creative process

“A Late Winter Morning” Complete!

| Forgotten Fields
A windy day in late winter, filmed 25 August 2018.

Taking much longer to develop than I anticipated, “A Late Winter Morning” is done at last, a celebration of the titular subject in three stanzas, reflecting upon those striking moments that move one to compose: sunlight upon the verdant landscape, familiar birdsong—one’s wistfulness upon hearing it.

I am also pleased that I have found a final title for the offshoot poem, previously undecided between “A Morning Chat” and “A Chat at Solitaire”. It is now simply “A Chat”, referring at once to the bird, the African Stonechat (Saxicola torquatus) and the subject of the poem, its splendid warbling song.

In the days to come, I shall turn to “A Blustery Day”, composed on 25 August 2018, a windy day in late winter (June to August in South Africa). I had the foresight at the time to film the blowing pines that inspired the sketch—there is a row beside the house planted by my mother three decades ago:

Poetry Publication Progress (2020-10-04)

O, Spring!

| Forgotten Fields
Baeometra uniflora amid Ursinia, 19 September 2020. Copyright 2020 Forgotten Fields. All rights reserved.
Baeometra uniflora amid Ursinia (possibly U. discolor), one of the many inspiring sights of spring (September to November in my country, South Africa). Taken 19 September 2020.

To me, spring is a time of involuntary inspiration. In the past month alone, I have composed many new poetic sketches inspired by the flowers I encountered, most of them for the first time, as what bloomed last year, now is nowhere to be found, replaced by different species.

Incidentally, I have noticed in my new sketches a sudden predilection for rhyming couplets in trimetre.1 Spontaneously, they take on the lively AA BB CC and so on rhyming scheme. I do not object; what better way to express the simple and cheerful feelings that move me to write, just now!

Of course, these new sketches are for a future, second anthology—I am yet working on the first—but, in the embrace of Persephone, how could I refuse to comply? I confess I feel a sense of frustration that days are so short and the list of what I wish to achieve in them so long.

  1. da-DUM da-DUM da-DUM / da-DUM da-DUM da-DUM and so on.

A Poemlet Complete

| Forgotten Fields
Saxicola torquatus, 8 February 2019. Copyright 2020 Forgotten Fields. All rights reserved.
An African Stonechat (Saxicola torquatus), taken 8 February 2019.

The offshoot poem from “A Late Winter Morning” (itself yet unfinished) is complete! It is light and fun, and one cannot help but laugh as one bounces through its lines.

I am undecided about its ultimate title, wavering between the simplicity of “A Morning Chat” and the sprightliness of “A Chat at Solitaire”—pum-pum pum-pum pum-paahm—which echoes the animation of the verse, but I am not pressed for a decision.

Incidentally, the date of the original draft is listed as 29 August 2020 when it came into being, but it emerged from the main poem, which was drafted 15 August 2018.

Poetry Publication Progress (2020-09-26)