This month's blog is all about Darkness and the absence of it. I am fast becoming a Grumpy Old Woman, all because the council have erected a new street light just feet away from the front of our house (we do not have much front garden, only a narrow strip) and this has had a profound and deleterious effect upon both of us. Sleep is nigh impossible and you can walk about the house in the middle of the night without putting any lights on This is from inside our sitting room. And this from inside our bedroom. The intensity of the light is not really shown up here, but believe me, you could read the paper, sew or knit by this light. The intransigence of the County Council beggars belief, and dehumanizes us. Our well being and mental and physical state of health is worth less that ticking the right boxes. Evidently these street lights have to comply with certain directives and boxes have to be ticked. They cannot turn the light off at midnight because only certain lights are allocated to be turned off and this is not one of them. So my thoughts, in my sleepless and exhausted state, have turned much to the benefits of darkness. Being brought up on a farm , miles from a road, and before many places had street lights anyway, there was the thrill of looking at the night sky. As a child I would muffle up in warm clothes and go and stand outside on a clear night with my I Spy the Sky at Night book to identify constellations and tick them off in my book. There were favourites, it was a comfort to know that the Plough was there behind the elm tree which grew behind the piggery, high up above the farm house was Cassiopeia, and Orion. How did they get their names ? Who named them ? I could see why the Plough was so called, but could not connect it to a Bear, as in Ursa Major ? Who could see a Bear ? The Plough - PublicDomain,https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=10033440 But my thoughts have also gone back to the importance of darkness in so many ways. It has been the inspiration of poets and playwrights, musicians and artists. Could Dylan Thomas have begun "Under Milkwood" without being able to paint a word picture of night quite like this ? To begin at the beginning: It is Spring, moonless night in the small town, starless and bible-black, the cobblestreets silent and the hunched, courters'-and- rabbits' wood limping invisible down to the sloeblack, slow, black, crowblack, fishingboat-bobbing sea. The houses are blind as moles (though moles see fine to-night in the snouting, velvet dingles) or blind as Captain Cat there in the muffled middle by the pump and the town clock, the shops in mourning, the Welfare Hall in widows' weeds. And all the people of the lulled and dumbfound town are sleeping now. Hush, the babies are sleeping, the farmers, the fishers, the tradesmen and pensioners, cobbler, schoolteacher, postman and publican, the undertaker and the fancy woman, drunkard, dressmaker, preacher, policeman, the webfoot cocklewomen and the tidy wives. Young girls lie bedded soft or glide in their dreams, with rings and trousseaux, bridesmaided by glow-worms down the aisles of the organplaying wood. The boys are dreaming wicked or of the bucking ranches of the night and the jollyrogered sea. And the anthracite statues of the horses sleep in the fields, and the cows in the byres, and the dogs in the wet-nosed yards; and the cats nap in the slant corners or lope sly, streaking and needling, on the one cloud of the roofs. You can hear the dew falling, and the hushed town breathing. Only your eyes are unclosed to see the black and folded town fast, and slow, asleep. Dylan Thomas [1914 - 1953] - the opening lines of Under Milkwood The paintings of Atkinson Grimshaw so skillfully show a moonlit world, or sometimes in the light of gas lamps - certainly he would not have been inspired by streetlights of the intensity to floodlight a sports stadium. This picture is by John Atkinson Grimshaw 1836 - 1893. Look for his paintings on the Art Uk website, they are very atmospheric https//:artuk.org This is of Yew tree Court, Scalby and is in Scarborough Art Gallery. Part of the experience of dark nights is the beauty of sunsets, sunrises, the greyness of the dusk and the anticipation of the dawn. Moths, Bats, the Evening Primrose, the scent of the Honeysuckle, birds flying home to roost, the dawn chorus. What is modern light pollution doing to our world ? But I am becoming a GOW again, so here are some words by Robert Herrick [ 1591 - 1674] , which I used to sing to the music of Roger Quilter [ 1877 - 1953] - To Daisies Shut not so soon ; the dull-ey'd night / Has not as yet begun / To make a seizure on the light, / Or to seal up the sun. No marigolds yet closed are, / No shadows great appear ; / Nor doth the early shepherd's star / Shine like a spangle here. Stay but till my Julia close / Her life-begetting eye, / And let the whole world then dispose / Itself to live or die. Lots of flowers are sensitive to darkness and light, what are we doing to them with constant artificial light ? Will the daisies continue to fold up their petals to show the rosy underside ? The daisy is the Day's Eye, and opens with the dawn and closes at the end of the day. Many plants are photo-sensitive without having an optical nerve or a brain. The clever little daisies know when it is night and when it is day. But mostly my thoughts are around the need for sleep. I also used to sing a song by G F Handel called "Come to me soothing Sleep", this song is now constantly in my brain . Come to me soothing sleep! / And with thee bring forgetfulness and dreams Then when darkness spreadeth her wing / I should love her and embrace her Bid her welcome, bid her welcome as a friend Indeed. The other song repeating itself in my brain is one that was made popular by Simon and Garfunkel - Hello darkness my old friend, I've come to talk with you again ........ In restless dreams I walked alone / Narrow streets of cobblestone / 'Neath the halo of a street lamp / I turned my collar to the cold and damp When my eyes were stabbed by the flash of a neon light / That split the night And touched the sound of silence I bet you are humming it now as well ! And don't get me started on Silence .... But throughout the ages poets and writers and artists of all descriptions have linked darkness to sleep and its benefits. A madrigal (I also used to sing this) by John Wilbye [1574 - 1638] shares this sentiment - Draw on sweet night, best friend unto those cares, that do arise from painful melancholy. My life so ill through want of comfort fares, that unto thee I consecrate it wholly, sweet night, draw on ...... And whilst I was suffering from serious sleep deprivation, I thought the coolness of the Parish Church and the somnolent tones of Choral Evensong would give me some peace - which it did until the last hymn, which I had always loved, until now. By John Ellerton [1826 - 1993] Saviour again to Thy dear name we raise / With one accord our parting hymn of praise ....... Grant us Thy peace Lord through the coming night / Turn Thou for us its darkness into light NO ! Please let me sleep. This is by Edward Burne Jones [1833 - 1898] and is called The Sleeping Beauty. It is in Manchester Art gallery, also on the Art UK website. So in order to get my Beauty Sleep, I think I will have to resort to this .... I hope that you are getting your full quota of sleep. Any remedies that you can share are welcome !
0 Comments
|
AuthorThis is where you can share creativity with me. I believe that everyone has something creative within them, and it is a joy to find ways of being creative. Blogging is NEW to me, so here goes ..... Archives
January 2024
Categories |