The wood shavings curl &
curl to my father's voice
as he sings to the wood
releasing its scent
wave upon wave
of pine
crashing upon
this shore of summer
its morning long
forgotten.
This wood will shape shift
into a chair leg
dovetailing into
the song he sings
as the wood listens
to every syllable
as if his singing
coaxed into being
chair leg...window frame
stool or saddle.
"Oh believe me if al those
endearing young charms..."
and the wood swoons
to his planning
'''...that I gaze at so
fondly today."
Moore's melodies and pine
reaches back in time
to grasp
the moment
lost to my mind
but now returning
to its rightful place
as wood becomes chair leg
to my father's
singing.
There would be no stop and sing time or now we are singing time...songs and poems were threaded through needle's eye of reality and stitched into my consciousness. Moore's melodies and such arrived in the act of planing wood or digging potatoes or making a bicycle from scratch from scraps found abandoned. The Da was an inveterate shed maker and anything that could be built in a shed and a great maker of bicycles...a bike for all ten of us! The songs and poems flowed through the ordinary process of the day which I through an emotional osmosis soaked up through my very being...music mapping the invisible landscape of the hidden self.
After Thomas Moore's wife, Elizabeth, was badly scarred by smallpox, she refused to leave her room, believing herself ugly and unlovable. To convince her his love was unwavering, Moore composed the ‘Endearing’ poem which he set to an old Irish melody and sang outside her bedroom door. He later wrote that this restored her confidence and re-kindled their love.
BELIEVE me, if all those endearing young charms,
Which I gaze on so fondly to-day,
Were to change by to-morrow, and fleet in my arms,
Like fairy-gifts, fading away!
Thou wouldst still be ador'd as this moment thou art,
Let thy loveliness fade as it will;
And, around the dear ruin, each wish of my heart
Would entwine itself verdantly still!
II.
It is not while beauty and youth are thine own,
And thy cheeks unprofan'd by a tear,
That the fervour and faith of a soul can be known,
To which time will but make thee more dear!
Oh! the heart, that has truly lov'd, never forgets,
But as truly loves on to the close;
As the sun-flower turns on her god, when he sets,
The same look which she turn'd when he rose!
When the Kintetsu Yoshino Line's special express Type 16600 or Type 26000 "Sakura Liner" trains depart Asuka Station (in Asuka, Takaichi District, Nara Prefecture, Japan) a rendition of the tune is played within the train to announce departure. In Japan, the tune is also known as "Shine with the Flowers of Spring Days".