Edwin Morgan

[Silverlining]

The Empty Song
Liz Lochhead

Today saw the last of my Spanish shampoo.
Lasted an age now that sharing with you,
such a thing of the past is.
Giant Size. The brand
was always a compromise.
My new one's tailored exactly to my needs.
Nonspill. Protein-rich.
Feeds Body, promises to solve my problem hair.
Sweetheart, these days it's hard to care,
But oh oh insomniac moonlight
How unhoneyed in my middle of the night.
I could see you
far enough. Beyond me
how we'll get back together.
Campsites in Spain, moonlight,
heavy weather.
Today saw the end of my Spanish shampoo,
the end of my third month without you.

***

~S

[Monco]

hi Silverlining

Thanks for the Lochhead poem, I shall have a think about it for a short while then post my thoughts on it.

As for the Priest and Doctor in Days, Larkin is quite a straight forward poet, he said himself he didn't like poems to be only reading matter for literary academics. He strongly believed they were for the ordinary man too.

I think the Priest deals in life after death, and the Doctor in trying to prolong life. They are both opponents of death, they are both in the business of "solving that question", though each deals with a different aspect of it.

The Fly

Little Fly
Thy summers play,
My thoughtless hand
Has brush'd away.

Am not I
A fly like thee?
Or art not thou
A man like me?

For I dance
And drink & sing;
Till some blind hand
Shall brush my wing.

If thought is life
And strength & breath;
And the want
Of thought is death;

Then am I
A happy fly,
If I live,
Or if I die.

William Blake

[Silverlining]

Hi Monco -

Days –

"I think the Priest deals in life after death, and the Doctor in trying to prolong life. They are both opponents of death, they are both in the business of "solving that question", though each deals with a different aspect of it."

I gave the priest and the doctor a thought myself and got to a similar conclusion… I think they could represent the physical and the spiritual in a correlation to the popular interpretation of life and death … 'Running over the fields' … I could also make [yet] another association to 'fields' and the idea of life and death… Will be reading more Larkin.

Thanks for Blake's The Fly - light and fun while [also] touching life and death. Quite an artist there!

"For I dance
And drink & sing;
Till some blind hand
Shall brush my wing."

Will check back soon...

~S

[Monco]

Silverlining, hi

I cannot claim to be getting too far with ‘Empty Song’. Obviously ‘empty’ refers to the shampoo bottle, but does it perhaps have another meaning as well?

But I am not sure what to make of :

“But oh oh insomniac moonlight
How unhoneyed in my middle of the night.”

Moonlight gets mentioned later “Campsites in Spain, moonlight, heavy weather”, she also rhymes ‘back together’ with ‘heavy weather’ which I find interesting.

Not sure about the “you” in the poem, who is it exactly? A person the narrator was once “sharing with”, but is no longer. But the narrator seems to want a reconciliation from line 10 onwards.

Any thoughts anybody?

Home is so Sad

Home is so sad. It stays as it was left,
Shaped to the comfort of the last to go
As if to win them back. Instead, bereft
Of anyone to please, it withers so,
Having no heart to put aside the theft.

And turn again to what it started as,
A joyous shot at how things ought to be,
Long fallen wide. You can see how it was:
Look at the pictures and the cutlery.
The music in the piano stool. That vase.

Philip Larkin 1922-1985

[Silverlining]

Hi Monco -

My view: the 'Empty Song' is an analogy between the shampoo and the relationship.

"Today saw the last of my Spanish shampoo.
Lasted an age now that sharing with you,
such a thing of the past is.
Giant Size. The brand
was always a compromise."

It seems like she had to 'compromise' – and she uses the shampoo brand, size and even the time it lasted to illustrate the thought.

"My new one's tailored exactly to my needs.
Nonspill. Protein-rich.
Feeds Body, promises to solve my problem hair."

Now that she is on her own there is no compromising, she is caring for her needs.

"Sweetheart, these days it's hard to care,
But oh oh insomniac moonlight
How unhoneyed in my middle of the night.
I could see you
far enough. Beyond me
how we'll get back together.
Campsites in Spain, moonlight,
heavy weather."

The character seems to be heart broken, misses her companion, cannot see a way of getting the relationship back… I also find that Spain could be a place they have been to together or where the other person is from [the shampoo is Spanish]… And as you mentioned her 'back together'/ 'heavy weather' rhyme – I agree it is a fine idea – could hint a troubled relationship…

"Today saw the end of my Spanish shampoo,
the end of my third month without you."

Timing the end of the shampoo with the end of the relationship?

Home is so Sad – Larkin – I am getting to like this. Again the chosen subject seems to be death and here the emotions from a home's perspectives?

~S

[Monco]

Hello Silverlining

"My new one's tailored exactly to my needs.
Nonspill. Protein-rich.
Feeds Body, promises to solve my problem hair."

But notice that it only promises to solve her hair problem.

I am not really sure about the Spanish campsites bit, but perhaps I could add that for British people Spain has been a very popular holiday destination for a couple of decades. I have been myself about 7 or 8 times. After Francos regime was over, the Spanish built large numbers of holiday resorts for foreign holidaymakers. As it was quite cheap it made holidays available to people on lowish incomes.

Perhaps the relationship in the poem began in a Spanish holiday place, or they visited it together. I am sure its connection with the shampoo makes it quite relevant.

This is one of my favourite Larkin:

Philip Larkin - This Be The Verse

They f*ck you up, your mum and dad.
They may not mean to, but they do.
They fill you with the faults they had
And add some extra, just for you.

But they were f*cked up in their turn
By fools in old-style hats and coats,
Who half the time were soppy-stern
And half at one another's throats.

Man hands on misery to man.
It deepens like a coastal shelf.
Get out as early as you can,
And don't have any kids yourself.

[Silverlining]

Hi Monco –

Thanks for the – This Be The Verse – Larkin. [Another brilliant piece!]

My view: I would say this style is definitely 'shadowy.' In this one there is no duality [shadow/light] – it dwells entirely in shadow.

They f*ck you up, your mum and dad.
They may not mean to, but they do.
They fill you with the faults they had
And add some extra, just for you.

Do you know at what age he wrote this poem? And if this relationship with his parents influenced his work?

That 'emotion' at first seems to be connected to one's teen years but then again not necessarily. I know of at least one other author [Kafka] whose life was extremely influenced by the relationship he had with his parents [the father in particular], it was a major issue throughout his life and one that influenced his work and sense of 'self ' tremendously.

But they were f*cked up in their turn
By fools in old-style hats and coats,
Who half the time were soppy - stern
And half at one another's throats.

From this point onward the poem increases to show that his disillusion is not only towards his parents – they were only 'f*ucked up in their turn' – but also at humankind…

Man hands on misery to man.
It deepens like a coastal shelf.
Get out as early as you can,
And don't have any kids yourself.

although I think that the feeling was generated [initially] out of his 'first' relationship, the one with his parents... On the line before the last – "Get out as early as you can…" – he could be talking about a separation from his parents but also a desire for isolation. It also shows [on the last line] that he does not seem to believe we can do better then our parents/ancestors because we only have misery to pass on.

Leave some short lyrics from MacCaig...

~S