Seas of Snow Page 11
‘Of course there will be similarities, there’s bound to be overlaps. But there’s an art to reading poetry and if you discover it, I promise you, you will never regret it. It’s the best way to escape the drudgery and difficulty of real life. It lifts you and guides you, it inspires you, it helps you. When you are lost in your imagination, building mind shapes and orchestrating your own Castle of Make-Believe, you have the Secret Key to life. Let me show you what I mean …’
He opened up the blue cloth bound book and showed her it was an anthology of verse. He flicked through the pages and hovered over this one, then that one, then another.
‘I think we’ll start with Wordsworth, Gracie.’
He began by asking her to read a poem out loud. It was called: ‘I wandered lonely as a cloud’ – a lovely title, she thought.
She started with some hesitation and stumbled a few times over the words, but got through to the end.
I wandered lonely as a cloud
That floats on high o’er vales and hills,
When all at once I saw a crowd,
A host, of golden daffodils;
Beside the lake, beneath the trees,
Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.
Continuous as the stars that shine
And twinkle on the Milky Way,
They stretched in never-ending line
Along the margin of a bay:
Ten thousand saw I at a glance,
Tossing their heads in sprightly dance.
The waves beside them danced; but they
Out-did the sparkling waves in glee:
A poet could not but be gay,
In such a jocund company:
I gazed—and gazed—but little thought
What wealth the show to me had brought:
For oft, when on my couch I lie
In vacant or in pensive mood,
They flash upon that inward eye
Which is the bliss of solitude;
And then my heart with pleasure fills,
And dances with the daffodils.
She finished and looked up from the page.
‘First of all, Gracie, what are you thinking, right now?’
‘Well, I feel a bit embarrassed about mucking up my reading in a few places and I feel slightly out of breath because I forgot to breathe in and I spoke too fast.’
‘Okay, Gracie, very good – but I mean what are you thinking, right now, about the poem?’
Oh. She paused, and reflected.
‘It made me see pictures in my mind – I was imagining the poor lonely cloud floating about in the sky feeling all lost, then feeling all happy when it suddenly came upon all those daffodils. It was like all that yellow felt real to me, I could really imagine what it all looked like. It was really easy to think about it in my mind.’
‘What else, Gracie? What did the choice of flowers do in the poem? How different would it have been if, say, it was a host of dark purple flowers instead of a host of golden daffodils?’
‘Well – the colour golden makes you think of bright, happy things, and – sorry I don’t know if this sounds silly, sir, but daffodils are quite a funny shape with their big trumpet middles sticking out like jolly tongues poking into the air. So they seem like cheery flowers. And because they’re yellow, you can’t help thinking there’s like a warmth and happiness about them.’
‘Very good. You see how your mind’s eye can join the dots and make pictures come to life in your head? And how what the words make you imagine start creating an emotional reaction in you? You don’t just observe their colour and their shape – the fact of their colour and the fact of their shape influences how you, Gracie, respond.
‘The funny thing about poetry is that when you start peeling back the layers, you realise lots of the time it has an effect on you in unexpected ways. You are reminded of a fragrance, a sound, a physical touch. All five of your senses start coming alive when you start joining the dots in poems and let your inward eye do the work.
‘The trick is to let it wash over you to a certain extent, and to start rereading and noticing what the words and phrases and sounds do to you. Let the power of the poet do its work. Let yourself feel things. Experience how it impacts on your senses, how the sounds come together and echo each other and immerse you.’
Gracie glanced back down at the page and skimmed the words.
‘I really like the way the poor, sad poet ends up being able to cheer himself by just thinking back to his happy memory. And words like “twinkle” and “sparkling” remind me of light reflections on the sea; and words like “dance” and “sprightly” seem full of movement and joy! And isn’t it funny how the poet uses the word “golden” and then also “wealth” so you get the sense that the experience is rich. And isn’t it nice that he’s using words like “glee” and “gay”. And isn’t it wonderful how in just a few lines he moved from something so sad and lonely to something which is filled with “pleasure” and “bliss”.’
Mr Hall smiled at her. He had had a feeling young Gracie would get the hang of it.
‘Exactly, Gracie. Next term we’re starting to study the wonderful art of poetry, and you’ll discover the power of words like you’ve never done before. Why don’t you borrow this book and start seeing what you think?
‘Poetry, if you let it, will help you make sense of the world. It can be your solace and your friend, even in the loneliest of times. Your escape. Your Secret Key.’
Words
The rain was lashing down that day. Rivers of wetness, sloshing into the tops of trees, crashing against window panes and drenching anyone who had the misfortune to be out in it.
You know the kind of rain where it’s almost as if God was emptying great big baths of water everywhere? Well, that’s what Gracie was thinking. The heavens were opening that day.
She was coming to the end of morning lessons on a Tuesday. Maths. Bit boring really. They were having to work out how long it would take to get to Margate from Bury St Edmunds if you were travelling at 30 miles per hour. Why did maths questions always seem to have Bury St Edmunds in them? Was it even a real place? And why did it matter how long it would take? And didn’t the route you took affect the answer? Why did they always want to pin you down to one fact when there were thousands to take into consideration?
Her mind was drifting to loftier places, the soundtrack of the tropical rainstorm playing rhythmically in the background, beating down in slow symphony with her heart. She had been trying to memorise the Byron poem Mr Hall had set for her as a bit of extra English homework. Ever since that unexpected lesson in the library, he’d been giving her suggestions of poems to read and learn. Some of them she found easier than others. Sometimes the vocabulary was just a bit too difficult and if you got more than one hard word in a row it made it tricky to make sense of the whole thing.
She was particularly fond of poets that wrote using simple language but with vivid ‘imagery’. Mr Hall had taught her all about imagery recently and she loved conjuring the pictures in her head. Letting the emotions wash into her.
This new Byron poem was absolutely wonderful. As she read it, the phrases danced in her thoughts, and a calmness settled in her.
The words hovered in the air before her, enticing her to create mind shapes …
She walks in beauty, like the night
Of cloudless climes and starry skies;
And all that’s best of dark and bright
Meet in her aspect and her eyes …
Gracie was floating, luxuriating in the sounds and images playing together. A shape was being created in her mind, connecting the dots of the meaning of the words to the dots of the forms of the words to the dots of the sounds of the words. Like a spider’s web spinning outwards and back in on itself, the poem was taking form, coming to life in revelation. She was the invisible conductor and her mind was spinning the web of layers, conjuring an extraordinary sense of the poem’s inner being.
‘Gracie, come on.’
She peered into the words marking the desktop – carved she supposed by compasses. There seemed to be girls’ names, boy’s names, secret love messages and one or two phrases about teachers long gone.
‘Gracie, I said come on!’
She looked up and understood she was the only person left in the room. She wondered how long she had been caught up in her mind shapes. She had been on the cusp of teasing apart the opposing forces of darkness and light in the poem, exposing its themes into naked being. She loved the contrast between the beautiful lady’s raven tresses and the soft light on her face …
In the doorway, Mrs Spindler was chiding her. ‘Come along, it’s lunchtime.’
Something as mundane as lunch felt so unimportant to Gracie these days. She was still in her spell, and wanted to play with her flights of fancy some more.
She wandered off to the library so she could sit quietly and contemplate the poem further. It was as if the beauty was somehow above her, a benign, beautiful presence which was too spiritual for this earth. And innocence was at the heart of her, and of the poem itself. Purity, love, goodness and light. Gracie hugged herself with the joy of seeing and understanding. She listened to the sounds it made, softly reciting it aloud so she could bathe in the richness of its watery depths … cloudless, tress, less, express, nameless, goodness … the ‘ess’ rhyme undulated up and down through the river of the poem, echoing backwards and forwards with the other words. The glow below, the light denies. The clever way he used day and night as interlocking themes, knitting the words together with fairy thread. It was just so very, very … beautiful.
She walks in beauty, like the night
Of cloudless climes and starry skies;
And all that’s best of dark and bright
Meet in her aspect and her eyes:
Thus mellow’d to that tender light
Which heaven to gaudy day denies.
One shade the more, one ray the less,
Had half impair’d the nameless grace
Which waves in every raven tress,
Or softly lightens o’er her face;
Where thoughts serenely sweet express
How pure, how dear their dwelling-place.
And on that cheek, and o’er that brow,
So soft, so calm, yet eloquent,
The smiles that win, the tints that glow,
But tell of days in goodness spent,
A mind at peace with all below,
A heart whose love is innocent!
The peace and calm in the poem lulled her into a serenity she craved these days. If she let herself drift too far into her own thoughts, memories of what happened in the bathroom would jaggedly overtake everything else. So it was words she turned to, to escape.
She had come to the poetry section of the library, the place where Mr Hall had pulled out that blue-spined poetry anthology the day of the ‘poetry lesson’. Well, there were three shelves in the whole library with poetry on but it was a start.
She glanced outside the window and took pleasure in seeing the raindrops gathering pace, chasing each other as they snaked down each pane of glass. Round, wormy droplets which seemed to absorb the greyness of the day in their fatness.
The bell startled her. She realised she had had no time to properly select a book, so she grabbed one with ‘rain’ in the title. It seemed appropriate enough.
She stuffed it into her satchel and dashed off to double art.
Billy looked at her with a tenderness she could scarcely bear.
‘Oh Billy,’ she said, softly, her voice so low you could hardly hear her.
A thousand thoughts were whirring around inside Billy’s head. He’d decided not to mention what he had realised about the white rose having come from his garden. He couldn’t understand why his Da would have brought a flower to Gracie’s Ma so decided it couldn’t have been important. He’d also decided not to ask too many questions. It was up to Gracie to explain what happened, in her own words and in her own way.
They were walking side by side, back to the clearing they had played in so many times when they were younger.
The memories of those happier, innocent play days seized them both at the same time. They exchanged glances, neither needing to say it out loud.
Billy was remembering building dens which were really castles, and making secret dark green holes which were dragons’ lairs. He had loved inventing worlds for her to discover, populated by fairies and goblins and princes and demons and witches. Dragons and princesses.
Gracie was thinking about how much they had enjoyed chasing each other, pretending to be otherworldly creatures from storybooks. She thought back to how she would join the dots of the characters and the places he created to understand the world he was making – ahhh, so I’m a princess, so this lump of stones and moss and leaves must be my castle. Ahhh, so I’m a fairy, so this clearing of twigs and branches must be my fairy palace. And this puddle must be my fairy pond.
Without thinking, they pottered over to the tree stumps where they had often started their games as children. They sat down, silently.
Gracie looked at Billy, and wondered how on earth she could put it into words? It was so much more than words – it was feelings of darkness and fear and terror. She wished she could join the dots for him so he could see what she felt, so she wouldn’t have to describe.
But she knew she had to say something …
‘Billy, I was frightened. It was awful. Joe is … he’s an evil man. This is going to sound strange, I know, but it’s like there’s something not right about him, Billy. I don’t think he’s got any niceness in him. He is the cruellest person I have ever met. And scary, too. He scares me like the birds do, Billy. And I mean really, really frightens me. Like he’s going to hurt people. Hurt me.’
Billy understood what she meant, and nodded.
‘It’s as if there’s blackness in his eyes, like that raven Billy, you know …’
How could he forget.
‘He looked at me in the same way. As if he was … hungry. As if he wanted to devour every bit of me, Billy.’
Again, Billy wasn’t sure what to make of this. He knew what a cannibal was and felt pretty certain Joe wasn’t one of those. He had the feeling Gracie was trying to break what happened to him gently, either to protect him or to protect herself, he wasn’t quite sure which.
‘He made me take my clothes off and run a bath.’
Now this was beginning to sound weird. Why would her uncle make her run a bath? He knew about men and their urges, of course. In fact he’d experienced the odd twinge himself even as a fairly young boy, but he had the feeling he was built differently to other boys. Not on the outside, on the inside. Where the other boys were running around chasing girls’ pigtails and trying to glance up their skirts, he had no sense that there was any point to it at all. He had his Gracie and that was that. And he certainly didn’t want to make her run a bath.
He wondered whether to ask why Joe had wanted her to run a bath but thought better of it.
‘He just kept staring at me, Billy. Everywhere. You know … everywhere.’
Billy looked at her. A shadow had crossed her face, darkly. That beautiful, innocent face. She had rounded cheeks like rosy apples and dark eyebrows which contrasted prettily with her yellow hair. She had such a sweet, sad expression. So soft, so calm. Even now, telling him this, her calmness moved him.
She was just so … lovely. He hoped that whatever Joe did to her he wouldn’t take that away from her. It was the very essence of Gracie-ness and he loved her for it.
‘I have asked Ma to stop him ever coming back.’
‘Do you think she will?’
‘I don’t know.’
Milestones
She thumbed the old pages carefully, letting the dusky paper fall through her fingers. She could feel the weight of the leather and the heaviness of the spine. Her fingertips traced the embossed lettering, as if conjuring a memory and willing the book to come alive.
The scent of old books was reminiscent of cinnamon somehow. Their dustiness and mustiness would tingle in the air and settle in anticipation of the pleasure to be had when words mingled with imagination.
The old poetry book was her dearest treasure. She looked at the book plate: ‘Harwood High School 1947’, it read in royal blue ink. The library stamps decorated the first two or three pages – red and black seals with dates ranging from September 1947 through to July 1952.
She thought back to those times. How very different they were. You’d have blancmange and jelly for a treat. Hardly anyone had a television. The wallpaper could be shocking … she remembered that orange floral paper with a shudder.
People spent their time talking, reading. Being together. People spent a lot of time at home. These days, there was lots more going out. Lots more external distractions. That was it – back in her day, folk were happy with hearth and home. Family. Ahhh, family …
Now it was much more usual for daughters and sons to live miles away. Sad, that … families were fragmenting and dissipating. Back in her day the family unit stuck together, and that was that. Helped each other. Supported each other. Stood by each other. Even in the worst of times …
She had a clawing sense of regret and guilt but could never place it. Only the words of the poems helped her feel light and free these days – mostly because of the memories she had of that mother–daughter togetherness, when they read out loud to each other. She could reach back and touch that lightness, that sense of communion, that special bond they’d had.
But those moments were fleeting, and even when they surfaced, she soon lost track of what she was thinking.
There’s so much going on.