January performances in reflection

Good to have a video of Giles two poems at the Ashmolean today.

https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?v=555702717792592&notif_t=close_friend_activity
I hope the link works.

It was a curious day. I loved hearing all the poems, though some were spoken too quietly and were much the better for being repeated.

I realized afterwards that I had not included the death of Mary in my poem.

Someone reminded me that I had mistaken the annunciation for the epiphany.

Epiphany is a better word for that event than the annunciation however, even if it is "wrong".

Vahni's dog wolf was astonishing. I can't wait to see it on the blog.

There were lots of glitches in organisation this time.

Let us blame the bad weather.

At least the sun shone today.

I shall add further thoughts as they occur. Drop back as the mood takes you.

Please share your own feedback on the day in the comments section or send them by email to the blog address.

Enlightened

And I am searching

Yet

Losing my way

You have reminded me

to practise

Practise calm

Every day

So

I went out seeking

And stopped

Still….

Breathing in

a purifying breath

Quelling the fidgety form

To submission

*   *   *

And the little boy

came to me

Wearing a hat of yellow brocade

A golden  temple

on his head

He smiled

One of his lives

At me

*    *   *

And here you are to remind me

You who have stood centuries

And stood for what?

You elude me

Then you come and bring your light

And I want to be where the light is

Diana Moore

January 2013

Ground floor | Room 12 | India to 600

Fragmentary forearm and hand of the Buddha

From an observation during a meditation in 2009

Diana Moore is author of the children’s illustrated poetry book:  A Fishy Coat Tale And Other Poems. 

She offers sessions on ‘Creating And Writing Humorous Poetry’ to children and adults.

www.diana-moore.com

Ground floor | Room 12 | India to 600

Fragmentary forearm and hand of the Buddha

From an observation during a meditation in 2009

HOARD by Paul Surman

Is an idea pulled drawstring-tight

to itself. Like a miser counting

and recounting their suspicion.

But in the museum the word

has become soft-lit, bare metal flesh

no longer buried deep

in the airless enchantment

of the soil. Here coins, artfully arranged,

spill from broken pots,

their tight-packed hardness loosened

by this sudden disembowelment―

redistribution of wealth

in an age in which they are no longer

common currency, and passing visitors

look at them through secure plate glass,

trying to imagine hands that hid them,

meaning to return. And see perhaps a being

the colour of breath, made entirely of thought,

place a container in the earth, and take

one last furtive backwards glance

at what might be nobody at all, or us.

Didcot and Chalgrove coin hoards―

Ashmolean Museum, Oxford

Enlightened…?

And I am searching

Yet

Losing my way

You have reminded me

to practise

Practise calm

Every day

(pause)

So

I went out seeking

And stopped

Still….

Breathing in

a purifying breath

Quelling the fidgety form

To submission

(pause)

And the little boy

came to me

Wearing a hat of yellow brocade

A golden  temple

on his head

He smiled

One of his lives

At me

(pause)

And here you are to remind me

You who have stood centuries

And stood for what?

You elude me

Then you come and bring your light

And I want to be where the light is

Diana Moore

January 2013

From an observation during a meditation in 2009

Cittern

http://www.flickr.com/photos/29320962@N07/8334234273/in/photostream

You can see her pouting
over the manuscript.
She doesn’t understand
music properly, but
the newfangled cittern
makes that irrelevant:

she can strum with half
the aplomb of anyone.

Just pity that poor fellow
using real skill to chisel
out enough gilded foliage
to half-plug her soundhole.

She’d say, “You’re a git.
Earn your wage.
Don’t complain.”

He'd say: "When God
was making men,
where did he put
your lughole
and your brain?"

Poem by Giles Watson, 2013. Citterns were adaptations of mediaeval citoles, with flat backs which made them less costly than lutes. They were metal-strung, and effectively the precursors to the steel-string guitar, both in design, and in the extraordinary variation in the talents of the people who played them. The poem is partly inspired by a cittern made of maple wood by Gaspar de Sallo (1540-1609), and partly by Pieter van Slingeland’s painting, "Woman with Cittern" (1677). The poem is, of course, a conflict between modern Marxist and feminist criticism. I agree with both.

Room 39, both of my poems are inspired by real musical instruments - that room is the musical instrument gallery.

A very Christian Goddess

To the right

inside the portal

maiden mother and crone

share their knowledge of this temple of what is past

or immortalised.

Opposite

The Goddess holds the head,

the severed head,

of merely mortal man.

Do you dare ascend the

sweeping stone stairs

to the chamber of the Queen of Heaven

Cross the threshold

under the lintel

into the womb room tomb

where Mary is conceived,

is born,

gives birth,

and dies.

This is a place of extraordinary conceptions.

An angel connects Joachim and Anna, father and mother.

At this moment of embrace the Queen of Heaven

is supposedly conceived.

But wait.

Who is this female attendant, who stands behind the barren woman,

whose thighs join in a most distinctive V?

Is this the holy ghost, whose hand stretches in blessing?

Is this the maiden who shall bear the surrogate child of God?

Or is this the Goddess in whom all things find fruition?

I always struggle with the idea

We are made in the image of God.

Then Mary is born.

Hallelujah!

Two envious midwives fight over the baby.

An attendant gives her condolences to the visitors;

sad and sombre visitors.

Mother lifts a hand

in blessing or dismissal.

She looks really tired.

What is to be understood from all of this?

Epiphany!

The angel descends direct from God above.

His wings are dark.

Mary bows her head.

This is indeed a fearful undertaking,

to bear a child

not sanctioned by the human law.

She will need an angel by her side

to keep the stoning mobs at bay.

Even at this moment

a spy conceals himself

behind a pillar.

Mary holds her child,

practising for the sorrows of the crucifixion.

The Christ child struggles to be free,

already too big to be a babe in arms.

Then Jesus is already fully grown.

He eagerly ascends

to the heaven of his mother’s face,

tenderly touching her cheek,

while pulling at the neck line of her dress.

She gazes down, serene.

In the old religion

the God man king

would have been sacrificed to the Goddess.

At this crucifixion

the Goddess grieves for her lost son,

while her sexual self continues

worshipping his feet.

Martha looks on, ashamed.

For the men

Christ goes on suffering on his cross.

Mary’s Magdalen maid

gazes,

pensive or penitent,

her pink lips flowing with oil,

florid.

Her halo turns the world to gold

behind her head.

In the distance,

darkness.

Times change

We must be born again

Into another world, another room.

Puritans have come

taking the Goddess’ head,

leaving the headless body holding

the infant saviour,

safe in a world of yesterday.

Nick Owen

Forward Programme

 Poetry at the museum is growing and our plans are ambitious. 

We have dates in the diary for the next “What’s On” gallery performances.  They are April 13^th, May 11^th and June 15^th.  We shall soon have our own dedicated place on the museum website to promote our work.

I shall lead an introductory workshop “From art to poetry, making poetry at the museum” on April 21^st  10.30 – 3.30.

Looking further ahead to the summer holiday period, we will be putting on week day lunch time recitals every week through August in the lecture theatre. These will be paid events.

I shall lead a two day summer school in August on poetry at the museum.

We aim to continue coverage of upcoming exhibitions. We will offer performances towards the end of the exhibitions to give us a chance to visit and study works before we write and perform. As before there will be a mixture of exhibition and outside exhibition performances.

In June there will be a Master Drawings and a Stradivarius exhibition.

This autumn, September to January, there will be a Henry Moore and Francis Bacon exhibition.

Moving ahead to 2014 there will be a Manet and Modigliani exhibition from February to June.

The big one for us will be the Blake exhibition from November 2014 –February 2015.

We also plan paid performance events in the atrium.

 January Performances  

Poet                                    Object                                Title

Vahni Capildeo  Rm. 15 : Lucera bronzes #7, 'Dog or Wolf'.               Dog or Wolf

Paul Surman                               Room 7 Money:                                   HOARD

Giles Watson                                    Room 39                             Cittern and Virginal

Diana Moore                                   Eastern Art                               "And here we have..."

David Olsen           the Stradivarius violin.                                      “A Silent Messiah”,

Nick Owen  14 Century Italy Room (1^st Floor)                             A very Christian Goddess.

February Performance

Poet                         Object/place                  Title

Dr J McGowan                    Egyptian room                                          Pharoah’s concubine

Nick Owen                         Egyptian Room                                           Death mask

Giles Watson                    Waterhouse (PreRaphaelite room)                Ariadne

Paulette Mae  Dancer looking at the sole of her right foot (WA 1950.8) by Edgar Degas        twist

Vahni Capildeo    Rm 48 #83 Jan Jansz. van de Velde III [still life with glass of beer]. A Table of My Own