Literary Gifts

     Thinking of all the literary sources that underlie the poems in my collection, The Green Road to the Stars (that I made available on Kindle exactly one year ago), I realize that I'm a lot like a magpie, a bird that flies around picking up small glittering objects.  There's something in my spirit always alert for scenes or situations -- in fiction or nonfiction -- that I can pick up and drop into my own nest.
     Springtime in Britain, by the famous American naturalist, Edwin Way Teale, was a magpie's delight, a treasury of sensitive observations, literary reminiscences, and vivid descriptions of the landscape of England and Scotland.  Little details noticed by his eye and ear are everywhere in my rhymes, and several poems -- "Jackdaws Nesting in a Cathedral," for example -- derive almost completely from one of his visits to ancient historical and religious sites in Britain.
     Another open treasure chest is the autobiography of the English novelist, Elizabeth Goudge, whose scenic depictions in The Joy of the Snow are so fresh and densely foliated that they are like Constable's paintings.  I am indebted to her as well as Teale for my poem, "Swans in the Moat at Wells," because she lived in that city as a child around 1900, and her chapters set there are a hymn to the bishop's palace and the bishop's moat with its aristocratic, bell-ringing swans. 
     She also gave me the rhyme "In Devon," which is based on her eerie experience of hearing -- alone -- the dawn song of a glorious disembodied voice, early one morning during World War II. 

Now, just for your reading pleasure, you who are reading this blog, here is my rhyme.

In Devon

Once in a lane
by a stream's narrow bed,
a glorious voice
sounded over my head. 
It wasn't a lark's,
singing everyday joys.
It wasn't a girl's,
and it wasn't a boy's.

It swelled from the grass
to the soft Devon sky.
It was clearer and stronger
and greater than I.
But nothing and no one
was over my head.

"Singing just happens
in Devon," they said.   


And since I have some time, I'll also include "Swans in the Moat at Wells."

Swans in the Moat at Wells

Here's Bishop Swan of Bath and Wells
and Mrs. Swan, as though two spells
had hovered over streams and ponds
to turn a couple into swans --
A man and wife of noble race
with liquid eyes and long-necked grace.

They ring a bell to let us know
they want their tea before they go,
a tea that's made of bread and bread,
delivered at once slice per head.

"But don't they ever wish for jam?
a hard-boiled egg?  A bit of ham?"

They glance at me with some disdain.
Aristocrats do not explain
to silly commoners like me
why they must have their wish for tea.

Without a napkin, spoon or cup,
they wet their bread and snap it up,
thus making it quite plain to see
that bread-and-dripping's best for tea.

They paddle off to swim back when
it feels like half-past four again.

   (Note: The bishop in that part of the world is referred to as the Bishop of Bath and Wells, although in my poem the bishop has webbed feet.)