The Return of the Cranes
John Heath-Stubbs (Carcanet £9.95)
Review by Vernon Scannell in Ambit 172
John Heath-Stubbs who is now in his mid-eighties and completely
blind has been publishing his poetry for well over half a century
and, while his work has always been well-received by the more discerning
reviewers and treated with the proper respect due to it by the literary
establishments of successive decades, his gifts have often seemed
to be rather taken for granted, and he has not received the popular
recognition that flashier but far flimsier talents have been accorded.
His latest volume, The Return of the Cranes, shows no diminution
of the technical skill, deep learning, keen observation and intelligence
that we are accustomed to finding in his poetry, and though the
prevalent tone is often light and almost chatty, this does not prevent
some of the poems, especially those which affirm his Christian faith,
from piercing to the heart.
In this book, Heath-Stubbs often adopts an old curmudgeonly persona
behind which he can effectively voice what I am sure are genuine
aversions to many aspects of life in our times. There are shrewd
digs at the menace of television, the absurdity of conceptual art,
the banality of football and, in a little poem that states a preference
for the expurgated version of ‘Lady Chatterley’s Lover’,
the ubiquity of porn in modern fiction. I particularly liked ‘Just
Enough Change’ in which:
In front of me, the lady by the counter
Reckoned up her change. ‘I’ve just got
Enough to buy a galaxy,’ she said.
And how in heaven’s name, in the name
Of all the whirling and twirling stars, was I to know
A galaxy could be a chocolate bar?
Finally I must quote in its entirety a short poem that was written
for the Omar Khayyam Society Dinner, November 2001 (I hardly need
to stress the importance of that date):
Omar in Autumn
A great autumnal moon rises in heaven,
The nightingales have left for other climes,
A few late roses bloom. The astronomer
Is poured a drink, and improvises rhymes.
It’s no bad thing, perhaps, we should remember
That such a garden was, or might have been;
The eastern skies are dark with threats of violence,
And with fanatic bigotry obscene.
So if, at last, they blow us all to bits,
We will have drunk with Omar and with Fitz.
I think Fitzgerald would have approved of that, and probably Omar,
too, or at least Fitzgerald’s Omar.
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