September 2013: Emilie Sings Piaf & Dave Fleming's tribute to Seamus Heaney

SEPTEMBER 18th

Good evening folks,

Am just getting ready for La Vie, L'Amour, Emilie Sings Edith ... but just had to abandon the curling tongs (usually do that in the venue anyways) to share these thoughts with you....

Some years ago I came up with: "Time is Love, so Love is how you spend your Time." I guess even when it's one's own philosophy, one can forget it. Or, perhaps it's just easier to think like this when you've less life experience and are tripping the ripples... but with the abundance of the colours and shades of living, it can all get a bit tricky to say the least! I feel it's like the shadows of experience gradually wraps the heart in cling-film, making it a little more untouchable or removed. Funny enough, they call it shrink wrap in the States, don't they? ... The shrink-wrapped heart, perfect ornament for the shelf!

And then there's the "culture of cool" which seems to send the message that you shouldn't really care about anything too much. Or at least, don't be seen to care. Take a chill pill, be like the proverbial duck that all that water rolls off.

But what's the point? What is the point if we don't care about ourselves and each other? And what happens in our gardens, towns, families and, well, world? And what's the point if we don't show we care?

Revisiting these songs of Edith Piaf's now, which I used to sing almost 10 years ago, has been very enlightening, and affirming - and challenging to remove some of the cling-flim! She really addresses the whole spectrum of life, of joy and pain and loss and, in the end, always insists gratitude and love, a love that is all the more real and beautiful precisely because of all the "larmes" (tears):

Mais moi, j'ai dans le cœur de quoi toujours aimer,

J'aurai toujours assez de larmes pour pleurer,

J'aurai toujours assez de rire pour effacer,

Les tristes souvenirs, acroches, ou passes,

Je veux toujours aimer, je veux toujours souffrir.

Si je n'dois plus aimer, moi je préfère mourir.

Mais, moi, j'ai dans le cœur de quoi toujours aimer,

Aimer... Aimer... (Toujours Aimer)

And while we're on the subject, we are?, well we are now! I would like to share with you another story that I think is a beautiful illustration of humanity. As you know earlier in the year Dave Fleming and I ventured forth from our respective scribblers closets to show our poems the light of dusk with "Words & Music" one evening in Ranelagh. In that evening Dave read a beautiful poem he had written about Seamus Heaney. Someone told Dave he should send that poem to Seamus, which eventually Dave did only to receive a handwritten letter in gratitude from Seamus himself. How precious. And how beautiful that they both cared enough. I think Seamus Heaney gave us a beautiful poetics of humanity.

The story doesn't end there, for on Seamus' passing, Dave was inspired to write another poem in his memory. Along with all the other tributes to Seamus Heaney on Facebook, Dave added his poem, which you will please read below (and I'm sure he'll read it again this Saturday at Scenes from the Salon,St. Phillips Parish Hall, 8pm). The poem was spotted by someone in the Irish Times and published making Dave Fleming now a published author! Congratulations Dave!!

Take care of yourselves and each other and hope to see you soon! Now, I really have to get ready, fast!

Emilie

His Master's Pen

In memory of Seamus Heaney 1939-2013

The house awoke to sunrise

Over Sandymount Strand

But today was to be no ordinary day.

The pen, that lay on the desk

In the sun-filled attic study,

Overlooking the world and its movements,

Would not be stirred from its horizontal slumber.

Today, an eerie silence filled the space

As reflections of time-past

Whispered in faint echoes.

Fragments of old poems flash into life

Lightening bolts of memory fill the room

With agitated excitement and then

Deposit that curious static dryness on the air,

Having been sucked of the life-blood of its creativity.

The pen, that relic of the ancient craft

Had served as friend and servant

To the fertile mind of its master;

Had served as fellow-traveler

On the many fantastic journeys of his mind;

Had served as companion and comforter

During the lonely periods of creative famine;

The blank page awaiting the scratch of activity

The black markings giving contrast and balance

To the blinding whiteness of the empty void.

That pen will stir no more,

Sitting forlornly on the desk,

Reposing on the arena of past triumphs,

But confident that it had

Participated in some epic adventures,

Guided by a true colossus.

Never again will it experience the surprise

Of new words describing the ordinary;

Of extra-ordinary concepts

Conveyed with everyday words.

The pen, like its master, at last can rest,

Having served the world, the country

And most significantly, the beloved flock,

Of ordinary people who felt to know him intimately.

He addressed them with a warmth and caring

For he understood their human condition,

He recognised the importance of the normal

The complexity of the simple bits and pieces.

The enforced silence will roar loudly on the horizon

As the pen adapts to the tranquility of redundancy

While the master proceeds to join his peers in another place:

The bond, which endured a lifetime, finally broken?

Dave Fleming