I was on a train from Paddington at commuter time. Everyone was preoccupied. Even walking up the platform to board, most people had their heads bent over their telephones. In the carriage some passengers began conversations about management, using ugly neologisms. Others flipped open laptops and frowned their way home, columns of figures and dense many stranded graphs filling their screens and possibly their minds.
As we left London behind and entered open countryside I saw through the window the most beautiful sunset. I realised not one single person in the carriage other than me was looking out the window. Locked in a world filtered by earbuds and headphones, bent over their devices, their whole visual focus on those little lighted rectangles, they were missing reality.
I thought for a moment of trying to alert them to the wonder outside: "Look! It's amazing! The colours, the glorious transcience (or transient glory?)" But I didn't want to be arrested or certified.
I thought of the poem Adlestrop. I suppose such a poem is unlikely to be written any more.
I suppose that if you are going to be Edward Thomas, you will know all the birds already. But this week a friend mentioned the phone app "Merlin", which helps one identify birds by their song or appearance. And last summer a shirt-tail relative mentioned it and I think used it while we were hiking.
ReplyDeleteAnd I should confess that I spent my bus ride home reading (in a book--I'm not that young). But there was time to observe the sky both while waiting for the bus and while walking home from the bus stop.
I do often think that reading a book is also a way of not being present. I tend to look up from a book more than I do from a screen. Mind you, I'm usually looking up from the book in order to "just quickly" have a look at something on my screen, shame on me.
DeleteZoë: Yes, this is the world we live in these days, isn't it? You capture it well. A lovely thought about "Adlestrop." But, I wonder: hasn't it perhaps always been this way when it comes to human nature? (Acknowledging, of course, the impact of technological "Progress" and "advances." And also acknowledging that I, for instance, am as guilty as the next person of being "distracted by distraction from distraction.")
ReplyDeleteAfter reading your thoughts (with which I entirely agree), this poem from early in the Ninth Century A.D. by Po Chü-i came to mind:
The snow has gone from Chung-nan; spring is almost come.
Lovely in the distance its blue colours, against the brown of the streets.
A thousand coaches, ten thousand horsemen pass down the Nine Roads;
Turns his head and looks at the mountains -- not one man.
The title of the poem is: "Passing T'ien-men Street in Ch'ang-an and Seeing a Distant View of Chung-nan Mountain." The translation is by the wonderful Arthur Waley.
Thank you again for all of your wonderful and lovely thoughts over the years. Steve
Thank you so much for the ninth century poem, which is a delightful perspective to be given. And thank you for such a kind message.
Delete