Going Public - The Art of Narration

GOING PUBLIC 07.19. 2013 "Old Romney Church" and "Eastbridge" by Peter Davey from his collection of "Poems from Long Ago" 

- recorded with permission of the author peterdavey2.wordpress.com for www.goingpublicproject.wordpress.com

Old Romney Church

The clock 
beats, leafy shadows wave
upon a sunlit wall;
can all of human history be held
within one moment of a summer’s afternoon?
the clock’s beat
which bore our planet out of emptiness
will bear it back again – the clouds, the trees,
the birds chattering beyond the windowpane;
yet, growing older, time
is crossed and recrossed constantly with hints
of something else, imbued by every scent and texture
of this ancient place; experience 
and dreams 
and memories
and new experience attained through art 
are more real to me now
than time and space
and shadows of reality we move among

Eastbridge

As the daylight fails,
as the ruined tower darkens
on the fading clouds,
as the blackbird, scolding,
swoops among the bushes,
in remembered voices and in silence
comes the moment of reconsecration
on this empty land

Image by Peter Davey

Poems from Long Ago "Old Romney Church" and "Eastbridge" by Peter Davey read by Sonia Vilim

GOING PUBLIC 09.27. 2013 Theme: Banned Authors 
Selection of poems by Anna Akhmatova banned by a party resolution of 1925 which she termed her "The Vegetarian Years" being accused of representing an introspective bourgeois aesthetics reflecting only trivial "female" preoccupations not complying with the new revolutionary politics of that time. 

Source: http://www.public-domain-poetry.com/anna-akhmatova

White Night
I haven't locked the door,
Nor lit the candles,
You don't know, don't care,
That tired I haven't the strength
To decide to go to bed.
Seeing the fields fade in
The sunset murk of pine-needles,
And to know all is lost,

That life is a cursed hell:
I've got drunk
On your voice in the doorway.
I was sure you'd come back.

I Wrung My Hands
I wrung my hands under my dark veil. . .
"Why are you pale, what makes you reckless?"
-- Because I have made my loved one drunk
with an astringent sadness.

I'll never forget.    He went out, reeling;
his mouth was twisted, desolate. . .
I ran downstairs, not touching the banisters,
and followed him as far as the gate.

And shouted, choking: "I meant it all
in fun.    Don't leave me, or I'll die of pain."
He smiled at me -- oh so calmly, terribly --
and said: "Why don't you get out of the rain?"
Kiev, 1911

As a White Stone
As a white stone in the well's cool deepness,
There lays in me one wonderful remembrance.
I am not able and don't want to miss this:
It is my torture and my utter gladness.

I think, that he whose look will be directed
Into my eyes, at once will see it whole.
He will become more thoughtful and dejected
Than someone, hearing a story of a dole.

I knew: the gods turned once, in their madness,
Men into things, not killing humane senses.
You've been turned in to my reminiscences
To make eternal the unearthly sadness.

Solitude
So many stones have been thrown at me,
That I'm not frightened of them anymore,
And the pit has become a solid tower,
Tall among tall towers.
I thank the builders,
May care and sadness pass them by.
From here I'll see the sunrise earlier,
Here the sun's last ray rejoices.
And into the windows of my room
The northern breezes often fly.
And from my hand a dove eats grains of wheat...
As for my unfinished page,
The Muse's tawny hand, divinely calm
And delicate, will finish it.

I Taught Myself To Live Simply
I taught myself to live simply and wisely,
to look at the sky and pray to God,
and to wander long before evening
to tire my superfluous worries.
When the burdocks rustle in the ravine
and the yellow-red rowanberry cluster droops
I compose happy verses
about life's decay, decay and beauty.
I come back. The fluffy cat
licks my palm, purrs so sweetly
and the fire flares bright
on the saw-mill turret by the lake.
Only the cry of a stork landing on the roof
occasionally breaks the silence.
If you knock on my door
I may not even hear.

Image: Private archive of Sonia Vilim

Anna Akhmatova Selection of Poems read by Sonia Vilim

Parting at Heathrow Airport
by Peter Davey from his collection of poems "Poems From Long Ago" peterdavey2.wordpress.com

Those sunlit clouds
away beyond the wire and concrete hills
remind me that you’re out there still, that we
who overlay the bones of time
with dreams
will always meet again

Sketch by Peter Davey

Parting At Heathrow Airport by Peter Davey read by Sonia Vilim

GOING PUBLIC 24.01. 2014

Nähe des Geliebten
von J.W. von Goethe

Ich denke dein, wenn mir der Sonne Schimmer
Vom Meere strahlt;
Ich denke dein, wenn sich des Mondes Flimmer
In Quellen malt.
Ich sehe dich, wenn auf dem fernen Wege
Der Staub sich hebt;
In tiefer Nacht, wenn auf dem schmalen Stege
Der Wandrer bebt.
Ich höre dich, wenn dort mit dumpfem Rauschen
Die Welle steigt.
Im stillen Haine geh ich oft zu lauschen,
Wenn alles schweigt.
Ich bin bei dir, du seist auch noch so ferne.
Du bist mir nah!
Die Sonne sinkt, bald leuchten mir die Sterne.
O wärst du da!

Source:http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/N%C3%A4he_des_Geliebten
Image by Peter Davey

Nähe des Geliebten by J.W. von  Goethe read by Sonia Vilim in German

GOING PUBLIC 24.01. 2014

LOVE'S NEARNESS
translated by Henry Van Dyke

I think of thee when golden sunbeams glimmer
          Across the sea;
And when the waves reflect the moon's pale shimmer
          I think of thee.

I see thy form when down the distant highway
          The dust-clouds rise;
In darkest night, above the mountain by-way
          I see thine eyes.

I hear thee when the ocean-tides returning
          Aloud rejoice;
And on the lonely moor in silence yearning
          I hear thy voice.

I dwell with thee; though thou art far removed,
          Yet thou art near.
The sun goes down, the stars shine out,—Beloved
          If thou wert here!

From the German of Goethe, 1898.

Source: http://www.gutenberg.org/
Image: Peter Davey

Love´s Nearness by J.W. von Goethe read by Sonia Vilim in English

The Hawk
By William Henry Davies
 
 Thou dost not fly, thou art not perched,
     The air is all around:
    What is it that can keep thee set,
     From falling to the ground?
    The concentration of thy mind
     Supports thee in the air;
    As thou dost watch the small young birds,
     With such a deadly care.

    My mind has such a hawk as thou,
     It is an evil mood;
    It comes when there's no cause for grief,
     And on my joys doth brood.
    Then do I see my life in parts;
     The earth receives my bones,
    The common air absorbs my mind -
     It knows not flowers from stones.

Source: www.public-domain-poetry.com

The Hawk by W. H. Davies  read by Sonia Vilim

Bereft
By Robert Lee Frost

Where had I heard this wind before
Change like this to a deeper roar?
What would it take my standing there for,
Holding open a restive door,
Looking down hill to a frothy shore?
Summer was past and day was past.
Somber clouds in the west were massed.
Out in the porch's sagging floor,
leaves got up in a coil and hissed,
Blindly struck at my knee and missed.
Something sinister in the tone
Told me my secret must be known:
Word I was in the house alone
Somehow must have gotten abroad,
Word I was in my life alone,
Word I had no one left but God.

Source: www.public-domain-poetry.com

Bereft by Robert Lee Frost read by Sonia Vilim

A Winter Eden
By Robert Lee Frost 

A winter garden in an alder swamp,
Where conies now come out to sun and romp,
As near a paradise as it can be
And not melt snow or start a dormant tree.

It lifts existence on a plane of snow
One level higher than the earth below,
One level nearer heaven overhead,
And last year's berries shining scarlet red.

It lifts a gaunt luxuriating beast
Where he can stretch and hold his highest feat
On some wild apple tree's young tender bark,
What well may prove the year's high girdle mark.

So near to paradise all pairing ends:
Here loveless birds now flock as winter friends,
Content with bud-inspecting. They presume
To say which buds are leaf and which are bloom.

A feather-hammer gives a double knock.
This Eden day is done at two o'clock.
An hour of winter day might seem too short
To make it worth life's while to wake and sport.

Source: www.public-domain-poetry.com
Image: Peter Davey



Sonia Vilim reads A Winter Eden by Robert Lee Frost

GOING PUBLIC  02.15. 2013  - "Eingang" by Rainer Maria Rilke
http://www.goingpublicproject.wordpress.com

A wonderful poem on embracing the unknown and overcome fear by setting foot on new soil in order to flourish and thrive.

Eingang (the beginning poem of  "The Book of Images"/"Das Buch der Bilder" 1902)

Wer du auch seist: am Abend tritt hinaus 
aus deiner Stube, drin du alles weißt; 
als letztes vor der Ferne liegt dein Haus: 
wer du auch seist. 
Mit deinen Augen, welche müde kaum 
von der verbrauchten Schwelle sich befrein, 
hebst du ganz langsam einen schwarzen Baum 
und stellst ihn vor den Himmel: schlank, allein. 
Und hast die Welt gemacht. Und sie ist groß 
und wie ein Wort, das noch im Schweigen reift. 
Und wie dein Wille ihren Sinn begreift, 
lassen sie deine Augen zärtlich los...

Source: http://picture-poems.com/rilke/images.html#Entrance

Eingang  - a poem by R. M. Rilke - German (read by Sonia Vilim)

GOING PUBLIC 02.15. 2013 - "Entrance" by Rainer Maria Rilke
www.goingpublicproject.wordpress.com

A wonderful poem on embracing the unknown and overcome fear by setting foot on new soil in order to flourish and thrive. 

Entrance  (the beginning poem of "The Book of Images"/"Das Buch der Bilder" 1902)

Whovever you are:  step out in to the evening
out of your living room, where everything is so known;
your house stands as the last thing before great space:
Whoever you are.
With your eyes, which in their fatigue can just barely
free themselves from the worn-out thresholds,
very slowly, lift a single black tree
and place it against the sky, slender and alone.
With this you have made the world. And it is large
and like a word that is still ripening in silence.
And, just as your will grasps their meaning,
they in turn will let go, delicately, of your eyes . . .

Source: picture-poems.com/rilke/images.html#Entrance
English versions © 1999 -2011Cliff Crego


Entrance - a poem by  R. M. Rilke - English (read by Sonia Vilim)

GOING PUBLIC 03.08. 2013 - "LAMENT" by Rosaria Trenta
www.goingpublicproject.wordpress.com

A poem of unrequited love and obsession, the kind that gives only pain and yet can't be avoided. 

LAMENT

I don’t care that you ignore me
I don’t mind that you forget me
You touched my soul
And it flew away
You messed with my heart
And it went astray

Forsaken perhaps recoiled
In the fretful mind that never sleeps
Imagined and strongly desired
In the perpetual silence of death
That hurts so deep

You can’t see me in the shadow
You won’t hear me in the dark
I kissed your lips
And they dried my sorrow
I smacked your cheek
And it filled with colour

I don’t care if you destroy me
I don’t mind if you reject me
We have sinned, despised and cursed
We left nothing untouched, unheard
Too late for questions, no reason to repent
We frugally dispense the grains of time
No cheating spouse to gracefully resent
The shattered heart that we cannot mend
Confined to a rhyme in this devil’s lament

© Rosaria Trenta - All rights reserved
http://rosariatrenta.tripod.com/
www.canistriggerpublishing.com

Lament  - A Poem by Rosaria Trenta read by Sonia Vilim

GOING PUBLIC 03.15. 2013 - "COLD" by Peter Davey from "Poems from Long Ago" 
- recorded with permission of the author http://peterdavey2.wordpress.com

www.goingpublicproject.wordpress.com

A revealed piece from the treasury chest of the lonely bard from Winchelsea :)

Cold.

the sense of never knowing how another sees; 
though each human eye can fold about the stars, 
project a kind of homespun order on the void
and though our features flow in other veins, 
still remains the cold sense that, 
even skin to skin, 
a space divides us wider than the sky; 
is this shade of blue
your shade of green? 
my world
your world? 
Each child alone in darkness
father, daughter, son
conjoined by love while every sight and scent
is formed by memories of what alone is ours 
	
    cold.

Frightening.

Photo: Morning View by Peter Davey

Cold - A Poem by Peter Davey (read by Sonia Vilim)

GOING PUBLIC 03.22. 2013 - "SUNBEAM" by  Anna Akhmatova 

A poem from Anna Akhamtova´s Silver Age featured in the book of verse Evening (Vecher).

I pray to the sunbeam from the window -
It is pale, thin, straight.
Since morning I have been silent,
And my heart - is split.
The copper on my washstand
Has turned green,
But the sunbeam plays on it
So charmingly.
How innocent it is, and simple,
In the evening calm,
But to me in this deserted temple
It's like a golden celebration,
And a consolation.

Source: http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/sunbeam
Image: From Sonia Vilim´s archive - Sunset in Chania

Sunbeam - A Poem by Anna Akhmatova (read by Sonia Vilim - English)

GOING PUBLIC 03.22. 2013 - "SUNBEAM/солнечный луч" by Anna Akhmatova

A poem from Anna Akhamtova´s Silver Age featured in the book of verse Evening (Vecher).

Молюсь оконному лучу -
Он бледен, тонок, прям.
Сегодня я с утра молчу,
А сердце - пополам.
На рукомойнике моем
Позеленела медь.
Но так играет луч на нем,
Что весело глядеть.
Такой невинный и простой
В вечерней тишине,
Но в этой храмине пустой
Он словно праздник золотой
И утешенье мне.

Source: http://www.akhmatova.org/verses/vecher/vecher.htm
Image: From Sonia Vilim´s archive - Sunset in Chania

Sunbeam/солнечный луч - A Poem by Anna Akhmatova (read by Sonia Vilim - Russian)

GOING PUBLIC 04.19. 2013 -  A short poem triptych from "LUNAR ECLIPSE" by Peter Davey, expressing the author´s sensations and deep connection to nature and surroundings which have been sharpening his intuitive capacities of writing.
- recorded with permission of the author peterdavey2.wordpress.com for www.goingpublicproject.wordpress.com

1. Dawn after Snow 2. Dead Bird 3. In the Shelter of the Firs

Dawn after Snow

the room
dignified by pale light
a burd chirping very softly
on a neighbour´s lawn
from the vanished path
tips, stumps of things
beyond the window 
earth
new, poised
to be discovered
by the cold
sun

Dead Bird

Death is so quiet here
at the field´s edge
so dignified and unforgiven, far
from human life and human stare

In The Shelter of the Firs

In the shelter of the firs
a hiss of seas ascending into waves
rough wood and cones and needles
sliding on the sky
a high
burnishing of sun

Image: Studies of Rainclouds by Peter Davey 

A short poem triptych from Lunar Eclipse by Peter Davey read by Sonia Vilim

GOING PUBLIC 04.26. 2013 The moon has ascended to the second part of the triple set from  the collection of poems about nature "LUNAR ECLIPSE" written by Peter Davey 

- recorded with permission of the author peterdavey2.wordpress.com for www.goingpublicproject.wordpress.com

1 In An Ancient Woods On Fawley Down 2 Grass Snake 3 Lunar Eclipse

In An Ancient Woods On Fawley Down 

Sunlight only
penetrates, transforms
this tangled mound of thorns
the wild clematis

One leaf
bears all the sun’s radiance
bears all the shadows of the earth
about itself

Grass Snake 

Sprung
from stalk and dust
in burning sunshine
whip and wind and weave
through limpid water
sliding
into shade

Lunar Eclipse

Last night I walked on empty hills
and saw the full moon’s slow eclipse
all human life was held within
the shape that shaped that bloodred shadow
on the moon’s face

A short poem triptych from Lunar Eclipse by Peter Davey read by Sonia Vilim - part 2

GOING PUBLIC 05.03. 2013 Immerse into this wonderful night walk with Peter and his dream being sharply observed by the eyes of an enigmatic bird of prey :) 

- recorded with permission of the author peterdavey2.wordpress.com for www.goingpublicproject.wordpress.com

1 Dog-walking at Midnight 2 Kestrel 3 A Dream from the collection of poems LUNAR ECLIPSE" written by Peter Davey http://t.co/q2uMxI64rs

Dog-walking at Midnight

night
warm
wet
with pasted leaves
the full moon
spinning free
beyond the tumbled-upward
tatteredm gleaming
cliffs and cornices of cloud
our shadows
clean
along the white
lane

Kestrel

steep
behind me soars the green
hill
and foaming trees
and further still, beyond them, poised
a speck
each feather delicately spread
aflame

A Dream

such a small
thing to ask
such a large 
thing to gain
simplicity
the surf breaking on the sand
the cry
of gulls

Image: Peter Davey 


A short poem triptych from Lunar Eclipse by Peter Davey read by Sonia Vilim - part 3

GOING PUBLIC 10.05. 2013  "Words"  and "If We Move Towards Eternity" by Peter Davey from his collection of "Poems from Long Ago" drawing us into his inner space of contemplation...

- recorded with permission of the author peterdavey2.wordpress.com for www.goingpublicproject.wordpress.com

W o r d s

We fasten words to things that fill our world
then cease to see them -
goat, stone, snow
cow, bean – we barely notice
how eternity has brought to bear
upon each molecule its energy of purpose
forming patinas of bone, of grizzled skin,
of horn, of hair; we seldom sense
the transience of ancient weathered things
nor apprehend
the folding forms of birth and growth and death
until the word no longer fits


If  We  Move  Towards  Eternity

If we move towards eternity
eternity is not 
here – the blaze of finches’ wings,
of thistledown

If we move towards eternity, 
eternity is not within
each stone, each drifting seed
nor turn of tide and time, the seasons
turning ever on themselves

If we move towards eternity
eternity does not endow 
the planet’s poise, the slow majestic round
of sun and moon

If we move towards eternity
eternity is not within 
each moment we are here 
and now

alone	

Image: "Trapped Leaf" by Peter Davey


Poems from Long Ago "Words"  and "If We Move Towards Eternity" by Peter Davey read by Sonia Vilim

GOING PUBLIC 24.05. 2013 Peter´s reflections on a birding walk in the natural reserve Pannel Valley, a gloomy meeting of the river and the sea, finally returnig to the breadbasket of the Hampshire Downs.

- recorded with permission of the author peterdavey2.wordpress.com forwww.goingpublicproject.wordpress.com

Pannel Valley

oceans of fragmites
white
waves of stalks surging
into plumes
ducks
rocketing in brief bright formations
and the sky
blue
blue and gulls
flurrying like sudden
snowstorms, and the marsh-harrier among them, veering, lumbering
on huge
sombre wings

Estuary

dead
land
a shattered window rattles in the wind
where gulls rise
above the dead water and the dead sand
dead land
the city murmuring
across the sea, exhales its columns curling
to the clouds
the earth burns
one ship
specked upon the blue
emptiness

Returning to the Hampshire Downs

All smells of rain
the wire grass, clouds
rearing in the west
one sweep of skyline rough with stalks
with thisleheads
rooks
rise upward
spiral, soaring, calling
glide away
slight curves across the hills
the rim of land
outshines the sky

Image: Courtesy of Peter Davey


A short poem triptych from Lunar Eclipse by Peter Davey read by Sonia Vilim - part 4

GOING PUBLIC 07.06. 2013 

- recorded with permission of the author peterdavey2.wordpress.com for www.goingpublicproject.wordpress.com

Where the Hens lived


At home the henhouse was
dry wood slatted; it stood
down among nettles 
and some wild grasses but the hens’
wandering and foraging and scratching 
somehow caused
the nettles and the grass to vanish
leaving bare earth; there was an iron
watercart, swaying, squeaking as it moved, 
it sometimes 
slopped over, if you filled the tank too full,
and soaked your legs. I loved how
that ground was not definable - it was not
meadow, it was not 
garden, it was not
farmland, it was just
where the hens lived, out the back –
wire, warmth, dry earth 
some scraps of groundsel
poking through the holes in iron sheets,
and murmuring and chortling, the sudden
fast fluttering of wings, and now and then
the cock crowing

Midsummer Night at Tynepits Cottage


Windows wide upon the whirring world
the curtain stirs
between the shadow-mouths of furniture 
and shifting trees, between the brink of sleep
and forest-realms of badgers, foxes, owls;
the lapsing, rising breeze
deflects the nightjar, holds
one blackbird calling 
in the deep wood; is the moon
vast, round, bronze beyond the maybug’s
fumbling, the distant line of downs 
still visible from Great Oaks Wood?

Windmill Hill at Two in the Morning


Vast
silence
vast silver silence
two o’clock
the soaring firmament is mine
earth
belongs to owls and badgers
weasels, beetles, maggots;
boundaries are redefined
by tiny tracks and feeding grounds,
a single cry
denotes the forest humped against the night

vast
silence
Mars suspended out across the ocean
now the sky surrounds
this planet bearing all its life in whispers
stars are underneath the earth
and suddenly you sense its giant bulk,
its massive roundness,
how
it hangs with perfect buoyancy
in emptiness

Image: Where the Hens Lived by Peter Davey


Going Public - The Art of Narration

Sonia Vilimova