World Poetry Day. The importance of “days”. Blossom. Trees. And street art.

 It seems that today is World Poetry Day! Founded by UNESCO in 1999, on the occasion of its 30th General Conference held in Paris to “give fresh recognition and impetus to national, regional and international poetry movements.” Poets, both past and present, are honored, and oral traditions of reciting poetry are revived. Reading, writing, and teaching poetry are encouraged, and converged with other mediums of expression such as music, dance, painting, and more. 

There you go. 

Another “day”. 

Is there, I wonder, a “day” for every day of the year? I suppose that to some extent there is; after all every day is somebody’s birthday. If your birthday falls on a “day” is the importance of your birthday somehow overshadowed?  Not unless you allow that to happen. Personally I never suffered unduly for sharing my birthday with Robert Burns. It must be a lot more troublesome to have your birthday coincide with Christmas, especially when you are a child. Ideally we should all have our birthdays mid-year to give people time to think up interesting things to give us as presents. 

Anyway, today is World Poetry Day and Simon Armitage has published a new collection of poems, all about spring and blossom. He’s been going round looking at blossom in National Trust Places. His new collection, and an EP of some of the poems as songs, is called Blossomise. Here’s an excerpt.

Profusion

We plucked a poem
out of a book,
scissored it off
while the words and letters
still popped,
while the lines and stanzas
curtsied and blushed.

We dried and pressed it
between the years,
between cherry leaves.
That makes no sense.
Then folded and folded it,
posted it into a hole
in a stone-fruit tree.

It was an old-style,
home-style poem.
Meaning what?
Meaning blossom as light,
blossom as hope
after winter’s tunnel,
after the narrow dark.

The plan was to reignite
the living flame
if the flame went out.
Hey presto, in April
the poem budded and bloomed
and we read it, chanted it,
knew it by heart.

But it blossomed again
in July, then again
in December, drunk
on meltwater, drugged
with the tepid milk
of the winter sun.
What had we done?

It must be odd, though, being Poet Laureate, and being expected to produce poems to order. Does he have a separate collection of poems that just come as inspiration, needing work but not made to measure for a particular occasion? 

I suppose artists of all genres must have that kind of dichotomy. Painters have long had to rely on commissions to keep themselves going, especially as their works often only gain value after the artist has died. Which brings me to Banky and his latest work, a person spraying green paint on a wall behind a severely pollarded cherry blossom tree. A comment on what local authorities do to urban trees, it gives the impression of the tree back in leaf. 

Local residents have wondered if their rents will go up now that there is a Banksy in their street.  

The local authority put railings around the mural to protect it but already someone has been and sprayed white paint on it. I wonder why.

As regards the tree, there is a strong possibility that it will regrow. A couple of trees on our road were severely pollarded some time ago, looking for a while like huge catapults, the kind that the Bash Street Kids brandished. Last spring they started to grow new shoots and before long their catapult shape was hidden. There is hope for Banksy’s urban tree. 

We need trees in our cities. .

Life goes on. Stay safe and well, everyone!