Time and Tide waits for no man. We cannot hold back the seasons. November can be a depressing month, the year is almost over, it does not have the jollity of December, we have turned the clocks back and it is dark by the middle of the afternoon ..... but if you look November can still have some special moments. So this month I have tried really hard to look for beauty in the dying colours of the garden, and find creative poems which put into words the essence of November. Earth puts her colours by, / And veils her in one whispering cloak of shadow; / Green goes from the meadow, / Red leaves and flowers and shining pools are shrouded; / A few stars sail upon a windy sky, / And the moon is clouded. This is the first verse of a lovely poem by Percy Hugh Beverley Lyon, 1893 - 1986, poet and headmaster of Rugby School, who served in the Durham Light Infantry during the First World War and was awarded the Military Cross. There is an article about him on the Durham Light Infantry web pages www.durhamatwar.org.uk/story/12850/ His photographs, diary and letters have survived. He was taken a Prisoner of War at the end of May 1918 and ended up in Poland. He survived, and now knowing that he went through all those horrors, the poem which I have always associated with the end of the year and fading colours, now has a deeper significance. This year November has been deeply moving with all the stories from the First World War, but here is a selection of thoughts about November to share. The Kalendar of Shepherds: being devices for the twelve months. This dates from 1493, first published in Paris, with several later editions, it is a type of Almanack illustrated with woodcuts which depict seasonal work and the appropriate signs of the zodiac. The author was supposed to be a shepherd and each month compared the season with the twelve ages of man. He wrote with the expectation that the years of man are three score years and ten, and thus divided the age of man up into roughly six years each. This is the woodcut for November. Someone is pulling something down from a tree for pigs to eat. There are sheaves of corn, the cows are inside, and three people are killing a pig and catching the blood for black puddings. Then commeth November: that the dayes be very short, and the sun in maner giveth little heat, and the trees looseth their leaves. The fields that were greene, look horie and gray …. and then winter is come that a man hath understanding of age, and hath lost his kindly heate and strength: his teeth beginne to rotte, and also to chatter, and then, hath he no more hope of a long life, but desireth to come to the life everlasting ….. A timely reminder to go to the dentist perhaps .... The first of November is All Souls Day and the second is All Saints. Allhallowtide, where tide means season, and we can sing the stirring music of Ralph Vaughan Williams to the hymn "For all the saints who from their labours rest" words by William Walsham How. Thanksgiving for all those saints who have gone before us and also for all the souls of those living now. Each verse ends with a soaring Alleluia, which certainly lifts the soul. Though you need a good organist to carry it along, all eight verses. At the beginning of November there is still some colour in the garden, and my hydrangeas keep their flower heads all through the winter until we snip them off when the new buds show in April. As I have been tidying up the garden, taking down the sweet peas, and sunflowers and taking in geraniums, they have held memories of a wonderful summer when we seemed to spend days outside. John Clare has long been a favourite poet. He lived from 1793 - 1864 and came from a poor background, but lived close to nature which he described in exquisite detail, though with little punctuation. This is part of a poem called "The Summer Gone". The summer she is gone her book is shut That did my idle leisure so engage Her pictures were so many - some I put On memory’s scroll - of some I turned the page …… So summer went and so the autumn goes Hedge orchard wood to red and yellow turn The lark-becrowding field a desert grows The brooks that sung do nothing else but mourn For company - there long-necked cranes sojourn Unstartled by the groups that summer gave When reapers shepherds all with thirst did burn And thronged its stream - aye life need little crave For such will winter be in the unnoticed grave. The third of November is Saint Rumwold or Saint Rumbold's day. Although he is associated with Buckingham and Northampton, there is a local dedication not just in a church but in the name of a village in Teesdale. Romaldkirk is a large parish which takes in a huge part of Teesdale on the Yorkshire side of the Tees, it is a lovely old church. Worth a visit. November 5th , Guy Fawke's Day, Gunpowder Plot, call it what you will. There used to be a special service for the 5th November in the book of Common Prayer thanking God for the deliverance of Parliament. Please to remember / The fifth of November / Gunpowder treason and plot / I know no reason / why gunpowder treason / Should ever be forgot. There may be other versions of the rhyme, but this one was collected by Iona and Peter Opie and is in their book "I saw Esau" . As a children we probably had no idea what treason was, and the biggest association I had with this date is toffee that my mother made with dark treacle. I think it was called Plot Toffee. Anyone else remember this ? There are other anniversaries on this day. One is the Glorious Revolution of 1688, but it depends on which side of the political and religious divide you are of course. This was the date that the Protestant William of Orange landed in the West Country after a "Protestant wind" blew him from Holland, King James II fled to France, and William was crowned King William III and his wife Queen Mary. The picture below depicts the landing of William III at Torbay on the 5th November 1688 and is at the National Maritime Museum and on the ArtUk website. November 5th is also the date of the Battle of Inkerman in the Crimean War in 1854. This 11th November has been particularly poignant as we have been reminded of the Centenary of the signing of the Armistice in 1918. There have been many moving tributes given and stories told of great valour and bravery. The men who went to war made the ultimate sacrifice, but women made a sacrifice too. Here are two poems written by women from the point of view of women. The first gives the voice of a nurse, the second the voice of a mother. He was just a boy, as I could see For he sat in the tent there close by me. I held the lamp with its flickering light, And felt the hot tears blur my sight As the doctor took the blood-stained bands From both of his brave, shell-shattered hands - His boy hands, wounded more pitifully Than Thine, O Christ, on Calvary. I was making tea in the tent where they, The wounded, came in their agony; And the boy turned when his wounds were dressed, Held up his face like a child at the breast, Turned and held his tired face up, For he could not hold the spoon or cup, And I fed him …. Mary, Mother of God, All women tread where thy feet have trod. by Mary H J Henderson And the second poem by a woman is written by one of my favourites, whom I have mentioned here before, Dorothy Una Ratcliffe. She wrote in Yorkshire dialect, and the words she used take me right back to my childhood on the farm. This poem is in the form of a letter written by a mother to her son, this is only part of it. A Farmeress to her son on active service. Hope Alone, Driftdale Head, My dear son, I’se writin’ to thee in t’owd kitchen thoo knaws well: …. Thoo wilt finnd ‘at thi own Muther’s kept things gradely, “not been slack” So our farm is in grand fettle, ‘gainst rare days when thoo comes back; An’ ther’s brass in t’Bank at Richmond, ivery penny in War Loan. Geese an’ turkeys, ducks, they sold well, an’ that bonnie heifer roan Promises to be a beauty, t’finest milker in our herd Heer’s a capper ! I can see thee slap thi knee “Upon my word!” ….. An’ ther’s nowt I’d ask t’Almighty save just ony this yan thing Gie our country peace wi’ honour, an’ my lad wi’t comin’ spring. Nivver doubt but we’ll be happy in them years ‘at lie ahead, As we wur when yance I tucked thee, my lile chuckie, safe abed. We are in the canny keepin’ of a Lord who’s varra thrang Guardin’ widows an their childer, rightin’ things ‘at have gone wrang. Mary Carr won t’prize at whist drive, ay, sure, she’s been varra good, Coom across this bitter morning’, broke up t’ice an’ chopped up t’wood. T’postman’s here: noo quiet Towser ! Beauty, doon, Lord, what a pother ! Two fra thee, lad ! I’se contented. Bless Thee. From thi luvin Muther The 11th of November is also the day of Saint Martin of Tours, or Saint Martin in Winter, Martinmas. This Saint Martin was often depicted as a soldier, and his story was that he saw a poor beggar shivering in the cold and cut his cloak in two with his sword and gave half to the beggar. That night he had a dream and saw Jesus wearing half his cloak, and was converted to Christianity. His half a cloak became a holy relic and became a sacred banner in France. It was kept in an oratory or chape, and the person who looked after it was the chapelain - from which we have the words chapel and chaplain. Martinmas was a time for preparing food to be preserved through the winter, a time of goose fairs and when beasts were killed before winter [they didn't have great stocks of silage to feed them through the winter, only breeding stock were kept alive], and an important date in old documents for holding courts, paying rents or doles from charities. Martinmas crops up in many historical documents as a season important to the economy. Another snippet from John Clare, who so keenly observed rural life - ‘Tis Martinmas from rig to rig Ploughed fields and meadow lands are blea In hedge and field each restless twig Is dancing on the naked tree A few brave calendulas are about the last summer flowers in the garden, but even they are getting buried under falling leaves. An old "Book of Days" published 1888, has this observation on November - On the cold dark naked hedge a few ears, which the birds have long since emptied, hang like funeral wreaths over the departed harvest . The rain raineth every day on the heps and haws and autumn berries … while the decaying leaves come rolling up to make a covering for their graves …. If a living flower still stands above its dead companions, it bends its head like a mourner over a grave, and seems calling on mother earth to be let in ….. So one of the last gardening jobs of the season has been to dig up the dahlias. I will confess husband does the digging not me, and it is so sad to say goodbye to them as they have filled the garden with colour all summer long. But as long as we keep the tubers dry in the garage we will start them growing again next spring. Once they are out of the ground it does not matter so much about the rain. Rain is a feature of poems about November. This is by Robert Calverley Trevelyan, 1872 - 1951, associated with the Bloomsbury group, he served with the Friends' War Victims Relief Service in France in the First World War. When after weeks of winter rains The foggy air hangs chill and wet, When misted are the window-panes, And walls and sheets and cupboards sweat; When chilblains itch in every shoe, And the mind's furnished chambers too Are damp and sodden through and through; When meals are glum and shoulders ache, No match will strike nor firewood blaze, Fiddlestrings squeak and tempers break, No robin sings and no hen lays; When paths are pools, and noses pearled, And cats in kitchen fenders curled Dream of a happier, drier world; Then suddenly, when least we think, A bright wind breaks the mist, and there The sun looks out above the brink Of piled up clouds, stair over stair: Glad then at heart are all live things, Both small and great, on feet or wings, Birds, boys and beggars, cats and kings Very soon we will be singing the words of Christina Rossetti, 1830 - 1894, "In the bleak mid-winter" and "Love came down at Christmas", but she wrote many, many poems. She knew the rain was vital if spring was to follow. Winter Rain Every valley drinks Every dell and hollow; Where the kind rain sinks, Green spring will follow. Yet a lapse of weeks - Buds will burst their edges, Strip their wool-coats, glue-coats, streaks, In the woods and hedges November has a little flurry of saints from many parts, some now forgotten, some half remembered, such as St Catherine on the 25th November, now remembered in the Catherine Wheel fireworks. Until right at the end of November there is St Andrew's Day on the 30th. An apostle and fisherman, whose story takes us right back to the Gospels. He is the patron saint of Scotland and many, many churches are dedicated to him. St Andrew's day heralds Advent and the preparation for Christmas. November is almost behind us and hopefully brighter days ahead. No sun, no moon, no morn, no noon, no dawn, no dusk, no proper time of day ….. no fruits, no flowers, no leaves, no birds - NOVEMBER Thomas Hood 1799 - 1845 And lastly, does anyone remember the Ladybird books ? Now they have been lampooned with modern titles and the old pictures. But I LOVED the series with illustrations by C F Tunnicliffe. The picture of the cows under the hedge-back just sums it all up.
So I hope that you have also been able to find something of beauty in November. I have been surprised at how much colour was still around on the days when the sun shone. In the introduction to An Anthology of Modern Verse [first published 1921 so not that modern] Robert Lynd wrote of poetry "It is the speech of soul to soul". I hope you have enjoyed these snippets of poems and will find more poems to inspire.
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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
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