Walk lightly in the Spring; Mother Earth is pregnant. So runs a Kiowa proverb.
I read that in The Independent last week when it published a selection of poems last week on the theme of ‘Spring’. All the old favourites are there: Wordsworth’s daffodils, Housman’s cherry trees and, of course, Tennyson:
In the spring a young man’s fancy lightly turns to thoughts of love.
Not just the young man, Alfred! And isn’t that an octameter? And what’s the difference between an octameter and a pair of tetrameters? Sometimes, when it comes to poetry I fear I can’t see the woods for the trees.
Philip Larkin’s The Trees is typical of him:
The trees are coming into leaf
Like something almost being said;
The recent buds relax and spread,
Their greenness is a kind of grief.
I tell people that there’s always one day at this time of year when I wake and know that it is Spring. There is a new something in the air – texture, tone, tang; I’m not sure – but something more than just a little extra warmth. Perhaps the analogy is that I sense that we have moved from a minor to a major key.
I always say that the coming of Spring is like a birthday gift from a rich old aunt, who is generous but forgetful. The gift may be early, it may be late, but it will arrive, and it’s always worth waiting for.
For some reason it reminds me of a Randolph Scott Western – most things seem to – in which he tends a sick horse. His companions recommend shooting it, but Randy maintains that there is nothing physically wrong with the animal, it has just given up. He proposes sitting up with it all night so that it knows it is not alone and then, when it feels the sun on its back in the morning, it will find the will to live.
So I’m feeling pretty cheerful and beg to differ with Mr Larkin. As for T S Eliot’s remarks about April being the cruellest month, all I can say is that he had the soul of a bank clerk. My only complaint about the Spring is that my laundry is taking longer to try, now that the heating is off. I never hang it outside. Since I spend so much time sniggering at the neighbour’s washing-line, with its ranks of bras looking like so many sailor’s hammocks and knickers like Ali Baba’s trousers, I fear to expose my underpants to ridicule.
I had a stroll around a nature reserve the other day. It was a sunny day; the birds were singing and the company delightful. All it needed was clouds scudding across the sky and boats bobbing on the ocean to give it all the qualities of an idyllic scene.
‘Look,’ said my companion, ‘Do you see that bird?’
‘Where?’
‘There.’
‘Oh, yes. What is it?’
‘It’s a wren.’
‘Oh, troglodytes troglodytes.’
I have a feeling that just about sums me up. My apologies, Mr Eliot.
I read that in The Independent last week when it published a selection of poems last week on the theme of ‘Spring’. All the old favourites are there: Wordsworth’s daffodils, Housman’s cherry trees and, of course, Tennyson:
In the spring a young man’s fancy lightly turns to thoughts of love.
Not just the young man, Alfred! And isn’t that an octameter? And what’s the difference between an octameter and a pair of tetrameters? Sometimes, when it comes to poetry I fear I can’t see the woods for the trees.
Philip Larkin’s The Trees is typical of him:
The trees are coming into leaf
Like something almost being said;
The recent buds relax and spread,
Their greenness is a kind of grief.
I tell people that there’s always one day at this time of year when I wake and know that it is Spring. There is a new something in the air – texture, tone, tang; I’m not sure – but something more than just a little extra warmth. Perhaps the analogy is that I sense that we have moved from a minor to a major key.
I always say that the coming of Spring is like a birthday gift from a rich old aunt, who is generous but forgetful. The gift may be early, it may be late, but it will arrive, and it’s always worth waiting for.
For some reason it reminds me of a Randolph Scott Western – most things seem to – in which he tends a sick horse. His companions recommend shooting it, but Randy maintains that there is nothing physically wrong with the animal, it has just given up. He proposes sitting up with it all night so that it knows it is not alone and then, when it feels the sun on its back in the morning, it will find the will to live.
So I’m feeling pretty cheerful and beg to differ with Mr Larkin. As for T S Eliot’s remarks about April being the cruellest month, all I can say is that he had the soul of a bank clerk. My only complaint about the Spring is that my laundry is taking longer to try, now that the heating is off. I never hang it outside. Since I spend so much time sniggering at the neighbour’s washing-line, with its ranks of bras looking like so many sailor’s hammocks and knickers like Ali Baba’s trousers, I fear to expose my underpants to ridicule.
I had a stroll around a nature reserve the other day. It was a sunny day; the birds were singing and the company delightful. All it needed was clouds scudding across the sky and boats bobbing on the ocean to give it all the qualities of an idyllic scene.
‘Look,’ said my companion, ‘Do you see that bird?’
‘Where?’
‘There.’
‘Oh, yes. What is it?’
‘It’s a wren.’
‘Oh, troglodytes troglodytes.’
I have a feeling that just about sums me up. My apologies, Mr Eliot.
By the way, I don't read The Independent. Somebody thought I might be interested in that particular page. I wouldn't lie about a thing like that.
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