John Keats

I love biographies. Usually of "artistic" people. A rather wide spectrum - "artistic? From Leonardo da Vinci to Keith Richards. I've read more than one on John Keats. I find his life story fascinating (if that's the right word) Strangely, not over keen on much of his poetry, I tend to like more modern poetry.

At the moment I'm rereading Andrew Motion's biography of Keats. Really enjoying it.

Anyway, reading it reminded me of a Charles Causley poem, Keats at Teignmouth. Anyone knowing Keat's life story knows that he died young, of tuberculosis. This ran in the family and by the time he was in his twenties he had already nursed his mother, and younger brother Tom, through their last months before death.

John Keat's would at some time have visited Teignmouth. In 1818 he would already have been aware of his own fate, having coughed up blood....


Keats At Teignmouth - Spring 1818

By the wild sea-wall I wandered
Blinded by the salting sun,
While the sulky Channel thundered
Like an old Trafalgar gun.

And I watched the gaudy river
Under trees 0f lemon-green,
Coiling like a scarlet bugle
Through the valley of the Teign.

When spring fired her fusilladoes
Salt-spray, sea-spray on the sill,
When the budding scarf of April
Ravelled on the Devon hill.

Then I saw the crystal poet
Leaning on the old sea-rail;
In his breast lay death, the lover,
In his head, the nightingale.