Family and relatives at "Coosane" farmhouse, South West Cork, mid 1960's, Graham on right.
Poems: Readings
Icarus replies: a reading of "Icarus replies" by Sophie Brown (opens in new window)
A Luminary: a reading of "A Luminary" by Sophie Brown
Colour: a reading of "Colour" by Sophie Brown
Poems: Text
Colour
A Seed Sown
Pronouncement
Lines to a Scarecrow
White Horse
This poem was exhibited at Graham's solo show at the Appledore Crafts Company in 2000, and gives an insight into Graham's love of colour, most strikingly shown in the cut outs, painted breadboards and painted tile designs.
Colour
Colour never loves you back,
Yet it never lets you go;
Except a primary one of course,
Which, like an adolescent horse,
Half pretending to attack,
Runs at you with all his force;
Runs the length of fields to show
That it’s you he’d like to know,
So you can see that, in his head,
His thoughts are yellow, blue and red.
Colour never knows your name,
Breathes, in ignorance of bad and good,
But a secondary one can tell
How pupils of the eye should spell
Harmonies that are the same
In either Paradise or Hell:
For they are three princes of royal blood
Who sow their seed as princes should,
With long smooth hands and faces serene,
In beds of purple, orange or green.
Drives up the blue-grassed hill of noon,
The chauffeured sun, the great tycoon;
Brakes at the summit and there sits
Awhile, for pleasure in the profits
Of all his light, ledgered in the crackling day,
All invested in the groaning clay.
Then even the sun shall shade his eyes
As his wealth through colour multiplies,
And he swells with pride and he smiles with mirth
At all the beauty he is worth!
This series of "Poems for Young People" of which these are 4, were mainly written in South West Ireland.
A Seed Sown
Some joys that you reaped
Have withered away,
And the tears that you wept
Will find your grave’s clay.
But those joys that you grew
No field can contain,
And the tears that you owe
You send with the rain.
So, though my eyes stare
In grief at your stone,
My heart knows you are
A seed that’s been sown.
Pronouncement
As far as I know,
And from what I've been told,
A rainbow doesn't grow
From potted gold;
And I'd hazard a guess
It's no path that's been rolled
By poet bold,
Or poetess;
And much less
A flotsam crown,
Or wreath:
But it might be God's pronoun
To us beneath.
Lines to a Scarecrow
Some day perhaps,
The roses I will pull,
And tie them round your turnip head
And make you beautiful.
And then one night maybe,
I'll find two stars that fell,
And give them to you for eyes instead,
And you will be an angel.
But early in the morn,
In your eyes that look for sleep,
I'll fling the dew the night has shed,
And make you weep.
For why did my God choose
No lovely face for me,
When I can give a sad scarecrow
Grace and Felicity?
White Horse
Nothing lovely stands as still
As the white horse on the hill,
And every tree and flower there
Must with me a mystery share:
For nothing lovely as this mare
Lives upon a mountain's breath,
Knows the motions of my fear,
Makes no sound that I can hear;
But whispers wisdom to the earth,
And listens to the serpent's sin,
And makes the morning star spin
Closer; now her dreams begin:
When all things lovely stand as still
As the white horse on the hill.
© Copyright 2011 estate of Graham Kingsley Brown, All Rights reserved.
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