Richard Westcott's poetry

  So here we are now – high summer, entering the second half of the year. I'm more conscious than usual of time passing. Yellow flags flower for such a short time, the cows will move on and even ox-eye daisies last only a while. Yet time is timeless: endless, it's the one thing that will never run out. All the time in the world... 'Natural Time', whatever that may be. Above all, the sun tells the time, giving warmth and growth. The daisy with its yellow disk-florets and conspicuous white rays finds its name from its sun-like appearance, literally the day's eye. And I am watched, even as I watch, while the daisies follow the sun. Natural time All the time in the world while the grass grows I am studied heavily by long-lashed eyes deep in an old wise head.   Black and white jigsaw shapes and hour-glass patches naturally fit together like settled stones in a wall. She shifts her weight   waiting.  Slow side to side swing of tail tells the tim...

    My daughter’s cat has captivated her family. Even I – being more of a dog person (Timmy our Jack Russell hates cats) – found myself admiring his grace and beauty, and all those skills a cat deploys and enjoys.  Thinking about their cat, I realised how many words contain 'cat'; so it was that this poem took shape. Predictably, I then thought I should write a dog poem. I didn’t actually get very far, having identified only a few dog words: after dogma/dogmatic, dogged, lying doggo and Venetian doges I began to run out. So the dog poem had to wait, its tongue hanging out. But having just gone to my (big) dictionary and found a long list of dog words and phrases, ranging from a certain Shakespearian Dogberry through dog collars, dog days and dog-eared to a dog’s dinner, the Dogstar and dogwatch, I now feel like telling Timmy something can be found to be thrown, and he can wag his tail – even chase a cat.    A Concatenation of Catchwords   Where ...

  Love comes in many forms. My little poem this month celebrates a couple of them. I celebrate the manifest love a girl feels for a tiny bird upon her hand. In this moment, she is captivated.  It is as if, for a timeless instance, during which they each illuminate the other. nothing else exists, But another form of love’s in play - a father's love for his daughter. She's grown up now, but here she still is – an innocent girl, my daughter, entranced by a bird. I too am captivated. Perhaps that's what love's all about?   Still Life   A moment it was and a moment still is when colours come live soft life radiates and lightness descends to surprise and delight one who is loving observant and awestruck whose open hands gentle a wonder of nature sensing perfection   warm in the sunshine a golden girl glows blessed by a fledgling just for a moment a moment of stillness before each flies away  

  As it's April, the 1 st being of course All Fools' Day, here's a foolish poem. And why not be foolish, at least occasionally?   Life is too often too serious. Many might suggest Jabberwocky as one of the best known and loved foolish poems. In fact, it's a slaughter poem which shouldn't be funny at all, but what with its crazy story, made-up words, galumphing rhythm and compelling rhymes, the whole poem whiffles merrily along. That the poor old Jabberwock was decapitated and two other fearsome monsters are left rampant, or should I say frumious, and it looks suspiciously as though everything otherwise seems to return to what it was before all this happened – none of these are allowed to spoil the chortlement. The hero – for such he has become – enjoys the warmest of welcomes from a proud father, who declares it to be a frabjous day! Actually, frabjous is where I started.   A friend in our poetry workshop suggested the word as the topic for our next meeting...

  Coming back to an old work place can be startling, especially if it's been abandoned. Abandoned not just by you, but by those who might have followed. Forsaken for good, even if circumstances had made it impossible to continue. It might not help much to remind oneself that part of the reason for all this was that the work was inefficient, clumsy and had become outmoded. Maybe worst of all would be to find amongst the ruins and abandonment an entirely inappropriate new clueless set of incumbents who could never have understood how hard we'd tried? But perhaps after all, that might be consoling. A comforting realisation that all has not been wasted, that new uses have been found for what we've left behind – in short, that life goes on. We hope. The Forecaster   This was where we lived and worked – a weather station way up north – Wrangel Island, to be precise Kolyuchin – north of Chukotka.   We made observations, carefully measured the various meteorolo...

    I find myself posting this poem at the end of January – the 27 th , Holocaust Memorial Day. So much has been said, dwelt upon and shown – absolutely rightly – about this particular eightieth anniversary. I offer here a description of a solitary player of music at that place – music, the most abstract of all the arts. It could be suggested paradoxically that the abstract may not represent the worst way to approach the most real, most grounded of events. I don't know. I do know that February, and life itself, lies ahead, for which I give thanks. Perhaps it's best that no more be said now. Double Sarabande in 9/8 from Bach’s Partita  No. 2 in D minor for Solo Violin   Before he began there was silence. Now as he follows the lines the Sarabande accompanies him.   He proceeds with care placing his feet upon those old sleepers sunken and soaked avoiding the ballast and cinders.   The quavers are harnessed in triplets rising and falling as t...

  For this first month of a New Year, I thought I'd do a first of my own, with a second.  What I'm trying to say is that this time for the first time I'd offer you two poems. I'm happy to say they're both quite short. Actually they are a pair anyway. A pair of chairs. Van Gogh's painting of his own chair is probably better known than that of his (for a while) friend Gaugin's. I've always found that humble little empty chair backing into its corner with the box of onions and simple tiled floor nothing less than poignant.  Gaugin's chair however with its arms is slightly grander: here we have not one but two light sources, a couple of books and what looks like a carpet. But neither chair is upholstered – they're both essentially basic, sharing certain similarities. Seen as a pair, they make suggestions about friendship – about welcome, suitability and preparedness; while at the same time, they both speak of absence – not just temporary, but al...