The poetry presented of this Web-site is the creative work of a man with an interesting history. His life, according to one source, is a modern "odyssey". Currently (January 2003 AD) he lives and works on a farm in England, having announced his intention to live a quiet, contemplative, rural life.

All artistic creations should be judged on their merits, and while the life and former beliefs, political or otherwise, of the artist may be of interest, they should not cloud one's artistic judgment. In the majority of instances, while the artistic creations are remembered after the death of the artist, their beliefs and political opinions are long forgotten. 

Outwardly, Myatt's Promethean quest - involving as it did a study of Martial Arts, the violence of ultra-nationalist politics, periods as a vagabond, two terms of imprisonment, personal involvement with Islam, Buddhism, Taoism, Hinduism, Christianity, paganism, the Occult - is now generally known. Inwardly, his personal life is much less well-known. It may have been that his first period as a vagabond was prompted, in part, by a series of ultimately unhappy romantic liaisons, one of which led to the young women in question moving abroad where she gave birth to Myatt's daughter. This series of events does seem to have inspired some of his poetry, as did his first marriage, which failed when his wife ran off with a younger woman (who, incidentally, was the dedicatee of Myatt's translation of Sappho's poetry). His second marriage ended with the death, at the age of 39, of his wife from cancer. The failure of his third marriage led him to spend another period as a homeless vagabond, in the hills and Fells of Cumbria, a period which inspired him to produce more pagan poetry before he returned to writing about that second love of his life, women. For if there are two themes which consistently run through his poetry, they are Nature, and women. Indeed, he once remarked that "I often feel that some women embody the beauty, the numinosity, the joy, the sensuality, of Nature." 

This love of women is especially evident in his recent (unpublished) novel entitled Gilbert's Patch, in a manuscript he wrote over two decades ago - about a relationship involving two women - to which he gave the title Breaking the Silence Down, in several of his poems, and in many of his letters to me:

So it was that I then, as now, remembered a wisdom of years ago, forgotten in the artificial turmoil of political, religious, plots, of chasing ideological schemes and promethean dreams. Remembered especially when I, only months ago, in her, my married lover's house, awoke and she, my new love, lay warm, naked and half-asleep beside me, our limbs, our bodies, our feelings, entwined, and there was no need to speak, to leave. We seemed one, then, as when our passion joined us and we would lie, wordless, looking, smiling, gently moving, touching, in that beautiful calmness of love. (A Learning: Hand written letter, by Myatt, addressed to JR Wright, dated Nearing the Winter Solstice; postmarked December 17 2002.)

It is one of the aims of Art to elevate us and raise us up and away from the mundane world. The poetry of David Myatt is decidedly non-political. If it can be categorized, it is "pagan", Nature-loving and empathic. It is also highly individualistic, not to say romantic.

What we find expressed in much of this poetry is a profound desire for a more natural and a more human way of life. We also discover, in his poetry, a sensitive man, in love with Nature, who seems to enjoy the company of women far more than the company of men, and who finds:
 

There is much that is beautiful
But nothing that surpasses the beauty some women
Reveal
Through their eyes
(The Silent Wisdom)

It seems that his diverse peregrinations, adventures, travels, wanderings and involvements have inspired his diverse poetry, and it is therefore not surprising that some of his poems are about love, the joy of love, and the sorrow that often arises when love ends:

It was a calm night
Perfumed by moon
Which drew droplets of fractured
Light to my pillow and relief
To the majesty of her flesh
(Summer Love)

Only in passion did we glimpse in moments a beauty
Beyond -
As when, satiated within our lover's arms,
Our being relaxed to journey in defiance of our life
To where some gods were born
While rain played as rain played upon those panes of glass
And a Church clock tolled its ten amid the morning city noise
In her Apartment
When we who waited warm in bed should long ago
Have been upon our way to work.
(Only Relate)

I have no sentence of undisputed meaning
To describe the feeling
As I entered to hear the organ playing Bach:
There was no Time
No century of belonging
Only a leaving in an inward implosion
As I stood, unaware of who or what I was.

But she was real, this goddess
Who played with thin fingers
Creating in an instant a divinity
Of love
Her wraithe form almost swathed in black:
She looked up, once, as I sat astounded,
And smiled in concentration.
(Playing Bach)

Three weeks to dream
As life ebbs as a life ebbs.
I'm glad we went to Egypt -
Her first words
Following that fatal verdict.
 
Now, forward four weeks,
Her strength mostly gone,
She sleeps as I remembering
Watch
Almost crying
And yearning for times past
Like those Summer days
We remembered yesterday
When we had sat together
Amid the heat in our colourful garden
At peace beneath a sky of blue.
(Meanings)

I had gone, unannounced, unexpected,
To see them kiss as they stood
Near her window.

Each false Spring is a lesson
Which Nature slowly learns
As harsh Winter in returned
When stark frost, chilling,
Creeps to crack some bursting buds:
Poems cannot change this
Just as Summer is not Summer
Without Spring
(Shadow Game)

 

But no spell, no wish
Brought my distant lover to me
And I was left to run slowly
Back
And wait the long hours
To Dawn.

By the fire, I think of nothing
Except the warmth of my love
No longer needed.
(In The Night)

 
Always a dream or a memory
Lead us on
And we wait like children
Trusting in the spirits of the Earth.
We love unsuspecting
While they our lovers scheme,
Succour themselves on our blood
And bleed us dry
(Letter)

If Myatt is to be remembered, it will hopefully be for his poetry, rather than for his political or religious writings, or his quest among the religions of the world.

J. R. Wright
Oxford
5 January 2003 A.D.