Lightshaw

Old memories

Lark ascending into an old English chronicle

Summer vertical musical steps into a curved span of sky

Saw buzzing flies. Whisking tails,

Mud dozed trampled track

Hoary trees winding bows across a reflective rill spilling

catching silver river rings rising

stickleback caught and drowned men seen

 

The music of ancient loft spaces and beamed golden air

And the mote God cosmos of straw chewed sentences

Lazily shouted across work unfinished and sharp tools abandoned

Noises abroad spread by hazed distance

Bells and clang and steam machine whispered

Followed in speed by oiled smell and then slight spotted movement

 

Lazy deep seasons heat,

 

winged peace sleep complete

 

flower singing buzzing meadow

 

down sifting breezing shallow

 

soft liquid drinking made

 

willow blue wafting shade

 

pool clear sly trail

 

sky shine wind sail

 

arched bridge breeze melt

 

orchard fruit times felt

 

sound singing green reed

 

field mouse ear chickweed

 

Writing, painfully painting his familiar landscapes in an inadequate medium. She is his

 

audience, his critic, his biographer of feeling. These writes are his wishes as he thinks

 

about creating. Only for her. Only for everyone else through her. He believes only she can

 

truly understand and reciprocate in writing from far away.

 

 

Mist clearing from a story told of childhood

 

Sung birds and calling to come home

 

Across fields and late for the lessons

 

Of beaten breath and dangerous unwilling smiles

 

A world of his lonely place

 

Peace and errant absence

 

A place of green nature

 

And ultimate happiness

 

Sung to a woman in a far distant place

 

Who he knew then

 

But never met

 

Until he loved her

 

And her golden hair.

 

 

 

Author's Note

The photograph is mine and is called Empty.
Lightshaw is the old farm, (1610) where I spent a significant amount of my childhood. It was pronounced Leeshi in my Lancashire dialect.

Reviews

[Dean]

Ken, I bumped up against the second line of the second stanza, and the more I read (over and over) the remainder of the poem, this seemingly curious wording began for me, a summary of the entire piece--the involvement of every day's labor and noise, with the spell of so many captivating things, the buzzing meadow singing with flowers, (synesthesia?) the arched bridge, the windy sky, even the scampering field mouse--and finally you leave me with the seeming afterthought of "her golden hair", haunting me as I reflect on the panorama of thought, work, vistas, and an added soft echo! Magic,indeed!

[Ken Simm.]

When I was young Dean, I often thought that the golden dust motes I saw in the air were God. Because I was told that He was everywhere and everything. I had asked the Vicar what omnipotent meant. That was where that line came from. There were lots of dust motes in the hay making barn. I was given an egg for my wages.
I'm so glad you liked this one.

[Ken Simm.]

There was an element of synethesia in this time as well.

[Dean]

They are God, aren't they?
--and how short sighted of the Christians (I was one once) to define god (God?) as a "he"---or any definition at all.

[Ken Simm.]

So was I, then I think. I agree by definition He/She/They/it would defy definition.

[Dean]

good to have something in common with you. You are light years ahead of me as a poet.

[Ken Simm.]

Pish tush and pshaw. Dean. Not true but thank you.

[jacob erin-cilberto]

this is beautiful...the mix of childhood memories and the love poem to the woman you never yet met...

but love just as much as if you had known her a lifetime.

i really like all of the subtle alliteration in this.

i really like reading you, i just get lost in the imagery..sucked into it...so good.

jacob

[Ken Simm.]

I think I have known her for that long. Many, many thanks Jacob.

[roarke]

I'm thinking how a baby's eye's see many things it hasn't yet words to express, yet it is in a sublime decision to show the innocent such glorious sights, that stay with them until words are learned and experiences journaled. Yet, in contemplating this write, I can't help but wonder how strongly you were inspired, how these visions and feelings mingled, aged, until they were summoned again and expressed in the same wide-eyed inspiration. Huge write Ken, deep as the sigh of the wind.

[Ken Simm.]

Summoned again, yes, that is what it is. Thank you for being so perceptive my friend.

[Donald Meikle]

sotternellere Ken The pic's as good as the words (as usual) nice hot trip down memory lane mate

[Ken Simm.]

Thanks Donald. Glad you like it.

[Sami Khalil]

This write is a rich in all aspects of the poetic craft written by a magical quill and echoes the childhood and its wonderful place in nature and his heart...Thank you for sharing...:)

[Ken Simm.]

Many thanks Sami for enjoying this and saying so.

[Sami Khalil]

You are welcome...:)

[Rogue]

Through you, you know I already have an inkling of this place of your childhood. And did you run free over field and through orhard as well? Watching the birds and hiding in the tall grass?

I like the structure of this, the mix of different styles. As always your descriptiveness never fails to put us there through your eyes.

Beautiful memories, Ken. :)

[Ken Simm.]

Yes I did Rogue. I had little 'camps' everywhere. These are what I describe. Thank you so much my friend for your on going support.

[Jack...]

Love the format of this piece. I could feel the sense of growing up on this old farm and living the days of youth in what had to have seemed a fanasty land, at least now it does. Your words painted a wonderful picture using the painted memories of a childs mind. This was fantastic and the photo awesome.

[Ken Simm.]

The farm was fortified and had a moat Jack. It also had a gibbet and two large very old barns. And down the bottom of the fields was what we called The Bird Sanctuary. If the farmer found anyone shooting or stealing eggs he would round them up, put them in the back of his old car. Then drive them a hundred or so miles away and leave them with a shilling for a phone call.
Thank you for looking and liking my friend.

[Jack...]

It sounds so very cool my friend. What an adventure of life.

[Ken Simm.]

Not if you were the lad driven to the Lake District and left. But it was for me.

[Jack...]

Still, I love the way the old farmer dealt with this problem and I can only imagine what it mightnhave been like to be sitting in the back of his old car not really knowing what mughtnhappen next. It would make a really cool story.

[Ken Simm.]

This was in the sixties Jack, oh and he also took his shotgun. I bet they did wonder. Mr Smith the farmer was in trouble with the Police more times than I can remember. He also showed me how to castrate bullocks. Then his wife fried them for our breakfast.

[Ken Simm.]

I was about eight or nine at the time.

[Jack...]

Hmmm, I'm glad I've already eaten this morning. :)

[Leslie Philibert]

Ken is such a talented writer I have a bad conscience when I just write a few lines. This deserves a lot more...but to put it simply, Ken is a writer I have read for some time, and I have never read anything from him that wasn`t first class and full of literay merit..

[Ken Simm.]

You do me too much credit Leslie. I am honoured by your words.

[Pete Langley]

There is a place in the mind that is a refuge - where when we go there, he only feelings are safe and warm. You evoke such peace with this, Ken. Each line gives another blanket of comfort. P.

[Ken Simm.]

I think you would have liked this place Pete. It was an old way station for the pack trains of wool over the Pennines on the way to Liverpool. The old farmer Mr Smith was very strange. I was the only lad he would let on the farm because I was 'the lad us liked birds'. See what I said to Jack above for more information. I'm very glad you like it. Thanks mate.