 Poetry: January 02, 2019 Issue [#9309] |
This week: Elizabeth Jennings Edited by: Stormy Lady  
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Delay
by Elizabeth Jennings
The radiance of the star that leans on me
Was shining years ago. The light that now
Glitters up there my eyes may never see,
And so the time lag teases me with how
Love that loves now may not reach me until
Its first desire is spent. The star's impulse
Must wait for eyes to claim it beautiful
And love arrived may find us somewhere else.
In a Garden by Elizabeth Jennings
When the gardener has gone this garden
Looks wistful and seems waiting an event.
It is so spruce, a metaphor of Eden
And even more so since the gardener went,
Quietly godlike, but of course, he had
Not made me promise anything and I
Had no one tempting me to make the bad
Choice. Yet I still felt lost and wonder why.
Even the beech tree from next door which shares
Its shadow with me, seemed a kind of threat.
Everything was too neat, and someone cares
In the wrong way. I need not have stood long
Mocked by the smell of a mown lawn, and yet
I did. Sickness for Eden was so strong.
In Memory of Anyone Unknown to Me
by Elizabeth Jennings
At this particular time I have no one
Particular person to grieve for, though there must
Be many, many unknown ones going to dust
Slowly, not remembered for what they have done
Or left undone. For these, then, I will grieve
Being impartial, unable to deceive.
How they lived, or died, is quite unknown,
And, by that fact gives my grief purity--
An important person quite apart from me
Or one obscure who drifted down alone.
Both or all I remember, have a place.
For these I never encountered face to face.
Sentiment will creep in. I cast it out
Wishing to give these classical repose,
No epitaph, no poppy and no rose
From me, and certainly no wish to learn about
The way they lived or died. In earth or fire
They are gone. Simply because they were human, I admire.
Elizabeth Jennings was born on July 18,1926 in Lincolnshire England. Her father was a Chief Medical Officer that moved the family to Oxford England when she was six. Jennings discovered poetry while attending Oxford High School. She went on to attend St Anne’s College. After graduation Jennings became a librarian at the Oxford Library.
Jennings started getting her poems published in Oxford Poetry, New English Weekly, The Spectator, Outposts and Poetry Review. Her first book of poetry, “Poems” was published in 1953. Her second book, “A Way of Looking,” published in 1955, won the Somerset Maugham award. In all Jennings wrote and published many books of poetry, including “The Mind has Mountains” published in 1966, “The Animals' Arrival” in 1969, “Growing Points” in 1975. Followed Celebrations and Elegies in 1982 and “A Spell of Words: Selected Poems for Children,” in 1997. Her last book of poetry, “Timely Issues” was published in 2001.
Elizabeth Jennings suffered from mental illness throughout her life. She never married and spent the last few years of her life living at Unity House in Old Headington. She died on October 26, 2001 an in care home. She is buried in Wolvercote Cemetery, Oxford.
Rembrandt's Late Self-Portraits
by Elizabeth Jennings
You are confronted with yourself. Each year
The pouches fill, the skin is uglier.
You give it all unflinchingly. You stare
Into yourself, beyond. Your brush's care
Runs with self-knowledge. Here
Is a humility at one with craft.
There is no arrogance. Pride is apart
From this self-scrutiny. You make light drift
The way you want. Your face is bruised and hurt
But there is still love left.
Love of the art and others. To the last
Experiment went on. You stared beyond
Your age, the times. You also plucked the past
And tempered it. Self-portraits understand,
And old age can divest,
With truthful changes, us of fear of death.
Look, a new anguish. There, the bloated nose,
The sadness and the joy. To paint's to breathe,
And all the darknesses are dared. You chose
What each must reckon with.
Thank you all!
Stormy Lady
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The winner of "Stormy's poetry newsletter & contest" [ASR] is:
Most of my firm resolutions never come to pass.
You see, when I seem strong, I’m fragile as a crystal glass.
Or if they’re promptly broken, then I say, “That doesn’t count!”
And charge it to my overdrawn emotional expense account.
By crisp daylight, I find my life quite flippin’ serious,
But after darkness falls, I turn the World Dial to ‘Delirious’.
Tipsy with the roller coaster view from starry sky above,
I flutter down to find the ground fits me just like a baseball glove.
I’ve heard that all is relative. Well, let me clearly proclaim this …
Laughter makes it bearable, Nietzsche’s gazing-back abyss.
Honorable mention:
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Good luck to all 
