Burn's Night

My Love is Like a Red, Red Rose

O my Luve's like a red, red rose
That’s newly sprung in June:
O my Luve's like the melodie
That’s sweetly play'd in tune.

As fair art thou, my bonnie lass,
So deep in luve am I:
And I will luve thee still, my dear,
Till a’ the seas gang dry:

Till a’ the seas gang dry, my dear,
And the rocks melt wi’ the sun;
I will luve thee still, my dear,
While the sands o’ life shall run.

And fare thee weel, my only Luve
And fare thee weel, a while!
And I will come again, my Luve,
Tho’ it were ten thousand mile.

The Little Prince: Antoine de Saint Exupéry

Whole book on line

This is a favourite book to read to one’s children and grandchildren; a book that can invigorate, challenge and renew the adult. The Little Prince by Antoine De Saint Exupéry is perhaps the most loved and most widely read book in the West after the Bible. The book was published in 1943 and has been translated into more than 180 languages and sold more than 80 million copies, making it one of the best-selling books ever.

The Little Prince barely stretches to a hundred pages, but what an incredible hundred pages they are. Most bookstores carry this French novel in their children’s section. The book is written in words that are simple with a poetic flow to them; it is also illustrated with more than forty delicate pen-and-ink pictures drawn by the author. It can be read in one or two sessions but takes a lifetime to fully comprehend. This is a voyage of discovery that compares in my experience, to reading Siddhartha by Herman Hesse without the sexual experiences. As with many of the great books of philosophy and religion a proper comprehension of the wisdom contained requires a child’s faith, acceptance and willingness to suspend disbelief. In the words of the author, ‘Grown-ups never understand anything for themselves, and it is tiresome for children to be always and forever explaining things to them.’

The story begins with a pilot being marooned in the desert, which is in part a reference to real life experiences of the author who was a famous aviator and war hero. He meets a child who is the sole inhabitant of the planet Asteroid B-612, and has lived happily alone in his home-asteroid until the wind plants for him a new seed, from which springs the loveliest flower he has ever seen – a single rose.

This is the story of a boy who falls in love with a rose and lavishes his full attention on the flower. The rose torments him with her vanity and her pride. The Little Prince must leave the only home he has known to set off into the galaxy, in search of a sheep. The sheep will eat the little baobabs before they grow big enough to threaten the rose.

Understanding what is important about life and trying to find a friend becomes the mission of the Prince along the way.

It’s a trail of disappointment really. There’s the absolute monarch, the conceited individual, the drunkard, and the businessman. They are all too wrapped up in their own affairs to consider being the Little Prince’s friend; the drunkard’s tale:

‘What are you doing here?‘ he said to the drunkard whom he found sitting silently in front of a collection of bottles, some empty and some full.
‘I am drinking,‘ answered the drunkard lugubriously.
‘Why are you drinking?‘ the little prince asked.
‘In order to forget,‘ replied the drunkard.
‘To forget what?’ enquired the little prince, who was already feeling sorry for him.
‘To forget that I am ashamed,‘ the drunkard confessed, hanging his head.
‘Ashamed of what?‘ asked the little prince who wanted to help him.
‘Ashamed of drinking!‘ concluded the drunkard, withdrawing into total silence.
And the little prince went away, puzzled.
‘Grown-ups really are very, very odd,‘ he said to himself as he continued his journey.

He meets a snake when he finally lands on planet Earth. Alluding to his poisonous bite, the snake states ‘Whomever I touch I send back to the earth from which they came’ but then he decides that the prince is too “innocent” for him to do so. Right in the middle of the desert is Antoine de Saint- Exupéry who has crash-landed in his aeroplane. They seem to understand each other right away, as much from what isn’t said as from what is said.

The Little Prince tells of all the experiences he has had going from planet to planet until his arrival and what he has learned along the way. The most important thing he reveals is a secret that was taught him by a fox that he tamed:

“Goodbye,” said the fox.
“And now here is my secret, a very simple secret:
It is only with the heart that one can see rightly;
what is essential is invisible to the eye.”

“What is essential is invisible to the eye,”
the little prince repeated,
so that he would be sure to remember.

“It is the time you have wasted for your rose
that makes your rose so important.

“It is the time I have wasted for my rose–
“said the little prince
so he would be sure to remember.

“Men have forgotten this truth,” said the fox.
“But you must not forget it.
You become responsible, forever,
for what you have tamed.
You are responsible for your rose. . .”

“I am responsible for my rose,”
the little prince repeated,
so that he would be sure to remember.

With his new level of understanding, the Little Prince is at last ready to meet the snake again, but not before he passes on his new knowledge to the author - knowledge of the healing power of love which makes all things unique, and how the pain of saying goodbye is worth it if it changes how we look at the world.

This is the central lesson of the story–love and responsibility for one another. Almost the last words the Little Prince states: ‘But the eyes are blind. One must look with the heart.’

The relevance of The Little Prince is particularly important in the harsh realities of the Credit Crunch, as the prince ridicules the foundations of the modern era namely power, wealth, fame and despair through his innocence, one begins to realize the hopelessness of hope itself, for our hopes are pinned on those very foundations which, unfortunately, hold little meaning to a naive, vain rose who lies in wait somewhere for her hero to return home. Understanding life is what this story is about. The book is readily available on the Internet, and I urge you to read it. I leave you with a noted quotation from the author:

‘A single event can awaken within us a stranger totally unknown to us. To live is to be slowly born.’

The Little Prince

D-Day: The Battle for Normandy - Antony Beevor

I have read a large number of Antony Beevors books - Stalingrad, Berlin and The Hisory of the Spanish Civil War. They are all excellent - not a word I use a lot.

This book is several hundred pages long but compulsive reading - full of fact and anecdote in equal measure. War is not glamourised nor is this book partisan - American, British, Canadian, Germans are described equally - a work of stature.

Some reviews

Guardian

The pleasure of this book lies in the vividness of an episodic narrative, backed up by judicious use of quotation. Moving from the weather drama to surveillance of the assault beaches, to individual accounts of each beach, to the breakout for Paris, the action never lets up.

Independent

Beevor does battle history consummately, but he does something more than battle history. His account of the battle for Normandy combines clarity and density. The narrative has a characteristic texture. It is not so much the face of battle as the very pores.

D-Day: The Battle for Normandy

Some One

YESTERDAY BLUE

© Gloria Smith 1977

I took a moonbeam to a dream

A shimmering, shining translucent ray

It came as I lay in the quiet darkness

Raining magic sparkles, whispering my name

I drifted up to a mysterious land

Where dreams come true – and wishes too!

So I wished for you and we danced about

To the misty music playing in my heart

You took my hands and kissed me warm

Like yesterday, and mirrored in your eyes

Was all the soft, sweet love I felt for you inside

I know now that it never really fades or dies

Our love took wing upon the evening breeze

A pure and precious little white bird thing

Recaptured now trembling in the palm of my hand

Hard to hold and ever harder to understand

Reshaping – changing form into a tiny bud

Then bursting forth into a fragrant flower

Flooding us with memories; dripping nectar sweet

Come my love and eat – of love’s desire forever

As I awake the first light of dawn steals in

Through shades all drawn, and nights spell ends

I cherish our rumpled sheets and bed

I tenderly touch your face and tousled hair

And know I love you sleepy head

Published 1977 The Ashland Daily Independent & in “Strawberry Saxifrage” (an anthology by The National Society of Published Poets)

Crow, Mockingbird and Bluejay

Crow
with his black heart
antagonizes
with malice
of intent

Mockingbird
with his mate
will not be intimidated
stands his ground
singing the whole time

Blue jay
with his fine blue coat
knows
that he is a pretty bird
and pays their drama no mind

----------------------------------

Mockingbird
by my window listening to
Charlie Parker play on my radio
decided that he too could sing like a bird
His intro riff was a clarion call to heaven and
Then he dropped down into a minor key, the brother/bird tweeted
thirds and fiths and sevenths too, hitting staccato notes blue as the sky

He made it sing
He improvised and built his
song into a steady grind even making it swing
And I swear that I thought "this bird is messing with me"
He broke into a kind of scatting that was so joyous that I understood
The best thing to do was to just turn my radio off and listen to the mockingbird

by Kelvin Cook

William Blake and Football

Werewolf

Comments about this series of poems were mixed. What do you think?

I carry your heart with me