Day 7 - Ballad

BALLAD
David Harsent


As I walked by the riverside
Death came up to me
He said, 'This river runs, my friend,
To a deep darkening sea


And what goes over at the weir
Can never come again
Whether it be sweet heartsease
Or whether it be pain


All the tears shed in the world
Will trickle to this flow
And what that weight of weeping tells
Only I can know


Watch how the river thickens now
And carries with the flood
Sweat from mines and factories
From battlefields the blood


Spittle from the prison yard
And from the graveyard, clay
And all the work of evil hands
That can't be washed away


The milt and meltings of the drowned
Caught up with butcher's spill
Turn with the tug of the morning tide
And leach to the midstream swill


Lightless boats unload their freight
Of malice and dismay
Bringing the bright and beautiful
To ruin in a day


All the stones are cold and blind
All the winds are ill
All the birds are silent
and all the fish are still


No one stands where you now stand
Without feeling the pull
The river brings to flesh and blood
When rolling at the full


So take a step and take a step
and take a step away
For you and I are set to meet
By here another day


When the water's at the flood and fierce
And colder than my hand
As I take you past the bankside trees
Out to the last of the land


And the running river tells a tale
Of the life you should have led
And the stars and moon are the first you see
Of the reachless riverbed.'


Today's poem is 'Ballad' by David Harsent (continuing with the really happy theme we've had going on these past few days...). This poem is one of the few poems I've posted that has been more bound by form than the others. It follows a ABCB rhyme scheme (the second and fourth line rhyme with each other, the first and third do not for the uninitiated) and is iambic (the stress is on the second syllable). This is a very traditional form, fitting considering the title is 'Ballad', a traditional poetic storytelling technique. The whole affair is very traditional, right down to good old-fashioned iambs, which odd considering Harsent is a contemporary poet (saying that, Duffy has been leading a campaign to bring back the old-fashioned methods - she has a number of sonnets written in iambic pentameter and other over-traditional forms).


Your task today is to write a poem in a traditional form. This can any form you like. Some examples of traditional forms are sonnets, ballad, elegies or villanelle. Try, where possible, to maintain a rhyme scheme. This can be any scheme you like, and it can be as far-fetched as you like, just try and have one (though I understand that a rhyme scheme in a villanelle could cause you a splitting headache).