John Bradburne breathed poetry. It came out of him like water from a tap- and the tap was always on. He would often complain that he was unable to write in prose, and always preferred verse- even in his everyday letters to his family and friends. The climax of a remarkable poetic life, which began in his youth, was the decade from 1969, when he wrote some 6,000 poems- sometimes a dozen or more in a day. The quantity of his work has no precedent- and we have not yet discovered all of it, for much still remains hidden in letter-form in many an attic or drawer. He is the most prolific poet the English language has ever seen. The poetry displays a single-minded enthusiasm and clarity of vision that is compelling in its intensity and endearing in its humanity. His best work contains lines of great beauty and profound spiritual insight.
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“Mutemwa”
This people, this exotic clan
Of lepers in array
Of being less yet more than man
As man is worn today:
This is a people born to be
Burnt upward to eternity!
This strange ecstatic moody folk
Of joy with sorrow merged
Destined to shuffle off the yoke
Of all the world has urged:
This oddity, this Godward school
Sublimely wise, whence, I’m it’s fool!
An extract from the poem ‘Mutemwa’. To read the poetry go to the poetry website: www.johnbradburnepoems.com.
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