These clouds are soft fat horses That draw Weather in his wagon Who bears in his old hands Streaked whips and strokes of lightning. The hooves of his cattle are made Of limp water, that stamp Upon the roof during a storm And fall from dripping eaves; Yet these hooves have worn away mountains In their trotting over Earth. And for manes these clouds Have the soft and various winds That still can push A ship into the sea And for neighs, the sable thunder.
James Reaney, 1949
“Clouds” is from The Red Heart (1949), James Reaney’s first book of poems.
Like the life here The wallpaper repeats itself Up and down go the roses Similar blows struck out By air-banging green fists: A bright rose and a blue one A pink blow and a blue one
The years have not changed their likeness Except that those behind the sofa Have kept their original blaze And those opposite the window Have turned yellow.
Aunt Henny says to Aunt Penny, “Have you read She? Oh, a terrible book, An awful book! Yes, it’s by Haggard Rider Haggard.”
Aunt Lurkey says to Aunt Turkey: “I nearly slipped today, I nearly Slipped today. We should put a piece of carpet On that particular step We should,” Says Aunt Lurkey taking another should Off the would pile.
No one remembers when The wallpaper was new, except The wallpaper itself In the green smothered darkness behind The sofa and the cupboard.
And I, I their awkward fool Board there while I go to school.
Join us on Saturday January 18 at 8:00 pm at Western’s von Kuster Auditorium for a musical evening of “Songs of London Poetry and Painting” by local composers Oliver Whitehead (guitar) and Steve Holowitz (piano).
Inspired by poems and art with a Southwestern Ontario connection, Whitehead and Holowitz have set to music poems from James Reaney’sSouwesto Home and Colleen Thibaudeau’sThe Artemesia Book.
The performers are London musicians Sonja Gustafson, soprano, and Adam Iannetta, baritone, along with Ingrid Crozman on flute and Patrick Theriault on cello (replacing Christine Newland).
When & Where: Saturday January 18, 8:00 pm, von Kuster Auditorium, Don Wright Faculty of Music, Western University
In the Summer 2019 issue of Queen’s Quarterly, Thomas Gerry’s article“Marvellous Playhouses” celebrates James Reaney’s emblem poems. For Gerry, the poems “put into play” Reaney’s artistic process, a “magnetic method” he developed for generating meaning through the use of wit.
The emblem poems are theatre-like devices that draw readers into the activity of making meaning. As with audiences for dramatic performances, emblem-readers’ participation is vital. [Queen’s Quarterly, Summer 2019, page 196]
James Reaney’s emblem poem “The Castle” first appeared in Poetry (Chicago) (1969). See Queen’s Quarterly, Summer 2019, page 197. Summer 1979: James Reaney working in the garden near Stratford, Ontario (Photo by Les Kohalmi)
For a full discussion of all ten emblem poems and James Reaney’s artistic process, see The Emblems of James Reaney, available from The Porcupine’s Quill.
May 4-5 in London, Ontario — In celebration of Canadian composers, the Village Opera directed by Adam Corrigan-Holowitz will present The Great Lakes Suite, which features six poems by James Reaney set to music by John Beckwith.
Reaney and Beckwith became friends when they were students at the University of Toronto in the late 1940s. The Great Lakes Suite is from The Red Heart (1949), James Reaney’s first poetry collection. Inspired by the poems, John Beckwith created a chamber cycle for two voices accompanied by a trio.
When:Saturday May 4 at 7:30 and Sunday May 5 at 3:00 Where: Elmwood Avenue Presbyterian Church, London, Ontario Tickets: $25/$15 for students: https://villageopera.com/buy-tickets
James Reaney’s poem“Lake Superior” begins the suite:
Lake Superior
I am Lake Superior Cold and gray. I have no superior; All other lakes Haven’t got what it takes; All are inferior. I am Lake Superior Cold and gray. I am so cold That because I chill them The girls of Fort William Can’t swim in me. I am so deep That when people drown in me Their relatives weep For they’ll never find them. In me swims the fearsome Great big sturgeon. My shores are made of iron Lined with tough, wizened trees. No knife of a surgeon Is sharper than these Waves of mine That glitter and shine In the light of the Moon, my mother In the light of the Sun, my grandmother.
Illustration by James Reaney, 1962 from Twelve Letters to a Small Town (page 6).
Come celebrate Stratford Ontario’s literary heritage and take the Stratford Literary Walking Tour — James Reaney’s old high school Stratford Central Secondary School is one of ten stops on the way.
James Reaney was born and raised on a farm three miles east of Stratford in South Easthope Township, and he bicycled to and from high school every day for five years (1939-1944).
Between the highschool & the farmhouse
In the country and the town
It was a world of love and of feeling
Continually floating down
— From James Reaney’s poem “The Bicycle” (1962)
James Reaney’s drawing for the poem “The Bicycle” from Twelve Letters to a Small Town (1962)
For more of James Reaney’s Stratford and Perth County inspired writing, see the links below:
Here is the Eleventh Letter from Twelve Letters to a Small Town, a suite of poems James Reaney wrote for composer John Beckwith in 1962.
James Reaney’s Twelve Letters To A Small Town (1962)
ELEVENTH LETTER — Shakespearean Gardens
The Tempest The violet lightning of a March thunderstorm glaring the patches of ice still stuck to the streets.
Two Gentlemen of Verona On Wellington St. an elegant colonel-looking gentleman with waxed white moustachioes that came to tight little points.
Merry Wives of Windsor The Ladies’ Auxiliary of the Orange Lodge marched down the street in white dresses with orange bows on them.
Richard III At last all the children ran away from home and were brought up by an old spinster who lived down the street.
Henry VIII Mr. White’s second wife was the first Mrs. Brown and the first Mrs. White was the second Mrs. Brown.
Troilus & Cressida “Well, I haven’t been to that old Festival yet but since it began I’ve had ten different boyfriends.”
Titus Andronicus Young Mr. Wood to-day lost his right hand in an accident at the lumber yards.
Romeo & Juliet Romeo & Juliet Streets.
Timon of Athens Old Miss Shipman lived alone in a weatherbeaten old cottage and could occasionally be seen out on the front lawn cutting the grass with a small sickle.
Julius Caesar Antony wore a wrist watch in the Normal School production although he never looked at it during the oration.
Macbeth Principal Burdoch’s often expressed opinion was that a great many people would kill a great many other people if they knew for certain they could get away with it.
Hamlet A girl at the bakery took out a boat on the river, tied candlesticks to her wrists and drowned herself.
King Lear Mr. Upas was a silver haired cranky old individual who complained that the meat was too tough at the boarding house.
Othello At the edge of town there stood a lonely white frame building—a deserted Negro church.
The Merchant of Venice When my cousin worked for the Silversteins she had her own private roll of baloney kept aside in the refrigerator for her.
Henry V The local armouries are made of the usual red brick with the usual limestone machicolation.
Twelve Letters to a Small Town was first published in 1962 by the Ryerson Press. In the Afterword to the 2002 facsimile edition, James Reaney wrote that after it was published, “Many Stratford residents said they saw on paper for the first time their memories of the town and wrote to me to say so.”
Among the shows currently on at the Stratford Shakespeare Festival in Stratford, Ontario are The Tempest, Coriolanus, Julius Caesar, and The Comedy of Errors.
I saw the sundogs barking
On either side of the Sun
As he was making his usual will
And last testament
In a glorious vestment.
And the sundogs cried,
“Bow wow!
We’ll make a ring
Around the moon
And children, seeing it, will say:
Up there they play Farmer in the Dell
And the moon like the cheese stands still.
Bow wow!
We shall drown the crickets,
Set the killdeer birds crying,
Send shingles flying,
And pick all the apples
Ripe or not.
Our barking shall overturn
Hencoops and rabbit-hutches,
Shall topple over privies
With people inside them,
And burn with invisible,
Oh, very invisible!
Flames
In each frightened tree.
Whole branches we’ll bite off
And for the housewife’s sloth
In not taking them in
We’ll drag her sheets and pillow cases
Off the fence
And dress up in them
And wear them thin.
And people will say
Both in the country
And in the town
It falls in pails
Of iron nails.
We’ll blow the curses
Right back into the farmer’s mouths
As they curse our industry
And shake their fists,
For we will press the oats
Close to the ground,
Lodge the barley,
And rip open the wheat stooks.
We shall make great faces
Of dampness appear on ceilings
And blow down chimneys
Till the fire’s lame.
With the noise of a thousand typewriters
We shall gallop over the roofs of town.
We are the Sun’s animals.
We stand by him in the West
And ready to obey
His most auburn wish
For Rain, Wind and Storm
Barbara Bryne, Douglas Rain and Sandy Webster in Colours in the Dark, 1967 Photography by Peter Smith & Company (Courtesy Stratford Festival Archives. Reproduced with permission.)
All day cars mooed and shrieked,
Hollered and bellowed and wept
Upon the road.
They slid by with bits of fur attached,
Fox-tails and rabbit-legs,
The skulls and horns of deer,
Cars with yellow spectacles
Or motorcycle monocle,
Cars whose gold eyes burnt
With a too-rich battery,
Murderous cars and manslaughter cars,
Chariots from whose foreheads leapt
Silver women of ardent bosom.
Ownerless, passengerless, driverless,
They came to anyone
And with headlights full of tears
Begged for a master,
For someone to drive them
For the familiar chauffeur.
Limousines covered with pink slime
Of children’s blood
Turned into the open fields
And fell over into ditches,
The wheels kicking helplessly.
Taxis begged trees to step inside
Automobiles begged of posts
The whereabouts of their mother.
But no one wished to own them anymore,
Everyone wished to walk.
James Reaney, 1949
“Klaxon” is included in The Red Heart (1949), the first collection of James Reaney’s poems, and you can also find the poem in The Essential James Reaney, available from The Porcupine’s Quill.
((( • )))Listen to James Reaney read “Klaxon” in Poets on Film No. 1 from the NFB’s animated film collection.
From “Klaxon”: “No one wished to own them anymore, // Everyone wished to walk.” (July 2017, Vancouver, BC)
November 5, 2016 — Western Archives display of James Reaney’s writing prepared by archivist Amanda Jamieson. (Photo courtesy Elizabeth Reaney)
We hope to see you all again next year when author and curator Tom Smart will give a talk on James Reaney’s visual art.
James Reaney’s watercolour painting “David Willson Meets an Angel in the Forest”, 1962 (Photo courtesy Linda Morita, McMichael Canadian Art Collection)
