Poetry and Music
If you have been keeping up with me, you will know that I am on the road to a Masters in Creative Writing in Manchester. During the term, I became involved with something called the Rosamund Prize, which is a collaboration been postgraduate composer students in the Royal Northern College of Music and postgraduate poet students at Manchester Metropolitan University. The upshot was a piece jointly created with Nate Chivers, a PhD student from the US. It was performed at a competitive concert at the end of April. It was an amazing experience and I am so pleased with the result. So, if you click on the link below, you should see the performance. I have also added the original poem which is on a previous page but here it is again I hope you enjoy listening to and watching. Enjoy, share and send back some feedback.
At the French Italian Border
The young French cellist holds
his 17th century Stradivarius gently by its neck,
rechecks its tuning. Eyes sparkling,
face handsome, smooth, attractive,
fashionable evening shadowed chin.
Taking a deep breath, holding it,
he scans the dressing room one last time.
A young African man slinks along the station,
wearing a wrecked bomber jacket,
old shirt, torn jeans, broken running shoes.
He has a look of permanent hunger,
backpack looks surprisingly light,
presuming a journey from who knows
where over who knows how long.
The cellist acknowledges the applause
from the full house, takes his place
on the elevated platform,
places his precious instrument precisely
and carefully on its spike, steadies himself,
readies his bowing hand, fingers the strings.
He nods to the conductor.
The young man moves like a shadow,
lingers beside the train door,
notes the Polizii positioned along the station.
The whistle blows, doors begin to close.
He checks one last time, leaps aboard,
moves swiftly along the carriage,
finds a seat, drops in, crouches low.
Peter Clarke
November 2018
Phil
10.06.2019 13:21
Lovely piece, very nicely worked. Congrats, Peter!
Marguerite Colgan
05.06.2019 05:27
Catching the moment by the neck, what's at hand. Wow you're doing it, Peter. Wonder-full
Clíodhna
03.06.2019 20:25
STUNNING Peter! What a fantastic piece! Wonderful performance!
Latest comments
25.11 | 22:15
Grief is experience through the mundane. Simple but powerful. The accompanying image really compliments the poem.
07.11 | 11:14
Hi Peter,
A great observation! Social media can be a scary place... I also need to reduce my time there
Hugs,
John.x
06.11 | 16:24
A great one, Peter, in the context you describe. I don't read social media myself, I doubt my equilibrium could stand it. 'The balance of his mind disturbed' yes, I think it would be.
06.11 | 15:59
Yes, gossip is a weapon of mass destruction.
In my business as well as personal life I have zero tolerance.
And What About . . .
I have neglected this for far too long, and now it is time again. But what to write about, what poem to share? The world is packed with catastrophic possibilities. Such choices: dementia/genocide colluder or extreme narcissism in the White House; a hung parliament in the UK; the reunification of the USSR with a tyrannical megalomaniac at its head; the eradication of a race by a genocidal government in Gaza; the African continent reduced to bankruptcy and regression to male tribalism; in Ireland, even with an appalling electoral turnout the routing of the far right and Sinn Féin may offer some comfort except we face another FF/FG fiasco. Mother Nature rumbles on its rampage, raging against the human species’ abject destruction of the planet’s habitat. What the . . .
Being facetious right now is my only defence against absolute despair. So read, comment, pass it on, and send feedback.
City Walking and Cycling take 680,000
cars per day off the road
Irish Time Heading
More and more folk, cycling and walking, may
keep gases from greenhouses further at bay
This newspaper heading illustrates vividly
thousands of cyclists and walkers assiduously
stopping some cars on their journey
pushing them aside - making drivers quite surly
Mountains of metal - like scrapyards of sculpture
keep bicycle lanes quite safe - at this juncture
The new revolution is well underway
don’t get behind wheels - hear what they say:
Cars and their fumes play a very big part
the smell is quite phew don’t mention cow farts
Wear out your shoe leather walking
greet travellers with smiles while you’re talking
Force councils to make better spaces
to go out and about roaming those places
where vitamin D, and oxygen from trees
fill our lungs and our brains so we see
how to save us and this magical planet
except for some vicious old tyrants goddammit
Peter Clarke, 18th March 2024