Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, ON A GREY-HAIRED OLD LADY KNITTING, by FRANK WILMOT


Poetry Explorer

Classic and Contemporary Poetry

ON A GREY-HAIRED OLD LADY KNITTING, by                     Poet's Biography
First Line: Cast on 120 stitches
Last Line: And turn, lady, turn.
Alternate Author Name(s): Maurice, Furnley
Subject(s): Knitting; Symphonies; Concerts


AT AN ORCHESTRAL CONCERT IN THE MELBOURNE TOWN HALL.
PRICES, TWO AND ONE PLUS TAX

CAST on 120 stitches,
Rep. to the end of the row;
Loop the scream of the flying witches
And the bassoon moaning low.

Surely this will be wondrous raiment
With mellow horn-tones woven in,
The clarinet's woodnotes and the clamant
Trombone courting the violin.
Little black dots for the drums, dear lady,
A blue gash for the viola, please;
There's a faun in an afternoon, cool and shady,
And sun on morning seas.
And there's the thin triangle sound --
Can you snare, do you think,
The bell-bird clink
Like fairy jewellers that tap
On silver anvils in the trees?
You will trap, mayhap,
With ease
The procession of chords profound
Purple with passion that sweep
Across the bass viols murmuring deep;
Can you capture those, do you think?
And weave them into your garment's shape,
O feverish finger loom!
So tone and measure shall never escape
The mesh of their woolly doom?
Weave these rhythms deep, old lady,
Cross and common, triple and ragged;
Trees and towers thrust black against
An orange sunset sky.
Not words, nor thoughts, nor facts you capture
But moods and melodic volume
You shackle in rhythms there.
For thought goes beyond the decoys
And steady beat of the old pentameter's jog
Or hendecasyllabics, sapphics, alcaics or strophes,
Paeons or anapests; but here the wild stars come
Ranged in tramping battalions out of the vast to your fingers
And nameless, smothered emotions
Sway in new measures.
Gales swell and recede and the trees bow in due order;
Bars of the bird carols melt and merge;
The waves make regular cadence
To the sound of moonlight flooding a snow-capped crag,
Snatch these rhythms and hold them, lady,
Till your woven garment is home for the thunder
And the colour that throbs in a rose.

All this comes from the magic wand
Beckoning harmony from beyond,
Of the oil-haired, hollow-backed baton-waver
Who swoops and flogs like a galley-slaver;
So weave them, lady, weave them in,
Horror and sunshine, laughter and sin.
Not words, not words, but moods and measures
Out from the vast's unnameable treasures.
Till through your quiet thread there runs
The unspeakable heat of the suns,
And your deft loopings hold
Space's unspeakable cold,
Till the norms of your rhythms exceed
A constellation's flashing speed.

K. 1 purl to the last stitch, K.
Rep. to the end 2 tog. and spurn
The passages where mad brasses bray
And turn, lady, turn.

A quiet of babies in their beds
Breaks to the drums and the cymbals flashing gold;
An angry gale has torn the clouds to shreds,
A naked moon is shivering in the cold,
O knit and weave your warp and woof
Under the candelabraed roof
That, melting in music, opens wide
On the uncounted stars outside.

Flutter on, fingers, fetch and fend;
How do you know you are venturing where
The phantoms of old desires contend
With spectres of young despair?
How will you know what spells are caught
In the nooses of endless thread?
How will you govern this wild thing fraught
With the abracadabra of dread?
Is it garb for sages, garb for youth?
How much terror, how much truth?
Here all the howling fates are loosed;
Know you what things your chains have noosed?
Here all Christ's miracles are freed
And groping in a hopeless need,
Have a care, lady, oh, have care --
How can you will what you will not snare?

From the sleeve-holes shape the shoulder,
Purl to the last eight, click the bones;
P. 7, K. 1, cast off; bolder
Sound the cheeky little piccolo's tones.

Weave away, lady, and when you have done
Some youth will plunder this robe from you --
He shall outlive the sun.
Shimmering with all the captured wonder
Of starry waters and flowers and thunder,
Things of spirit and things of thew,
He'll throw the garment about his shoulders
Making zealots of all beholders.
Chaos may threaten, passion condemn
But he will shepherd them
From our deliberate mazes
Of the wizardry of phrases
Into a world of calmer aims,
Sweeter spirit and selfless claims
And clearer sight.
At his beckoning they will come
To dip their cups and draw
Of the clear waters flowing from
The wells of universal law
And universal light
Till Forbearance, gentle wraith,
Puts swords of pity in hands of faith
For there's this power in Beauty, lady weaver,
Beyond all sermons of the true believer.
For he shall take
The self-deceit
Out of their ordered, aimless lives;
And he shall make
Old scars of gyves
Sprout Hermes wings for blundering feet.

K. 1 purl to your heart's content,
Rep. to the end 2 tog. and spurn
The baton waving its last lament
And turn, lady, turn.





Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!


Other Poems of Interest...
Home: PoetryExplorer.net