Penelope Shuttle

An apple tree bent double with fruit
grew in the middle of the living room
shaking gently
as the average family pootled by with plates
or devices in their hands

The room was almost all tree
everyone edged round it
Curiously no one picked a single apple
nor did the ripe fruit ever fall

The full tree stood there
a daemon to behold

Who lives in that house now
I can't tell you
My childhood lives on there
and my parent shadows
and all my days and nights that will never bear fruit

The apple tree I speak of
roots itself partly in truth and partly in lies
Those roots are splinters of the true cross
They alone know why miracles are best avoided
...

Father Lear the king so shaped his bairns
with the wand's upper hand
the fire's swanny wing
smooth tippet of the spider

In the very kingdom of herbs and servants
he shaped them
from peace vessels of the animals
from toil of the flesh
from milk horses and the birds of sighed mercy
and the tongue undone

He shaped his bairns
in night's long harm and in day's bright psalter
in the seven courts of the north
and with the mild birch of the paternoster

From his ploughing fields and his sweat
his toothèd heart and his waxing wit
Father Lear the king shaped his bairns
for good or ill this he did
...

The North Esk is heading for Musselburgh,
The Fal for the blue respite of the Carrick Roads,
without haste the Thames is making for Tilbury,
and the Nile, from her headstream
as the Lovironzo branch of the Kagera
to her splendour in Egypt, is off
to that shopaholic, the Med;
but the Humber drags himself
towards the hard-faced cold North Sea;
the Severn descends from her perfect hills
into the loving arms of the Bristol Channel,
as does the ever-loving Avon,
while the Tamar slips unnoticed
into Plymouth Sound -
leaving the oldest city in Japan,
the Basho saddens into the Sea of Haiku,
and through ice, frost and snow
the Yenisei struggles towards the Kara Coast,
and the Alma can't get
the Crimean War out of his head;
the Seine grabs the Yone, the Marne and the Oise
by their neck-scruffs, to slum it
in the English Channel,
as that peasant rebel the Vendée
bolts for the Bay of Biscay;
the Ouse, the Yare
and the Waveney splash into the Wash
without a care in the world;
only the Danube is big enough
to make a difference to the Black Sea;
Poppa Rhine also proceeds to the North Sea,
majestic and wise,
shepherding before him the Neckar,
the Maine, the Moselle and Ruhr,
the Ijssel, the Lek and the Waal,
the Meuse and the Scheldt -
what a river!
Solitary and serene, the Po
follows his long tarnished shadow
to the Adriatic shore
and the green Mekong plays down
its cloudbursts, approaching the Yellow Sea...

Rivers, o rivers

Did I forget you, Ganges,
Whose opulent delta blesses the Bay of Bengal?

Did I forget you, Tigris and Euphrates,
who marry in the broken hills
above Basra
and upon whose banks stand Mosul
and Baghad,
rivers bearing time on their backs,
whose waters swell the blood-seas of history,
whose tides trounce the moon?

Did I forget you,
Euphrates, Tigris?
...

A jug of water
has its own lustrous turmoil

The ironing board thanks god
for its two good strong legs and sturdy back

The new fridge hums like a maniac
with helpfulness

I am trying to love the world
back to normal

The chair recites its stand-alone prayer
again and again

The table leaves no stone unturned
The clock votes for the separate burial of hearts

I am trying to love the world
and all its 8,000 identifiable languages

With the forgetfulness of a potter
I'm trying to get the seas back on the maps
where they belong

secured to their rivers

The kettle alone knows the good he does,
Here in the kitchen, loving the world,
Steadfastly loving

See how easy it is, he whistles
...

Very quickly the moon shuns
the massive domes and rounded arches
of Byzantium,
the centre-fold cities of America,
Russia's cross little citadels,
by-passes backmost lakes,
all waters, cornerstones of rivers,
moon rushing
over orchards of peach and plum,
shoving clouds before her
in a cosset of shadow,
dashing over linens
draped on tenement poles,
over all your old addresses,
skimming the brightness
from each port-of-call, carrying
tomorrow's news in her breast,
along with the latent weeping of all living things,
and glittering fast, very fast over the South Pole
where the key to understanding Art Nouveau resides,
over the great Alps
in their snowy hair-shirts
and over Europe, which she salutes in passing,
coming to rest above my garden,
bringing me, whether I like it or not,
the first rain of the summer-end
...

I was running out of time
or time was running out of me

I was no longer
decades of clear water

Time
was a cache of lions,
the end of all the birds

I was hurrying to catch up with Time,
while Time stayed home

doing the ironing,
folding his minutes,
smoothing his hours,

soon there'd be not a crumpled second
for me to hide in
...

Then one afternoon
in a little private office
the consultant Zoe and me
there's no more to be done for you,

they're going to remove
the feeding drip, up the drug dosage,
‘...and he'll just slip away'

Already high on a flying carpet
of kind morphine dreams,
you've nothing more to say to us,
though last week you could still moan,

‘get me out of here'

Almost as bad,
the junior doctor in the corridor
asking furtively,
‘if he has a coronary arrest,
do you want him resuscitated?'

Unanswerable question,
while a few feet away on your deathbed,
you were letting go
autumns of the future,

remembering the past maybe,
how I charmed your wart away,
pressing the raw steak to your cheek,
reciting,

‘O wen, o little wennikins,
Here shall you build not, here have no abode...'
Then buried the chunk of meat
In the north of our garden...
Or maybe you dreamed of our modest travels,

You, who like Rembrandt never visited Rome,
But like the Master of the small landscape,
loved the microcosm, sand-grains, water-droplets,
chips of granite, the exact quota of crystals

packed into a geode no bigger than an egg

On the day they take the drip out
there's so much we don't know,
how long it will be
before life can ever be normal again,

above all we don't know,
Zoe and I,
how beautiful and welcoming
the sunlit sands of Maenporth will be

(o come unto these yellow sands)

nor how the equinoctial blue sky
will watch over us,
like a witty person struck silent,
as I scatter your ashes into the bright waves,
and the sea, nature's perfectionist,

bears you away in triumph.
...

Like Rosamund the Fair
I speed over Folly Bridge

like Alice
I look both ways
before crossing Speedwell Street

I'm not
as you see
an official guided walking tour

Like Fair Rosamund
I quickstep down Rose Place

like swift Alice
I skip across St Aldate's

the brainbox city
huffing and puffing in my ear

I'm not hurrying off
to visit a dozen harpsichords

or the church
where William Morris was married

or to see the remains of a dodo
I plan to read

not one
of the six million books

in The Bodleian
or admire a single dreamy spire

or stand in sombre silence
on the spot

where Latimer
Mortimer and Ridley
were roasted alive on god's turnspit

because I'm heading straight
for the heart

of this leather-bound city
where's there's good reason for shadows

where I'll find
panaceas of lavender

penny-royal and nettle
rose-petal potions

medicinal oak-scented valerian
balms and syrups of hollyhock

daffodil and milk-thistle
the Many-Leaf Pharmacy where

like the porpoise not the snail
I'm walking a little faster

waltzing like Rosamund the Fair
and Little White Alice

through the wards and waiting rooms
of The Physic Garden

earthy source of tincture and tisane
the help-yourself of nature

who wears a green coat
not a white
don't you agree?
...

My Life, I can't fool you,

you know me too well,

I'm sad of myself,

days live me in vain,

you test me

but bin my answers,

you're so busy, so tired,

evenings in the glass,

drink them, My Life,

but you won't,

driving your bargains

of years gone by,

promising me

this and that till

the walls are spells,

the roof's a star,

and

I seal the hour

in a tear,

a mortal tear,

I know you so well,

My Life, not at all
...

White rose day

in a white garden

summer wilding in and out

of the pergolas of white jasmine

vestal hedges

and pom-pom dahlias

so lets sleep

have a little zizz

for a week or so shall we

in the white rose white rabbit garden

ah but he's not hurrying now

he's too sleepy

the lime-tree walk reveals

its keen green sense of humour

but then it yawns oh it yawns

sleepy questions flora and fauna never ask

are and are not answered

sleepy afternoon of Cloth-Hall dreams

boat-house snores

green scarab beetle winging-by

taking flight from Lady Macbeth's robe

in the white and wealden garden

why not have a lovely snoozy little sleep

at Zizzinghurzzzt

where the spiders reel in their sleepy suppers

and what was I sayingggggg
...

1902. Monet's staying at The Savoy

in the same rooms

occupied by Whistler a few years ago

and successfully avoiding

the denotive shackles of too exact a realism

in his paintings of The Thames,

busy adding extra bridges -

all his boatmen are named Charon

ferrying the dead

from shore to shore



Only winter will do for Monet

London wrapped

in that mysterious cloak of fog

and mist

created by London's basin situation


Only in winter

can Monet paint the Thames

without risking the overabundance

of verisimilitude

though unlike Turner

he does not resort to the trick

of making the world taller, buildings,

mountains, waterfalls,



but like Turner and Whistler

he offers us

(and so will Dufy)

a world (a Thames) of radiant precision



Look sharp Billy! Four portions of everything for M'sieur Monet!
...

Few things worse

than being taken ill on Hounslow Heath

son

as the runaway Bishop learned

and many a humbler soul

so keep the straight and narrow

boy

don't stray from Hounslow's long unlovely street

respect its Grove Road School ethos

(though few of the pupils

know their alphabet)

don't footpad

the shadowy ways by the Crane

or ride the dark

of wildtrack and brake

where a bullet can find you -

heart or brain

anywhere anywhen -

between Hounslow and Heston

Our town's one dull street

won't get you took ill

with the plaguey gunshot

fatal and fast - why run the risk?



The nuns who worked the Syon Cope

have all gone home to Lisbon -

that's a safe distance from the Heath!

If Bishop Twysden

of Raphoe

had kept such faith

he'd be living in his Donegal living

to this day

son
...

How will you fare

up there in the air



starring

in the in-flight movie

of your life?



How will you fare

air-side



lightly-propelled

by your everyday pilot?



And when turbulence

rolls in

like a rolling pin



wielded

in a fist no angel clenched



to biff and bash

the plane

how will you fare?



Best not pluck

the thunder flower



as you spin

in the wheel of fortune



faring up there

in the air



alongside

cloud-canopy



and free-fall

of the heart
...

Round we go

the bus and I

Gladstone giving us

his stern twinkly blessing

on a little summer

come from nowhere

and nothing

dear of it

to kiss-better the long

and beastly winter wounds

the british library

stretching out

behind us

a great basking lion -

the library knows

many hands many minds

make light work even

of four subterranean floors

of incunabula

only now and then

does a scholar or a volume

hit the bonk -

and from ground level up

the zillion books of life

even the most gadfly of tomes

are sleeping or waking

in their alphabetical lofts

St Pancras

blushing nearby

only the river

keeping his cool

the river

the bus

and me
...

At Mylor

the water of the well



bears the armour of the light,

it hides and escapes



and stays still

under its hood of rock



amid a galore of graves

and green leaves,



spring of fresh water

beside the sea,



a find, a treasure,

a pedigree,



no idyll

but the essential source,



now retired

from its work of sole sustenance,



living among memories

of former fame,



a saint's hand dipping in

like a taper unquenched,



coins splashing down

for reverence, not luck,



from time to time,

a self-baptism,



secret and quick,

for some



prefer their ritual

out of doors,



water understands this,

and loves the brow



fanned with its body

for reasons the water easily guesses,



for it is the one who blesses,

freely,



freely it runs

its long unceremonious



caress

through my fingers,



and on my lips

tastes ferriferous,



blood-hint at the periphery,

pell-mell mint at the heart.
...

When I couldn't

bear another day,



I cloud-watched

for dear life -

no two skies alike



Those skies

made plain to me



where my thoughts began

and where they ended



I saw the witch Kikimora

and her white Cat

scudding from cloud to cloud



Stop weeping

on the world's shoulder!



Kikimora

spat out her good advice
...

I cast you into the waters.
Be lake, or random moon.

Be first light,
lifting up its beggar's cup.

I scatter your ashes.
Be the gale teaching autumn
to mend its ways,
or leopard so proud of his spotted coat.

Be the mentor of cherry trees.

I cast your dust far and wide,
a sower broadcasting seed:
Be wild rose or hellebore or all-heal.

Descend as a vein of silver,
never to be seen,
deep in the lynx-eyed earth.

Rise as barn owl white as dusk;
dove or raven marvelling at his flight.
Know different delights.
...

If we ever meet again,
and I don't see how we can,
it won't be on the Avenida del Poeta Rilke
in Ronda,
or by the banks of the green Guadalquiver
or in Granada
where the sunset goes on till midnight,
it won't be in any of those houses by the sea
we called our own,
or in the Plaza Abul Beka
where the house martins feed their fledglings
in mud-nests under the sills,
or in the square
where the foal above the fountain
watches his moon shadow
on the wall of an inn old when Cervantes knew it,
and it won't be up in the mountains
where at the hottest hour of the day
one hundred thin long-faced wild sheep
pour out of a cave, as from the underworld.

If I ever see you again
it won't be in the water mirrors
of the Alhambra
or in a building
that doesn't know if its a cathedral
or a mosque
or by the fountains of the Garden of the Poets
in the Alcazar Real
or in the dark oratory
where they keep the writing bones
of St Juan de la Cruz, gift-wrapped
in white ribbons.

And if I ever travel north,
you won't be sitting beside me
on the bus to Silverknowles,
Clovenhorn or Rosewell.

If I ever sleep with you again
it won't be in our own eager bed
or in that haunted hotel four-poster at Glastonbury,
on the drunken sleeper to Paddington
or on board the QE2 well below the waterline,

we won't sleep together
in any friend's spare bed
or on a neighbour's floor
after some burst pipe emergency
or in that hilarious sleepless bed
of our first year together,

no, if we ever meet again
(and how can we?)
it will be in a summer time has lost track of,
in a back-street hostal
hidden in a labyrinth of tiny white lanes,

two steps past the old Synagogue
and the dens of the silversmiths,
within the white walls
and behind the black window grilles
of The Repose of Baghdad,
still bearing, see it?
its faded sign of star and crescent moon.
...

After a year,

I put your black shoes out

for the re-cycler



Two pairs



Our walks go with them,

our days out,

our journeys



In the red casket of the bin

they wait as if for you,

but you're as far away as Dad,



whose new widow

keeps his suede brogues

on guard in the glass porch



to scare off intruders
...

Pity Redgrove's Wife?

I think not.



Praise Redgrove's Wife?

Why not?



Kiss n'snog Redgrove's Wife?

I dare not.



Be-jewel Redgrove's Wife?

With topaz and coral?

I will not.



Publish Redgrove's Wife?

I shall not.



(But I shall).



Forget Redgrove's Wife?

No, I have not.



Question Redgrove's Wife?

Not yet, not yet.



Confuse Redgrove's Wife?

I need not.



Fear Redgrove's Wife?

Oh fear not.



Dream of Redgrove's Wife?

Yes, night after night.



Translate Redgrove's Wife?

Why not,

she's not made of tin.



Amaze Redgrove's Wife?

Leave that to Redgrove.
...