Two forevers
This week: IV by A.E. Housman, from his collection ‘Adittional Poems’
THERE are two ‘forevers’. Two. ‘What in the name of God is he on about? Two forevers?’... Sounds ridiculous, impossible, daft? At first glance, yes, perhaps it does, but bare with me, there are, and certainly for us humans.
Forever, as we know, is the continuation with no ending. Perhaps even, at a stretch, with no beginning, but our heads are not designed to be warped with mind-bending thoughts of no beginnings, but these same minds are wide open to entertain the notion of no ending. Immortality – the going on forever and ever.
Our universe, the scientists and physicists tell us, began with a big bang some 13.5 billion years ago, and will, in some shape or form, go on forever. Matter can neither be created or destroyed, but merely changed from one form to another, and therefore there will be an existence of some kind.
But, none of us will be around to witness any of this whatsoever. We may, thankfully, create a sound, or music or some combination of notes that will echo forever somewhere in the cosmos, but we ourselves, and all that we sensed and felt, will be gone.
Therefore, when we utter or listen to, the following sentences, are we fooling ourselves, are our inaccuracies misleading us, are we wrong? ‘I will love you forever’... ‘stay with me forever’... ‘ You will stay in my heart until the end of Time’... Forever!
Of course we’re not wrong, how can we be? Don’t we mean every word we say? That is why, rather than allowing science pour cold water on us all and shatter our illusions with logic, data and fact, I’d rather consider the existence of the second forever. Our forever.
Consider it a sub-group of the real forever if you wish, but it remains ‘ our’ forever. The human variety. The end of time, is the end of our own time (anything else is a bonus, depending on who you believe!).
A.E. Housman (1859-1936), from Worcestershire, England, author of that classic collection A Shropshire Lad, (which has enjoyed over 100 editions!), is considered one of the finest British scholars who ever lifted a pen. He wrote a beautifully sad poem dealing with this very thought of longevity of love, which had haunted him greatly throughout his life. The fear that love itself had a lifespan, was merely mortal, and through no fault of its own (as it were), would perish, when we do. We merely have the lend of it! Poem IV
It is no gift I tender,
A loan is all I can;
But do not scorn the lender; Man gets no more from man. Oh, mortal man may borrow What mortal man can lend; And ‘ twill not end to-morrow, Though sure enough ‘ twill end. If death and time are stronger, A love may yet be strong; The world will last for longer, But this will last for long.
How cleverly he makes his point by using words such as ‘ loan’ and ‘ lender’ and ‘mortal’. And he seems resigned to the realisation that ‘death and time are stronger’. But the positioning of his adjectives in the final stanza truly turns on its head our assumptions of love and forever.
We normally might expect in a poem, at the end of a line, for ‘stronger’ to follow ‘strong’, or ‘ longer’ to follow ‘ long’. He does the opposite. He reverses them, which sadly strengthens his persuasion against of our long held belief. Two forevers are better than one. John J Kelly is a multiple award-winning poet from Enniscorthy. He is the co-founder of the Anthony Cronin Poetry Award with the Wexford Literary Festival and co-ordinator of poetry workshops for schools locally.
Each week, John’s column will deal mainly with novels, plays and poems from both the Leaving Certificate syllabus and Junior Certificate syllabus.