Poem of the Month - December 2009

I read in the paper recently that a new movie on the life of John Keats, called Bright Star (would I were as steadfast as thou art...) will be released in a few weeks. Like many who will read this blog, I came to know Keats as an impressionable teenager, and have loved his poetry ever since. I was reminded that he died at age 25, and was very ill for all of his adult life, which makes his beautiful and emotionally mature poems all the more remarkable. I can still recite many lines from several of his better-known poems, and often turn to them when I am feeling sad and sorry for myself.

Like these powerful opening lines from Ode on a Grecian Urn:

Thou still unravish'd bride of quietness,
Thou foster-child of silence and slow time,
Sylvan historian, who canst thou express
A flowery tale more sweetly than our rhyme

I was amazed to read that over two hundred and forty of Keats's letters survive and form the basis of Bright Star. I will most certainly be heading to see it as a Christmas treat to myself - selfishly, I am not willing to share this moment with anyone and if I could command a whole theatre to myself while I watched it I would.

Good poetry is incredibly moving. It plays with the senses, the emotions, the soul. If I can ever get close to writing a couple of lines that are anywhere as good as Keats poorest work I will consider myself a successful poet. In the meantime, I have to keep working on achieving and surpassing my own personal best.

This poem may well fall short of being good, let alone my best, it may not stir an emotion or the senses in the reader, but it is my offering for this festive month and I hope it holds some merit. It is also my Ode to Keats.

Small packets of joy release the frozen heart.
(An Ode to John Keats)

Long have I sat and wept
As a film played out a tale of love and loss,
With red-rimmed eyes and tear-stained cheeks
Have I felt the pain of being human,
Each time I read a new story
Of a heart being broken, a life cut short.

There is something dramatic in all things art -
Yet two centuries of poetry, of lovers,
Of ongoing creation and re-creation
Have failed to approach
The pure perfection of your lines
The melody of your psalms.

These are the gold that other poets
Pan for amongst the grit, and rarely find.
Your sylvan images convey more truth
Than a stroll along the Delphian path of grass and stone.
A modern-day oracle of sorts, I bow
In homage to your published works.

And grieve for the others that remain
Unrecorded and unheard.
Their pleasure, pain and hopefulness linger, soft and present,
Within your letters, true and strong
Preserved by those who loved you then
For those of us who came too late,

Yet love profoundly all the same.

Your unwrit lines are greater far
Than measured verse we lesser beings gestate.
You are our master and our muse -
Who know full well that though we strive to emulate,
Apprentices will we remain.

I will not forget you, or your love
For life, your passion, or your home
But I will not weep or pine for you.
At times when I am low, in need of life support,
You will, as ever, walk about,
Softly, in my imagination.

December, 2009