Echo Monthly
Reviewing the Works of Poets, each month, 
with extracts from the best moments..

 
 

* Ewan Elliott *

Ewan Elliott's american research reached a  pinnacle in the last poem he posted in May. He accompanied the poem with a message containing excerpts from Uncle Tom's cabin and a small note. The Whipping Post,  however, stood by itself.
 

       * THE WHIPPING POST *

   "....please administer 15 lashes to this slave..."
   Instructions to a house master
   Like cattle sent to slaughter
   Each lash is marked, each lash dealt with precision

        "...She is only 15 madam..."
        "...What do you mean she is only 15..."
        "...she is an impudent little monkey..."
        "...1 lash for each year and she is MY slave."
        "...So go about it, but don't cut her to deep."
        "...I want her serveing me tonight."
        "...and I don't like blood."

who needs a commentary ? The poem is bald, direct, and too sharply revealing for words of mine to do anything but detract from its power.

Ewan began the month with two interestingly diametric pieces. Coffee, and  Ravens, one objectively subjective, the other subjectively objective. One personal, objective, thoughtful, and distanced, the other - descriptive, oddly moving, bites deep..
 

       COFFEE

  Some people have a life, I have a coffee
  Spinning around, sugar an all 2 at least
  Blueberry buns, savory buns, long headed woman

  People that tell me they know me
  From where? - I don't know
  From years ago they say

  ...

       * RAVENS *

  Cawing black harbingers of doom
  Banking slowly around in a flock
  To feed of a farmers corn
  Resting on a tattered scarecrow

                        ...

  Country courtesy demands the Wedgewood
  And the silver sugar bowl
  Plastic smiles from them, nervous looks in return
  As the briefcase is opened
  Bank statements laid out, loan agreements to

  The bank can no longer carry you
  We are forced to foreclose
  As the black car drove away
  The bird gun boomed again

  A farmer and his wife sat in silence
  The ravens cawed, the kettle sang
  It all seemed so bloody normal.

Ravens would be one of my favourites for the month.

This ability to be laconic in personal poetry, and personal in poetry about other's lives is one of Ewan's greatest strengths. Yet there are times when he shows us 'the raw heart' in such a way that the reader shares the emotion, as it were, directly, here's an excellent example of this skill.

       * FRUSTRATION *

    At the nearness of you, to my ear
    I can hear your breath, almost feel it
    To reach out and touch you, would be unbearable
    Because you do not want me near you
    But you keep ringing, just let me be free
    Stop ringing me.

it is so direct, so personal, so complete and so short, that one is
still reeling from the punch of the first lines when it is all over. One contrasts this with the bubbling delight, the exhuberant, willful,  'I do': like an addendum to the Songs for My Daughters, this poem sings into our lives. It is, more than like, it is being there:

  Faraway in a faraway land
  The phone rang
  A voice answered
  I froze
  Then grunted, "Hi"

  She bubbled over
  Our daughter was engaged
  The least I could do was ring
  Ring her mother and ask what he was like

and perhaps even more so in the quieter, more reflective, but still jubilant thanksgiving that is:

       * I'm very happy Dad *

  The words tumbled onto the page
  On a letter to me, she hadn't sent many
  "I'm engaged Dad, I am very VERY happy
  I want to know who you are
  I don't know you at all
  So write and tell me and I will ask more questions!"
  Oh, and I appreciated the letters you have written
 

...

  Years and years of letters written
  None returned -
  "If she wants to know what I am like
  Why doesn't she ask her mother?
  According to her we are very alike"
 

Ewan has a way of dissecting all sorts of social and cultural
assumptions, almost in passing as it were..  A Stranger came calling describes the fun that leads to tears, the 'male ethos'.

  We laughed as we drank, played cards and talked
   Two young men swapping thoughts and jokes
   A sparring competition was thought up
   Between us both, he told me he was 'good'
 

here's a laconic example of the same skill, this one, and 'online poem' - online in more than one way:

       Like refuse floating
       And scooped to sieve a moribund mind set
       And regardlkess of the days spent thinking
       Cigarettes are smoked - blood preessure taken
       Decisions made

       Of another kind
       Lines drawn on maps
       This is yours this is ours
 

       "Why is ours so small?"

This uncompromising wrestling match with the truth lead to some marvellous writing as the african american poems continued through the month. Here's another 'coffee moment' with Ewan, peeling our morals for all he is worth..

   The other day a man bought me a 55 cent cup of coffee
   As we talked I looked at his face, he was so black he shined
   I had some old photos scanned the other day
   I looked so white a ghost looked back at me
   How can I write of this?

   Perhaps I will write a better essay because I am not a part of it
   And can see more clearly - perhaps.

it also leads to the fascinating bird and animal poems. The eagle was rewritten this month, and there was a seagull in a poem redolent of beaches and the crying, when along came another cat:) this time with canine accompaniment..

 Stretching languidly on pillows and sofas

 No other one dares to come in - one sniff and they are gone

a strangely carol like loop in this poem, 'unlike my dog who...unlike my cat who' - whimsical and not displeasing, this chasing of tails. But the 'animal poems' have always had more to them. One recalls the greyhound in 'it ran and ran' - alongside that, the horses and the bet, the owners and the riders and the cameras, and these penetrating lines from

gains and losses..

  That is the ultimate guide of whether people like what you do
   It is if you can ride your star to victory
   And into the money
   Not how you look on camera or sound in print.
 

so Ewan continues to exercise his talent and increase it.. I leave him this month, with congratulations on his steady imput and growth, and a small thank you for the evocation of an 'era' in one of his last
offerings of the month, 'Wide and Soft'
 

       * WIDE and SOFT *

  Thirsty beast it was - guzzled fuel like a tanker
  Took an age to clean inside - beer bottles and caps
  Forget the rust, she's a beaut - tyres tight
  And the chicks love that BIG WIDE back seat
  And go boy, she could do the ton no worries

  A mothers worry, to see her daughter in it was grounding
  Grounded for weeks - Just a plaintive face looking longingly
  At the back of this old V8 as it cruised past.

This poetry you're sending us is quite a cruise, and I thank you for it:)