INTRODUCTION
The poems in this section were all written as part of the novels.
The Eye of the Queen has a lot of scraps and quotes which hint at undisclosed poetry and epics, but it has no substantial poems of its own.
In my second book, which became the 2 volumes called The Gardener, I wanted to experiment. I had read Anthony Burgess’ Enderby books at some point – and although Enderby is a bit of a failed poet, I had no doubt that Burgess had laboured over the poems. Even so, I did not think the poems were very good – my heroes at that time being W.B. Yeats and Shelley and a Manchester poet whose name escapes me for the moment. But I was intrigued by the attempt. When I came to write the Paxwax books – Master of Paxwax and Fall of the Families – I decided to follow Burgess’ example and see what it was like to have to create verse for a character. I was aware that I was, in a way, setting up hurdles for myself, and I did not really know why. Perhaps I just wanted to see what would happen. However, believe it or not, I have always tried to make each of my books distinct and I knew of no other science fiction writer who had attempted to do this. There is, of course, a lot of science fiction poetry, but I wanted to see if I could reflect a man’s mind through his verse.
Pawl Paxwax is quite a damaged man and very singular. Verse is a kind of escape for him. A veritable overflow of emotion. He is extravagant and romantic and gives no thought to criticism. His final poem however, I wanted to make quite distinct. I have always likes Old English and so, for what is in fact an elegy. I chose to imitate the verse form and rhythm of a work such as The Wanderer – for that in a way is what Pawl is. It has always seemed to me that such poems have an inbuilt sadness – an awareness of the transience of all pleasure, and all life. So it is in his grief that Pawl composes his Song to a Sad Fisherman. It is the last poem he will ever write.
In the texts I have added a bit of the novel to make the context more clear.
POEMS BY PAWL PAXWAX
Across a full moon
I do not fear the stranger
Or the creature that dogs me and will
Beckon me soon
To flickering noon.
But that veil behind the eye,
Song of Longing
Why do I see your face in the water?
Why hear your voice in the bubbling stream?
I am not satisfied with shadows,
Though shadows of you are all that I see.
Oh I am a foolish man.
Being thirsty I throw open my mouth,
And gulp and gulp drinking you down,
So much that breathing comes hard.
Oh I am a foolish man,
For when I have drunk, I lie on my back,
And wish and wish, thinking of you,
That I were thirsty again.
***
Chapter 14
Once upon another time, on the cliffs,
on a blustery day, I saw a tree burn.
Being a boy I looked for a bucket.
Being a man, should I have prayed for rain.
***
Chapter 16
Song of the Inevitability of Loving
Burn the forest,
You’ll not kill him.
Beat the thicket,
you’ll not start him.
Cover the wild land with dome and glass,
You’ll not trap him.
He’ll still be there,
Waiting,
Crouched like a wrestler,
Staring out of grass and pools,
When you least expect him.
bid him greeting,
The Green Man.
Neddelia screwed up her face and her curved fangs made strange shadows. “Mmm. Don’t like it. Don’t like burning and killing. I said a love song.”
“It’s a song about love,” said Pawl.
“Ha! Some love. Some song!”
Pawl leafed on. “Well how’s this then?”
I thought it was dying, the beetle
That crawled into my room,
After knocking on my window.
“I thought….
“Spare me,” interrupted Neddelia. “Or shall I leave now? I want something to warm the cockles of a lonely heart.”
Pawl found some lines he had never finished “Try this.”
Rough as a dog and famished too,
I find sweetness in the cup you bear.
You brought me fruit in winter.
You bring me love I will not share.
Neddelia sat up and looked at Pawl. “There’s my man. That’s what I came to hear.” She lay back and looked up through the grass and out to the clouds. “Who for?”
***
Chapter 31
Song to Laurel
You came to me in a crazy time,
Travel dazed and trailing my anchor,
Love, love me and never change.
You outshone the lights of Lotus,
You made the nights on Arcadia your own,
Love, love me and hold me firm.
If I could climb through space I would
Swing on the stars to be near your side,
Love, love me and never change.
Fresh as the rain and bright as the sun
That rides the heaving backs of waves,
Love, love me and hold me firm.
Hold me in passion with strong, bold arms,
Lead me to lie in your warm dark sea.
Love, love me and never change,
Love, love me and hold me firm.
***
Chapter 37
Song of the Secret Lover
Say who is that shadow with you,
That dappled man with sea weed hair?
Is he your dream lover,
The one that lives when eye lids close,
The lazy deadly lover who rolls in your dreams?
Do you
See his face on damp walls, and catch
His smile in the shadows of trees?
Does he smile from the smoke that curls from your fire?
Does he live in your cottage at twilight?
I will blow in the face of the smoke man.
I will stand in his sun
And take his gleam from your eye.
I will make me a coat from your darkness.
Let him walk beside me, if he can.
***
Chapter 38
Song of the Wisdom of the Carpetal Tree
I’m here, a whole-in-one,
A sleeping girl beside,
Gazing through this sun-splashed tree…
And I notice the wise Carpetal.
How bold its red leaves!
Blood and Wine offered
To the crushing sun.
But yet…
but yet see there
Tucked beneath each blazing leaf
The fruit of the tree.
It hides its secret well.
(It hides us well)
And we who lie in its shade,
We are part of its secret now.
Hush. The tree is speaking.
“Show fierce. Show fair.
But that which you hold dear,
Hide well!
Les the questing snout of the beast
Or keen knofe, or clattering tongue,
Destroy your composure.”
That is the wisdom of the Carpetal Tree.
***
From THE FALL OF THE FAMILIES
Chapter 3
Pawl wondered about himself. He had sat down intending to let a simple love lyric flow, for he was in the mood and the words were bubbling. But it seemed the time for love lyrics was over.
Song of the Dog
The dog sat at the master’s gate,
famished for a bone,
but though it waited all the day,
the master came not home.
The dog gnawed at a stone,
and though it howled when the moon peeped out,
the master came not home.
At twelve o’clock the thunder cracked,
the rain came with a roar,
pelting the dog where it lay quite still,
outside the master’s door.
“I think it is about innocence,” said Pawl.
Pawl’s last poem – Song to a Sad Fisherman
Cordoba’s Song
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