Golf poems

[John Crowley]

Thinking about Archie Baird recently brought me to re-read his book “Golf on Gullane Hill”.


Spotted two great short poems.


Andrew Lang - 1884


I hae played in the frost and the thaw,
I hae played since the year ’33,
I hae played in the rain and the snaw,
and I trust I may play till I dee.


“The Gullane Grace” .... with a nod to R. Burns


We hae meat and we can eat,
And hit the ba’, or shank it,
For food and drinks and Gullane Links,
For drives that fly and putts that sink,
Oh let the Lord be thankit!


And then of course there is Sir John Betjeman:



How straight it flew, how long it flew. It cleared the rutty track
And soaring disappeared from view beyond the bunker’s back -
A glorious, sailing, bounding drive that made me glad I was alive.
                                   

[Richard Fisher]

The Hon. Sec. by John Betjeman

The flag that hung half-mast today
Seemed animate with being
As if it knew for who it flew
And will no more be seeing.

He loved each corner of the links-
The stream at the eleventh,
The grey-green bents, the pale sea-pinks,
The prospect from the seventh;

To the ninth tee the uphill climb,
A grass and sandy stairway,
And at the top the scent of thyme
And long extent of fairway.

He knew how on a summer day
The sea's deep blue grew deeper,
How evening shadows over Bray
Made that round hill look steeper.

He knew the ocean mists that rose
And seemed for ever staying,
When moaned the foghorn from Trevose
And nobody was playing;

The flip of cards on winter eves,
The whisky and the scoring,
As trees outside were stripped of leaves
And heavy seas were roaring.

He died when early April light
Showed red his garden sally
And under pale green spears glowed white
His lillies of the valley;

The garden where he used to stand
And where the robin waited
To fly and perch upon his hand
And feed till it was sated.

The Times would never have the space
For Ned's discreet achievements;
The public prints are not the place
For intimate bereavements.

A gentle guest, a willing host,
Affection deeply planted -
It's strange that those we miss the most
Are those we take for granted.

Those two closing couplets are inscribed in the platform at St Pancras Station, near the bronze statue of Sir John. GCA readers will doubtless be pleased to know that (as with Seaside Golf) the club under scrutiny is St Enedoc.

[John Crowley]

The Hon. Sec. by John Betjeman

The flag that hung half-mast today
Seemed animate with being
As if it knew for who it flew
And will no more be seeing.

He loved each corner of the links-
The stream at the eleventh,
The grey-green bents, the pale sea-pinks,
The prospect from the seventh;

To the ninth tee the uphill climb,
A grass and sandy stairway,
And at the top the scent of thyme
And long extent of fairway.

He knew how on a summer day
The sea's deep blue grew deeper,
How evening shadows over Bray
Made that round hill look steeper.

He knew the ocean mists that rose
And seemed for ever staying,
When moaned the foghorn from Trevose
And nobody was playing;

The flip of cards on winter eves,
The whisky and the scoring,
As trees outside were stripped of leaves
And heavy seas were roaring.

He died when early April light
Showed red his garden sally
And under pale green spears glowed white
His lillies of the valley;

The garden where he used to stand
And where the robin waited
To fly and perch upon his hand
And feed till it was sated.

The Times would never have the space
For Ned's discreet achievements;
The public prints are not the place
For intimate bereavements.

A gentle guest, a willing host,
Affection deeply planted -
It's strange that those we miss the most
Are those we take for granted.

Those two closing couplets are inscribed in the platform at St Pancras Station, near the bronze statue of Sir John. GCA readers will doubtless be pleased to know that (as with Seaside Golf) the club under scrutiny is St Enedoc.

Well then, St. Enondoc is now added to the itinerary of our next hiking/golfing trip to England.

[Jeff_Brauer]

I wrote on standing on the first tee at the Old Course on a frigid day:


"Damn, it's cold."


(The end)


Working on a series, with the next one up being about playing in Texas in August, over 100 degrees. 

[John Kavanaugh]

I was watching a movie where there was a reference to Yeats. Caused me to think of Rich Goodale.


Funny thing about Yeats and such. It don’t do diddly on Indiana pussy.

[Tim Martin]

Lacy edge bunker
I can’t see the green from here
Halfway house next hole

[John Crowley]

I wrote on standing on the first tee at the Old Course on a frigid day:


"Damn, it's cold."


(The end)


Working on a series, with the next one up being about playing in Texas in August, over 100 degrees.

smiley face!

[Peter Pallotta]

A still man-made pond
My duck-hook finds it, once more --
Splash! And then, silence.

A cigarette lit
Too many today, I know --
Damn! I hate this game.

The pond is still there
I tee up again, and slice --
Thwack! Architects suck.

[Greg Smith]

O fools!  who drudge from morn til night
And dream your way of life is wise,
Come hither!  prove a happier plight,
The golfer lives in Paradise!                       

John Somerville, The Ballade of the Links at Rye (1898)

***

As you can see below, I liked this one.

[Joe Bausch]

From the Feb 15, 1923 edition of the Brooklyn Times and the golf writer William Hicks' article on a new contraption to make the golf swing automatic, comes this poem from "Ball Hook, or The Golf Worshippers", a prelude Hicks' article:

Farewell, farewell to thee, indoor professors,
     Who teaches the duffer to hit the wee pill,
For now on the scene comes a substitute, yes, sir,
     A mechanical pro that give us the skill.

No more we'll be bothered by language insistent,
     "Hey!  swing them there arms in a neat follow-through,"
And likewise we'll miss the injunction persistent,
     "Say, bend that left knee like the crackerjacks do."

Perhaps – who can say? – this new patent infernal
     Will some day bob up in a regular game,
And bring a hot flush to the cheeks of the Colonel,
     Who'll hide his old head in a bunker for shame.

[Michael Whitaker]

It seems my friend’s approach
has found the fronting stream.
No! The bastard cleared the burn
And now my win’s a dream.

[Colin Macqueen]

Gentlemen,
I always get excited when the GCA fraternity go all maudling, romantic, literary and squishy and go in search of poetic fragments! I have never come across that "ode" to John Betjeman. I think it is terrific and it conjured up the very emotions which I have been straddled with ever since playing Ashludie and Burnside links as a wee boy in Scotland.


And of course John Kavanaugh enters the fray with an allusion I do not get .....  but that's fine as he precipitated a flurry of haiku which I think is dear to his heart. And fine haiku they were so thanks Tim and a 3 stanza one from Pallotta touching, nae doot, on the failings and frustrations that so many of us labour under!


My favourite golf poem is "Seaside Golf" which I recite whenever our golf club runs its "Poets Corner" event so I was pleased to read the "ode"... thanks Richard.
Cheers Colin

[Jim_Coleman]

The golf links lie so near the mill
That almost every day
The laboring children can look out
And see the men at play.

[John Crowley]

O fools!  who drudge from morn til night
And dream your way of life is wise,
Come hither!  prove a happier plight,
The golfer lives in Paradise!                       

John Somerville, The Ballade of the Links at Rye (1898)

***

As you can see below, I liked this one.

We do live in Paradise!

[John Crowley]

SEASIDE GOLF
By Sir John Betjeman

How straight it flew, how long it flew,
 It clear'd the rutty track
 And soaring, disappeared from view
 Beyond the bunker's back -
 A glorious, sailing, bounding drive
 That made me glad I was alive.
 
 And down the fairway, far along
 It glowed a lonely white;
 I played an iron sure and strong
 And clipp'd it out of sight,
 And spite of grassy banks between
 I knew I'd find it on the green.
 
 And so I did. It lay content
 Two paces from the pin;
 A steady putt and then it went
 Oh, most surely in.
 The very turf rejoiced to see
 That quite unprecedented three.
 
 Ah! Seaweed smells from sandy caves
 And thyme and mist in whiffs,
 In-coming tide, Atlantic waves
 Slapping the sunny cliffs,
 Lark song and sea sounds in the air
 And splendour, splendour everywhere.

[V. Kmetz]

The Second Hole

Alarums and the slowness of dreams
passing sixty men at their golf
before I arrived on the scene:
a gathering circle around Postman Pete,
who wilted with the bags before his man
had played from the second tee.

We ripped apart his garb
to restore his purple face;
no emergency drill ever taught how to defibrillate
the dead man—and so away he went; the sirens grew faint. 
We looked at his rags in the flattened circle of grass;
his last absolute act of human production
was to have shat in his pants.

“Is this how it ends?” one of us said. 
And we planted a tree
on the spot, that has no plaque.
From Caddie to Master to Member to Man,
we instead tip our hat[/size] [/size]and remember how
the match can still end early
on the second hole of sudden death.[/size]

[Sam Andrews]

Who's is that?

[Ronald Montesano]

Hakuna balata
what a wonderful phrase
Hakuna balata
was a passing craze

[Bret Lawrence]

MA MASHIE


(From the Royal Montreal Golf Club)


By J. Gardner Thompson


Ma driver, she’s a bonnie club,
She’ll drive twa hunner yerds;
An’ maybe, when the win’s ahint;
Two fifty’s on the kerds.
It’s fine tae get a hertsome drive,
It mak’s ye feel sae classie—
But pride aye comes afore a fa’—
 I hae tae use ma mashie.

I lo’e the game an’ fine wad like
To dae the coorse in eighty,
But while I hae to use that club
I fear the task’s o’er weighty.
But I’ll persevere an’ maybe learn
The trick o’ the wee lassie,
An’ this nicht I’ll drink a toast tae her,
Ma mashie, oh, ma mashie.

[John Kavanaugh]

Why does a kid that describes himself
As a fun guy
Start a thread on the Refuge about
Being triggered by the membership policy at
Pine Valley

[Peter Flory]

It's easy to grin
When your ship comes in
And you've got the stock market beat.

But the man worthwhile
Is the man who can smile
When his shorts are too tight in the seat.

- Morey Amsterdam as performed by Judge Elihu Smails

[Mike_Young]

not many rememebr the words here just the music...https://thegolfnewsnet.com/lyrics-masters-theme-song-augusta-dave-loggins/

[Bret Lawrence]

LINES ON THE “MAIDEN” BUNKER, ST. GEORGE’S LINKS, SANDWICH.


(Suggested by Longfellow’s “Beware.”)


BY C. H. COMPTON


I know a maiden near the sea,
Who oft inviteth us to tee.
If thou art driver far and sure
You may accept without demur;
But if thou’rt not so sure and far
Then of that maiden fair beware,
       She may be fooling thee.

The ball, clean struck and lofted well,
High o’er the maiden’s head will swell,
And on the green will land you safe,
Winning the hole or else a half.
Then may you look with conscious pride,
And find whatever may betide,
       She’s not been fooling thee.

But if you cannot venture thus,
Then without more ado or fuss,
Play round the left and try to win
With iron loft and straight putt in;
And so this cautious style will prove
At length a more successful move—
      You’ll not befooled be.

And when the eighteen holes are played,
To club returning, you have stayed
For lunch, and chat upon your play,
A lesson in your heart may lay,
Whilst resting ‘neath the wide-spread trees,
Delighting in the cooling breeze.
      And ‘scaped from being fooled.

That maiden fair you then may find
Is like the rest of woman kind.
Self confidence is not the way
With her, though bold, to win the day.
But circumvent her playful wiles,
And your reward will be her smiles,
      And so her fool you’ll be.

       
Golfing Annual 1888-1889

[Richard Fisher]

Just to clear up any confusion arising, both The Hon Sec and Seaside Golf are poems by John Berjeman, not about him. Older UK-based GCA readers may recall Sir John's famous film of the 1970s, Metroland, in which he is shown on the first tee at (I  am 95% sure) Moor Park, performing an (undeliberate) air shot.

[Quinn Thompson]

I scribbled this down after working a long day on a golf course in the North of Japan. There was nobody out there by the time 6:00 rolled around, and I spent the last 30 minutes just sitting in a Toro cart by a tee box on a par 5; watching the sun set and wondering what I was doing there...


Bury me on a golf course,
Along the "line of charm",
Lay the sod on thick,
So the divots won't harm.


Bury me on a golf course,
In the 'short stuff' I say,
Away from the sandy pits,
And where the fescues do sway.


Bury me on a golf course,
A par 5 shall do,
When you lie where I lay,
Give it a go in two.


Bury me on a golf course,
At the end of a day,
Then fix the big divot,
And be on your way.


Q.T. - summer of 2017.