(1907 – 1999)
“Left Melfort for Prince Albert & examining & sleeping at National Hotel. Met Mr. & Mrs. Jack Hicks, musicians & delightful people & was liberally entertained with lemon pie & other luxuries.” {June 14 1949}
“Arr. Saskatoon & bus to Prince Albert to re-visit the Hicks – Jack & Marjorie.” {July 4 1949}
Music for Two Voices and Wind – The Gulls
It is some lost thing, you said
to the cries of the first gulls
circling over the brown river
as we sat one each side
sweet water bubbling out of stones.
This song, I said, rises
through channels of darkness,
rises winter long, joins
season to season with singing.
It is some lost thing was all
you answered, your eyes following
the white wings above the river.
(John V. Hicks, from Now is a Far Country)
George possessed a natural charm that people found very endearing (a friend commented “You can’t help but like him”). This meant that persons of all stripes – musicians professional and amateur, painters and poets, sculptors, philosophers, teachers – appear and recede throughout the diaries; some are briefly illuminated, but are transitory . . .
One who became a friend (albeit a mostly distant friend as he lived many miles across the country) was poet and organist John V. Hicks. He and his wife, teacher/composer Marjorie Kisbey Hicks, are spoken of as very kind hosts to George on examining trips and opera tours. Hicks was obviously a gentle man, very sensitive to deep connections in life, spirit and nature. He made his living as an accountant but his heart was in music and poetry; though his books of poems appeared only when in his 70s, he had published poems in journals long before that. He was the organist for 60 years at St. Alban’s Cathedral in his home of Prince Albert Saskatchewan, where it’s said his love of Bach shone through.
The following two paragraphs are taken from a brief profile of Hicks found in the Prince Albert Arts Centre. Having never met him, I nevertheless sense that he and George were kindred spirits in several ways.
“Although Hicks never attended university, he was rewarded for his contributions to the arts with an Honorary Doctorate in Literature from the University of Saskatchewan, the Saskatchewan Order of Merit, a lifetime award for excellence from the Saskatchewan Arts Board and several other praises. Hicks was appointed Prince Albert Writer-in-Residence in 1978, where he was held in high esteem and was often described as the city’s most distinguished living citizen.”
“… true to his values, (Hicks) lived modestly. He never owned a television set or a vehicle, preferring to walk, even in the most frigid weather. Behind Hicks’ old-fashioned exterior he held a lifelong passion for various forms of literature, J.S. Bach, opera, sherry … as well as dessert of any kind.” (Just George’s cup of tea!)
If you find yourself in Prince Albert, Saskatchewan you may be interested in visiting the John V. Hicks Gallery in the Prince Albert Arts Centre, dedicated to the man “for his many contributions and mentorship to local artists”.
George’s friendly association with John Hicks lasted over 25 years; he reappears from time to time in the diaries, the final mention occurring in June 1976:
Dark Morning
Mother, there’s a pterodactyl
perched on our aerial. He
bends it. When he folded his wings
he made the sun come out.
Omens of extinction are
everywhere. We don’t need
visitations of forgotten reptiles
to twist our antennae awry.
You thought it was a dark morning.
It was his wing span, I tell you –
how many inches? No – pterodactyls
don’t answer to inches.
Hand me that duster, will you?
Every day is a dark morning.
Here, mother. Let’s not go extinct.
He’s sitting there inventing feathers.
(John V. Hicks, from Winter Your Sleep)
Autobiography
Say what you like I know
the pebble is part of a mountain
ground to bits by ice years
smoothed by water
buffed by wind
cleansed by memory
beyond all else learning
how to lie still
(John V. Hicks, from Months Mind)
“Bus Saskatoon to Prince Albert – Coronet Motor Hotel, & exams in Calvary United Church.
Supper at the Hicks on four nights out of the six I am here. I used to stay with them during Opera visits …” {June 24 1976}
Now is a Far Country
now is a far country
set at untravellable distance
your sapphire glance
star stone and star stone
strikes at an old nerve
exposes a fork of pain
in this strange land
a sullen roar trails
silver pencil streaking bulletlike
across sapphire sky
it has left without me
riffing through history books
and yellow diaries
in this strange land
(John V. Hicks, from Now is a Far Country)