The morning runs . . .
by Nicholas Heiney (1982-2006)
The Silence at the Song’s End edited by Libby Purves and Duncan Wu, Songsend Books

The morning runs
on, a springtime secret
through the avenues
and avenues which lure
all sound away

I sing, as I was taught
inside myself.
I sing inside myself
when wild moments
slice some tender evening
like a breeze
that rattles gravel
and digs in the dirt

I sing, as I was told,
inside myself.
I sing inside myself
the one wild song, song that whirls
my words around
until a world unfurls

my ship’s new sail
I catch the dew and set
a course amongst the ocean curls

The silence at the song’s end
Before the next
Is the world

This is perhaps the last complete poem that Nicholas Heiney wrote before taking his own life at the age of 23 after a long battle with severe mental disturbance. It is from an extraordinary book of his poems, sea-logs and journals.

The poem begins with the morning running on through “avenues which lure / all sound away”, so there is the idea of the deadening of external noise, which in effect isolates the poet and makes way for his inner voice. Morning and spring are synonymous with rebirth and new beginnings, and while they appear to be kept at a distance, they may also reflect the new beginning the poet seems to be working towards. The poem itself is driven by the words “I sing”, which, like a mantra, become songlike in their repetition, evoking a sense of elation.

A propensity for song is present, even if embryonic, in all of us and is found at our emotional core. Which is why poetry, combining our internal music and our emotional response to our world, is often an effective way of conveying our feelings.

The poet’s consciousness of his inner song connects him directly to the force of his emotional wellspring, with which he must coexist. When he writes that he sings as he was taught, I think of those lessons as being a result of the mindfulness of the developing ego. A lack of awareness of ourselves – and others – does not encourage us to sing inwardly, only to sit like a stone and let life pass around us. He sings “when wild moments / slice some tender evening / like a breeze”; the disturbing breeze is metaphorical, but strong enough to rattle gravel and dig the dirt, which could easily represent his troubled thoughts. His inner song being “the one wild song” makes me think that it is the song he was born with, and which has accompanied him throughout his life. Such a song surely originates from the vibration of emotions in response to life experiences – like notes from a tuning fork. It “whirls” his words around as if whipping up a wind to fill his “ship’s new sail”, yet it is “a world” that unfurls it, which makes me think that it is the idea of a world that does this. During the last six years of his life Nicholas Heiney sailed extensively, crossing the Atlantic and the Pacific oceans, and so it is natural that he would use references to sailing as metaphor. My perception is that he is preparing for a journey.

“The silence at the song’s end / Before the next / Is the world” brings closure to the poem by directing us to the idea of soundlessness when the song is over, and the vast silence of the world that follows it. Only Nicholas knew what the nature of that silence might be. The poem combines exhilaration and separation as if the sailor, having sung his song, now sets a course – a new course – for a voyage on which we cannot accompany him, because it is he who sets the sails and the ship is his own.

frieda.hughes@thetimes.co.uk

Nicholas Heiney’s book will be serialised in The Times from Wednesday 31 October, 2007

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