The Sonnets of Christopher Whitby

Slightly Foxed

Sigs B5r to C4v have not been

cut, which makes me wonder quite what I should

do. What would the library say if I were seen

to take a knife– consider also what would

be their view if that same knife should then turn out

to be not sharp enough and the pages tore

even just a teensy bit. Would someone shout

at me in all this rustling quietness, or

simply fix me with a stare, then lean down for

a word? ‘Your ticket, Sir, if you don’t mind,

and now let me escort you to the door.

You seem unmindful of the rules you signed.’

Of course, I’ll end up doing what is right,

no matter what adventure seems in sight.

Bookmark

After the funeral my brother said,

‘I’ll sort the books.’ I wondered why. Suppose

our mother wanted them untouched – all those

raw memories bound up in what he’d read.

So later I was quite relieved to see

most shelves still full. The boxes in the hall

contained ‘his other wives’: the sea in all

its moods and sailing ships. No use to me,

and yet I took back what I’d given. Then

tucked inside an Alexander Kent I saw

the bookmark. Was this at his bedside when

he at last conceded he would read no more?

They float now by my bed, but I’ve not dared

to read his last words among so many shared.

Lost Inheritance

“You can tell whose son you are,” my mum would say,

especially when I’d irritated her

by being me, but with each faltering day

I know my father less. When we inter

the bones, we bury the memories too –

not that he ever spoke much of his life

or I ever asked. The bare facts I knew

but not his doubts or any inner strife

he might have struggled to contain throughout the years.

If we could somehow have our time again

I’d force him to confess his deepest fears

and what he’d seen and done that caused most pain.

I am his son, and give his goodness due,

but need to feel his heart of darkness too.

Making Out

Sometimes I think I got it all wrong. Not

just a turning missed, a fork to the right

instead of left, but a start all to pot,

back to front, upside down, inside out, quite

hopelessly muddled, off on the wrong foot,

stumbling head over heels, arse about face,

all fingers and thumbs, both feet somehow put

down the same trouser leg, an utter disgrace.

But then the point of balance need not lie

dead centre for a movement to run true

and goals are just an attitude of mind.

So in eccentric travel I may try

the better part of what there is to do

and more than those who never look behind.

Breaking Silence

There was a time you’d climb a mountain top

and find yourself alone to contemplate

whatever promptings God, your inner soul,

or nature’s trenchant silence might evoke.

To do that now, you have to beat the dawn

or settle for arrival with the dusk,

having doggedly threaded through the Goretex exodus

to curious looks and snippets of sharp advice.

Now mountains keep their counsel through the day,

but met at the right hour will whisper still

the old familiar charm: “All this I give

to you, as far as eye can see, and more,

if you will but bow down and worship me.”

Enveloped in the mist, I bend my knee.

[Commissioned for the Ninth International Festival of 

Mountaineering Literature at Bretton Hall College of 

the University of Leeds in 1995 and reviewed by Terry 

Gifford in The Alpine Journal here.]

Salad Days

I haven’t written a poem for you

for forty years. I feel a bitter shame

at that, since it was largely due

to your departure that I ever wrote at all,

Well, that and holding God to blame.

I had a fire then, when death was new

and righteous indignation fanned the flame

of such creative gifts as I might call

my own. And then, half unremarked, a day

arrived when I could write without my fix of pain.

O brave new world ! Yet it’s banal to say

my writing could be anything but vain,

For looking back, one thing I plainly see:

I never wrote for you. I wrote for me.

[In mem. Alistair Lauckner 1952-1965]

Interrogation

It would be better if you told us what

we want to know now. You’ve been in this game

for long enough to know you’re dead. It’s not

the when but how that is at stake. A shame,

of course, in other times.... but let that go.

What can I say to make your case more plain?

Our people are... creative, skilled. They know

about the careful management of pain.

You wonder what I am and why I choose

this work – a man with family, like you.

They think I’m in accounts, which is quite true

if you– Excuse me. Yes? Ah, good. Good news!

You are reprieved. Though not released, not yet.

We have your child. Let’s watch her pay your debt.

Rex Quondam

So now at last the final battle waits.

I have no hope that Merlin will appear.

            O sing me the songs of Avalon

I doubt there’s magic strong enough in all

the world to change the course of these events

which will consume us all. We yield our days

            and lay me down like a child

not to the dark of some triumphant evil

but to the greyness that is history.

Our kindling light will just be once upon a time.

My own flesh rebels and I am weary–

            I have no wanting for the dawn

I could not start again, not even for

the grail, which, truth to tell, I know devoured

our fellowship. What’s left I should desire now?

            since death my heart beguiled

Out with the candles. Let but one remain

To light us to our graves and show our dreams were vain.

[An 'interwoven' sonnet that works well as a spoken 

or acted poem with the italic lines sung a capella to an 

extemporised 'haunting' tune. In a stage version I 

have thrust ‘Excalibur’ back into ‘a stone’ at the end.]

There’s more if you can bear it; sonnets page 3