Conversation:

Sea Fever has a very striking rhythm.
If the version which starts "I must go down to the seas again..." is right, the first line is a miture of iambs (light stress followed by heavy stress) and anapaests (two light stresses followed by a heavy stress)
If you take the 'go' out, the rhythm of the first line is more regularly anapaestic. But the same doesn't follow for the second line.

The rhythm makes the poem very difficult to imitate. I tried once and got as far as
"I must go down to the shops again, to the busy shops and the tills
And all I ask is a credit card and the funds to pay the bills."

I like that.

I confess I know nothing about Masefield. The 'I must go down to the sea' poem is one we always had in school anthologies, but that was it.

Didn't he write a novel about the China tea ships? I remember hearing a radio version of it.

I'm lost

All I have managed to find out was it written without the 'go' and taught like that but there is a recording of where he clearly puts the go in it

after that things get muddled with the go coming and going

(well that is what I picked up after my 10 minutes googling )

I can see why that would mess with poor Mr CC's head, why the change??

offer him some perculiar tea, poor chap

Anapaestic? I knew that poetlady would have inside knowledge of thee matters.

Love the parody.

Perhaps that's why Sea Fever has such an enduring appeal, because of the striking rhythm, which adds to the mantra-like mystique of the poem.

If I was reciting it, I would definitely go with the not go. . 'I must down to the seas again ..' sounds so much more mysterious and poetic.

Hmm, yes, I don't know anything about Masefield, daydreaming in school, as usual. The only poets who would pull me out of my reverie would be the trippy ones, like Coleridge. . Wonder why?

Yes, thankyou darlin', Mr CC is still most perturbed. .

I guess Mr Masefield was experimenting with rhythms, and life decisions. To go or not to go.

Where does the go go?

Now I have 'wake me up before you go-go' ear worming me

quick, think of something else, Two Tribes, Relax, it has all gone so 80's

off, Wham is back

two tribes

Hey there, you wild 80s kid. . I love it. I just imagined John Masefield grooving to Wham, Frankie Goes to Hollywood, and some other things.



Interesting culture shock. .

Somewhere, all things are interconnected. Depending on where you go. Or not go. Or have gone. Or will go.

Boldly.

goes where no go has been before...

*checks she has her towel*

Yes, , this proves my point, John Masefield as a Trekkie.

Hah!

Apparently Star Trek fans reeeely hate being called Trekkies, is this true?

I love Bones. Dr. McCoy. DeForest Kelley, mmm he was my pinup for years.

I'm a Trekkie, in search of brekkie.



I must down to the Bridge again ...

Of course!

then there is Towel Day.





Is this conversation surreal?

No! No! We are very connected people.

Check out Awix's movie review this week... Which is called 'Hat Trek'.

There is a Hat Trek

should we wear one, *fashions one up from tinfoil, a feather,a twig, or it might be a random cocktail stick, hopefuly not one from a cheese and pineapple hedgehog*

we do tidy up better than that don't we, anyone done any recycling recently

should a tardis tip up, should you hold on to your hat or just let it go? Perhaps Aunty Winnie would know?

I'd discard a fascinator, might have your eye out *ouch*

but keep hold of me hat pins

and know where my towel is

hah! yes, Hat Trek

(starts to make origami hat out of Dr McCoy poster)


mmm handsome hat.

Recycling! yes! (recycles five hundred stewed peculiar teabags, and a five volume unfinished handwritten novel about paranoia, pizza, paisley pattern pyjamas, and something else entirely)

Well, if you were walking about in your paisley patterned pyjamas, and you kept finding peculiar stewed tea bags in strange places, you might get a bit paranoid.

Or you might decide it was the work of one of those garden gnomes they've let into the Chelsea Flower Show.