Graverobbing & Other Burglary

“Bird”-lary with a Teacup
—Poems by Tom Goff, Carmichael, CA
—Anonymous Photos and Artwork

RED CROSSWALK

On affluent Fair Oaks Boulevard,
they’ve painted the space inside crosswalks deep red.
Will the rich dye stand out like a crossing guard?
Does red signify blood real pedestrians bled?
As I cross, traffic suspended, am I a red-carpet arrival?
Will fate’s wheel-spin no longer determine
my opossum chances, death or survival?
Will a black craquelure soon fissure, spread
through the border’s white stripes, leaving them spotted
like ermine?

BODYSNATCHING KEATS

John Keats, they say, was an apothecary
by training (we’d say surgical intern),
but was he more sinister too, and culpably?
A grave robber, or one with a yen to yearn
after his own death, end a foreshortened life
with blood-frothed breath from consumption, yes, but worse,
to augment his future earnings by the knife
with “resurrection-man” delvings, under curse,

after fresh corpses, ripe for study, for thought
that “teases us out of thought?” Did you burn,
young doctor, strange vices to ashes in your own urn?
Your “Isabella’s” an ode to grave-odor, fraught
with rankness. Can that be you in those basil shoots,
your poor deluded genius-head putting down roots?


—See “Was Keats a Graverobber?” by Kelly Grovier at
www.bbc.com/culture/story/20190723-was-the-poet-john-keats-a-graverobber/.

NOVEMBER WOODS (II)
Symphonic poem by Arnold Bax, 1917

November Woods may lash us with cyclonic
force, yet the chromatic trauma comes
battering at us with an architectonic
logic. Birches may splinter; music hums,
the other side of a glassless window pane.
This vitrine bottles catching yet graspless shadows,
as in Art Deco silhouette plays whose weathervane-
flat figurines uprise in an absence of meadows,
from a realm black-painted, forged of zinc.
This is the rain-beaten world of lovers balked.
Yet listen to the slow turn of beautiful tunes.
First, six-eight loveliness, lightly stroked in ink.
French horns, with gravity equal to many moons,
add retrograde spin to urgent tidal shock.

Strings burst into song: a rapturous countervoice
upsurges. Banshee-like, all keening storm-noise… 

TEA, SCONES, AND GHOST MUSIC*
(Ireland, 1937)

If you wish to travel Sheep’s Head, take Goat’s Pass.
This is in County Cork: a dizzying view
downslope to ocean. Darkening, the mass
of nightfall gathering tufts of fog into
its hem. Trail reclaimed in places by slick grass,
a car slithers. Five persons in it: Arnold Bax,
Anne Crowley, Aloys and Tilly Fleischmann, Pat
(that’s Father Pat). The hope that nothing cracks,
whether a cylinder head or gasket. Reeling
through dusk, while praying no tyre too bald goes flat…
Bax peers at his watch. 7:30. Anxious feeling:
“My Fourth Symphony’s at 8:00 tonight;
Sir Henry Wood’s on the BBC, conducting.
I do believe Henry would be quite annoyed
if I didn’t listen in.” Father Pat: “Quite right.
Let’s see: where might we find a wireless?”
This being County Cork, all country—what
to do? All huddle: let’s find a near village. Tireless,
they jounce the frail car into Ahakista.
In this half-hour’s quest all are employed.
At this or that house and pub they inquire: Wireless?
None to be found for money nor love, the gist of
it. Brainwave, Father Pat: The curate’s house!
I know him; he has a wireless, let’s go see…
They reach the home. All dark; the mists that souse
the air in August. Father Pat takes the lead,
he best knows the path. The traveling pack all follow.
Windows black, no fireplace smoke; the priest’s
on holiday. Ah, the sitting room window, open;
an upthrust of the sash. Now Pat and Anne
clamber over. The door, from inside, admits
Aloys, Tilly, and Bax. Through lightless hallway
till Father Pat gropes to…a wireless! His hand flits
onto the knob, one turn, and: Bax’s Fourth!
The very first bar of the symphony! In thrall, they
stumble into chairs. E flat’s true north,
wind lashing the sun-flecked ocean, rising tide
in brusque chops of double bass, viola, cello.
Trombone, bass trombone, tuba: foghorn caution
to all ships; strings and woodwinds join the blazon,
before the oceanic quickstep turns more mellow,
all romance and sea chantey. Nothing brazen,
this entry without breaking. Nevertheless,
someone hears these odd strains of music filter
through the sitting room door. What curse, bad cess?
Not poltergeists, surely not faeries. What’s off kilter?
The door opens just a crack. Father Pat, dark figure,
shoos away the soft motion. The door shuts,
no noise. Third movement ends; the symphony’s done.
Now all can let out their breath. The drive over ruts,
the guilty thrill of entry, the sheer fun
of Bax’s milestone broadcast: talk tumbles out.
The lights come on: a middle-aged woman, a tray
of good hot tea, rich cake, and buttered scones!
Partaking of all the delectables, they doubt
their luck. The housekeeper, still shaken, must say,
Lord, what a fright I had! Her thoughts that ran
from spirits to Ireland’s curse, those Black and Tans
of the past, England’s hard hand in all the Troubles…
Brushed back from the door, she went straightaway to pray;
knelt at the small oratory, decided that she
could do what she thought best, make buttered scones and tea,
to serve to the living or else to the dead
who seem so to enjoy the music. Up bubbles
the explanation from Father Pat. All shriven,
the strange intrusion. Tilly’s daughter, May,
will later retell this family story, led
to believe this is what creative ones do. If you
believe in art, practice an art, then you can do
just about anything. Wonderful! Sir Henry Wood,
told by Bax, “This could happen nowhere but here,”
writes back to Bax on a postcard, “I see. I fear
you’ve taken to burgling houses.” Understood
by all artists, this lust so lightly self-forgiven.


*Thanks to Tilly Fleischmann’s reminiscences, excerpted on the Sir Arnold Bax Website.  

___________________

Today’s LittleNip:

Every morning, we choose between milk or tea or coffee. Usually, I know what I like, but I don’t rule out changing my idea sometimes. The editing process is one of the most important parts in everyday life. The same is with my work: mistakes are part of the decision-making process.

—Maurizio Cattelan

 

___________________

—Medusa, thanking Tom Goff this morning for his tasty poems, a colorful way to get past the middle of the week. When ghosts appear, offer them scones and tea!

 Alice's Tea Cup Pumpkin Scones

For more about Alice’s scones, visit

bakelovegive.com/alices-tea-cup-pumpkin-scones/.

 

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