here http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b086ldlr

The Dressing Table (poem by my daughter)

Annette Lawford

There you sat, one leg folded over the other
Your wooden stick by you
The one you’d had since you were twenty
Since then, I heard the echoes of your vanity
Swirling round that dirty mirror
And there I was, sitting on the bed
I was seven and playing with your jewellery
My dear and old grandmother, I was by you then
The mirrors, the boxes, the ornaments and you,
You became an exhibition and I admired
Your hair that reminded me of looms, your hands
Carved from cherry wood, the deep grey storms you had for eyes
Sunken like glass ships.
Three stained panels faced you, reflected you from all
Sides, embracing your fine lines
The ones that made your skin feel like
Yolk when I kissed your cheeks
You would smile and I’d catch sight of three smiles
And your hair fell like gauze, it was so light
Your fingers playing their way through it,
It seemed as if young children were running through
Cornfields, gold turned dull by the clouds
Just as your fingers made a parting, a silver path
Melted into moonlight.
Then, with one graceful move,
Every lock of hair would lift up past
The nape of your fragile neck, and there! With little effort
Your hands would pin the bun into place
With black slides that slid so gently through the strands
I would watch in silence, as the morning sun would settle
Above the orchard and the pool
I felt the weak beams of light pass through us both
And steal away the colour from the wooden drawers
And the silver rings I’d hold in my hand
And for a second, you seemed so far away
Holding the ivory comb with the missing teeth, your
Eyes gazing dimly at the velvet case, now your mouth
Painted with rouge that barely showed, your lips so small
My memories of you grow old
As if the sun on any day, when shining in my life
Steals your picture away and when you died
That table which you sat at, the throne and the glass panels
Swung open like palace doors
Became my last mental photo of you
As I sat a little older on the stool, remembering you
Knowing that father was selling the house
And I could hear the ivy scratching at the wall
But the dressing table is still your throne,
And in my mind we are the last two who belonged
To that painting in the picture that I hang on the walls
Of my memory,
And I can still make out our figures
Even as the light begins to fade.


Catherine Lawford (aged 14)

The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam

These are just a few of my favourite verses:

One Moment in Annihilation's Waste,
One Moment, of the Well of Life to taste -
The Stars are setting and the Caravan
Starts for the Dawn of Nothing -
Oh, make haste!

Tis all a Chequer-board of Nights and Days,
Where Destiny with Men for Pieces plays:
Hither and thither moves, and mates, and slays,
And one by one back in the closet lays.

For in and out, above, about, below,
'Tis nothing but a magic Shadow-show,
Play'd in a Box whose Candle is the Sun,
Round which we Phantom Figures come and go.

Ah, make the most of what we yet may spend,
Before we too into the Dust descend;
Dust into Dust, and under Dust, to lie,
Sans Wine, sans Song, sans Singer, and- sans End!

And if the Wine you drink, the Lip you press,
End in the Nothing all Things end in -Yes -
Then fancy while Thou art, but what
Thou shall be - Nothing- Thou shall not be less.

Oh, come with old Khayyam, and leave the Wise
To talk; one thing is certain, that Life flies;
One thing is certain, and the Rest is lies:
The Flower that once has blown for ever dies.

This has claim to be one of the greatest poems in the English language as Edward Fitzgerald wrote most of this great poem freshly; very little actually came from Omar Khyyam

Edna St Vincent Millay - Love Is Not All

Love is not all: it is not meat and drink
Nor slumber, nor a roof against the rain;
Nor yet a floating spar to men that sink
And rise and sink and rise and sink again;
Love cannot fill the thickened lung with breath,
Nor clean the blood, nor set the fractured bone;
Yet many a man is making friends with death,
Even as I speak, for want of love alone.

See also another of my favourite Millay poems as well as her famous 'Dirge Without Music'

Favourite Museums - Miho Museum, Japan

The Miho Museum houses Mihoko Koyama's private collection of Asian and Western antiques bought by the Shumei organisation. Mihoko Koyama (who died in 2003) was a follower of Mokichi Okada (1882 – 1955), a philosopher and spiritual leader who later became her life teacher. Okada held that the true nature of civilization lies in the realm of beauty—the realm of art. Under his tutelage, Koyama devoted herself to a life of faith, ultimately founding the spiritual organization, Shinji Shumeikai. Under the influence of Okada’s ideas, Koyama came to believe that finding and experiencing objects of beauty could exalt the spirit and bring beauty to the world at large. She met IM Pei in 1997 and had him design the Miho Museum on a mountainside in Shiga Prefecture, not far from Kyoto.

For more photos of the museum, click here 

Heine

A young man loved a maiden
Who turned from him aside
To one who loved another yet
And took her for his bride

The maid at sore resentment
At fortune so ill-starred
Married the first who came along;
The young man took it hard

It is an old, old story
But it is forever new
And whosoever suffers it
It breaks his heart in two

Heine

Song of Solomon

Cherry blossom in Battersea Park

The Song of Solomon

My beloved spake, and said unto me,
Rise up, my love, my fair one, and come away.
For lo, the winter is past, the rain is over and gone;
The flowers appear on the earth; the time of the singing of birds is come, and the voice of the turtle-dove is heard in our land;
The fig tree putteth forth her green figs, and the vines with the tender grape give a good smell.
Arise my love, my fair one and come away.
O my dove, that art in the clefts of the rock, in the secret places of the stairs, let me see thy countenance, let me hear thy voice; for sweet is thy voice and thy countenance is comely.
Take us the foxes, the little foxes, that spoil the vines; for our vines have tender grapes.
My beloved is mine, and I am his: he feedeth among the lilies.

Song of Solomon 2:9


The other Song of Solomon

1. The song of songs which is Solomon's also.

2. And the King who was Solomon did raise himself in his bed on to one arm and
shake his head, for he was sore perplexed, and he did speak thus unto Sharon who was of the Park of Gidea and sayeth:

3. Er, um... this has never happened to me before.

4. And Sharon, whose hair was as a flock of goats from Gilead, for that day she had been to Jason 'n' Gary in the Street which is High for a platinum rinse, did reply unto him: Yea! And truly I am a natural blonde – pull the other one, for it ringeth like the bells of heaven.

5. And Solomon spake saying, No honestly, it must have been that last Malibu; for did I not say that mixing it with Bailey's Irish Cream as the ram is mixed with the ewe in the field, was a bad idea?

6. But Sharon, who was the daughter of Beverley of Hendon and Murray of
Southgate, did cloak herself in fine silk and damask and 50% poly-cotton mix and was out of the tent smartish saying, You know your trouble, old son - you're past it.

7. And Sharon was not seen again in that land nor in Tyre nor in Ashkelon nor in Sidon nor yet in Edom, although a wise Moabite did see her sister once buying a boiling fowl in Sainsbury's.

8. Or it might have been Waitrose.

9. At any rate, Solomon was much vexed and did call unto his tent all the wise men and the assistant wise men and the friends of the wise men and he did say to them, Actually, it's all a bit embarrassing, guys.

10. And the wise men spake to him with one voice and did say, You don't have to tell us, squire. And one man who was neither so old nor so wise as the rest and who was known as Shmuley, said, Have you tried thinking of someone else? Like Vanessa, or Gaby Roslin, or that woman who slices the salmon at Shwartzes?

11. And Solomon said, You mean the one with the tattoo on her tuchas? You think I want to go blind, or what?

12. And so the wise men did go into the land and they did speak with the
apothecaries and the priests and the healers and at the end of the second quarter of the moon they did return to Solomon.

13. From Ararat came word that would be the woman dress as a servant from the
gentile lands, or a houri in silk, or as a traffic warden, success would be guaranteed and Solomon's loins would be girt and his seed spread far.

14. But Solomon did shake his head, saying, Who wants to think of a traffic warden in bed? I mean, where's she going to stick the ticket?

15. And a messenger who had dwelt long in the land of Tesco did say that he had heard that half-a-dozen oysters did the trick and then he did make a raucous sound which was like unto a snort.

16. But Solomon did shake his head again saying, Oysters? Oysters? What do you think we are here? Reform or something?

17. And there was a silence about the tent like as to the silence of death, for the oysters and the traffic warden were the best they could come up with.

18. But then up speaketh a man of the distant land they call Shnorrer and he did say, I have a potion that is called Viagra.

19. And Solomon did frown, saying, What, you mean you rub it on? Won't that be a
bit embarrassing? You know; she's about to take off her fifth veil when you stop and say, Hold on, love: there's this potion.

20. The man who was of Shnorrer did clutch his sides and laugh saying, But it is a pill. A blue pill.

21. Solomon did frown and did say Blue? Blue? Whoever heard of blue pills?
Pills are white. Except for Night Nurse which is green and yellow.

22. But the man who was of Shnorrer speaketh thus, saying, Shah! For I guarantee
that with one of these little beauties thy loins will be as the Cedar of Lebanon which grows above all the trees in the forest, not only straight but also long.

23. And Solomon did say, Hmmmm.

24. And the man who was of Shnorrer said. Straight up, squire, One of these and
you won't be able to stand up straight for a week. You'll be walking at five and forty degrees like Max Wall on a good night. You won't be able to get out of the tent sideways....

25. And Solomon said, Enough already - we take the point.

26. And so Solomon did take the blue pill and he did call unto his tent Deborah who was called also Debbie.

27. And also Samantha who was Sam, and Sarah who was Sar, and Fatima who was
er, Fatima.

28. And there was a great rejoicing all through the land, and Solomon did emerge
from his tent grinning like the grinning things of the desert.

29. But a priest did say to Solomon, Beware! For does this pill not contain that which is forbidden us in Leviticus?

30. And Solomon thought long and he thought hard, for he was a wise king, and he
said, Send forth a messenger to Jedediah, the Scribe who is writing the word of
Leviticus on a scroll as we speak.

31. And say unto Jedediah he has a deal. Leave Viagra out and he can keep his
bacon sandwiches in.

32. And so it was.

The Dazzling Fluidity of Days

No medium has yet been devised for the translation of life into language, nor can any words recall the dazzling fluidity of days. Single yet fixed in sequence, they fall like the shaft of a cataract into time and through it.

Freya Stark - Beyond Euphrates

This is the strapmline of this Journal

Hampshire 45 Years Ago

Stocks and Harvestgate Farms below Old Winchester Hill

  

I grew up here. Nothing has changed in the more than forty years since this photo was taken in 1973

Ramesh Balsekar

Ramesh giving his daily talk in his house in Bombay, surrounded by pictures of his guru, Nisargadatta Maharaj

An inscription in one of Ramesh's books - a quotation from Chuang Zu that says all there is to say: "The wild geese do not intend to cast their reflection; the water has no mind to receive their image"