Eulogy to John and Cary Grant

by Tim Veater

(On the occasion of a new ITV film)

In a white mug, how the tea stains, rusty red

And how difficult it is to drink,

Lying horizontal on my trusty bed.

What luxury it is to lie awake,

The room as silent as a tomb,

Outside a damp November, calm,

The clinging Hazel leaves a-yellowing,

With not a sound or movement,

To disturb the moment here,

My early morning upstairs room.

I read in 'The Times' of Cary Grant,

His early years in Bristol, 'two up, two down',

When aged only eleven he returned

To find his mother gone, though she did not,

Committed by a drunken father to a home,

For those who unforgetting were forgot,

But told she was on a long vacation,

Which not for twenty years did he discover,

His father lied and on his death bed he admitted,

She was alive and still his mother.

It's no surprise he ran away and changed his name,

A famous actor he became with many parts

And many glamorous wives and secret lovers.

He flew his Horfield nest

But could not flee the horrors of his past,

Despite his several scattered homes

In Beverley Hills, Palm Springs and Malibu,

They followed him there, well disguised,

Playing the convincing part

Of a quintessential English Gent.

And how his audience lapped it up,

Complicit in the self-deception.

He made his mark and played the role

Without a hitch or an American inflection.

“Dahlings I love you”, he said and said again,

Perhaps he did and had to do, to make his way,

Through envied vacuous glamour, glitz,

From Temple Meads to snake-pit Hollywood,

A slick and smiling testament to the US Dream

And how good looks and charm can overcome

The disadvantage of a broken Bristol home.

I'm pleased to say at thirty-one,

Belatedly he made it up,

With his abandoned self and long-lost mum.

I never shall forget in different time and place,

The despairing howl, as John went in the ground.

A Bristol audience for the supremely talented Jacob Collier:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-sJF0_U30dE

Cool for Cats 

by Tim Veater

 "The wind bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest the sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh, and whither it goeth: so is every one that is born of the Spirit."

Alfie my cat sits on the window cill,

Black against the morning light,

In contrast, quite invisible

In the darkness of the night,

Only evidenced by scratching on the glass,

I have to let the spirit in.

Collier, Fender, Orlinski, are three cool cats upon the stage,

Making sounds, playing with our ears and soul.

Are they there or are they here?

Belatedly I've come to know

And cursed myself I am so slow,

To recognise their vocal splendour.

Each giving rise to rave revues and wild applause

From world-wide venues, people lost in wonder,

Never really knowing why

Music has this power to move, enthrall,

Casting its mythic spell,

Breaking all the barriers asunder.

Counter tenor Jakub, Jozef, Orlinski's falcetto hits the notes

Other voices cannot reach,

From a former cruel castrati age.

Pergolesi, Scarlatti, Vivaldi would be amazed and proud,

Their sounds had percolated down the sands of time,

Titilating, through medium profound, the modern ear.

Samuel Thomas Fender (“Just call me Sam”)

With a sudden jolt, brings us bang up to date,

But moves us still in quite a different idiom and sphere

Of North Shields poverty, despair and hate.

But joyfully, in a thrilling, impulsive rythmn,

Embedded in a classic American rock beat.

Jacob Collier is another prodigious musical talent,

Great advertisment for a single mother,

Chinese genes and North Finchley constituency.

Where in a lonely room he mastered

Music's complicated language, whilst still a boy,

Instruments bowing to his dextrous innovative toys.

Only the violin escaped his control, scratching on a window pane,

Mastered all the arts that modern technology supplied,

Creating multi layered sounds, defying all the accepted rules applied,

Ploughing quite new ground, definition of genius,

Promoting harmony to the crowd, making them believe,

They are a heavenly choir - and so it seems.

All three do far more than make a noise,

They resonate with something buried deep in breast,

A unifying chord that moulds the crowd as one,

To tears, to cheers, and deafening standing ovation,

On a journey to the glorious sun

And back again, returning home.

My cat who waits upon the cill, lets out a plaintive cry,

To be let in. She cannot sing, but contented sits and stares,

Listening mesmerised. For she is definitely impressed

By Jacob's piano arpeggios and scales

And Sam's annihilating supersonic missile beat

And Jakub's wine-glass shattering mountain peaks.

For music is the food of love, a recipe for joy,

A feline feast that purring humans use to see the light.

The milk of human kindness and with my cat, lap up.

'C' is for charisma, a chord that charms the ear,

Teasing, tempting all the senses, far but near,

Resolution seeking. Satisfied but wanting more.