Poetry for School by Jack Houston

POETRY FOR SCHOOL

by Jack Houston

Stoke Newington c. 500,000 BC

“The sharp implements at North-East London have been found in such positions that the idea is sometimes forced on one that all the makers of the implements suddenly died or left the place in fear of some impending danger, and left their tools on the very spots where they were actually being used.” — Worthington G. Smith

Young, fit, barely lingual & single (the female he mated with last night

still ain’t returned his call), he stands & surveys an unyet named land.

He’s with his group, safer in their small number. Around them hairy, dark, large-horned beasts

& hairier, darker larger-tusked beasts stomp the plain that stretches all the way to the water.

Troop & herds watch each other warily – the same game played & replayed – no one wanting to let slip;

all mad scared of the massive cats that ripple through the longer grasses: deadlier

as the day fades.

He squats

&, using a technique passed from hand to hand, with a hard stone in one – soft flint in the other,

gently knap – knap – knaps until a sharp edge is made. He holds up his latest blade to the light. It’s perfect,

almost too sharp, & will serve him well. But when she (yes, her) walks past and coos gently, he drops it.

Living the Dream

Double-dropping pills with whisky, that’s how you knew it was a dream. There’s no way you could down anything with whisky, straight from the bottle, ugh, no way.

That’s how you knew it was a dream. In real life you’ve had experiences with whisky, straight from the bottle (ugh, no way!) when you were a teenager that’d have put you off.

In real life you’ve had experiences, some good, some bad, most happening when you were a teenager. That’d have put you off taking too many risks, being too wild.

Some good. Some bad. Most happening so fast you almost miss everything. Taking too many risks, being too wild, you have to calm down. You can’t go on

so fast you almost miss everything: the highs, the lows. It ain’t easy to — you have to calm down. You can’t go on raving until you’re old and grey, can you?

The highs. The lows. It ain’t easy to imagine it, going out, trying to keep up raving until you’re old and grey. Can you? I can’t. No thanks. Better to settle.

Imagine it, going out, trying to keep up (it must get a bit much after a while). I can’t. No thanks! Better to settle down, bring some new little ravers in.

It must get a bit much after a while; you want someone to take over. Don’t go getting down, bring some new little ravers in! Watch them have a time of it, naturally

you want someone to take over. Don’t go getting all freaky-deaky now. You’re not giving up. Relax, watch them have a time of it. Naturally, though, you might want to join in a bit; but

all FREAKY-DEAKY now — you’re not giving up! Relax, there’s no way you could down anything… though you might want to join in a bit. But double-dropping pills with whisky?

The Flying Squad

No one round here was quite sure of what had happened to the Alsatians. Perhaps someone took them off out for a walk and lost them or something. All I know is one day the police started to train budgerigars.

And what with your parakeet not being the most fearsome of creatures we simply laughed

at first.

But, as it happens, they’ve got a sharp sense of smell, so can sniff out crime at a mile; and once you’ve seen one lift off and climb quicker than a skittish kitten, you soon start to wondering,

Have I made decent choices? kept the right kind of friends?

Keen of eye, supple of limb, and surprisingly vicious, a chatter of budgerigars are. Once they’ve mustered and got their blood up, nowhere’s safe.

Tho’ it ain’t until you’ve gone and seen a score of them,

little claws flashing under a blur of blue-green-yellow feathers,

swoop down to bodily hoik a geezer into custody, that you really begin to think about going straight.

Post Peak

2 horses stand together in a car park, the marmalade glow of morning having them look else, else, else.

Manes sporadically twist a tail’s flick. The rusted hulk,

sitting flat in the corner, communicates dead tradition. A sign speaks to no one, threatening nothing, nothing, nothing. The horses pick between the cracks going for the tiny unnamed sun-bloom flowers that rise, rise, rise, blossom, blossom, blossom, fall.

Rise,

blossom, blossom, blossom,

fall,

fall,

fall,

fall,

fall,

fall.

Breath

“Because breath allows all the speech force of language back in… everything in a poem can now be treated as solids, objects, things.”

Charles Olson

Now breathe. Go on, we both know you have to; both know you must, still. Fill your lungs. Empty them. Feel the air pass through and into you.

Now imagine you are playing a flute. Purse your lips. Hold the instrument

at the correct angle. No, no, no, not like that, you’ll never make a note that way. Yes, that’s better.

Now blow. Doesn’t that sound good? Bit like a bird, only deeper and richer.

Now try to picture being a concert pianist, about to play before a large hall of people. They are quiet, waiting for you to play your first note.

Now don’t panic. Don’t get nervous. Keep your breathing even and regular. This will help with your nerves, calming them, and also your performance.

Now try and think ‘I’m a tree.’ Breathing in what people breathe out and breathing out what people breathe in. You need not worry a jot about music or performance. Though birds live and sing within your branches, and you’re

now made of wood, which could be used to make a piano.

The Fall for Harun Yahya

In the beginning there’s a twitch or an itch, or a feeling like heat on the back of the head.

Our eyes squint and start shrinking, ears tuft up. A deep yearning for trees.

Things get hairy, but we just can’t talk about what’s going on. We walk away

from cars, homes, phones, retrace steps back to simpler. The whales come

stomping onto land. Cows get big and pigs get angry. Chickens fly their coops and grow terribly

large. And while we rustle in undergrowth, using all four legs, tails descend to balance leaps between branches.

Soon fur and feather drop. Legs go all caudal. We slither back into the sea; cells fall

apart — an elemental tango slowing to a stop: amin-o, amin-o, amin-o, amin-o.

COMMENTARY

In the first of these six poems I have, like Seamus Heaney in North, used archeology as an influence for my poetry. But where Heaney used the bog bodies found throughout northern Europe, I have turned to the hand-axes that are still being found in people’s back gardens in the suburbs of North London. These are dated back to about half a million years ago when the forerunner to Homo Sapiens, Homo Erectus, lived in a country we would barely recognise. However, I wanted the poem to focus on what unites our two species. I tried to do this by having the language, ‘Young, fit’, ’ain’t returned his call’, ‘latest blade’, be up-to-date, thereby helping the modern-day reader

to connect with the subject of the poem. The main drawback with this conceit is that when ‘today’ s’ idiom moves on, the poem may be left sounding as dated as an Acheulean stone tool. Another poem set in pre-history is Linda France’s ‘Acknowledged Land’ — in which the action is placed and dated ‘Northumberland, 10,000 – 700 BC’ in an epigraph. The similarities between her poem and my own do not end there, in her poem France even has mention of ‘so many blades, knives // we whittle from the sharp sound of flint’.

In the latest issue of PN Review, there are two pantoums. One by Marilyn Hacker, ‘Pantoum in Wartime’, and one by Kathleen Bell, ‘at the station of Montparnasse’. Both are very technically impressive. Like both these poets I have taken the second and fourth line of each stanza and repeated them in the first and third lines of the next, taking the two ‘unused’ lines — the first and third lines from the first stanza — and using them in a last stanza that arrives after ten stanzas. Writing poems to forms such as the pantoum is quite the technical challenge, but is also a lot of fun. There is a connection with August Kleinzahler’s ‘Sunday in November’ in that this poem not only references some else’s dream, ‘And who were they all in your dream last night / chattering so / you think that when you woke / the living room would be full of friends and ghosts?’ but also speaks in the second person. John Ashberry tackled the pantoum form in a poem simply titled ‘Pantoum’. The literary spirit of Simon Armitage looms large over ‘The Flying Squad’. Poems such as ‘The Stuff’, and ‘Brassneck’ all feature speakers from an unspecified criminal underclass. I have tried, like Armitage, to express a character through the use of a distinct voice that does not quite sound like it is using received pronunciation, ‘climb quicker than a skittish kitten’, ‘a chatter of budgerigars are, once they’ve mustered / and got their blood up’, ‘Tho’ it ain’t until you’ve gone and seen a score of them, little claws flashing / under a blur of blue-green-yellow feathers, swoop down / and bodily hoik a geezer into custody’. I was also pleased to be able to use a bird-related collective noun. Jane Yeh’s ominous ‘The Birds’, where she has birds that are wanting ‘to live on the ground like people, but they can’t be arsed to make weapons’, was an enjoyable influence. Reading through The Wolf magazine, I was struck by Alvin Pang’s new offerings, ‘-drawn’ and ‘Obituary’. In particular, his use of spacing the words around the page gave me the idea for ‘post peak’. As I was writing the poem, I also thought of a recent issue of Magma where a ‘concrete poetry’ theme led to many poems whose shape in some way equalled their content. When

the poem began to come together I could see the ‘tiny untitled sun-bloom flowers’ appear. There is also a nod to Charles Olson and his work in spacing words on the page. The collision of concrete poetry and plant-life brings to mind George Starbuck’s ‘Sonnet in the Shape of a Potted Christmas Tree’ There is a poem by Will Kemp in a recent issue of The Rialto that is worth quoting in full:

The Rowers

They came through the lifting mist,

eight blades skimming the water each man stretching forwards then

heaving back on taking the catch, the bow at once thrust on towards

the hard yards of the Long Reach, the crew pulling clear of that grey

like a longship leaving the sound.

I return to Olson for the epigraph to ‘Breath’. Though this poem’s light, comedic tone really owes more to Billy Collins than it does Olson. There is also more than a passing resemblance in form to Heather Phillipson’s ‘Speech to be Delivered at the First Convenient Occasion’, with its indented lines running back and forth across the page. Though these poems use the space of the page in an innovative fashion, neither come close to Olson’s ‘Maximus of Gloucester’ in which the lines slip their moorings entirely to go spinning off around the page. Glynn Maxwell has written a poem titled ‘Breath’ in which he writes, ‘Inhale. In that is old democracy’.

‘The Fall’, with its dedication, biblical opening line, and description of a reverse evolutionary path this poem pokes gentle fun at steadfastly-held creationist beliefs without, I hope, offending anyone too much. It owes much to the poetry of Jean Sprackland, who in poems such as ‘Fibre Optic’, ‘Soulless’ and ‘The Mission’, addresses themes of science, technology and spirituality. There is also the irreverence of Sam Taylor who in his poem ‘Sunday Morning’ describes a young Jesus as having ‘acne then, full-blown craters’. Nicholas Laird, in his poem ‘The Effects’, writes ‘To see the gods withdraw, / dethroned, exposed to ridicule’, which in some way prefigures both Sam Taylor’s and my own poem. Jorie Graham has written a poem titled ‘Evolution’, though I fear I may now be comparing puddles to oceans.

Finally, it is interesting to note that if we pay attention to Helen Vendler’s distinction between dramatic monologue and lyric (i.e. that dramatic monologues are ‘poems that are overheard’ and a lyric is a poem that makes ‘their reader the solitary speaker’), we immediately notice that all the above poems lack the lyric ‘I’, are dramatic monologues. If we believe that ‘one can look for [the personal] and already one is not oneself, one is several’ then this may not be so much of an issue. But could be, if only for the sake of balance, something I may wish to address in my future poetic endeavours.