Best Cædmon Poems
Santa Monica Pier
I remember watching
the ocean roll on the shore,
wave after wave,
crashing down on the solid sand
and I idly staring back
wondering if the Atlantic was as blue.
I watched him light a candle
and move in the swaying light
from a bygone age.
The flame flickered, so fragile,
it leans and sways in the cold breeze
My burning love is the flame in the lamp
From antiquity--a pre-industrial artifact
An oil lamp of glass from Rome
Bronze from Carthage
A terra-cotta from Athens
He smiles at me
in a flicker of light and
knows all my past like a line from Virgil
A chronicle from Homer
An essay from Milton, a history of Herodotus
And me, ignorant,
knowing nothing of him
can only quote
from Ovid,
Beowulf,
Caedmon and Gilgamesh.
The flame descends,
From the nape of the lit candle,
and we are lying in darkness on a spring night.
Everything in history is forgotten
and yesterdays are not so many
as night descends,
the lit moon cast in the glow
of the lamplight of our love.
Caedmon's Hymn
by Michael R. Burch
At the monastery of Whitby,
on a day when the sun sank through the sea,
and the gulls shrieked wildly, jubilant, free,
while the wind and time blew all around,
I paced those dusk-enamored grounds
and thought I heard the steps resound
of Carroll, Stoker and good Bede
who walked there, too, their spirits freed
—perhaps by God, perhaps by need—
to write, and with each line, remember
the glorious light of Caedmon's ember,
scorched tongues of flame words still engender.
Here, as darkness falls, at last we meet.
I lay this pale garland of words at his feet.
Originally published by The Lyric. "Cædmon's Hymn," composed at the Monastery of Whitby (a North Yorkshire fishing village), is one of the oldest known poems written in the English language, dating back to around 680 A.D. According to legend, Cædmon, an illiterate Anglo-Saxon cowherd, received the gift of poetic composition from an angel; he subsequently founded a school of Christian poets. Unfortunately, only nine lines of Cædmon's verse survive, in the writings of the Venerable Bede. Whitby, tiny as it is, reappears later in the history of English literature, having been visited, in diametric contrast, by Lewis Carroll and Bram Stoker's ghoulish yet evocative Dracula. Keywords/Tags: Caedmon, hymn, angel, inspired, inspiration, inspirational, first English poem, Old English, oldest English poem, Anglo-Saxon, Bede, cowherd, Christian, monk, spiritual, god, sonnet
Caedmon’s Face
by Michael R. Burch
At the monastery of Whitby,
on a day when the sun sank through the sea,
and the gulls shrieked wildly, jubilant, free,
while the wind and Time blew all around,
I paced that dusk-enamored ground
and thought I heard the steps resound
of Carroll, Stoker and good Bede
who walked here too, their spirits freed
—perhaps by God, perhaps by need—
to write, and with each line, remember
the glorious light of Caedmon’s ember:
scorched tongues of flame words still engender.
***
He wrote here in an English tongue,
a language so unlike our own,
unlike—as father unto son.
But when at last a child is grown.
his heritage is made well-known;
his father’s face becomes his own.
***
He wrote here of the Middle-Earth,
the Maker’s might, man’s lowly birth,
of every thing that God gave worth
suspended under heaven’s roof.
He forged with simple words His truth
and nine lines left remain the proof:
his face was Poetry’s, from youth.
“Cædmon’s Hymn,” composed at the Monastery of Whitby (a North Yorkshire fishing village), is one of the oldest known poems written in the English language, dating back to around 680 A.D. According to legend, Cædmon, an illiterate Anglo-Saxon cowherd, received the gift of poetic composition from an angel; he subsequently founded a school of Christian poets. Unfortunately, only nine lines of Cædmon’s verse survive, in the writings of the Venerable Bede. Whitby, tiny as it is, reappears later in the history of English literature, having been visited, in diametric contrast, by Lewis Carroll and Bram Stoker’s ghoulish yet evocative Dracula. Keywords/Tags: Caedmon, hymn, Old English, Anglo-Saxon, oldest English poem, England, Christian, spiritual, angel, poets, poetry, Whitby, Bede, Carroll, Stoker
At Cædmon’s Grave
At Caedmon's Grave
by Michael R. Burch
“Cædmon’s Hymn,” composed at the Monastery of Whitby (a North Yorkshire fishing village), is one of the oldest known poems written in the English language, dating back to around 680 A.D. According to legend, Caedmon, an illiterate Anglo-Saxon cowherd, received the gift of poetic composition from an angel; he subsequently founded a school of Christian poets. Unfortunately, only nine lines of Caedmon’s verse survive, in the writings of the Venerable Bede. Whitby, tiny as it is, reappears later in the history of English literature, having been visited, in diametric contrast, by Lewis Carroll and Bram Stoker’s ghoulish yet evocative Dracula.
At the monastery of Whitby,
on a day when the sun sank through the sea,
and the gulls shrieked wildly, jubilant, free,
while the wind and time blew all around,
I paced those dusk-enamored grounds
and thought I heard the steps resound
of Carroll, Stoker and good Bede
who walked there, too, their spirits freed
—perhaps by God, perhaps by need—
to write, and with each line, remember
the glorious light of Cædmon’s ember,
scorched tongues of flame words still engender.
Here, as darkness falls, at last we meet.
I lay this pale garland of words at his feet.
Originally published by The Lyric
Keywords/Tags: Caedmon, Hymn, Whitby, angel, illiterate, cowherd, goatherd, shepherd, monk, gift, blessing, Bede, Carroll, Stoker, first English poem, oldest English poem, Old English, Anglo-Saxon