ha-ha ha-ha

an ekphrasis: Picnic at Glyndebourne, England, Tony Ray-Jones, 1967

Picnic at Glyndebourne, England, Tony Ray-Jones, 1967

Art today is from Tony Ray-Jones (1941 - 1972), a photographer known for his candid photos of the English at leisure. He died young of leukemia and his work was published posthumously in A Day Off: An English Journal. He said:

My aim is to communicate something of the spirit and the mentality of the English, their habits and their way of life, the ironies that exist in the way they do things . . . For me there is something very special about the English 'way of life' and I wish to record it from my particular point of view before it becomes Americanised and disappears.

at the Glyndebourne opera festival 

ha-ha you think
when you notice it
the ha-ha*

in the pasture  
four holsteins 
chew their cud 
and farther out
a few dozen sheep
stand static 
clad in their 
finest wool
—ha-ha

here on this side
on the lawn 
the opera goers 
enjoy a mobile tea:
wine, soup, biscuits 
their basket-full 
of soporifics
—ha-ha

the man
his jacket draped 
over his chair
comfortable 
in white shirt 
suspenders
gazes magnetically 
at his bowl 
as his spoon 
like Uri Geller
gradually bends
—ha-ha

while the gowned
and necklaced 
woman 
ruminating
focuses her eyepiece  
onto the sloped pages 
of her big book 
on the art 
of John Constable
—ha-ha

a civilized tableau
you might think	
the English 
ever adept
at barriers 
nothing 
to blink at 
or laugh 
too much 
about
—ha-ha

but something 
kinetic 
does abide: 
nothing in the air
or ground
to stop the waft 
of livestock 
and with it
a slow loss— 
of knowing 
   say
a bovine low 
modulating 
from the drone 
once tuneful
of an aria
—ha-ha


*ha-ha: a recessed landscape design element that creates a hidden barrier to preserve views. An incline slopes to a low retaining wall that prevents access to a garden by, for example, grazing livestock. The word "ha-ha" derives from the moment of discovery when the recessed wall suddenly becomes visible.

Wivenhoe Park, John Constable, 1816 (with a fence to hold in the cows)