1. |
Hope of a Tree, Part 1
03:55
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For there is hope of a tree
If it goes down, then it will sprout again,
That its tender branches will not cease.
Though the root grows old in the earth
And the stock dies in the ground,
At the scent of water it will bud
And bring forth boughs.
Man wastes away and dies,
And gives up the ghost and where is he.
But there is hope of a tree.
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2. |
Secrets
02:52
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3. |
Mirabelle
03:07
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As if they were waiting for a world to begin. As if they were waiting for a world to begin and had gathered for the view, plum position, here on our lawn.
Gods, she had said. There are gods in the Mirabelle tree.
It was early, I was wrestling on a sock. But the way she said it, more breath than voice, made me join her there at the bedroom curtain.
Kids, I thought, sitting in the branches, thumbing their phones. But we both knew. Instead of some other Monday’s finches flicking, they had settled here; a stillness, a grace of them.
Small, I said. A bit small for gods.
The binocs, she said. Though I’d already grabbed our battered copy of The God Spotter’s Guide.
Hathor, Lady of the Sycamore, was swinging her legs. Then Dog-headed Penghou, his arm around a dryad. And Tapio, tiara’d with a fresh Finnish fir branch.
And Nang Tani and Jinmenju. A gallery of sprites and faes from The Arboreal. And there at the top, like the Christmas fairy, Baltic Lauma. I could have sworn she waved.
Who could imagine a humble plum supporting such godhood? And yet we had expected it, were prepared.
Where else would they gather for this convention, and when, if not Now, as the earth tilts like an upturned table, and the silvery ones from undiscovered stars prepare to descend?
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4. |
Binsey Poplars
03:22
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My aspens dear, whose airy cages quelled,
Quelled or quenched in leaves the leaping sun,
All felled, felled, are all felled;
Of a fresh and following folded rank
Not spared, not one
That dandled a sandalled
Shadow that swam or sank
On meadow and river and wind-wandering weed-winding bank. O if we but knew what we do
When we delve or hew—
Hack and rack the growing green!
Since country is so tender
To touch, her being só slender,
That, like this sleek and seeing ball
But a prick will make no eye at all,
Where we, even where we mean
To mend her we end her,
When we hew or delve:
After-comers cannot guess the beauty been.
Ten or twelve, only ten or twelve
Strokes of havoc únselve
The sweet especial scene,
Rural scene, a rural scene,
Sweet especial rural scene.
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5. |
Pause, Woodman
02:55
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Pause, Woodman, ‘ere you make a stroke
Against this unoffending oak.
Think if there be no other way
And let the noble fellow stay.
But if by hard necessity
You are compelled to fell the tree,
Then go perform an act of grace
And plant another in its place.
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6. |
Cherry O
04:57
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Loveliest of trees, the cherry now
Is hung with blooms along the bough,
And stands about the woodland ride
Wearing white for Eastertide.
Cherry now, along the bough.
Woodland ride, Eastertide.
Now of my threescore years and then,
Twenty will not come again.
And take from seventy springs a score,
It only leaves me fifty more.
Cherry now, along the bough.
Woodland ride, Eastertide.
Years and ten, come again,
Springs a score, fifty more.
Now of my threescore years and then,
Twenty will not come again.
And take from seventy springs a score,
It only leaves me fifty more.
Cherry now, along the bough.
Woodland ride, Eastertide.
Years and ten, come again,
Springs a score, fifty more.
And since to look at things in bloom
Fifty springs are little room,
About the woodlands I will go
To see the cherry hung with snow.
Cherry O, hung with snow
Things in bloom, little room.
Years and ten, come again,
Springs a score, fifty more.
Cherry O, hung with snow
Things in bloom, little room.
Cherry now, along the bough.
Woodland ride, Eastertide.
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7. |
Chico
06:13
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8. |
Twig of Willow
01:40
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Silver bark of beech, and sallow
Back of yellow birch and yellow
Twig of willow. Twig of Willow.
Stripe of green in moosewood maple,
Colour seen in leaf of apple,
Bark of popple. Bark of popple.
Wood of popple.
Wood of popple pale as moonbeam,
Wood of oak for yoke and barn-beam,
Wood of hornbeam.
Silver bark of beech, and hollow
Stem of elder, tall and yellow
Twig of willow. Twig of Willow
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9. |
Yew
03:14
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Once I met a tree, a yew planted in Caedmon`s century,
Walked its span, conjuring stories held in the dark scope of its memory,
Then lived a while and forgot about the tree
Till years later, back in the same southern county,
Staying in a borrowed house, writing, earnestly.
A storm had blown. A man outside was clearing debris.
’Famous writer’, he said. ‘Proper one, lives nearby’.
I knew the name from school; drama in verse set in history.
Full of cock I knocked at his door, invited myself for tea.
The old man humoured his visitor, showed me his desk in the study
And talked; the craft of writing, life, mortality.
Listened too, was gracious. Perhaps he was lonely.
I told him I was writing, gave him a draft of my play.
He read it; liked it, or said he did, commented kindly,
And gave me his new one: ‘Caedmon`, it was called (Father of English poetry).
Driving home, I passed through the village of the ancient yew tree,
Parked up, glimpsing the shavings, the trunk sawn brutally.
Down, blown down in the storm, they told me.
I stood for a while then hacked a branch from the ruin of its body
And sent to the playwright a sprig from the yew seeded in Caedmon`s century.
Alive still, I wrote, and for planting, a crooked line of English poetry.
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10. |
Hope of a Tree, Part 2.
04:40
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For there is hope of a tree, hope of a tree.
If it goes down, then it will sprout again,
That its tender branches will not cease.
Though the root grows old in the earth
And the stock dies in the ground,
At the scent of water it will bud
And bring forth boughs.
For there is hope of a tree, hope of a tree.
Man wastes away and dies,
And gives up the ghost and where is he?
But there is hope of a tree.
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Schwa Leeds, UK
Welcome in Schwa: Peter Spafford writes poetry and plays the piano; Richard Ormrod plays other instruments and arranges tunes. More recently, Jacqui Wicks sings and plays the ukulele.
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