Damn, I do miss playing the old game. I heard this poem on telly, it was read most beautifully and in the spirit of the Ashes I shall post it here. Try reading it out loud…

ON HAVING GIVEN UP CRICKET

I shall play cricket in heaven
in return for the afternoons
gladly given to the other
pleasure of others’ leisure.

I shall walk, without haste, to the wicket
and nod to the angels kitted
in their whites waiting to discern
the kind of batspirit I am.

And one stroke in heaven, one dream
of a cover drive will redeem
every meeting of bat
and ball I’ve done without.

And I’ll bowl too, come on to bowl
leg-breaks with such control
of flight and slight changes of pace
that one over will efface

the faint regret I now feel.
But best of all I shall field:
alert in the heavenly deep,
beyond the boundary of sleep.

– Michael Laskey, from ‘Thinking of Happiness’ (Peterloo, 1991).

The BBC (as I never tire of repeating; my favourite broadcaster) showed the film ‘The Girl with a Pearl Earring’ yesterday. I caught it midway but could tell straightaway it was about Vermeer. And that was because of the amazing lighting and cinematography. It was as if every shot was reminding you of Vermeer’s work, and I was kept guessing whether I had seen that particular shot in a painting, or whether it was just a continuation of the atmosphere and colour theme. Breathtaking, and I see the film has won a good few awards for the efforts.

Meanwhile, I also have an idea for the one telly show where celebrities have not yet been shoe-horned in:- Celebrity Zoo Farm! Celebrities are kept in a zoo, and every episode there’s heart-breaking news, like one of them has to be castrated ot put down. But there’s also good news, like they have established a breeding pair of So-and-So from This-or-That with So-and-So from That-or-Other and expect a litter anytime soon.

I started reading J.M. Coetzee’s (Wikipedia tells me it’s a common Afrikaans name pronounced “kut’se”) book ‘Disgrace’. Coetzee is the recipient of the Nobel prize for Literature in 2003 and the Booker Prize in 1999.

The book ‘Disgrace’ is about a 52-year old professor at a Cape Town university who has an affair with a student that goes sour. It’s a beautifully written book with a humanistic approach, a multilayered masterpiece, so I’ll give you an excerpt that really hit me last evening.

Intro: The Professor used to teach Classics and Modern Languages at the university, but that faculty has been closed down and so he stays on as a redundant Communications professor; a job for which he has no love, and so fails to inspire any in his students. Soraya is a prostitute, a moralistic prostitute, he visits every Thursday afternoon:-

He continues to teach because it provides him with a livelihood; also because it teaches him humility, brings it home to him who he is in the world. The irony does not escape him: that the one who comes to teach learns the keenest of lessons, while those who come to learn learn nothing. It is a feature of his profession on which he does not remark to Soraya. He doubts there is an irony to match it in hers.

“He touched a lot of people”

I watched a programme yesterday about wildlife refuges in London, and they showed a beautiful rooftop garden, the largest in Europe, on top of an ex-department store. They are open to the public unless booked, and accessible through a doorway marked ’99 Kensington High Street’. The garden had oak trees in 18 inches of topsoil and four swans, a couple of which where called Splosh and Pecks!

Heard this beautiful song on the radio today. By British Singer/Songwriter John Martyn.

May you never lay your head down without a hand to hold
May you never make your bed out in the cold

You’re just like a great strong brother of mine and you know that I love you true
You never talk dirty behind my back and I know there are those that do
Won’t you please, won’t you please, won’t you bear in mind
Love is a lesson to learn in our time
Won’t you please won’t please won’t you bear in mind for me

May you never lay your head down without a hand to hold
May you never make your bed out in the cold

And you’re just like a good close sister me and you know that I love you true
You hold no blade to stab me in the back and I know that some do
Won’t you please won’t you please won’t you bear in mind
Love is a lesson to learn time
Won’t you please won’t you please won’t you bear it mind for me

May you never lay your head down without a hand to hold
May you never make your bed out in the cold

May you never lose your temper if you get hit in a bar room fight
May you never lose your woman over night

May you never lay your head down without a hand to hold
May you never make your bed out in the cold

May you never lose your temper if you get hit in a bar room fight
May you never lose your woman over night