Poetry and Art, Seamus Heaney and George Brown

This week I took my grandchildren blackberry picking and then showed them how to make jam. To my utter amazement, they had a whale of a time, seems the simple pleasures of life do still amuse children even in this age of electronic wizardry.

Blackberry-Picking by Seamus Heaney

Late August, given heavy rain and sun
For a full week, the blackberries would ripen.
At first, just one, a glossy purple clot
Among others, red, green, hard as a knot.
You ate that first one and its flesh was sweet
Like thickened wine: summer's blood was in it
Leaving stains upon the tongue and lust for
Picking. Then red ones inked up and that hunger
Sent us out with milk cans, pea tins, jam-pots
Where briars scratched and wet grass bleached our boots.
Round hayfields, cornfields and potato-drills
We trekked and picked until the cans were full
Until the tinkling bottom had been covered
With green ones, and on top big dark blobs burned
Like a plate of eyes. Our hands were peppered
With thorn pricks, our palms sticky as Bluebeard's.
We hoarded the fresh berries in the byre.
But when the bath was filled we found a fur,
A rat-grey fungus, glutting on our cache.
The juice was stinking too. Once off the bush
The fruit fermented, the sweet flesh would turn sour.
I always felt like crying. It wasn't fair
That all the lovely canfuls smelt of rot.
Each year I hoped they'd keep, knew they would not.

I have one comment to make about this poem;  ……………..his mother should have shown him how to avoid the dreaded mould and make jam
 

Seamus Heaney

Heaney was born on 13th. April 1939, the eldest of nine children at the family farm called Mossbawn in the Townland of Tamniarn near Castledawson, Northern Ireland, about thirty miles north-west of Belfast and two miles north-east of Magherafelt. As well as being a farmer, his father Patrick was also a cattle dealer and was a popular figure at cattle markets and fairs throughout the district. His mother Margaret was a member of the well-known McCann family from Castledawson, many of whom worked in the local Clark’s linen factory. His family were Catholic and he was raised in the Irish Nationalist tradition.

Read more here on his web site.

http://www.seamusheaney.org/

Art work by John George Brown

John George Brown studied first at Newcastle-on-Tyne England, then at The Edinburgh Academy Scotland, after which he moved to New York (in 1853) and continued his studies at the National Academy of Design. He later became a member of the Academy of Design, a charter member of the Water-Colour Society and president of the Water Colour Society from 1887 to 1904. He generally but not exclusively, confined himself to representations of street child life.

http://www.artsender.com/artists/Brown_John_George.htm

delete reply debieo wrote on Oct 11, '09 What a wonderful, informative blog Loretta. Love the illustrations along with it.

delete reply fransformation wrote on Oct 10, '09 What a delightfully refreshing presentation. I enjoyed all of it, that includes my trip down Memory Lane.

delete reply sanssouciblogs wrote on Oct 8, '09 Great melange are art and word. Delightful. Loved your personal tale. Blackberries are the new Nintendo or Wii! What goes around comes around, bring back the farm!

delete reply bostonsdandd wrote on Oct 8, '09 LOL Takes me back to Summers spent on the roadsides looking for the same juicy fruit :-). http://bostonsdandd.multiply.com/journal/item/363

delete reply sylvie1 wrote on Oct 8, '09 wonderful!~ This brought back so many memories for me, it made me feel good and smile. I used to pick blackberries, eat them off the bushes ... enjoy the fantastic homemade pies and jam ... yummmmm http://sylvie1.multiply.com/journal/item/898/POETRY_WEDNESDAY..._TURN_TO_STONE

delete reply skyerider wrote on Oct 7, '09 What memories this brought back! Thanks so much for sharing!

delete reply mitchylr wrote on Oct 7, '09 Brought back some memories of childhood. Great post :-))

delete reply lauritasita wrote on Oct 7, '09 I love the poem, in fact, it made me feel a little hungry, LOL

delete reply caffeinatedjo wrote on Oct 7, '09 I really like that last painting of the boy with that impish smile on his face sitting on his shoe shine stand. This poem made me smile, reminding me of how my friends and I, when we were kids, would find blackberry bushes and eat as we picked them. Yum!!! Then we would proudly bring what was left to our folks. Never could get those stains out of my clothes, though ;).

delete reply veryfrank wrote on Oct 7, '09 Really quite a nice little poem.

delete reply brendainmad wrote on Oct 7, '09 Yummy! I remember those briars too ut te fruit was so delicious.

delete reply bennett1 wrote on Oct 7, '09 Ah, yes, he could have prevented the mould, but it would have ruined the glorious metaphor of the fleeting richness of childhood. This is a wonderful poem, as juicy, sweet, and piquant as the berries.

edit delete reply forgetmenot525 wrote on Oct 7, '09 Thanks Emma

delete reply hedgewitch9 wrote on Oct 7, '09 How fantastic!