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That's wonderful Alf. At the end of last weekend's run in Mosedale (back o'skiddaw) I sat on the bridge over the beck, messing around with a few soft pastels, trying to capture the marvellous array of stunning, fiery, autumnal colours set agains the grey purples of Carrick Fell. Didn't manage it of course (:D ), but it was fun nevertheless, and really breathtaking (but not as much as my slog up Blencathra!).Quote:
Originally Posted by Alf
To an Athlete Dying Young
The time you won your town the race
We chaired you through the market-place;
Man and boy stood cheering by,
And home we brought you shoulder-high.
To-day, the road all runners come,
Shoulder-high we bring you home,
And set you at your threshold down,
Townsman of a stiller town.
Smart lad, to slip betimes away
From fields where glory does not stay
And early though the laurel grows
It withers quicker than the rose.
Eyes the shady night has shut
Cannot see the record cut,
And silence sounds no worse than cheers
After earth has stopped the ears:
Now you will not swell the rout
Of lads that wore their honours out,
Runners whom renown outran
And the name died before the man.
So set, before its echoes fade,
The fleet foot on the sill of shade,
And hold to the low lintel up
The still-defended challenge-cup.
And round that early-laurelled head
Will flock to gaze the strengthless dead,
And find unwithered on its curls
The garland briefer than a girl's.
Alfred Edward Housman
This one is for injured and recovering runners everywhere.
The Panther
His vision, from the constantly passing bars,
has grown so weary that it cannot hold
anything else. It seems to him there are
a thousand bars; and behind the bars, no world.
As he paces in cramped circles, over and over,
the movement of his powerful soft strides
is like a ritual dance around a center
in which a mighty will stands paralyzed.
Only at times, the curtain of the pupils
lifts, quietly--. An image enters in,
rushes down through the tensed, arrested muscles,
plunges into the heart and is gone.
Rainer Maria Rilke
Fall
Short days. The leaves are falling
to the deadline of the ground, gold
as the pages of myth. I feel the cold earth
fall away from the sun, the light's heart harden.
I fall too, as if from the glinting plane overhead,
backwards, through fierce blue, though I only lie
in your arms, on our coats, the last hour of autumn,
grasping a fistful of yellowing grass as you move in me,
fall and fall and fall towards you, your passionate gravity.
Carol Ann Duffy
Alf that Housman verse was very very moving, thanks for sharing that.
Been reflecting on the most glorious times to be on the fells. For me it's the arrival of first light after a night moving through the mountains. Now more than ever, it's important to be deeply conscious of those moments that make life's high points so vivid, including those wonderful moments on the fells that are hard to describe without turning to verse, of sorts...
Here's my attempt to try and sum up that magic time to be out. I hope it rings a few bells and a few wry smiles
Arrival
Appearing from the mists
As if they, not I, have just arrived there
The encircling heights of the summits to come
and the ones that are done
The new morning light
A promise the cold night could never break
All the colours of this Earth emerge from the ebon
One by glorious one
I enjoyed that OOP and it does ring a bell.:thumbup:Quote:
Originally Posted by OneOffPoet
A good Autumnal poem that Mossy and one to warm you up a bit as well :rolleyes: :D
Here's one from the man from Mytholmroyd which is also the home of Calder Valley Fell runners of course :cool:
There came a day
There came a day that caught the summer
Wrung its neck
Plucked it
And ate it.
Now what shall I do with the trees?
The day said, the day said.
Strip them bare, strip them bare.
Let’s see what is really there.
And what shall I do with the sun?
The day said, the day said.
Roll him away till he’s cold and small.
He’ll come back rested if he comes back at all.
And what shall I do with the birds?
The day said, the day said.
The birds I’ve frightened, let them flit,
I’ll hang out pork for the brave tomtit.
And what shall I do with the seed?
The day said, the day said.
Bury it deep, see what it’s worth.
See if it can stand the earth.
What shall I do with the people?
The day said, the day said.
Stuff them with apple and blackberry pie –
They’ll love me then till the day they die.
There came this day and he was autumn.
His mouth was wide
And red as a sunset.
His tail was an icicle.
Ted Hughes
Blimey! That's a Ted Hughes I've not read before. Cheers Alf - really liked it.Quote:
Originally Posted by Alf
Hey OneOffPoet, that's very resonant of the breaking dawn, although for me it's watching the event while half-waking on a tussocky hill side, tucked up in a bivvy bag. I'm ashamed to say I've not managed to run through the night yet as I'm too much of a lazy hound! :)
Coney Island
Coming down from downpatrick
Stopping off at st. johns point
Out all day birdwatching
And the craic was good
Stopped off at strangford lough
Early in the morning
Drove through shrigley taking pictures
And on to killyleagh
Stopped off for sunday papers at the
Lecale district, just before coney island
On and on, over the hill to ardglass
In the jamjar, autumn sunshine, magnificent
And all shining through
Stop off at ardglass for a couple of jars of
Mussels and some potted herrings in case
We get famished before dinner
On and on, over the hill and the craic is good
Heading towards coney island
I look at the side of your face as the sunlight comes
Streaming through the window in the autumn sunshine
And all the time going to coney island Im thinking,
Wouldn't it be great if it was like this all the time.
Van Morrison
Doubt shall not make an end of you
Doubt shall not make an end of you
nor closing eyes lose your shape
when the retina's light fades;
what dawns inside me will light you.
In our public lives we may confine ourselves to darkness,
our nowhere mouths explain away our dreams,
but alone we are incorruptible creatures,
our light sunk too deep to be of any social use
we wander free and perfect without moving
or love on hard carpets
where couples revolving round the room
end found at its centre.
Our love like a whale from its deepest ocean rises -
I offer this and a multitude of images
from party rooms to oceans,
the single star and all its reflections;
being completed we include all
and nothing wishes to escape us.
Beneath my hand your hardening breast agrees
to sing of its own nature,
then from a place without names our origin comes shivering.
Feel nothing separate then,
we have translated each other into light
and into love go streaming.
Brian Patten