Gordon Phillips – Tyneside Poet
I first met Gordon in the early 1970s,
both of us “incumdons” to the North East, he from St. Albans
while I’d arrived from Burnley. It was poetry that brought us
together as active members of The Tyneside Poets.
We shared the ethos of taking poetry
away from the self-regarding circles of academe and the cliques to
encourage a wider participation. At the same time we developed and
honed our own poetic voices.
Gordon’s verse always had a strong
musical current pulsing through it and he went on to work with
composers to produce work that was lyrical and had strong strains of
North Eastern traditions and heritage running through it.
True to the belief in encouraging
others we worked together on two anthologies of young people’s
poetry under a small press imprint, Pivot Press. For the first one we
had a goodly number of contributions and the detailed planning of the
anthology was well underway. What we didn’t have was a title. Then
Gordon received an envelope with a couple of good poems in it.
The accompanying letter also proved
significant. The boy, early teens, was enthusiastic about the
possibility of having a poem or two published. However, he was
somewhat concerned about how he might be perceived by his peers. This
led him to write that he’d be really pleased if we used one of his
poems but, “…don’t tell my friends.” Both editions of “Don’t
Tell My Friends” were very successful.
Before I left Tyneside in 2012 Gordon
had been showing me a poetic project he was working on with St.
Mary’s lighthouse in Whitley Bay as its focus. Recently, almost
five years later he gave me a copy of the CD, “The Square and
Compass”: the project was completed and set to music. A grand piece
of work.
Unfortunately, the CD has been followed
far too quickly with bad news. On Sunday, 5th February
2017, the illness Gordon had alerted me to finally claimed him.
Perhaps it is always too soon, but this is truly so. On my last visit
with him he told me of other projects he still had in mind and I had
hoped he might at least be able to bring some of them to fruition. It
is not to be.
However, as a poet his voice, Gordon’s
words, will live on. It was poetry that brought us together,
sustained our long friendship and will remain to speak to me.
Dave Alton
POEM FOR GORDON (1949-2017)
Across a Fenham avenue,
through the pools of stars in your eyes,
the seering light of your vision,
I saw your finely hewed words running towards me,
a crystal stream
tearing along these Newcastle lanes.
We tripped along together
in huddled poetry readings,
throbbing public houses
and ancient mansions,
searching for images
to make our days
brighter,
longing for a folk song
to drink with
in the approaching darkness.
Searching,
always searching,
for the right words
to sing to our loved ones,
we crossed the sea
to fulfil our dreams
from the flat land of East Anglia
into the arms of Scandinavia,
returning with that smile of yours
still intact,
beaming with the sun
breaking up the clouds
on any dogged northern day
in your adopted home,
lending a sparkle to Grainger Street,
a twinkle to our beer;
the joy of a lasting friend,
the spilt dreams
forever flowing with us.
KEITH ARMSTRONG
THE TREATMENT BELL (GORDON'S FINAL POEM)
On the side wall, beside the reception
hangs the treatment bell,
pristine, silver,
its shine an encouraging glow.
Before it, hopeful patients sit.
The next ringer strikes a note for them all:
a customary three times
for an end of plan toll,
excitement measured in the hammering and applause.
Gordon Phillips, 18th December 2016
Note from Maureen Phillips:
The first time Gordon and I heard the three rings of the bell was on his first visit to the Department of Radiation Oncology for consultative purposes to evaluate and determine his most optional treatment.
The inscription on the bell is:
Ring this bell
Three times well
It's toll to clearly say
My treatment's done
This course is run
And I am on my way
FOR THOMAS BEWICK
In your precious art you raised
delicate species fresh, alive
with every searching niche of blade,
on metalled tints of bone
in flesh, conceived.
Today, our clear eye can review
that aggregate of animals
and speading plants which grew;
now your thoughts to Cherryburn
are our adoption.
Through sludge of field flung back
from my drag of parting feet,
crossing rutted rural lands
you swept in light and shade,
a lock of trees
inside a border to engrave.
Gordon Phillips
(as read by Dave Alton at Gordon's funeral on Thursday 16th February 2017 at St Robert of Newminster Roman Catholic Church, Newcastle upon Tyne)
