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Nov
05

Remember Remember The Fifth Of November

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I know, not long distance love poems at all, but it is Bonfire Night in the UK when the unsuccessful attempt to blow up the Houses of Parliament by Guy Fawkes and chums is celebrated with bonfire parties, fireworks, and the symbolic burning of effigies (known as “guys”) of Mr Fawkes. The Gunpowder Plot failed, some would say we could do with another (successful) one today…

1.

Remember, remember the fifth of November
Gunpowder, treason and plot.
I see no reason, why gunpowder treason
Should ever be forgot.

Guy Fawkes, guy, t’was his intent
To blow up king and parliament.
Three score barrels were laid below
To prove old England’s overthrow.

By God’s mercy he was catch’d
With a darkened lantern and burning match.
So, holler boys, holler boys,  Let the bells ring.
Holler boys, holler boys, God save the king.

And what shall we do with him?
Burn him!

2.

Guy Fawkes, Guy
Stick him up on high,
Hang him on a lamp post
And there let him die.

Guy,Guy,Guy,
Poke Him in the eye,
Put him on the fire
And there let him die

Burn his body from his head
Then you’ll say
Guy Fawkes is dead
Hip, Hip, Hooray!

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Feb
24

He Wishes For The Cloths Of Heaven

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Had I the heavens’ embroidered cloths,
Enwrought with golden and silver light,
The blue and the dim and the dark cloths
Of night and light and the half-light,
I would spread the cloths under your feet:
But I, being poor, have only my dreams;
I have spread my dreams under your feet;
Tread softly because you tread on my dreams.

WB Yeats

A love poem with a veiled threat? Or a plea? Whatever, the rolling rhythm of this poem is enchanting, particularly lines 3 and 4 with their 4 ‘ands’, and assonance (light, night, half-light). (Good job he ignored his english teacher about using ‘and’ too often!)

Unusually the rhyming sequence – ab ab cd cd is also repetitious, ie not only do the words rhyme, they’re the same words!

It produces a quasi-religious incantatory, mesmeric effect – stunning.

Listen to it recited by the best voice in the english speaking world – Sir Anthony Hopkins.

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Feb
16

Then said Almitra, “Speak to us of Love.”

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Then said Almitra, “Speak to us of Love.”

And he raised his head and looked upon the people, and there fell a stillness upon them.

And with a great voice he said:
When love beckons to you follow him,
Though his ways are hard and steep.

And when his wings enfold you yield to him,
Though the sword hidden among his pinions may wound you.
And when he speaks to you believe in him,
Though his voice may shatter your dreams as the north wind lays waste the garden.

For even as love crowns you so shall he crucify you.
Even as he is for your growth so is he for your pruning.
Even as he ascends to your height and caresses your tenderest branches that quiver in the sun,
So shall he descend to your roots and shake them in their clinging to the earth.

Like sheaves of corn he gathers you unto himself.
He threshes you to make you naked.
He sifts you to free you from your husks.
He grinds you to whiteness.
He kneads you until you are pliant;
And then he assigns you to his sacred fire, that you may become sacred bread for God’s sacred feast.

All these things shall love do unto you that you may know the secrets of your heart, and in that knowledge become a fragment of Life’s heart.

But if in your fear you would seek only love’s peace and love’s pleasure,
Then it is better for you that you cover your nakedness and pass out of love’s threshing-floor,
Into the seasonless world where you shall laugh, but not all of your laughter, and weep, but not all of your tears.

Love gives naught but itself and takes naught but from itself.
Love possesses not nor would it be possessed;
For love is sufficient unto love.

When you love you should not say, “God is in my heart,” but rather, “I am in the heart of God.”
And think not you can direct the course of love, if it finds you worthy, it directs your course.
Love has no other desire but to fulfil itself.

But if you love and must needs have desires, let these be your desires:

To melt and be like a running brook that sings its melody to the night.
To know the pain of too much tenderness.
To be wounded by your own understanding of love;
And to bleed willingly and joyfully.

To wake at dawn with a winged heart and give thanks for another day of loving;
To rest at the noon hour and meditate love’s ecstasy;
To return home at eventide with gratitude;
And then to sleep with a prayer for the beloved in your heart and a song of praise upon your lips.

——”——

This is an extract from The Prophet, by Khalil Gibran

Written in 1923 The Prophet was in all my friends’ pockets and bags in the 70s. I love how this extract on love just sweeps you along on waves of undulating poetic prose, just like love itself.  And what an image that is of Love threshing and kneading and baking you. Wow!

Here he is, the inspiration behind many an amateur poet and philosopher.

Khalil Gibran

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Dec
30

The Lover tells of the Rose in his Heart

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This great love poem needs to be read out loud, or at least softly to oneself. It resonates as one of the most evocative of long distance love poems.

The metre of the work is called anapaest (anapest for North Atlantic friends). Originally an ancient greek marching beat, the metronomic rhythm of the verse really drives the poem along. So taking the main image of the 4th and last line the rhythm goes like this:

Are WRONGing your IMage that BLOSSoms a ROSE in the DEEPS of my HEART.

Each main accented word is the key word that makes up the picture, the other words are just fillers but which serve to move the poem on at a pace which strikes the ears with a certain inevitability.

Where the metre is broken eg All things WORN out and OLD, only serves to emphasise the stressed word, in this case ‘worn’.

And in the line the HEAvy STEPS of the PLOUGHman, the line mimics the laboured gait of the farm worker, and coupled with his onomatopoeic ‘splashing’.

Finally in the last verse the anapaestic rhythm is maintained until ‘remade’, the word stands out because it is so important that all these depressing images the poet can change so that the picture of their beloved is beautiful, untainted by harsh reality.

(By the way, the poem featured in an episode of Desperate Housewives.)

The Lover tells of the Rose in his Heart

All things uncomely and broken, all things worn-out and old,
The cry of a child by the roadway, the creak of a lumbering cart,
The heavy steps of the ploughman, splashing the wintry mould,
Are wronging your image that blossoms a rose in the deeps of my heart.

The wrong of unshapely things is a wrong too great to be told,
I hunger to build them anew and sit on a green knoll apart,
With the earth and the sky and the water, remade, like a casket of gold
For my dreams of your image that blossoms a rose in the deeps of my heart.

WB Yeats

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Dec
12

If You Were Coming In The Fall

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The 7th in this collection of long distance love poems is another poem which can be interpreted on different levels.

If You Were Coming in the Fall

If you were coming in the fall,
I’d brush the summer by
With half a smile and half a spurn,
As housewives do a fly.

If I could see you in a year,
I’d wind the months in balls,
And put them each in separate drawers,
Until their time befalls.

If only centuries delayed,
I’d count them on my hand,
Subtracting till my fingers dropped
Into Van Diemen’s land.

If certain, when this life was out,
That yours and mine should be,
I’d toss it yonder like a rind,
And taste eternity.

But now, all ignorant of the length
Of time’s uncertain wing,
It goads me, like the goblin bee,
That will not state its sting.

At first sight it seems like the poet is so full of longing and love for their absent partner that they don’t care how long the separation will be, as long as the eventual reunion is cast-iron, rock-solid guaranteed.

But this is one of those long distance love poems about doubt, uncertainty, and the gradual erosion of the solid foundations of love precisely because of time apart.

The poem’s first 4 verses begin with “If”, but it’s not the positive  ”If” of Rudyard Kipling’s famous poem. And as with each verse the time-frame gets more improbable – from the length of a summer, to eternity. With all these ‘Ifs’ we just know that there is a massive ‘But…’ on its way. Sure enough in the last verse it arrives with a punch. And it’s not just ‘But’, it’s ‘But now’ – in reality, in the present, no hypotheses, no wonderings about the future, just the hard-edged actual situation.

The separation and the lack of a definite date for a meeting with their lover is now acting as a goad – i.e. it is prodding and pushing the poet to do something, but they don’t know what the nature of the motivation to act is – the sting is not declared.

Maybe the poet is coming to the realisation that this is the end of the relationship.

Certainly the imagery of the poem is not that of love, longing, and the certainty of togetherness.

We have annoying flies, balls of wool (sexy?!?), fingers dropping, rind, goad, goblin and sting. Not the language of romance!

Taken as a whole then, the poem is not one of the most romantic of long distance love poems, but some of the sentiments when taken out of context are powerful statements of the power of love to overcome time and distance.

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Oct
24

Long Distance Love Poems – i carry your heart with me

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The sixth in my anthology of long distance love poems, this one by ee cummings is in fact one of the poet’s more traditional, certainly in terms of the layout, although his trademark approach to word order is apparent, though not as obvious as in others of his works.

i carry your heart with me

i carry your heart with me(i carry it in
my heart)i am never without it(anywhere
i go you go,my dear; and whatever is done
by only me is your doing,my darling)
i fear
no fate(for you are my fate,my sweet)i want
no world(for beautiful you are my world,my true)
and it’s you are whatever a moon has always meant
and whatever a sun will always sing is you

here is the deepest secret nobody knows
(here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud
and the sky of the sky of a tree called life;which grows
higher than the soul can hope or mind can hide)
and this is the wonder that’s keeping the stars apart

i carry your heart(i carry it in my heart)

It is (almost) a sonnet the classic love poem form – it has 15 lines rather than 14, and the 5th line “ i fear” is of course very short. But it does finish off with a rhyming couplet, albeit the 2 lines being separated.

A fusion of form and function because the brackets carry their phrases in the main sentences, just like the poet’s heart carries their lover’s heart in their own.

Read the poem over a few times and you begin to feel the deepness of the poet’s love, deeper than “the root of the root” as well as paradoxically the height of their love “the sky of the sky”.

This phraseology has a child-like simplicity and feel to it, again echoing the sentiment that this is a totally natural, basic (in the sense of original – the base) emotion. As basic and as natural and as beautiful as the trees, the sun, the moon and the stars.

The only sour note seems to be the “i fear”, – fear what? But the poet is playing with us, for they fear “no fate”.

Part of engaging with ee cummings poetry is to read it out loud. The lack of punctuation, use of lower case, and seemingly spontaneous word order seems to me to mimic the spoken word – how language comes tumbling out of our mouths without being edited, refined and redacted. And in particular with this poem it seems such a heartfelt, spontaneous outpouring of emotion that it can only be a natural expression of the poet’s fundamental love – fundamental in the sense that it arises from the deepest foundations of their being.

The heart is the centre of love, and the poet’s heart carries their lover’s core within their own – how much more in love can you be? One of the great long distance love poems to send to your own loved one.

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Oct
15

Long Distance Love Poems – Shall I Compare Thee To A Summer’s Day?

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Long Distance Love Poems

The fifth of my long distance love poems and it’s now time for the master of love poetry, William Shakespeare. I defy anyone no matter how philistine not to have heard this opening line, no matter how dimly remembered. And British readers may well be surprised to see the phrase “the darling buds of May” in here – the title of a hugely popular TV series about a lovable but slightly roguish country family, starring David Jason and a young and delectable Catherine Zeta Jones (Mrs Michael Douglas). Anyway here’s the poem, and below I’ll have a look at it in more detail to see how it works, and if its message is as obvious as it seems.

I’ve divided it up like this because all sonnets are structured like this, ie 3 four-line verses ending up a with a couplet of 2 lines. Normally they’re presented in one block though, as in the photo.

Sonnet 18

Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?
Thou art more lovely and more temperate.
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,
And summer’s lease hath all too short a date.


Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,
And often is his gold complexion dimm’d;
And every fair from fair sometime declines,
By chance or nature’s changing course untrimm’d;


But thy eternal summer shall not fade
Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow’st;
Nor shall Death brag thou wander’st in his shade,
When in eternal lines to time thou grow’st:


So long as men can breathe or eyes can see,
So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.

This is one of those long distance love poems which can be read on two levels. On a simple level it’s the poet telling their loved one how perfect they are, and even though they both know that time waits for no human being, the poem itself is immortal, and by extension so is its subject as long as people read it.

On a different level, a closer look at the text reveals more.

The first two lines establish the theme of the loved one being more beautiful than a summer’s day. And the next 6 lines explain why – because in the apparent perfection of a summer’s day there are many imperfections – in other words life, and by extension physical beauty, are like that. But – study the images – they’re ALL negative – look at the words: Rough, shake, short, too hot, dimm’d, declines, fade, untrimm’d.

The poet really drives this home, and despite the apparent optimism of the final 6 lines, we know as well as he does that it is ONLY the poem which is eternal – the loved one is long dead, their eternal summer HAS faded and Death CAN brag about it.

For those in long distance relationships this most famous of long distance love poems has one clear message – concentrate on your long distance love NOW!

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Oct
05

Long Distance Love Poems – Western Wind When Wilt Thou Blow

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Two very short long distance love poems for you this week. 400 years apart in time, but both very much together in what they’re saying to us.

The first one is from the 16th century and is by the prolific poet Anon!

Western wind when wilt thou blow
The small rain down can rain
Christ if my love were in my arms
And I in my bed again

That first line is pure magic – it’s a total marriage of form and function. You can HEAR the wind blowing with those 4 “W”s, culminating in the onomatopoeia of “blow”. Stunning.

And the next line,much quicker and lighter, echoing the light rain, with the repetition of “rain” creating an effect of the monotony of rainfall. Rain can be melancholic and depressing, just what the speaker is experiencing.

Then suddenly, and with an explosion of feeling – frustration, longing, love – that “Christ”, followed by the simplicity of the last two lines. As in so many apparently simple but deeply moving poems whose sentiments engage us today, the language is all anglo-saxon, except for the “Christ”. By that I mean there are no latin or greek based words. This common language expresses common emotions, which is why it’s as relevant today as it was 400 years ago. Even the archaic “thou” and “wilt” in the first line seem right.

I think this guy is a sailor, maybe in the Caribbean, possibly a pirate, waiting for the west wind which I suppose is accompanied by rain in that region . Maybe this will strike a chord with Navy girlfriends and boyfriends and indeed all military spouses, waiting for that homecoming.

We’ve all been in a similar situation, waiting to get home to our loved ones and stymied by travel arrangements! No internet for long distance lovers in those days.

Here’s an image of a manuscript of the poem set to music.

Long Distance Love Poems

This dates from the early 1500s and is the only known source. It’s in The British Library in London. I’ve transcribed it here:

Westron wynde when wylt thou blow
the smalle rayne downe can rayne
Cryst yf my love were in my Armys
And I yn my bed A gayne

The second of these two long distance love poems is altogether much more recent:

Celia Celia

When I feel sad and weary
When I think all hope is gone
When I walk along High Holborn
I think of you with nothing on

What more can one say?  Here’s a  brief biography of the poet, Adrian Mitchell. By the way, High Holborn is a busy street in central London.

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Sep
27

Long Distance Love Poems – At Parting

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For all those military spouses, girlfriends, boyfriends, the third in this collection of long distance love poems.

At Parting

Since we through war awhile must part
Sweetheart, and learn to lose
Daily use
Of all that satisfied our heart:
Lay up those secrets and those powers
Wherewith you pleased and cherished me these two years:

Now we must draw, as plants would,
On tubers stored in a better season,
Our honey and heaven;
Only our love can store such food.
Is this to make a god of absence?
A new-born monster to steal our sustenance?

We cannot quite cast out lack and pain.
Let him remain – what he may devour
We can well spare:
He never can tap this, the true vein.
I have no words to tell you what you were,
But when you are sad, think, Heaven could give no more.

This long distance love poem is particularly apt today, with the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan meaning enforced separation from their loved ones for both men and women in the military, a lot of them miltary spouses of course. The military are especially prone to long distance relationships, even in peacetime.

The poet is optimistic that their lover will return , the parting is “awhile” – for a while and not permanent.  Asking their loved one to “Lay up” those qualities which gave so much pleasure and love, i.e. putting them in stock for future use, suggests they are sure of their return.

The structure and rhythm of the first two lines emphasises the “Sweetheart”, and is echoed in the fourth line’s  last word “heart”, both rhyming with “part” – the separation of these two hearts resonating in the sound pattern.

But the poet’s positivity is tinged with doubt – maybe this new monster god “absence” (new because they have never been separated before) will rob them of their stock of stored feelings for each other – the sweetness of “honey” recalling the Sweetheart of the first verse. The doubt is left hanging at the end of the first verse…

But pragmatically the poet decides that, yes, there will be an erosion of their feelings for each other, but there is plenty in the store even though the monster god of absence will “devour” some.

And what he can’t touch is the deep vein of love which even Heaven cannot outdo.

For some notes about the poet click here.

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Sep
17

Long Distance Love Poems – All You Who Sleep Tonight

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Another simply written poem, number two in my personal selection of long distance love poems.

All you who sleep tonight
Far from the ones you love,
No hand to left or right
And emptiness above –

Know that you aren’t alone
The whole world shares your tears,
Some for two nights or one,
And some for all their years.

The poet seems to be saying that, no matter how bad you may be feeling, everyone in the world has, or indeed will, at some stage in their lives, share your sadness.

Whereas in my first long distance love poem, The Taxi, the imagery was what drove the feelings of hurt and separation, here I think it’s more to do with the rhythm, the metre of the words.

The first line follows the tee-TUM tee-TUM tee-TUM rhythm: all YOU who SLEEP toNIGHT.

But instead of continuing that way, suddenly on the next line we have to pause on the accented word FAR, ending up with the stress in that line on the last word LOVE, emphasising the distance from our loved ones.

And in the first three lines, only one word is more than one syllable – tonight – but in the last line the word emptiness stands out by it’s very length, causing us to dwell on the word literally, and hence on the sensation of emptiness figuratively.

Similarly in the second verse, the established rhythm is immediately broken by the very strong emphasis on the first word KNOW, reinforcing the poet’s conviction that they are right, and that we who are alone can also know this and take comfort from it.

You may also notice how straightforward and un-flowery (!) the language is – no latin or greek influences here – just common, everyday words for what the poet is telling us is a universal feeling.

Click on the link for a brief biography of the writer of the second of my long distance love poems.

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