On Sun, Aug 11, 2013 at 05:02 PM,
Martin Law <martin.rainbowmaker@gmail.com> wrote:
THE
GYPSY CHILD.
Long
ago as the crow flies, down a rough track to an empty cottage in a
boggy hollow below a hill in Wales.
Late
in the season of nineteen-seventy, with no direction known and the
crisp oak leaves muttering in the chill of late autumn.
In
an upstairs bedroom, hidden in the night, by candlelight on dusty
floorboards, reclining on a bare mattress and propped against a
pillow, doodling with pencil and paper.
Wild
memory traces of Hendrix and gypsies, nocturnal trains of association
in the Dylan Thomas poetic mode of innocent muse inspiration blended
together and distilled evoking random snail trails of images.
“The
storm has blown away to the west...” Not stopping to consider if
that's where it would have gone. It felt right, westering and
slumber, nightfall and dreams, echoes of William Blake.
“Where
the golden light still gleams...” A paraphrase of Blake's younger
friend and pupil Samuel Palmer, and his 'Valley of Vision', “...e'er
the golden light still gleams, lingering as if loth to part”,
approximate quote.
“The
horses are settling down to rest, ... and your eyes are full of
dreams.” A descriptive picture emerging. Ah, the innocence of
unpolluted imagined imagery. Songs of Innocence and Experience, all
in the name of art.
Within
two years and yet another down time lost in London, abruptly boarding
a train and went west, as fate dictates, crossing the water, landing
with nothing but ten pence, in Ireland, 'Inis Fodhla', Island of
Destiny.
The
layers and waves of diversity are complex to chart.
So
i skip the tips of icebergs, sticking to the song in question,
namely, 'Gypsy Child.' Such a concentration of experience being
suspended within the icebergs themselves. Not that memory is really
set in stone, or ice, what is reflected being subject to your angle
of vision.
...”The
flames they leap while the ravens sleep.
Your
long hair flowing free.
The
shivering drops when the rain has stopped,
and
the stars above the trees.”
During
the two and a half years spent with my twin daughters after they were
born, i made a childrens' book based around the song. With colour
illustrations on every page. Titled: 'Gypsy Jack in the Tumbledown
Shack.' Beginning, “Gypsy Jack lives in the back of a ramshackle
tumbledown blackberry shack. Down at the endy of a dusty old track
with two gypsy horses 'Snow White' and 'Jet Black.' “
Thinking
to get it published, and having made a hand coloured copy for my
daughters, i later got stuck in London again where i showed it to
various publishers.
It
wasn't what anybody was looking for in the world of big business.
Being a rather 'too romantic' expression of a healthy lifestyle for
kids. No guns, no monsters, and no machines, just simple timeless
country life from another age.
Despite
the colour, one publisher in a streamlined highrise office reception
said,”I think you're really a 'black and white man'.” While
there's no lack of colour prejudice everywhere, how do you answer to
being called “a black and white man”? Except to insist you're 'a
person of colour.'
After
preserving the book, text and artwork, in a plastic bag for twenty
five years, it was eventually stolen by a Swedish person in Ireland
who'd promised to publish it in Gaelic for the schools. I've just
found i have eight photocopies of some of the illustrations
remaining.
But
back to the song.
...”The
music played as the campfire blazed,
in
a clearing down under the trees.
The
horses coughed and the gypsies laughed
and
the smoke rose high to the leaves.”
I've
lived in Ireland now for over forty years. A year or two ago, i did
some minimal shopping in town, which included a packet of lotus
incense. Then went for a short walk in the grounds of the local
'stately home', where i realized the incense was missing.
Back
in town, about to return to the cafe, about to close, where i thought
i must have left it. When a man i didn't recognise crossed the road
to ask if i was 'Martin.'
A
brief chat as i mentioned the incense and the cafe about to close.
“Here
it is,” as he handed me the lotus incense, “I found it in the
road.” More to the point, how did he recognise me?
He
went on to explain. He'd heard me regularly singing 'Gypsy Child',
my first written song, in 'The Good Karma' restaurant in Dublin back
in the early seventies, when he was a teenager. Not only that, but
he's been singing it continuously around the folk clubs in Dublin
ever since!
'The
Good Karma' was the Republic's first ever vegetarian restaurant,
situated at 4 Great Strand street, off Caple St. Dublin.
Founded
by a brilliant friend and artist no longer with us, Bob Bartlett,
bless you Bob, your friends and both your families since dispersed.
The Good Karma burned down to the ground some years after, with the
loss of life of Eamon, poet and sponsor who went back in to rescue a
kitten. Bob later drowned in a sudden storm one night crossing from
Schull harbour to Long Island, West Cork where he lived with his two
families. I was on the island at the time it happened.
Well,
with the incense, and the song and much experience in common, Tarlach
and i had to go and discuss this over a coffee and, as he had his
guitar with him, to compare notes so to speak.
Amazing
how a simple song can travel through time and space.
“So
now the fire is settling down
and
the caravan windows shine bright.
The
winds just sigh and the nightbirds fly,
Go
softly and blow out the light.”
“You're
a lonesome child of a gypsy wild
and
the night is calling you home.
Your
sleepy eyes by the campfire light,
where
the pines and the wild winds moan.”
So
perhaps a story is never lost but simply morphs into yet another
fractal, this being the latest one.
Now,
thousands of people must have heard it on the blog. I know gypsies
are known to get around.
This
one obviously has a life of its own.~
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Rainbowmaker
Art: Gypsy Child Illustrations, martin law
