Old Port, Montreal

Reading week consisted of no reading, instead I visited dear friends in Montreal. Old Port was beautiful during day and night - these are a few shots I took, trying to capture the quiet grandeur and historical beauty of the streets.

La Belle Dame Sans Merci

Ben Whishaw does an amazing reading of John Keats' "La Belle Dame Sans Merci". He also stars in the movie 'Bright Star' as the poet and is (in my opinion) an extraordinary actor; I loved him in 'Perfume: The Story of a Murderer'.

"La Belle Dame Sans Merci" by Sir Frank Francis B. Dicksee had been in my living room long before I knew its association with the poem. I love odd little coincidences like that.

Original version of La Belle Dame Sans Merci, 1819

Oh what can ail thee, knight-at-arms,
Alone and palely loitering?
The sedge has withered from the lake,
And no birds sing.

Oh what can ail thee, knight-at-arms,
So haggard and so woe-begone?
The squirrel's granary is full,
And the harvest's done.

I see a lily on thy brow,
With anguish moist and fever-dew,
And on thy cheeks a fading rose
Fast withereth too.

I met a lady in the meads,
Full beautiful - a faery's child,
Her hair was long, her foot was light,
And her eyes were wild.

I made a garland for her head,
And bracelets too, and fragrant zone;
She looked at me as she did love,
And made sweet moan.

I set her on my pacing steed,
And nothing else saw all day long,
For sidelong would she bend, and sing
A faery's song.

She found me roots of relish sweet,
And honey wild, and manna-dew,
And sure in language strange she said -
'I love thee true'.

She took me to her elfin grot,
And there she wept and sighed full sore,
And there I shut her wild wild eyes
With kisses four.

And there she lulled me asleep
And there I dreamed - Ah! woe betide! -
The latest dream I ever dreamt
On the cold hill side.

I saw pale kings and princes too,
Pale warriors, death-pale were they all;
They cried - 'La Belle Dame sans Merci
Hath thee in thrall!'

I saw their starved lips in the gloam,
With horrid warning gaped wide,
And I awoke and found me here,
On the cold hill's side.

And this is why I sojourn here
Alone and palely loitering,
Though the sedge is withered from the lake,
And no birds sing.

Breathe

Reading Lessons

"It would be, I have discovered, and indeed generally is, unwise to say almost any of the things one feels most moved to say. Unless you can somehow present them as a joke." - Europa, Tim Parks