3 posts tagged “keith armstrong”

THREE POETS, A FILM MAKER / PHOTOGRAPHER AND A WHITE HORSE

PHOTOS AND VIDEO BY TONY WHITTLE

Jingling Geordie Poet - Keith Armstrong was passing on the train between York and Newcastle when he noticed the

White Horse of Kilburn on the side of the Cleveland Hills, at Kilburn, near Thirsk and thought "That would make an interesting project". Keith, legendary poet and co-ordinator of the literary Northern Voices, did some research and discovered that 2007 was the 150th anniversary of the creation of Yorkshire's landmark White Horse.

The White Horse of Kilburn is not prehistoric like the other's around the country but the brainchild of John Hodgeson, the local schoolmaster who wanted to create Yorkshire's own White Horse. It is one of Yorkshire's best known landmarks and on a clear day is visible for over 30 miles. The horse measures 314 feet long (96m) by 228 feet (70M) high the eye is large enough for 24 people to sit on it. Above the landmark is the Suttonbank Glider station on the site of an ironstone fortress. The White Horse was camouflaged during the war years to prevent enemy aircraft using it to confirm their positions.

On Monday 10th Sept. Keith invited me to join him on the project and also Tony Morris - a Yorkshire folk singer and poet and resident of York Radio's folk programme. Keith's Newcastle friend, musician and photographer Tony Whittle did the filming and photography. We met up in Thirsk, despite Keith's train being cancelled, and taxied out to the Forrester's arms where we met up with Tony Morris. After a quick refreshment and visit to the Vistor's centre, Tony drove our motley crew up to car park below the White Horse. Tony had used his forsight and checked the location out before picking us up. "No good filming on the White Horse" he said "as the camera won't see the horse - just  a white background. Best film from the car park below with the horse above us". It was good advice. We hadn't realised how noisy it would be in the middle of nowhere! The sound of Gliders taking off and landing; jets zooming across the hills just as we started filming (it actually fitted in with one poem!); tourists driving up in cars; crows (there is one on the video as Keith starts his poems) and of course wind (not personal wind that is!!).

As we began spouting our quickly-got-together-odes, along with improvised music, bemused picnicers looked on at the surreal sight! Tony had brough a car load of obscure folk instruments including a guitar in Open D tuning and a lyre (which I dared to play through Keith's poem.) I'd never played one before but the improvisation seemed to work - we only did one take of each poem for the video and then I played the guitar through one of Tony's pieces (although this is on the original and longer video that wouldn't fit on Youtube.) There are poems and songs by Tony Morris on this vid and a poem each by Keith and myself. I wasn't too inspired by the White Horse but it was fun and interesting making the video.

Keith has arranged for the full set of poems (including some classic poems on White Horses) and the photographs and the video will become a touring the North Yorkshire libraries and arts cnetre with a couple of performances (including one in December at the Writers Cafe). They will also be a book (pending Keith finding the funding). All in all it's a contribution to the Anniversary celebrations of the White Horse of Kildale.

Below are some of the poems -

Flying out of John Hodgson’s brilliant mind,

inspired by Harrison Weir’s artistic pen,
it took Tom Taylor to land you here
in the ancient limestone
of wind-mocked Roulston Scar Cliff.
Thirty two laboured to craft you,
driven by the very Soul of Creation.

They gave you the gift of witness from this hill
and you have seen an awful lot
and are not left alone.
Your fine legs are pinned
to the side of Yorkshire
and these Tykes have mounted and whitewashed you,

drawn on you out of loneliness,
abused
and treasured you.

The rough days have flitted across your face
and the sun caressed your back.
Lovers have tried you on for size
and the skies have opened over you.

What wars, what landscaped wounds,
have passed you by.

Soldiers of God have marched on below you:
to stop your great heart hurting,
they hid you from the Nazis,
covered up your hail- lashed feelings.

Still, we will look after you,
knowing that you live on for future boys and girls
while we turn to rubble in Kilburn churchyard,
our eyes burn out,
our pulsing hearts close.

White Horse,
White Days
and Nights,
White Yorkshire Rose
in a colourful world:
this great steed belongs to all the Universe.
I do believe that
John saw that.
And we will continue
to feed this Horse’s lovely spirit
and, through its grace,
grow beautiful
ourselves.

KEITH ARMSTRONG

TALES OF THE WHITE HORSE OF KILBURN

From the Forrester’s Arms

With it’s galloping ales

I swear I saw a White Horse

stagger

Past Ragged Way and Little Acre

And come to rest

Upon the scar

Where gliders sneak and hover.

 

The horse with half a tail

And belly full of Black Sheep ale

Lay white among the grass

And counted every train that passed

Until it fell fast asleep

And dreamed White Horses of the past.

 

It dreamed of GK Chesterton

With Alfred and his ‘Visions of the King’

And placed their tale in the White Horse Vale

Where chiefs tanked up

With White Horse Ale.

And told their brave knight tales.

 

But me I came by plane

To Gatwick and then by train

Counting stations on the way

Alighting soon at Thirsk

taxicab to Kilburn

where I quenched a raging thirst.

 

From the cottage where I board

I swear I saw a knight with sword

Leap on the horse’s back

And gallop towards the railway track.

 

They spun around the Devil’s Leap

While villagers ran after them

In their sleep

And farmers chased them in a Jeep.

 

Next morning at English Breakfast

It was on the News at 7

Kilburn’s White Horse had made it down to Devon.

 

Horse were born to roam

They can’t be fixed in clay or stone

They are mobile like your phone

With souls that can’t be owned.

 

Now White Horses own the farms

And drink at night in the Forester’s Arms

And tell strange tales of human kind

I guess it helps them to unwind!

By Trev Teasdel

Keith Armstrong e mailed me this You Tube recorded a few years back in., I think, Durham Cathedral. One of his poems was set to music and filmed. I will add more details when Keith Sends them to me - but for now the video can speak for its self.

 

Keith Armstrong is one of the Top North East poet with an international reputation and, now in his sixtieth year, has a

fine body of poetry to his name. He is regularly to be found performing in Germany, Holland, Ireland, eastern Europe and the length and breadth of the UK. Keith was the very first guest on at the Writers Cafe when we started at the ARC in September 2004 and again started us off at the very first event  when we moved to the Georgian Theatre, this time with sax player Steve Windross. Keith often performs with musicians, sometimes a fiddle player, sometimes with Jazz, Northumbrian Pipes and with the Whisky Priests 
(Listen to his work them on his My Space - click the above link) with whom he made a CD called Bleeding Sketches. What Lindisfarne is to Tyneside, Keith Armstrong is that in terms of poetry. Time the TV made a documentary of this wandering poet, tutor, community worker, librarian, poetry performer and organiser. His poems are videos in themselves. Next week Keith is up in Edinburgh for the Leith Arts Festival 4th June DROP THE BEAT CAFE Queen Sharlot Hotel, Leith, Edinburgh, Scotland, - (and I will be reading alongside him) - and in August 18th July up in Aberdeen Central Library, Rosemount Viaduct ABERDEEN, Scotland -again with myself but in between you can gurantee Keith will have travelled much of the known world and its uncle! Here are a few of his poems - enjoy - TREVOR - Catch more of Keith's work on the Writers Cafe Main Site and on his Blogger or his My Space (On which you can hear some of Keith's work with the Whisky Priests)

THE STREETS OF TYNE

I kicked out in Half Moon Yard,
bucked a rotten system.
Fell out with fools in All Hallows Lane
and grew up feeling loved.

She dragged my hand down Rabbit Banks Road,
there seemed nowhere else to take it.
We mucked about in Plummer Chare,
soaked up the painful rain.

I wanted to control my life,
shout songs on Amen Corner.
I'd carry bags of modern ballads,
hawk pamphlets on Dog Bank.

Wild girls who blazed through Pipewell Gate
taught my veins to thrill.
I caught her heart on Pandon Bank,
my eyes filled up with fear.

Wanted to carve out a poem,
inspire the Garth Heads dreamers.
A lad grew up to dance along
the length of Pilgrim Street.

I take my wild hopes now to chance
the slope of Dog Leap Stairs.
Follow the pulse of my Tyneside days,
burn passion down The Side.

KEITH ARMSTRONG

ELEPHANTS IN TUEBINGEN

Such a postwar circus,
swill of pigs and drawn out cold war,
the bleeding never stops.
Under the straw,
the claw of a miserable history
grabs down the years
at the young who are innocent
of all the butchery and whoredom.
Imperial Germany is a fagged out colonial office,
a sweating prison
of bashed up ideals,
a broken clock
covered in ticks and leeches.

The animals have ecaped
and invade the Market Place.
Elephants sup at Neptune’s old fountain,
spurt out the foam of stagnant days,
trunks curling to taste the Neckar water.

This Tuebingen is a surreal pantomime:
barmaids swing from ceilings,
policemen hang from their teeth.
Frau Binder throws them buns.

And our Max Planck is a dream inventor.
Some boffin of his crosses a peach with a tulip,
the genetics of a bayonet in a breast.
The circus moves on to the Castle,
a giraffe nibbles at a church.
The sun gnaws at the clouds.

Like a clown,
I leap to down beer.
And a hideously sweet lady cracks a whip
and flashes her milky thigh at me.
It is no good.
I cannot raise a glassy smile anymore.
This circus is a tragedy.
The animals are sad
and rotten
with the stink of carnage,
seeping
from your television screens.

KEITH ARMSTRONG

LIKE THE SPANISH CITY
The days have gone;
the laughter and shrieks
blown away.
We have all grown up,
left old Catalonian dreams
and the blazing seaside bullfights.
We are dazed,
phased out.
Spaces where we courted
bulldozed
to make way
for the tack of tomorrow;
the hope in the sea breeze;
the distant echo of castanets
and voices scraping
in a dusty rotunda.
I remember where I kissed you,
where I lost you.
It was in Spain, wasn’t it?
Or was it down the Esplanade
on a wet Sunday in July?
Either way,
we are still
twinned with sunny Whitley Bay,
and flaming Barcelona too;
and our lives
will dance in fading photographs
from the pleasure dome,
whenever we leave home.

KEITH ARMSTRONG

THE JINGLING GEORDIE

Watch me go leaping in my youth
down Dog Leap Stairs,
down fire-scapes.
The Jingling Geordie
born in a brewery,
drinking the money
I dug out the ground.

Cloth-cap in hand I go
marching in the jangling morning
to London gates.
Jingling Geordie
living in a hop-haze,
cadging from the Coppers
I went to school with.

Older I get in my cage,
singling out a girl half my years
to hitch with.
Oh yes! I am the Jingling Geordie,
the one who pisses on himself,
wrenching out the telephone
his father placed off the hook.

Listen to my canny old folk songs;
they lilt and tilt into the dank alley,
into the howls of strays,
Ooops! The Jingling Geordie
goes out on his twon,
rocking and rolling the night away,
stacking it with the weary rest.

See my ghost in a discotheque,
in the dusty lights,
in the baccy rows
Jingling Geordie,
dancing gambler,
beting he'll slip
back to the year when the lads won the Cup.

Well I walk my kids to the Better Life,
reckoning up the rude words dripping
like gravy off me Gradma's chin,
Whee! goes the Jingling Geordie;
figment of the gutter brain,
fool of the stumbling system,
emptying my veins into a rich men's-palace.

'THE HOT-HEADED GENIUSES OF SANDGATE'

The hot-headed geniuses of Sandgate' are leaping round town tonight
but the place is drunk and the walkways stagger
and there seems no sense in historic streets.

Where old sailors lamented and hand-carts rested
and ships grew up on the river,
the times merge in the swaying crowds
and fancy-dress keelmen swig in the night.

Here's the 'hot headed geniuses'
gannin doon with the tide
to plant bites on fresh lasses' necks,

and the hours keel over
and the days rock on,
as the love-bitten 'Lass of Byker Hill'
falls in the Keelman's Arms.

So let the pipers play
this Tyneside story
all over again.
It's a Geordie nightmare,
a black and white dream
all for you,
with knobs on.

KEITH ARMSTRONG/TREVOR TEASDEL