Yes, yes, I\u2019m two days late, even taking into account the fact that I pushed poetry day back to Tuesday. No excuses for such tardiness are acceptable, which is just as well, as none are forthcoming.<\/p>\n
My appetite whetted by reading some of their poems in anthologies, next on my list of poets to read are Elizabeth Bishop <\/a>and Robert Lowell<\/a>, two American poets of the middle century. I\u2019ve scouted copies of their books in Dublin bookshops, but have yet to buy, as I find buying a book when you still have plenty to read at home is a sure-fire way to make sure you\u2019ll never read it: by the time you finish the what you\u2019re already in the middle of, the newness has worn off, and you end up back in the bookshop, because something else has taken your interest. Nonetheless, I feel certain that Bishop\u2019s work is something I\u2019ll have toread more of, not least because of the brilliant control and technique displayed in this poem, \u201cAt the Fish-houses???<\/p>\n Although it is a cold evening, Down at the water’s edge, at the place Cold dark deep and absolutely clear, This poem is about a poet repeatedly going to the brink of magic or surrealism, then pulling back, before finally taking glorious flight. Beginning with an almost oppressively mundane scene at the fish-houses, the poet begins to sprinkle silver on the scene. The sea becomes sentient \u201cswelling slowly as if considering spilling over??? and the moss acquires an unearthly glow. Then the pendulum swings back towards the ordinary, with the silver announced to be simply the scales of fish, though the \u201ciridescence??? of the flies, and the ingenious metaphor and rhyme of \u201cmail??? and \u201cscale??? allows a further drip of magic to enter the scene. The poet smokes a cigarette with the old man, talking of \u201cthe decline in the population and of codfish and herring???, very much back in the real world again. But again, the silver seeps through, the scales, a moment ago the mere scrapings from fish, now become sequins. Again, she backs away from the hallucinogenic vision, and back to reality, where silver is merely grey. Out by the sea, she sings to a seal, (subject of a strange joking reference to Baptism) building towards her final take-off, but backs off one final time, as if not quite prepared, in the ellipsis before the lines \u201cBack, behind us, the dignified tall firs begin???. <\/p>\n Now Bishop appears to be ready to plunge fully into the vision which has tantalised her since she first approached the fish-houses. The turbulence, the strange native energy of the sea is dramatised by the to-and-fro of the lines \u201cI have seen it over and over, the same sea, the same, slightly, indifferently swinging above the stones, icily free above the stones, above the stones and then the world.??? When she plunges into the water, it burns with some strange grey magic, shows itself to be more than mere water. Now she has truly punched through to the other side, where the world is more intense, more essential than that which she has left behind. In this respect, At The Fish-houses is a mystical poem, with poetry, or imagination the key to the otherworldly. The real thrill in the poem, for me, is the earlier part, the promise, through the glimmers of silver amid the grey, of visions to come. The vision, when it comes, is a final surrender to the poetic imagination, one that is all the more powerful for having at first been so conscientiously resisted.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Yes, yes, I\u2019m two days late, even taking into account the fact that I pushed poetry day back to Tuesday. No excuses for such tardiness are acceptable, which is just as well, as none are forthcoming. My appetite whetted by reading some of their poems in anthologies, next on my list of poets to read are Elizabeth Bishop and Robert Lowell, two American poets of the middle century. I\u2019ve scouted copies of their books in Dublin bookshops, but have yet to buy, as I find buying a book when you still have plenty to read at home is a sure-fire way to make sure you\u2019ll never read it: by the time you finish the what you\u2019re already in the middle of, the newness has worn off, and you end up back in the bookshop, because something else has taken your interest. Nonetheless, I feel certain that Bishop\u2019s work is something I\u2019ll have toread more of, not least because of the brilliant control and technique displayed in this poem, \u201cAt the Fish-houses??? Although it is a cold evening, down by one of the fishhouses an old man sits netting, his net, in the gloaming almost invisible, a dark purple-brown, and his shuttle worn and polished. The air smells so strong of codfish it makes one’s nose run and one’s eyes water. The five fishhouses have steeply peaked roofs and narrow, cleated gangplanks slant up to storerooms in the gables for the wheelbarrows to be pushed up and down on. All is silver: the heavy surface of the sea, swelling slowly as if considering spilling over, is opaque, but the silver of the benches, the lobster pots, and masts, scattered among the wild jagged rocks, is of an apparent translucence like the small old buildings with an emerald moss growing on their shoreward walls. The big fish tubs are completely lined with layers of beautiful herring scales and the wheelbarrows are similarly plastered with creamy iridescent coats of mail, with small iridescent flies crawling on them. Up on the little slope behind the houses, set in the sparse bright sprinkle of grass, is an ancient wooden capstan, cracked, with two long bleached handles and some melancholy stains, like dried blood, where the ironwork has rusted. The old man accepts a Lucky Strike. He was a friend of my grandfather. We talk of the decline in the population and of codfish and herring […]","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[196,89],"class_list":["post-264","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general","tag-elizabeth-bishop","tag-poetry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tuppenceworth.ie\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/264","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tuppenceworth.ie\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tuppenceworth.ie\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tuppenceworth.ie\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tuppenceworth.ie\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=264"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.tuppenceworth.ie\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/264\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tuppenceworth.ie\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=264"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tuppenceworth.ie\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=264"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tuppenceworth.ie\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=264"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\ndown by one of the fishhouses
\nan old man sits netting,
\nhis net, in the gloaming almost invisible,
\na dark purple-brown,
\nand his shuttle worn and polished.
\nThe air smells so strong of codfish
\nit makes one’s nose run and one’s eyes water.
\nThe five fishhouses have steeply peaked roofs
\nand narrow, cleated gangplanks slant up
\nto storerooms in the gables
\nfor the wheelbarrows to be pushed up and down on.
\nAll is silver: the heavy surface of the sea,
\nswelling slowly as if considering spilling over,
\nis opaque, but the silver of the benches,
\nthe lobster pots, and masts, scattered
\namong the wild jagged rocks,
\nis of an apparent translucence
\nlike the small old buildings with an emerald moss
\ngrowing on their shoreward walls.
\nThe big fish tubs are completely lined
\nwith layers of beautiful herring scales
\nand the wheelbarrows are similarly plastered
\nwith creamy iridescent coats of mail,
\nwith small iridescent flies crawling on them.
\nUp on the little slope behind the houses,
\nset in the sparse bright sprinkle of grass,
\nis an ancient wooden capstan,
\ncracked, with two long bleached handles
\nand some melancholy stains, like dried blood,
\nwhere the ironwork has rusted.
\nThe old man accepts a Lucky Strike.
\nHe was a friend of my grandfather.
\nWe talk of the decline in the population
\nand of codfish and herring
\nwhile he waits for a herring boat to come in.
\nThere are sequins on his vest and on his thumb.
\nHe has scraped the scales, the principal beauty,
\nfrom unnumbered fish with that black old knife,
\nthe blade of which is almost worn away.<\/p>\n
\nwhere they haul up the boats, up the long ramp
\ndescending into the water, thin silver
\ntree trunks are laid horizontally
\nacross the gray stones, down and down
\nat intervals of four or five feet.<\/p>\n
\nelement bearable to no mortal,
\nto fish and to seals . . . One seal particularly
\nI have seen here evening after evening.
\nHe was curious about me. He was interested in music;
\nlike me a believer in total immersion,
\nso I used to sing him Baptist hymns.
\nI also sang “A Mighty Fortress Is Our God.”
\nHe stood up in the water and regarded me
\nsteadily, moving his head a little.
\nThen he would disappear, then suddenly emerge
\nalmost in the same spot, with a sort of shrug
\nas if it were against his better judgment.
\nCold dark deep and absolutely clear,
\nthe clear gray icy water . . . Back, behind us,
\nthe dignified tall firs begin.
\nBluish, associating with their shadows,
\na million Christmas trees stand
\nwaiting for Christmas. The water seems suspended
\nabove the rounded gray and blue-gray stones.
\nI have seen it over and over, the same sea, the same,
\nslightly, indifferently swinging above the stones,
\nicily free above the stones,
\nabove the stones and then the world.
\nIf you should dip your hand in,
\nyour wrist would ache immediately,
\nyour bones would begin to ache and your hand would burn
\nas if the water were a transmutation of fire
\nthat feeds on stones and burns with a dark gray flame.
\nIf you tasted it, it would first taste bitter,
\nthen briny, then surely burn your tongue.
\nIt is like what we imagine knowledge to be:
\ndark, salt, clear, moving, utterly free,
\ndrawn from the cold hard mouth
\nof the world, derived from the rocky breasts
\nforever, flowing and drawn, and since
\nour knowledge is historical, flowing, and flown. <\/em><\/p>\n