I
Lying as it does just beyond
that dangerous reef so renowned
amongst the solipsists, the first
one being very close is almost
too geographically obvious.
For countless years the swells
have fumed like powdered glass
along its shores; or when stirred
up to ruin, in bitter throated waves,
amongst the solipsists, the first
one being very close is almost
too geographically obvious.
For countless years the swells
have fumed like powdered glass
along its shores; or when stirred
up to ruin, in bitter throated waves,
have crashed down hard against
its stubborn granite cliffs and falls.
The storm-wrack of the place
The storm-wrack of the place
has never offered up good kindling:
glass bottles lie half buried on
the tide mark; but when exhumed
they contain no messages. Above
the beach, the noise-crazed birds
twine their awkward necks in love,
then build untidy nests among
the hissing grasses: their spattered
feathers barely keep the shipwrecked
warm: but eaten raw, the carcasses
will almost serve to still the Island’s
special seeming brand of hunger.
glass bottles lie half buried on
the tide mark; but when exhumed
they contain no messages. Above
the beach, the noise-crazed birds
twine their awkward necks in love,
then build untidy nests among
the hissing grasses: their spattered
feathers barely keep the shipwrecked
warm: but eaten raw, the carcasses
will almost serve to still the Island’s
special seeming brand of hunger.
II
The second one is often deemed
to be, though crowded, far more
fortunate …
to be, though crowded, far more
fortunate …
Do feel free leave some comments here for me, maybe with some suggestions as to where this should go: at present it takes me about six months to churn out around fifteen almost poems. That means I start say around sixty or so pieces of work each year. Many poems, sadly, during the working life of a poet, are simply still born. And after all, when all is said and done:
How much time do we have to labour
on the lathes of our brief lives to shape,
for all these children the images that are
a waking baptism? To craft for them true title
a waking baptism? to our naked, ungainly selves?
then, without fear or favour, to let them all crawl
awkwardly free …
The Infinite Monkey
For poetry makes nothing happen: it survives
In the valley of its making where executives
Would never want to tamper, flows on south
From ranches of isolation and the busy griefs,
Raw towns that we believe and die in; it survives,
A way of happening, a mouth.
W. H. Auden – On the Death of W.B. Yeats
