by Allie Esiri
Phenomenal woman,
That’s me.
Now you understand
Just why my head’s not bowed.
I don’t shout or jump about
Or have to talk real loud.
When you see me passing,
It ought to make you proud.
I say,
It’s in the click of my heels,
The bend of my hair, the palm of my hand,
The need for my care.
’Cause I’m a woman
Phenomenally.
Phenomenal woman,
That’s me.
9 March • The Battle of the Sexes • Liz Brownlee
While International Women’s Day takes place annually on 8 March, its call for equality continues to resonate throughout the year and in many different gestures, some big, some small. In 1973 the male ex-tennis champion Bobbie Riggs challenged the great female tennis champion Billie Jean King to a tennis match, asserting that she could not, as a woman, beat him. In front of a TV audience of over 45 million, in a match that came to be known as ‘The Battle of the Sexes’, Billie Jean King won. Although this match did not happen on International Women’s Day, the spirit of what the day commemorates is captured in this poem by Liz Brownlee.
Bobby Riggs, tennis champ,
said a woman couldn’t
beat a man …
Billie Jean King, tennis champ,
in three straight sets, showed
a woman can.
9 March • ‘Hope’ is the Thing with Feathers • Emily Dickinson
In this poem, Emily Dickinson imagines Hope to be a bird that lives in the soul, singing eternally. Dickinson’s reassuring poem notes with wonder that while Hope has sustained the speaker through the darkest of times, it has never required anything in return.
‘Hope’ is the thing with feathers –
That perches in the soul –
And sings the tune without the words –
And never stops – at all –
And sweetest – in the Gale – is heard –
And sore must be the storm –
That could abash the little Bird
That kept so many warm –
I’ve heard it in the chillest land –
And on the strangest Sea –
Yet, never, in Extremity,
It asked a crumb – of Me.
10 March • Remember • Christina Rossetti
Christina Rossetti is associated with the ‘Pre-Raphaelite’ movement, which was founded by her brother Dante Gabriel Rossetti, along with the painters William Holman Hunt and John Everett Millais. The Pre-Raphaelites rejected the major recent trends in Victorian art in favour of an older inspiration. Christina Rossetti’s most well-known work is the poem ‘In the Bleak Midwinter’, which was set to music by Gustav Holst and is still performed as a Christmas carol today. In this poem, which is in the fourteen-line sonnet form, a lover imagines how she will be remembered once she has passed away.
Remember me when I am gone away,
Gone far away into the silent land;
When you can no more hold me by the hand,
Nor I half turn to go, yet turning stay.
Remember me when no more day by day
You tell me of our future that you planned:
Only remember me; you understand
It will be late to counsel then or pray.
Yet if you should forget me for a while
And afterwards remember, do not grieve:
For if the darkness and corruption leave
A vestige of the thoughts that once I had,
Better by far you should forget and smile
Than that you should remember and be sad.
10 March • Knocks on the Door • Maram al-Massri, translated by Khaled Mattawa
Loneliness is here likened to dust. The poem ends with the suggestion that the emotions we show the world are perhaps not always those which we truly feel.
Knocks on the door.
Who?
I sweep the dust of my loneliness
under the rug.
I arrange a smile
and open.
11 March • Green Rain • Mary Webb
Mary Webb’s novels and poems usually focus on the landscape of her native Shropshire. Her poems in particular are snapshot images of the natural world, and in this poem the sense of peace and stillness she feels while walking through woodlands gives the impression that even the rain might hang in the air and cease to move.
Into the scented woods we’ll go,
And see the blackthorn swim in snow.
High above, in the budding leaves,
A brooding dove awakes and grieves;
The glades with mingled music stir,
And wildly laughs the woodpecker.
When blackthorn petals pearl the breeze,
There are the twisted hawthorn trees
Thick-set with buds, as clear and pale
As golden water or green hail –
As if a storm of rain had stood
Enchanted in the thorny wood,
And, hearing fairy voices call,
Hung poised, forgetting how to fall.
11 March • Prior Knowledge • Carol Ann Duffy
Do you think Prior Knowledge is a real boy, or an imaginary friend? Although we all sometimes wish that we could have all the answers, this poem can be interpreted as a warning that knowledge can come at a price.
Prior Knowledge was a strange boy.
He had sad green eyes.
He always seemed to know when I was telling lies.
We were friends for a summer.
Prior got out his knife
and mixed our bloods so we’d be brothers for life.
You’ll be rich, he said, and famous;
but I must die.
Then brave, clever Prior began to cry.
He knew so much.
he knew the day before
I’d drop a jamjar full of frogspawn on the kitchen floor.
He knew there were wasps
in the gardening gloves.
He knew the name of the girl I’d grow up to love.
The day he died
he knew there would be
a wind shaking conkers from the horse-chestnut tree;
and an aimless child
singing down Prior’s street,
with bright red sandals on her skipping feet.
12 March • Tarantella • Hilaire Belloc
A ‘tarantella’ is a fast, upbeat dance that is supposed to mimic the feverish, frenzied effect of a spider bite – it literally means ‘tarantula’ in Italian — or of falling in love. This poem, with its repetitions and one word lines, captures the swift and relentless rhythm of the dance being described.
Do you remember an Inn,
Miranda?
Do you remember an Inn?
And the tedding and the spreading
Of the straw for a bedding,
And the fleas that tease in the High Pyrenees,
And the wine that tasted of tar?
And the cheers and the jeers of the young
muleteers
(Under the vine of the dark veranda)?
Do you remember an Inn, Miranda,
Do you remember an Inn?
And the cheers and the jeers of the young
muleteers
Who hadn’t got a penny,
And who weren’t paying any,
And the hammer at the doors and the din?
And the hip! hop! hap!
Of the clap
Of the hands to the swirl and the twirl
Of the girl gone chancing,
Glancing,
Dancing,
Backing and advancing,
Snapping of the clapper to the spin
Out and in –
And the ting, tong, tang of the guitar!
Do you remember an Inn,
Miranda?
Do you remember an Inn?
Never more;
Miranda,
Never more.
Only the high peaks hoar;
And Aragon a torrent at the door.
No sound
In the walls of the halls where falls
The tread
Of the feet of the dead to the ground,
No sound:
But the boom
Of the far waterfall like doom.
12 March • from The Lady of Shalott • Alfred, Lord Tennyson
This epic narrative poem by Alfred, Lord Tennyson takes its inspiration from a 13th-century Italian romance and tales of the mythical King Arthur. These wonderfully evocative opening verses introduce us to the bucolic idyll of Camelot, where the beguiling and mysterious Lady of Shalott remains cloistered inside her island castle after a strange curse prevents her from directly looking at the outside world.
On either side the river lie
Long fields of barley and of rye,
That clothe the wold and meet the sky;
And thro’ the field the road runs by
To many-tower’d Camelot;
And up and down the people go,
Gazing where the lilies blow
Round an island there below,
The island of Shalott.
Willows whiten, aspens quiver,
Little breezes dusk and shiver
Thro’ the wave that runs for ever
By the island in the river
Flowing down to Camelot.
Four gray walls, and four gray towers,
Overlook a space of flowers,
And the silent isle imbowers
The Lady of Shalott.
By the margin, willow-veil’d,
Slide the heavy barges trail’d
By slow horses; and unhail’d
The shallop flitteth silken-sail’d
Skimming down to Camelot:
But who hath seen her wave her hand?
Or at the casement seen her stand?
Or is she known in all the land,
The Lady of Shalott?
Only reapers, reaping early
In among the bearded barley,
Hear a song that echoes cheerly
From the river winding clearly,
Down to tower’d Camelot:
And by the moon the reaper weary,
Piling sheaves in uplands airy,
Listening, whispers, ‘’Tis the fairy
Lady of Shalott.’
13 March • Seasons of the Heart • Linton Kwesi Johnson
The Jamaican-born dub poet Linton Kwesi Johnson is one of the UK’s most prominent and celebrated contemporary writers. While many of his poems have a political resonance, this piece is more grounded in nature and shared human experiences of love and ageing. Here he beautifully equates life’s ups and downs with the inevitable changing of the seasons, and gently implores us to make the most of the ‘springtime of our days’ before we retreat into the ‘winter of our minds’.
Beguiled
by blue moon
O enchanting light
we lost our way
like lovers sometime do
searching wide-eyed
for wild flowers
in the ‘fragrant forest of the night’
now memories
slowly drift on by
like grey clouds
against the somber winter sky
and all our yesterdays are now become
the springtime of our days
life is the greatest teacher
love is the lesson to be learnt
like how the heart’s seasons shift
how the sweet smelling blossoms of spring
are soon become the icy arrows of winter’s sting
how spring intoxicated by the sun
now throws off her green gown
and summer’s golden smile is soon become
the frown of autumn’s brown
how passions spent we droop like sapless vines
In the winter of our minds
13 March • Lochinvar • Sir Walter Scott
Walter Scott was a nineteenth-century historical novelist and poet who was much admired during his lifetime. Much of his work centred upon stories of adventure and gallantry that play out in his native Scottish countryside – and this poem is no different. These lines serve as a free-standing poem that’s embedded in Canto V of his epic ballad ‘Marmion’. Set in medieval times, it follows the dashing hero Lochinvar as he gatecrashes a marital feast and steals away the bride from her dastardly husband-to-be with little more than ‘one touch to her hand, and one word in her ear’.
O young Lochinvar is come out of the west,
Through all the wide Border his steed was the best;
And save his good broadsword he weapons had none,
He rode all unarm’d, and he rode all alone.
So faithful in love, and so dauntless in war,
There never was knight like the young Lochinvar.
He staid not for brake, and he stopp’d not for stone,
He swam the Eske river where ford there was none;
But ere he alighted at Netherby gate,
The bride had consented, the gallant came late:
For a laggard in love, and a dastard in war,
Was to wed the fair Ellen of brave Lochinvar.
So boldly he enter’d the Netherby Hall,
Among bride’s-men, and kinsmen, and brothers and all:
Then spoke the bride’s father, his hand on his sword,
(For the poor craven bridegroom said never a word,)
‘O come ye in peace here, or come ye in war,
Or to dance at our bridal, young Lord Lochinvar?’
‘I long woo’d your daughter, my suit you denied;—
Love swells like the Solway, but ebbs like its tide—
And now I am come, with this lost love of mine,
To lead but one measure, drink one cup of wine.
There are maidens in Scotland more lovely by far,
That would gladly be bride to the young Lochinvar.’
The bride kiss’d the goblet: the knight took it up,
He quaff’d off the wine, and he threw down the cup.
She look’d down to blush, and she look’d up to sigh,
With a smile on her lips and a tear in her eye.
He took her soft hand, ere her mother could bar,—
‘Now tread we a measure!’ said young Lochinvar.
So stately his form, and so lovely her face,
That never a hall such a galliard did grace;
While her mother did fret, and her father did fume,
And the bridegroom stood dangling his bonnet and plume;
And the bride-maidens whisper’d, ‘’Twere better by far
To have match’d our fair cousin with young Lochinvar.’
One touch to her hand, and one word in her ear,
When they reach’d the hall-door, and the charger stood near;
So light to the croupe the fair lady he swung,
So light to the saddle before her he sprung!
‘She is won! we are gone, over bank, bush, and scaur;
They’ll have fleet steeds that follow,’ quoth young Lochinvar.
There was mounting ’mong Graemes of the Netherby clan;
Forsters, Fenwicks, and Musgraves, they rode and they ran:
There was racing and chasing on Cannobie Lee,
But the lost bride of Netherby ne’er did they see.
So daring in love, and so dauntless in war,
Have ye e’er heard of gallant like young Lochinvar?
14 March • Mothering Sunday • George Hare Leonard
Mother’s Day falls in March in the United Kingdom. The day celebrates the selfless and essential role that mothers play in families and society alike. In times past, maids and servants were allowed to take the day off to see their mothers and go to church. They would take with them cakes and other treats for their mothers – lik
e the specially baked wheaten cake in this poem.
It is the day of all the year,
Of all the year the one day,
When I shall see my Mother dear
And bring her cheer,
A-Mothering on Sunday.
And now to fetch my wheaten cake,
To fetch it from the baker,
He promised me, for Mother’s sake,
The best he’d bake
For me to fetch and take her.
Well have I known, as I went by
One hollow lane, that none day
I’d fail to find – for all they’re shy –
Where violets lie,
As I went home on Sunday.
My sister Jane is waiting-maid
Along with Squire’s lady;
And year by year her part she’s played,
And home she stayed
To get the dinner ready.
For Mother’ll come to Church, you’ll see –
Of all the year it’s the day –
‘The one,’ she’ll say, ‘that’s made for me.’
And so it be:
It’s every Mother’s free day.
The boys will all come home from town,
Not one will miss that one day;
And every maid will bustle down
To show her gown,
A-Mothering on Sunday.
It is the day of all the year,
Of all the year the one day;
And here come I, my Mother dear,
And bring you cheer,
A-Mothering on Sunday.
14 March • Human Affection • Stevie Smith
Here is another one for Mother’s Day, from the female British poet Stevie Smith. It is an illustration of how even one scene, one image, can convey a depth of emotion in poetry.
Mother, I love you so.
Said the child, I love you more than I know.
She laid her head on her mother’s arm,
And the love between them kept them warm.
15 March • To Daffodils • Robert Herrick
Robert Herrick was one of the seventeenth-century ‘Cavalier Poets’, so named because they supported King Charles during the English Civil War (Charles was eventually executed). Herrick wrote well over two thousand poems in his life, many of which were inspired by the Latin expression carpe diem – ‘seize the day’. A ‘carpe diem’ poem is one that focuses on the shortness of life, and thus on the importance of enjoying every present moment.
