Every pulpit pounding preacher will tell you that ecclesiastical confessions are essential to good health. I imagine those preacher were made ecstatic a week or two ago when Bernie Madoff confessed that he had committed eleven felonies. Such preachers will tell you that confessions will fix any ailment known to man or beast.
And so it is at this late date that I will confess that composing a poem is always beyond my reach. I am very fond of opera but I would have no idea about how to write one. And so it is with poetry. Every attempt at poetry is nothing more than an exercise in doggerel. But that does not dim my admiration for good poetry as well as good opera.
It has long been my contention that the best poetry written these days is found in lyrics to songs. When a man composes a poem and sets it to music, it has the power to capture my intellect. So the thought today is to cite perhaps five songs that have great poetry, good music, and a bit of philosophy.
First there is an Irish folk song that has been around for perhaps 200 or more years. It is called “October Winds” or “The Castle at Dromore.” One verse contains the words that are to be cited here today:
“Take time to strive, my ray of hope in the garden of Dromore.
Take heed, young eaglet, ‘til thy wings are feathered fit to soar.”
There is elegance in the language about the young eaglet being told to be careful until his “wings are feathered fit to soar.”
The second one to be cited here today comes from Eric Bogle. He is a Scot who acquired Australian citizenship late in the 1970s. Bogle writes all of his poems and sets them to music, and then performs them. One of the Bogle pieces is an anti-war song called “And the Band Played Waltzing Matilda.” It commemorates the battle at Suvla Bay where the Turks held the high ground and slaughtered the incoming Australians. This battle happened in 1915 and was the attempt made by the British to attack the “soft underbelly” of Europe. Unfortunately the battle at Suvla Bay went badly. Here are the lines that reside in my head.
“Then a big Turkish shell knocked me arse over head.
When I awoke in the hospital bed, I saw what it had done.
Well, I wished I was dead.
Never knew there were worse things than dying.”
For an old soldier, it is very difficult to shake the line, “Never knew there were worse things than dying.”
Eric Bogle has also composed another anti-war song. This one is called “Willie McBride” or “The Green Fields of France” or, alternatively, “No Man’s Land.” You may recall that the US President in 1917 was Woodrow Wilson. Unfortunately, he called the First World War “The War to End Wars.” As all of you can testify, the First World War did not end war in any sense. There are several lines from the poem that are of significance. Here are a few:
“And I can’t help but wonder, young Willie McBride,
Do all those who lie here know why they died?
Did you really believe them when they told you the cause?
Did you really believe that this war would end wars?
Well, the suffering, the sorrow, the glory, the shame,
The killing, the dying was all done in vain.
For Willie McBride, it has all happened again and again and again.”
The main question is that one line about “Do all those who lie here…” in this British military cemetery “…know why they died?” Perhaps the politicians know about what caused their deaths but as always, it is the soldiers who do the dying.
As a youngster, I admired the work of Rudyard Kipling. Kipling wrote his poems at the zenith of the British Empire. You will recall that prior to 1914, the Brits controlled India, Canada, British West Africa, Kenya, Hong Kong, New Zealand, and Australia, among other holdings. This Kipling work is called “Lest We Forget.”
“God of our fathers, known of old,
Lord of our far flung battle lines
Beneath whose awful hand we hold
Dominion over palm and pine
Lord, God of Hosts, be with us yet
Lest we forget, lest we forget.”
This particular Kipling poem was turned into an Anglican hymn. I suspect that it is not sung much anymore because the British Empire is a shadow of its former self.
Finally we turn to a folk singer called Tom Paxton. Paxton is 76 years of age, yet he still performs regularly. His genre is political satire on many occasions. In this poem and song, the subject was John Ashcroft, the former Senator from Missouri who was appointed Attorney General in the first term of the Bush administration.
The lines read like this:
“John Ashcroft went to meet the press.
He faced the microphones.
His heart was full of righteousness,
His voice like God’s trombones.
But then he saw the statue that was set behind him there;
She was “the spirit of justice,” yes, but one of her breasts was bare.
John Ashcroft looked with horror at this gleaming marble globe
That thrust itself upon him from a loosely falling robe.
Thus, it was so hard to concentrate on those he there accused
With that marble breast behind him, poor John Ashcroft got confused.
Each time he saw that marble breast, the poor man was appalled.
He quickly gave the order and a curtain was installed.
Now, when he makes a statement, you can see him on the tube.
He has curtained off the statue but you will still see one big boob.”
All that remains to be said is, “Good for Tom Paxton!” John Ashcroft was a disastrous Attorney General, topped only by the likes of Alberto Gonzales. But Paxton’s line about “one big boob” fits Ashcroft perfectly. And it deserves to be mentioned in this essay on poetizing.
There you have an Irish song, two Australian songs which were produced by a refugee from Scotland, the Kipling work, and the political skewering of John Ashcroft. There are dozens or perhaps even hundreds of quotable lines that float around in my head, but I believe that this essay on poetizing might give you an idea of what entrances me. There may even be a bit of jealousy here in that I wish that I could have produced some of these lines. Who can beat “feathered fit to soar” or “Never knew there were worse things than dying.”
Now, finally, I have gotten this essay on poetizing out of my system. It has lingered in my alleged brain for several months, which accounts for the title having to do with pregnancy. My hope is that, now that the essay has finally come to life, you enjoy it and maybe you will sing or hum some of the songs that it contains. I would suggest that a good place to start is on the lines about “Take heed, young eaglet, ‘til thy wings are feathered fit to soar.” I regret that I did not write those lines. But I intend to keep trying.
E. E. CARR
March 25, 2009
Essay 374
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Kevin’s commentary: As Pop writes his titles before the essays that follow them, I tend to start drafting my commentary before I’m even done reading the essay. This is, I’ll be honest, a bad habit. They say that the mark of a poor listener is someone who starts thinking up what he’ll say next before the first person is even done speaking. Perhaps debate, which did so many good things for my education, is to blame for this (hopefully minor) deficiency in character.
Nevertheless the moment that I got to the line “Do all those who lie here know why they died?” I thought to myself that I had just encountered the most significant part of the essay, or at least the part that had the greatest impact on me.
Wars today are so nebulously conducted that I am curious whether any of the soldiers deployed to Afghanistan and Iraq today are sure of the answer. Back at home we have largely gotten by on trite soundbytes like “they died for our freedoms” but I think even the American population is starting to realize that this is BS. Based on my lack of real knowledge of the issue I’d bet that there are probably only a handful of people who know exactly what ends their sacrifice are serving.