Competition
IN COMPETITION No 257, you were invited to write a poem with the title The Surprising Tree. Kevin Murphy celebrated a tree on a viaduct on the A413 at Gerrards Cross. Eden figured jauntily in Basil Ransome-davies’s entry, a place for ‘Prancing round in the nude, eating fresh natural food,/with the serpent a vague background hiss.’ To that forbidden fruit, Michele Crawford added the apple of discord and the mistletoe that killed Baldur. Rob Stuart recounted the memorable finding of a skull in a wych elm. J E Tomlin had an ancient cedar triumphant in a Whig peer’s park. Commiserations to them and congratulations to those printed below, each of whom wins £25, with the bonus prize of The Chambers Dictionary of Great Quotations going to Gail White.
Surprising Tree has partridges
For every day of Christmas.
It floats a flock of ibises
Along the ibis isthmus.
Surprising Tree has golden fruit
That Eve put too much trust in.
It also bore the peach that once
Was stolen by Augustine.
Don’t walk beneath Surprising Tree
When darkness falls, reflecting
That it can send a rain of bats
Upon the unsuspecting.
Though others warn the kids away,
I own I’m not so wary.
I’ll plant my own Surprising Tree
And see what it may bear me. Gail White
‘A Surprising Tree’ is what we’re asked to discuss.
But, for a clutch of reasons, I would say
The afore-used adjective is superfluous:
A tree – any tree – is surprising, anyway.
See: branches unfurling their leafy umbrella,
Helping to keep you dry when you’ve forgotten yours;
Hear: a tree’s feathered friends’ cheery a cappella,
So sweetly civilising the rugged outdoors.
Imagine: all that sap invisibly rising;
If that isn’t surprising, I ask you – what is?
Think: how we’d all need to be economising
On breath, without a tree’s blest photosynthesis.
In amazement, a tree will always make me stare
And if you can prove otherwise, I’ll eat my hat!
I mean: a slow, green fountain refreshing the air –
What could possibly be more surprising than that?
I White
Springing out of the ground, a tree Surprised me by the force within its life. Was it this mighty living tower, Bastion against the army of the winds, That cell and cell idealised as they grew? Was this their culture, world, aim, sense-of-one Half- or full-realised communal attempt To grope beyond their present minute lives And catch a reason for existence here? Were they content to live within a state Of living wood, and do their task therein? Surely a cell contentment must be there Or that strong tree would fade away and die As each constituent resigned his place And death, instead of life, would overcome. Gillian W Poland
Lightning had blasted it. Its bark had gone, Its naked boughs appealing to the sky For something to hide its shame. Cold sunlight shone On its bare trunk. There seemed no reason why The tree should stand. It groaned at night And waved its wasted form, welcoming shade And darkness to conceal the monstrous sight It had become. What purpose might be made Of this maimed giant God alone could know. Its branches, with dead fingers, clawed the air Forbidding any greenery to grow, And with the winds of winter sang despair. Yet life existed in its hollowed bole: A ghostly owl rose from its tortured soul. Max Ross
COMPETITION No 259 What with one thing and another, meals have been different in recent months. A poem, please, called Cooking for One. Maximum 16 lines. This month we cannot accept any entries by post, I’m afraid, but do send them by e-mail (comps@theoldie. co.uk – don’t forget to include your postal address), marked ‘Competition No 259’, by 17th September.