'These forms who hasten by' - ghosts and runners on the Pilgrims Way (1923)

The Pilgrims Way

Along the Pilgrims' way.

The yew trees sigh and sway,

They stand a lasting line,

On ancient days a sign.

The monk and minstrel gay

With prayer and roundelay;

The pedlar with his load;

They took the Pilgrims' road

And when the sun is low,

They sometimes seem to go

Along the same old track,

By yew trees, gnarled and black.

When folks say what they've seen,

Well, WE know what they mean;

These forms who hasten by,

Are really you and I!

(RMH, South London Harriers Gazette, November 1923)

Pilgrims Way,  Kent, 1950 - Bill Brandt

The Pilgrims Way is a route between Winchester and Canterbury, at least part of which follows ancient trackways on the North Downs even if its name and conception as a single continuous route probably goes back no further than the 1870s. It is popular with walkers and runners - including those taking part in  The Pilgrims Challenge 66 mile ultra marathon in the last couple of years.

The notion of following in the footsteps of ancient pilgrims is an evocative one, and in a certain light quite haunting. In the 1920s, when this poem was written, there was upsurge of interest in both the great outdoors and in ghosts. Robert Macfarlane notes that in this period 'people, traumatized by the war, took to the paths in search of ghosts  - setting out on the tracks of the lost and left-behind. Old paths became mediums in two senses: means of communion as well as means of motion. The convivial pilgrimages described by Chaucer became tinged with a morbid historicism: spectres stepped from the verge or hedge, offering brief address' (The Old Ways: a journey on foot, 2012).

This would seem to apply to this poem, which I found in an old South London Harriers newsletter, but  I like the twist  - that what others see as ghosts may in fact be runners hastening by.

I wonder who 'RMH' was?

[update - South London Harriers have identified an R.M. Harrison who ran for the club in this period, so he is possibly the poet]

Hamish Fulton's The Pilgrims Way features in the current 'Conceptual Art in Britain' exhibition at Tate Britain gallery in London. In  April 1971, Fulton conceived of  'A 165 mile walk' on 'Ancient paths forming a route between Winchester and Canterbury' as an art work leaving no trace other than this photograph of  'A hollow lane on the North Downs'.

More running related literature:

Jack Kerouac running down a mountain

'You just had to run' - Karl Ove Knausgaard

Morrissey - List of the Lost

Burns Night Running Thoughts

Running in the Railway Children

A Midsummer Night's Running

Running to Paradise - W B Yeats

The Sky of a Saturday Morning - John Updike

The Road is a Strange Country - Rebecca Solnit

The Runner - W H Auden

Once a Runner - John L Parker jr

Louisa May Alcott - 'A Joy to Run'

Running to Paradise - W.B. Yeats

Happy 150th birthday William Butler Yeats... the great Irish poet was born  in Sandymount on 13 June 1865. He spent time in my South London neck of the woods, conducting occult experiments on the site of what is now the Horniman Museum in Forest Hill,  visiting Madame Blavatsky in Norwood, and speaking at Southwark Irish Literary Club. Some even claim that his spirit inspired the campaign to save Oxleas Wood - a popular spot for runners - in the 1990s!

1900 portrait by his father, John Butler Yeats

His 1916 poem Running to Paradise is (I think) a reflection on the great leveller of death and ageing. The swift 'bare heel' of youth will end up in an 'old sock'; and in death - whether you believe in the after life or a cold lifeless grave - 'the king is but as the beggar'. So, like the beggar in the poem, we might as well run like the wind.

Running to Paradise (1916)

As I came over Windy Gap

They threw a halfpenny into my cap,

For I am running to Paradise;

And all that I need do is to wish

And somebody puts his hand in the dish    

To throw me a bit of salted fish:

And there the king is but as the beggar.

My brother Mourteen is worn out

With skelping his big brawling lout,

And I am running to Paradise;

A poor life do what he can,

And though he keep a dog and a gun,

A serving maid and a serving man:

And there the king is but as the beggar.

Poor men have grown to be rich men,

And rich men grown to be poor again,

And I am running to Paradise;

And many a darling wit’s grown dull

That tossed a bare heel when at school,

Now it has filled an old sock full:

And there the king is but as the beggar.

The wind is old and still at play

While I must hurry upon my way,

For I am running to Paradise;

Yet never have I lit on a friend

To take my fancy like the wind

That nobody can buy or bind:

And there the king is but as the beggar.

More running related literature:

Jack Kerouac running down a mountain

'These forms who hasten by' - runners on the Pilgrims Way, 1920s

'You just had to run' - Karl Ove Knausgaard

Morrissey - List of the Lost

Burns Night Running Thoughts

Running in the Railway Children

A Midsummer Night's Running

The Sky of a Saturday Morning - John Updike

The Road is a Strange Country - Rebecca Solnit

The Runner - W H Auden

Once a Runner - John L Parker jr

Louisa May Alcott - 'A Joy to Run'

The Runner - W.H. Auden (1960)

The Runner

All visible visibly

Moving things
Spin or swing,
One of the two,
Move, as the limbs
Of a runner do,
To and fro,
Forward and back,
Or, as they swiftly
Carry him
In orbit go
Round an endless track:
So, everywhere, every
Creature disporting
Itself according
To the law of its making
In the rivals’ dance
Of a balanced pair
Or the ring-dance
Round a common centre,
Delights the eye
By its symmetry
As it changes place
Blessing the unchangeable
Absolute rest
Of the space all share

The camera’s eye
Does not lie
But it cannot show
The life within,
The life of a runner,
Of yours or mine,
That race which is neither
Fast nor slow,
For nothing can ever
Happen twice,
That story which moves
Like music when
Begotten notes
New notes beget
Making the flowing
Of time a growing
Till what it could be
At last it is,
Where Fate is Freedom,
Grace, and Surprise.

Wilma Rudolph (USA) wins the 100 m at the 1960 Olympics

In 1960 W.H. Auden was commissioned to write a poem for a BBC programme about athletics - presumably tied in with the Olympic Games which were held that year in Rome.  My favourite section of 'The Runner' is the opening of the second stanza: 'The camera’s eye, Does not lie, But it cannot show, The life within,  The life of a runner' . A reminder that we can never see the interior life of the athlete - or anybody else.

More running related literature:

Jack Kerouac running down a mountain

'These forms who hasten by' - runners on the Pilgrims Way, 1920s

'You just had to run' - Karl Ove Knausgaard

Morrissey - List of the Lost

Burns Night Running Thoughts

Running in the Railway Children

A Midsummer Night's Running

Running to Paradise - W B Yeats

The Sky of a Saturday Morning - John Updike

The Road is a Strange Country - Rebecca Solnit

Once a Runner - John L Parker jr

Louisa May Alcott - 'A Joy to Run'