SIRIOL TROUP
Siriol Troup gave us a bravura reading showing the remarkable range of
her poetic output. She began with an early poem "Botanic" which won her,
as a prize, a weekend in Italy. The poem showed us straight away her
ability to use startling metaphor. In this poem flowers - how truly
observant and how rarely remarked - give us "truth in precision"; also,
equally true and stimulating, from the mouths of horticulturalists comes
"the sly rustle of Latin". Just perfect! She also showed her delicious
sense of fun in the poem "Ivory Tower" where she has tea with the
Bishop's wife who "all fluff and Godliness", patronises Siriol who
concludes the poem with this Biblical parody:: "her cup runneth over
- her cup, not mine, was full".
Siriol creates atmosphere so effectively. When she read the sonnet "Wind" we too felt the tearing power of the air with
"bulrushes buckling like sinners,
gulls ticker-taping the plough" and
"hedge-rows cock-a-hoop with shrieks".
In this sonnet ( as in "Ear-piercing" - another moving sonnet ) Siriol compresses the experience using the sonnet form in her own way: octave obediently followed by sestet, using the rhythm of a five stress line with a conversational tone and placing the emphasis exactly where she wants it to be, using assonance and repetition to subtle effect.
One could write extensively analyzing the prosodic complexity of her poetry, but I choose now to select just a few of the poems she read for us. For example the brilliantly entertaining "Three-Toed Sloth", an "evolutionary slug-abed" a "foraging folivore", the "dreamer idling in zoology's slow lane".How stimulating to coin the word "folivore" for 'eater of foliage'! Next I pick her eulogy on "Broccoli . . . the perfect vegetable" which contains every positive you can think of; which "Gainsborough found an inspiration"; whose appearance is "a self-repeating shower of Bonsai trees". Absolutely spot on; no wonder she feeds her family broccoli.
After the interval Siriol most generously gave each of us a printed sheet of recent poems to look at as she read. These gave us an inkling of how much research lies behind the poetry. Included were 3 poems on elephants transported to Rome (astonishing in itself) to be slaughtered along with other wild beasts in the Coliseum. Also a fully researched sequence on "Hirohito's Horse" - 5 poems in appropriately stylized Haiku- Tanka like rhythms. So versatile - such variety! She is a fine poet and entertained us nobly.
Back to TopPETER STILEMAN
A Poet for all Seasons
As anyone who knows our esteemed chairman might expect, this was an evening of marvellous entertainment and stimulation.
Peter began with an explanation of how his poems are inspired. There is a moment of perception and an attendant excitement which demands expression. A sense of fun is also important in much of his work. His poems’ themes show the profound influences of his love of his family, life, art and the countryside.
The poems he selected for us ranged from the gentle fun of “Will you step into my Humber” to the merciless wit of “Proud of Herself” and the hilarious“Names”; from the beautiful observation of “Sweetness and Power”, “The Coronal” and “Hokusai - Waterfall”, to the social comment of “Catalogues” and the more intimate experiences of “Haircut” and “Behind the Summerhouse”. Throughout the programme, we were treated to shining images. To catch just a few of these: in Peter’s universe there are “cricketball planets”; modern harvesting machines
"....... dropping
rounds of straw waste like golden faeces; or
fat, new minted sovereigns;”
and Gannets which
“like Concorde jet into the waves”.
If one was in any doubt, the evening would have convinced that here is a poet who is a master of form. Like all the skilled, he makes choosing the best form for a poem sound easy. To paraphrase: The elements of the poem develop a shape inside you; what you create must fit this shape. Even choosing a syllabic form can lead to powerful poetry. Peter’s poem “Conversion” made a telling example which, like so much of his work, reminded me of a quote from Alan Brownjohn. Asked what impression he’d like his poetry to leave on people, Brownjohn replied, “I want it to go down like lemonade but to hit them like vodka.” Our evening was full of lemonade-into-vodka experiences.
As for rhyming forms, Peter commented, he preferred to use para-rhyme or half-rhyme for the “conversational freedom” it allowed. His lovely poem “Haircut” perfectly illustrated that kind of freedom.
If you missed the evening, I’m afraid you won’t catch up on all the poems we heard by studying Peter’s spellbinding collection, My ’Handful of Pleasant Delights’. It doesn’t include many of the poems he read, ably assisted by Anne, Ann and Brian Biddle and John Thynne. Let’s hope he brings out a second volume soon as I crave a copy of the aforementioned “Conversion”; the political piece concerning Matilda, the vegetarian and “Names”, among several others.
The evening brought all the rewards that come from immersion in the voice of an excellent poet. There’s something infectious in the generosity of spirit conveyed by such work. I woke next morning with my mind whizzing with ideas and a greater understanding of the craft of poetry. It was tempting to believe the amusing understatement of Peter’s first poem of the evening. “Travel light, all you need is a pencil.” Also helpful would be a small fraction of his own skill, wit, perceptiveness and love of life.
Back to TopJOHN GODFREY
John Godfrey opened the batting in what is likely to become the regular TPS venue in 2007.
It was immediately apparent from his first poem “The Opening Door” that here is a poet who has a striking feel for what language can do, way beyond semantic precision. For example, from that poem, comes the line that as a poet he can ‘slip with the seals into a sea of fluid words’. The listener/reader responds to a metaphoric liquidity beyond definition.
There is much striking metaphor in his writing, some of it, inevitably deriving from his career in the railway industry. We get
‘ a high Embankment shoving along the horizon And viaducts stepping over small Rivers, planting slim stone legs In hidden valleys’.
Most impressive of all his railway poems was “The Man on Crewe Station” which deservedly won first prize in the Peterloo Poetry Competition last year. In the poem, metaphor is there but unobtrusive. Indeed the poem progresses in a spare and unemphatic narrative to a telling and deeply moving conclusion.
The meditative, quietly reflective element was present in a number of poems where undemonstrative narrative evoked a poetic significance; or, as in “Pound of Flesh”, about breast cancer, moved to a powerfully dramatic conclusion.
Finally in this commentary I would like to mention our appreciation of the element of John's wit in many poems. As, for example, in “New Patient” as he lay prone for a physiotherapist, he experienced [ultra]’sound waves’ (burying) ‘themselves in his buttocks’. Most witty of all, perhaps, was the poem “You are Here”. In this he imagines an England where global warming has raised the sea level to such an extent that his hill-top home near Hitchin with water lapping round, has post delivered by boat, where transport requires a thesaurus of nautical terms to describe it, where there is a reference to the ‘New Heathrow, formerly Luton Airport’.
We ended with a lively discussion. How could John write such poetry from scratch with two fingers only on the keyboard? This was an excellent way to inaugurate the proposed new venue and much appreciated by all.
Back to TopNEIL BEARDMORE
Neil gave a sparkling demonstration not only of the variety of
his poetic output but also of his skills as a raconteur and entertainer.
This may to some extent account for the strong element of vigorous dialogue in many of his poems and, possibly, for their variety and the lively flow of images.
He began with an amusing poem ‘Joe’s Corner shop’ ( New Bradwell, Milton Keynes) likely to be threatened by a supermarket. In the ensuing conversation-piece Neil showed an actor’s command of different voices in dialogue. He followed this local piece with two poems about India: the first about lovers, appropriately introducing the God Shiva, Creator as well as Destroyer, which showed his ability to reflect the elusive atmosphere of Hinduism and combine it with his evident love of wordplay: ‘willing/unwilling’; ‘mystery/mastery’ – and in the second poem ‘The Dogs of Palolan’ some startling and striking images: ‘the sun shrinks shadows’; dogs with ‘tongues as bright as bacon’; fishermen casting their ‘shawl of nets’ into the sea and then harvesting their catch in ‘ a horse-shoe prison’.
Neil’s range seems to have no bounds. The poem ‘Hacienda’ showed his ability to render a deep sense of loss as the ancient estate and beautiful building is destroyed to make way for, of all things, a concrete car park. Also in similar vein the desperately sad poem of mental disability ‘Away with the Fairies’ included the phrase of a person finding ‘comfort in rocking’.
To start the second half of the evening Neil gave us the surreal poem ‘Speak the House’ in which would-be purchasers had to address Number 41 in the appropriate tone of voice if it was to open the door to let them in – it wouldn’t let the key work! Once in and deciding that it wouldn’t be satisfactory they had to ask it to open the door to let them out when it answered with an emphatic “NO”.
So we had a wealth of deeply involving and engaging poems; but for me the most powerful was the vividly imaginative poem ‘Sahara’ which was ‘a sea-less beach’; ‘a sand ocean on the move’; the ‘God of the Dead End’; also ‘Nothingness Swallows All’. This poem should be widely read.
TPS says ‘thank you, Neil, for a rich evening’.
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