Constable Country, by John Greening

Willy Lott's House, by John Constable (England) c. 1810-1815

I
 
Willy told them how
in eighty-eight years
life required him to
leave it only once,
yet as we stand here
 
Looking over where
old rings of water
turn into tree stumps,
time has supplied a
small craft it will punt 
 
His side if we want
out of this sharp light
unshaded by elms,
somewhere we too can
enter that white house.
 ​

Boatbuilding Near Flatford Mill, by John Constable (England) 1815

II
 
Barge for a king, the miller or what passer-by:
one is waiting for somebody in its dry dock,
a solitary craftsman bent there, splash of a
thoughtful bow wave. The woodwork of the frames is fresh,
beautifully shaped and butted, plugged with caulking,
unfinished, yes, but the sight of it makes you think –
if she were to slide back just a little from him
leaving those tools in the silt and that child with no
dear mother to tell her no, if it were at once
in the river, in the current, and swept away
not even Raedwald would raise a hand, the great crowns
go on arbitrating between cloud and flatness.

Cloud Study, by John Constable (England) 1822

III
 
for R.C
​
Cumulus gathers
like brain matter, grey
over everything,
usurping the bright
day, its sun-disc, and
 
Skying has become
the only way to
understand how we
dare look up while this
young star falls to earth.

The Haywain, by John Constable (England) 1821

IV
 
Through the water he goes, ignoring us,
his load elsewhere, his mind running away
east from where the breakers will one day roll.
 
He’ll leave no trace of passing here, his plot
already lost before the defences
yield, but has this moment now to forge a
way through asking no man’s help, not even
aware of her. The horses drink. A dog
is mildly interested. If he brought hay,
none here today – perhaps there never was.
​

Salisbury Cathedral from the Bishop's Grounds, by John Constable (England) 1823

 
V

Still it tries to break through: but the elms
are united in their chorale, they
link arms and think of bark. No organ
is going to move them, and cattle
stay in the water belching methane
benedictions. But what’s that rising
up behind the spire, the glower of
rebellion against this wooden guard,
youthful urgency in its free form?
 
Change of scene at the proscenium
arch for the final act. All complaints
to the director. Blackout, curtain,
here it comes, and just as the English
elms have vanished, so that aspiring 
dream goes too, and those who dreamt they could
recreate it in oil are washed by 
a watery blur, colourless sheets
limply floating in the gallery.
​

Littlehampton, by John Constable (England) 1835

VI
 
Lone windmill on the beach, peaceful, perfectly unlike
industrial watchtowers that have been planted where
the elms still sucker and die – they whisper they’ll save us
though they have not heard of coffins and they cannot hear
laughter from the tall ships at all their lack of progress,
ever and only accruing power. X marks the
happy, long-departed landmark on this southern beach,
and how a handsome gentleman once stood and looked out,
musing on life’s frailty. He pricks a pig’s bladder of
paint and the windmill stirs. She will die. He tries again
turning into the easterly, but only the same
old empty rattling of lanyard on mast. He can do
nothing more. The sails will move. No grain left to be ground.

The Leaping Horse, by John Constable (England) 1825

VII
 
       Trotting back    
       home under   
       empty skies
 
Laughing at it all, you were
expecting nothing special:
a thorn tree and these timbers
passing a slimy secret 
in low murmurs at the bridge,
not this sudden urge to go
galloping into the new –
 
Hoof prints wiped into
oily skid marks, grey
roaring in the ears,
sound of the rainbow’s
end game being played.
 ​

Dedham Vale, by John Constable (England) 1828

VIII
 
Down there is what he said,
except that it’s clear he
doesn’t if you look at
him as he stamps out the
ashes and packs up to
move on the way we all –
 
      Visionary
      and plain John both –
      like to: up-sticks,
      exit the frame.

Stonehenge, by John Constable (England) 1835

IX

Summer brings this alignment – a great stone
temple on the plain, the Academy
of Druids, their pictures hanging still, and
no one understanding. The skies try to
explain but are too confused to make clear
how megalith and sun converge so that
earth can tell you the time, can show us how
now’s hand and the hand of then spell out the
genius of this setting, source of pure
energy, and the heart of Englishness.

The particular paintings are identified acrostically in each of the nine poems. J.G.

John Greening

​John Greening is a UK poet, a Bridport, Arvon and Cholmondeley winner with over twenty collections, including two from Carcanet. He has edited Grigson, Blunden, Crichton Smith and Fanthorpe, plus several anthologies and published a number of books on poets and poetry. His essays, Vapour Trails, appeared in 2020 and his Goethe translations in 2022 from Arc. His Rilke is forthcoming. The Interpretation of Owls: Selected Poems 1977-2022 (Baylor University, USA, ed. Gardner) came out in March.