Let us end the holiday season (mine, anyway) as we began it, with some verses from John Clare, together with a wish for a trouble-free New Year (faint hope!) to all our readers. The Old Year The Old Year’s gone away To nothingness and night: We cannot find him all the day Nor hear him [...]
Posts Tagged ‘John Clare’
The Old Year’s Gone Away To Nothingness And Night
Posted in Arts, Poetry, tagged Burrough Hill, John Clare, Leicestershire, New Year, Poetry on January 1, 2012 | Leave a Comment »
What Ere Wi Time Has Sanction Found Is Welcome : A Christmas Message From John Clare
Posted in Arts, Poetry, tagged Carol Vordeman, Charles Dickens, Christmas, John Clare, Poetry, Winter on December 24, 2011 | 2 Comments »
Once again, it’s that time of year on this blog where we wish a Happy Birthday to Carol Vordeman and a Merry Christmas and a New Year of your choice to all our readers. I hope Christmas brings you at least some of the joys described in this extract from The Shepherd’s [...]
Summer Pleasures They Are Gone …
Posted in Arts, Cricket, Poetry, Sport, tagged Autumn, Cricket, John Clare, Loughborough CC, Market Harborough CC, Nick O'Donnell, Poetry, Summer, Tom Wells on September 7, 2011 | 2 Comments »
A little later than usual, a poem for September. This rather chose itself. When I was at the Chesterfield Festival the other week, fielding in front of me on the boundary was Jon Clare, the promising Burnley-born Derbyshire all-rounder. In September’s issue of The Cricketer, which I happened to be reading at the time, there was an [...]
Christmas Greetings from the John Clare Lounge, Northampton
Posted in Arts, Church of England, Poetry, Religion, Sculpture, tagged All Saints, Christmas, John Clare, Northampton on December 18, 2010 | Leave a Comment »
In Northampton today. I dropped briefly into All Saints’ Church, where I observed that John Clare (see above and below) is getting (or being got) into the Christmas spirit. When Clare was being treated in the Northampton General Asylum he was “allowed a good deal of freedom, often walked into town and was a [...]
The Winter’s Come, by John Clare
Posted in Animals, Arts, Birds, Clouds, Nature, Poetry, Trees, tagged John Clare, Leicestershire, Melancholy, Northamptonshire, Poetry, Winter on November 24, 2010 | 2 Comments »
Meanwhile, back in the Midlands, some seasonal verse from John Clare: The Winter’s Come Sweet chestnuts brown like soleing-leather turn, The larch trees, like the colour of the sun That paled sky in the Autumn seem’d to burn. What a strange scene before us now does run Red, brown, and yellow, russet, black [...]
Dog-roses : trifles – foolish things
Posted in Arts, Cricket, Flowers, Nature, Poetry, Sport, Trains, tagged Brampton Valley Way, Cricket, John Clare, Northamptonshire, Poetry, Roses, Wild flowers on June 20, 2010 | 3 Comments »
Blogging-time limited this weekend, I’m afraid. Amongst other things I’m off to see my first 20/20 match this afternoon. Will I have some Damascene moment at Grace Road? Will the scales fall from my eyes? We shall see. Perhaps I shall see. That being so, I shall have to summon the aid of one of [...]
Young Spring Lambs, by John Clare (and some older sheep in Little Bowden)
Posted in Animals, Arts, Nature, Photography, Poetry, This England, tagged John Clare, Little Bowden, Market Harborough, Photography, Poetry, Sheep, Spring on March 31, 2010 | 2 Comments »
One of the traditional things we associate with Spring – and you may remember that, we had it last week – that I haven’t seen this year so far is lambs. Not one. Being an optimistic sort I’d like to think that this is co-incidence, rather than that sheep are becoming extinct. Here, however, is [...]
Snowstorm – John Clare
Posted in Arts, Birds, Nature, Poetry, tagged Birds, Helen Morris, John Clare, Poetry, Snow on January 10, 2010 | 2 Comments »
I came across a very useful volume yesterday in a charity shop – Where’s that poem? by Helen Morris. Published in 1967, it was intended as an aid for English teachers, and consists of a list of poems suitable for children between the ages of 8 and 15, arranged by topic. I can also see it [...]
