Friday, October 7, 2016

 

Quebec City, 

Queen

of

La Belle Province

 


Little John was a trapper who didn’t know how to walk on the pavement, poor, unlettered, but he was handsome as a prince. Lithe, tall, and bearded, we all called him Little Johnny Beard.  He carried the lakes in his eyes, and the sun in his blood.  He had a fine singing voice, planted houses along his way like a gardener plants cabbages.  His heart, like his voice, flowed over the land, covered it.  He was a maker of villages.  A builder by trade.... 
 
HOP LÀ!  COURAGE!  DEBOUT!
There's six old lakes I've got to move,
And three new waterfalls to bed,
And eighteen swamps to scrub and broom,
A town to build before day's end!
HOP LÀ!  COURAGE!  DEBOUT!



 
 
 

 

 
 
 

 
 

  

 


 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
The language of this country was virile, the faces human.  Poetry, like perfume under the brambles, was hidden deep beneath many a wrinkle.  The oar had led them to a safe and rugged port. These people knew how to sing and how to build a dike….these men who came rolling in, portaging want and misery, for the sole purpose of shaping fortune and happiness for innumerable sons and daughters....
 
 


 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 


 

 
 The majestic Saint Lawrence River,
great swallower, treasurer, and distributor
of the waters of Quebec...
 
HOP LÀ!  COURAGE!  DEBOUT!  

Two mountains to cross, but I'll get through,
Two rivers, I'll drink them dry!
So onward ax and onward shoes!
At home her love abides....
 
HOP LÀ!  COURAGE!  DEBOUT!
 
 
 
 
 
 

 
 
 
 
 
 

 
 
 
 
 
 

All text from Pieds nus dans l’aube
by Félix Leclerc.
English translation, adaptation,
and all photographs:
© Copyright 2016 by Cary Kamarat .
All rights reserved.
 
 
 
Please share your travel experiences and impressions by clicking on the word ‘comments’ below.  Alternatively, send your comments to the author directly at dinosasha@juno.com.

 

 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Wednesday, June 22, 2016

GLASGOW REVISITED

 
 
 

  
Along the rising cinder path
on the rich and green, as the mizzle falls,
and bluebells hide their color swaths
and magpies strut to a dancer’s call.
--Are you askin'?  --Ay.  --Then I'm dancin'.  Say,
can you feel the turbine slice the wind,
like a sky-flower spinning its hope and prayer?
But neither was granted the fallen queen
whose spirit sits upon the cairn.


From where she watched in darkened grace,
Queen of Scots in an ancient wood,
her kindred, cast in battle array
in a sea of guns and pikes and blood,
swept moor and village at Langside Hill.  Then,
ambush turned to rout and chase,
till the Regent halted a sacrifice
of the Queen's thousands, as they bore the shame
of a failed assault, and a fateful flight.
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
I have had to sleep upon the ground
and drink sour milk--the Queen would tell--
and have been these nights like the owls--
and embroidered secrets in a tearful vale.
She declared herself free of her land's miseries,
when the time came to lay her white neck
on the block,
'twixt the martyr's red robe and the beheader's black work.
And her cowering lapdog, and the hundreds
who watched,
were drenched in the blood
of the dead queen's skirts.




© Copyright 2014 by Cary Kamarat . All rights reserved.

Please share your travel experiences and impressions by clicking on the word ‘comments’ below.  Alternatively, send your comments to the author directly at dinosasha@juno.com.



Visit Travelwalk: Poems and Images,
published by Hartley-Wildman, April 2014