ROBIN HAMILTON
  

THE GREEN KNIGHT'S SINGS

              The Green Knight and the Foxy Ladies

                 The Green Knight:  Time's Posy

           The Green Knight's Sexual Harassment Blues

                The Green Knight:  Man Off-Course

              The Green Knight's Winter Love Blues

     The Green Knight:  Love At First Sight, Eighties Style




The Green Knight and the Foxy Ladies

One time the Green Knight was a squire of dames,
        he so well set up on his high horse;
Young and feisty, but maybe lacking style,
        So the foxy ladies laughed while strolling on.

Dealt he careful hands from out his pack of words,
        made legoland with groaning from the heart,
Spewed out syllables like some malign fire-eater,
        But the foxy ladies smiled, and still walked on.

Well like a dog, he danced upon the coals,
        panto bear do a hind-leg caper for applause:
He was real good -- they gave him prizes for his tricks,
        Still the foxy ladies went hurrying right on.

So the Green Knight come to final terms with it:
        no way this loving world will him embrace.
Pouched his hands in pockets, kicked a stone, and left --
        While the foxy ladies mourned his passing on.



The Green Knight:  Time's Posy

If I were a youngman
    still dressed in my blood
With the passion of twenty
    and lust at the flood,

I'd woo you with roses
    of marvellous hue
I'd count out petals
    in the cold March dew.

If I were a youngman
    still decked in my pride
With lies at command
    and desires yet to ride,

I'd pillion you properly
    set in my saddle,
Ride out in the weather
    where others won't meddle.

But as now I am older
    all happed in my skin
And the gate of the forest
    half-open within,

I'll woo you with nightshade,
    with hemlock and rue,
The flowers of my chagrin,
    the blooms that are due.

In the dark of the dusk
    on a still winter's night
With a crescent moon
    as the only light,

I'll come like the shadow
    of forgotten sin
To the door of your chamber
    that's locked within;


With no hope of grace
    on that wide double bed,
No thought of a joy
    as we lie at its head,

While the moonlight that breaks
    through the uncurtained gap
Is the sign of the lost ones
    who failed at the leap.


The Green Knight's Sexual Harassment Blues

Swaying down the street like an unresolved equation
        cab in the distance with a lady in it
Held up my hand to hail my dear, found out she was a
        foxy radical feminist.

Went round the corner to shoot some pool,
        there was the cue-ball with eyes upon it
Looking shrewdly right back at me, like some
        foxy radical feminist.

Climbed on a bus to hold onto my mind
        went down the track to the end of my time
Paid the conductor my heart and got no change -- another
        foxy radical feminist.

Kiting plastic like there's no tomorrow,
        drinking coffee for the whisky shakes,
Eating muffins to keep up my sugar -- across the table a
        foxy radical feminist.

Cracked right apart like Three Mile Island
        wide and high and open to the weather
It's summer in heaven but it's autumn in my soul, with those
        foxy radical feminists.

My head is on the jangle, my liver's on the skids
        my hands won't stop from shaking all the while
Got myself sorrows like a cat's got style, because of those
        foxy radical feminists.


The Green Knight:  Man Off-Course

He walked down the wrong road
       off the common track
   a bad road, a mean road
   long way and no way back.

Walked along the wrong road
       inside his head
   way back behind his eyes
   traced the paths of the dead.

Looked back across his shoulder
       out of his eyes
   saw the starlight beating
   down from the skies.

Listened to the blood pulse
       beside his ear
   might have been someone calling
   but he couldn't hear.

Took a ghost by the hand on that wrong road
       walked with her many a happy mile
   came at last to running water
   she vanished without a smile.

Met a friend, met a friend called woman
       thought she was a real as he
   didn't dare turn his back on her
   said, That's no way to be.

Held a child in his arms for a distance
       till she too faded away
   stepped out of his hold very soon
   just wasn't there one day.

Came to a hill deep inside his head
       long time past he's been almost dead
   cut off from his eyes, cut off from his ears
   cut off from everything except his fears.


Climbed that hill like it was a stair of wood
       stood beneath the gallows and put on a hood
   tied the noose tight around his neck
   said, I've come to the end of the last road I can take.

Stood free for a moment, said goodbye to ghost, child and
friend
       stepped off the hill and into the air
   such a long road, such a wrong road



The Green Knight's Winter Love Blues

A little bit past flirting but before we get to bed,
        that place and time we left at sweet sixteen;
The back seat of the movies when the lights have slowly dimmed --
        easy games we played before the problems came.

There's time and place and circumstance
        and somewhere for it all;
Safe games we play with daughters
        just to train them for these tricks,
Or that little bit of flirting
        just to keep the tension up:

Girls and boys have different idioms
        but share this common tongue --

A little fond affection and a little gentle stroking,
        just a little winter love to pass the time;
Not to go on past tomorrow but to hold on to today,
        where we snuggle up in corners outside time.

That nice moment when it's balanced on the line
        between "Goodby, dear John" upon the doorstep
Or right on and into bed,
        where the curtain drops, no world exists
And there's just me and you;
        And the mortgage and my children
And your mother's stern advice
        Exist outside those windows
Which the moonlight's beating on
        and there's no barrier that holds
Between our bodies' strict desires.

A little bit past flirting but before we get to bed,
        that place and time we left at sweet sixteen;
The back seat of the movies when the lights have slowly dimmed --
        easy games we played before the problems came.

To that point where when I touch your breast
        that says I'd better mean it,
There's times when what I'd go for
        would be games with lower stakes:
A little gentle whist to pass the time --

Till the next erotic whirlwind
        takes up my heart and tears it,
Let's stay within the confines
        of that safe, familiar game.

A little bit past flirting but before we get to bed,
        that place and time we left at sweet sixteen;
The back seat of the movies when the lights have slowly dimmed --
        easy games we played before the problems came.

A little fond affection and a little gentle stroking,
        just a little winter love to pass the time;
Not to go on past tomorrow but to hold on to today,
        where we snuggle up in corners outside time.



The Green Knight:  Love At First Sight, Eighties Style

Coming through the bar door
    took one look
        blew him away
            that's no lie.

That's the way it is
    old, old story
        girl in the corner
            man at the door
    hit him like a magnum
        slug in the belly.

Ain't so simple,
    ain't so easy
        bullet proof vest
            of a wife and family
    but she has method
        baby, watch her light that fire:

Learn a lot
    in twenty years.

Man gives a strange look
    falling down sideways
        inside --
            it don't show

Learn some technique
    in ten years more.

Walk across the bar room
    sound of the jukebox
        girl just talking
            `Not dancing, are you?'
                cuts her out.

Learn some technique
    in ten years more.

She plays it cool
    plays it attentive
        doesn't push it
            but doesn't look down
                a tough one, that sister.


Learn a lot
    in twenty years.

Walk to the bar door
    little bit apart
        not holding hands
            not joined up yet.

See her home --
    man with a family
        girl on the prod.

Learn a lot
    in twenty years.
        learn some technique
            in ten years more.

Write your own ending
    this story doesn't finish
        who gets whom
            who wins if they do.

Work it for yourself now
    girl on the prod
        man with a family.

Learn a lot
    in twenty years.
        learn some technique
            in ten years more.

But this I'll say
    without hesitation --
        he came through the bar door
            she was sitting in the corner
                took one look
                    and she blew him away.



 Author's Note:

The title, "The Green Knight's Sings", is a slight spin on "Songs" -- 
they're not quite, or not all, strictly songs.  So the title uses the verb
"sing" as a noun.

The Green Knight is an echo of George Gascoigne's semi-fictionalised
portrait of himself in "The Green Knight's Farewell to Fancy", crossed with
a bit of Berryman.  The end result is (I hope) pretty far from either.

1, 3, and 5 are the Green Knight using his own voice -- his sings, so to
speak.  The others are "songs" that the Green Knight writes.

So 1/3/5 are the GK's sings, 2/4/6 are his songs.

The sequence is from an upublished collection called The Middle Life.