An Autumn evening. The park deserted save for me and my dog. A solitary birds sings. Entranced I stand, his song bringing thoughts of sorrow comingled with joy. Beauty, pain and happiness, contradictory emotions stir within my breast.
The lonely bird continues to sing, his voice filling the darkening park.
Distant sound of traffick. I linger, reluctant to break the spell.
Later, the pub full of noise. Yet, through the din I fancy, dim and distant, the singing of the birds can be heard.
An open window. Birds singing in the garden below. Cars passing, the sound of engines disappearing, forever lost in time and space.
What is it to be free?
Freedom is walking barefoot as dawn lights up the sky, damp grass underfoot, wild birds flying unconstrained above.
Freedom is speaking without fear of consequences, no glancing with trepidation over one’s shoulder.
Freedom is letting go,, being who you want to be, not the personification of the desires of others.
Freedom is the passionate kiss, love unbound.
Freedom is life, the opposite of death.
I heard the bird sing, they spoke to me of spring, of joy profound, beauty all around, flowers strew the ground, love of life abounds.
Dark thoughts on a bright day. The sun warms my face, brightness mingles with darkness on this spring morning.
Birds sing gladdening my heart but, underneath the sorrow remains.
A child’s voice full of joy calling “mummy, mummy”. My mood lightens, there is love and innocence in this world of tears.
She smiled, awhile I tarried there, fashioned castles out of air. She laughed, set my heart aflame, tis love, or my overactive brain.
I think of her but who is she? A bird encaged longing to be free? Is she content in her cage? Or does she beat the bars with rage? Do I put my thoughts on her? Building castles in the air? Who am I? who is she? Both are struggling to be free.
Thomas Hardy’s The Darkling Thrush is one of my favourite poems. I recollect having had similar thoughts to those described by Hardy while pausing to listen to the song of a bird. In my case it was, I think a blackbird rather than a thrush which produced the emotions so aptly described by the poet in the below poem.
“I leant upon a coppice gate
When Frost was spectre-grey,
And Winter’s dregs made desolate
The weakening eye of day.
The tangled bine-stems scored the sky
Like strings of broken lyres,
And all mankind that haunted nigh
Had sought their household fires.
The land’s sharp features seemed to be
The Century’s corpse outleant,
His crypt the cloudy canopy,
The wind his death-lament.
The ancient pulse of germ and birth
Was shrunken hard and dry,
And every spirit upon earth
Seemed fervourless as I.
At once a voice arose among
The bleak twigs overhead
In a full-hearted evensong
Of joy illimited;
An aged thrush, frail, gaunt, and small,
In blast-beruffled plume,
Had chosen thus to fling his soul
Upon the growing gloom.
So little cause for carolings
Of such ecstatic sound
Was written on terrestrial things
Afar or nigh around,
That I could think there trembled through
His happy good-night air
Some blessed Hope, whereof he knew
And I was unaware.”
Oh for the days of your when I could be found sitting reading with nothing but the ticking of a mantle clock to keep me company. No e-mail, internet or mobile telephone to distract me. Oh blissful memories of sitting on a wooden bench in a pleasant garden with nought but the singing of the birds as my companions.
Oh the irony of waxing lyrical about the joys of days gone by on a laptop!
Technology has it’s place. I well remember failing to meet my friend Brian in the days prior to either of us owning a mobile. Both of us waited in London’s Victoria mainline station but in entirely different parts of that huge concourse. You can guess the rest, we failed to make contact and returned home frustrated to put it mildly! Today such mishaps are much easier to avoid as short of forgetting one’s mobile or the battery failing one can call or text to ascertain where your friend is.
The internet has opened up the world and is, on the whole a force for good. Authoritarian regimes find it increasingly difficult to prevent their populations from knowing what is going on in the wider world. Even in North Korea where access to the internet is prohibited accept for a privileged few in the higher reaches of the regime, some ordinary North Koreans manage to get online with the assistance of iPhones, which is to be welcomed.
However I still feel a sense of nostalgia for those simpler times when the internet had not yet been born and landlines ruled supreme. The constant exposure to extraneous noise (the pinging of e-mail, the beep of yet another text arriving) will unless we take great care destroy something incredibly precious – the ability to completely switch off and lose oneself in the company of friends, nature or a good book. .
I don’t have a magic bullet to square this vicious circle. However when I see children playing sports rather than glued to their mobile devices I do glimpse a ray of hope. Listen to the birds, go for a walk and if you possibly can leave your phone at home or at the very least turn it off.
For my author’s page please visit http://www.amazon.co.uk/K.-Morris/e/B00CEECWHY/ref=ntt_dp_epwbk_0
I am a huge fan of Dido and own all her albums. I recently purchased Girl Who Got Away and there is, as always a lot on it which gives tremendous pleasure. I particularly like The Day Before We Went to War, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4THzaCrMht4. The sound of the birds at the start and end of the music are evocative of peaceful times as is Dido’s singing but the song of the birds can be contrasted with the planes flying overhead.
On balance my next favourite track is Happy New Year which is sung in such a sad and beautiful manner, (for some reason I am unable to copy the link to this video. You can, however find it on Youtube by searching for “happy new year Dido”. As always a great album by a talented artist.
Me reading my poem entitled Birds,
K Morris - Poet 