POETRY
"Philosophy
is antipoetic. Philosophize about mankind and you brush aside individual
uniqueness, which a poet cannot do without sel-damage. Unless, for a start,
he has a strong personal rhythm to vary his metrics, he is nothing. Poets
mistrust philosophy. They know that once the heads are counted, each owner
of a head loses his personal identify and becomes a number in some government
scheme: if not as a slave or serf, at least as a party to the device of
majority voting, which smothers personal views."
(from 'The
Case for Xanthippe', in The Crane Bag, 1969)
The Visitation
Drowsing in
my chair of disbelief
I watch the
door as it slowly opens-
A trick of
the night wind?
Your slender
body seems a shaft of moonlight
Against the
door as it gently closes.
Do you cast
no shadow?
Your whisper
is too soft for credence,
Your tread
is like blossom drifting from a bough,
Your touch
even softer.
You wear that
sorrowful and tender mask
Which on high
mountaintops in heather-flow
Entrances
lonely shepards.
And even though
a single word scatters all doubts,
I quake for
wonder at your choice of me.
Why, why,
and why?
TO BRING THE DEAD TO LIFE
To bring the
dead to life
Is no great
magic.
Few are wholly
dead:
Blow on a
dead man's embers
And a live
flame will start.
Let his forgotten
griefs be now,
And now his
withered hopes;
Subdue your
pen to his handwriting
Until it prove
as natural
To sign his
name as yours.
Limp as he
limped,
Swear by the
oaths he swore;
If he wore
black, affect the same;
If he had
gouty fingers,
Be yours gouty
too.
Assemble tokens
intimate of him --
A ring, a
hood, a desk:
Around these
elements then build
A home familiar
to
The greedy
revenant.
So grant him
life, but reckon
That the grave
which housed him
May not be
empty now:
You in his
spotted garments
Shall yourself
lie wrapped.
Return of the Goddess
Under your
Milky Way And slow-revolving Bear
Frogs from
the alder thicket
pray In terror
of your judgement day,
Loud with
repentance there.
The log they
crowned as king Grew sodden,
lurched and
sank;
An owl
floats by on silent wing
Dark water
bubbles from the spring;
They invoke
you from each bank.
At dawn you
shall appear,
A gaunt red-legged
crane,
You whom they
know too well for fear,
Lunging your
beak down like a spear
To fetch them
home again.
Sufficiunt
Tecum,
Caryatis,
Domnia
Quina.
The White Goddess
All saints
revile her,
and
all sober men Ruled by the God Apollo's golden mean -
In scorn of
which we sailed to find her
In distant
regions likeliest to hold her
Whom we desired
above all things to know,
Sister of
the mirage and echo.
It was a virtue
not to stay,
To go our
headstrong and heroic way
Seeking her
out at the volcano's head,
Among pack
ice, or where the track had faded
Beyond the
cavern of the seven sleepers:
Whose broad
high brow was white as any leper's,
Whose eyes
were blue, with rowan-berry lips,
With hair
curled honey-coloured to white hips.
The sap of
Spring in the young wood a-stir
Will
celebrate with green the Mother,
And every
song-bird shout awhile for her;
But we are
gifted, even in November
Rawest of
seasons, with so huge a sense
Of her
nakedly worn magnificence
We forget
cruelty and past betrayal,
Heedless of
where the next bright bolt may fall
The Siren's Welcome to Cronos
Cronos the
Ruddy, steer your boat
Toward Silver
Island whence we sing;
Here you shall
pass your days.
Through a thick-growing
alder-wood
We clearly
see, but are not seen,
Hid in a golden
haze.
Our hair the
hue of barley sheaf,
Our eyes the
hue of blackbird's egg,
Our cheeks
like asphodel.
Here the wild
apple blossoms yet;
Wrens in the
silver branches play
And prophesy
you well.
Here nothing
ill or harsh is found.
Cronos the
Ruddy, steer your boat
Across these
placid straits,
With each of
us in turn to lie
Taking your
pleasure on young grass
That for your
coming waits.
No grief nor
gloom, sickness nor death.
Disturbs our
long tranquility;
No treachery,
no greed.
Compared with
this, what are the plains
Of Elis, where
you ruled as king?
A wilderness
indeed.
A starry crown
awaits your head,
A hero feast
is spread for you:
Swineflesh,
milk and mead.
The Theives
Lovers in the
act dispense
With such
meum-teum sense
As might warningly
reveal
What they
must not pick or steal,
And their
nostrum is to say:
I and you
are both away.
After, when
they disentwine
You from me
and yours from mine,
Neither can
be certain who
Was that I
whose mine was you.
To the act
again they go
More completely
not to know.
Theft is theft
and raid is raid
Though reciprocally
made.
Lovers, the
conclusion is
Doubled sighs
and jealousies
In a single
heart that grieves
For lost honor
among thieves.
Selected Works:
OVER THE BRAZIER,
1916
GOLIATH AND
DAVID, 1916
FAIRIES AND
FUSILIERS, 1917
THE PIER-GLASS,
1921
COUNTRY SENTIMENT,
1922
ON ENGLISH
POETRY, 1922
WHIPPERGINNY,
1922
THE MEANING
OF REAMS, 1924
POETIC UNREASON
AND OTHER STUDIES, 1925
MY HEAD! MY
HEAD!, 1925
POEMS 1914-1926,
1926
POEMS 1914-1927,
1927
LAWRENCE AND
THE ARABS, 1927
A SURVEY OF
MODERNIST POETRY, 1927 (with Laura Ridding)
THE ENGLISH
BALLAD, 1927
MRS. FISCHER,
1928
THE SHOUT,
1929
GOOD-BYE TO
ALL THAT, 1929
POEMS 1926-1930,
1931
BUT IT STILL
GOES ON, 1931
POEMS 1930-1933,
1933
THE REAL DAVID
COPPERFIELD, 1933
I, CLAUDIUS,
1934 - Minä, Claudius - adapted to television in 1976
ANTIGUA, PENNY
PUCE, 1936
COLLECTED
POEMS, 1938
COUNT BELISARIUS,
1938 - Valtamarski Belisarius
T.E. LAWRENCE
TO HIS BIOGRAPHER, 1938
NO MORE GHOSTS,
1940
SERGENAT LAMB
OF THE NINTH, 1940
THE LONG WEEK.END,
1940 (with Alan Hodge)
PROCEED, SERGEANT
LAMB, 1941
CLAUDIUS THE
GOD, 1943 - Claudius jumala - adapted to television 1976
THE READER
OVER YOUR SHOULDER, 1943 (with Alan Hodge)
THE STORY
OF MARIE POWELL, WIFE TO MR. MILTON, 1943
THE GOLDEN
FLEECE, 1944
POEMS 1938-1945,
1945
KING JESUS,
1946
THE WHITE
GODDESS, 1948
COLLECTED
POEMS,
1948
COLLECTED
POEMS 1914-1947, 1948
THE ISLES
OF UNWISDOM, 1949 - Turhuuden saaret
THE COMMON
ASPHODEL, 1949
SEVEN DAYS
IN NEW CRETE,1949
OCCUPATION:
WRITER, 1950
POEMS AND
SATIRES, 1951
POEMS, 1953
THE NAZARENE
GOSPEL RESTORED, 1953 (with Joshua Podro)
ADAM'S RIB,
1955
THE CROWNING
PRIVILEGE, 1955
THE GREEK
MYTHS, 1955
COLLECTED
POEMS, 1955
HOMER'S DAUGHTER,
1955
CATACROK!,
1956
ENGLISH AND
SCOTTISH BALLADS, 1957
JESUS IN ROME,
1957 (with Joshua Podro)
THEY HANGED
MY SAINTLY BILLY, 1957
5 PENS IN
HAND, 1958
STEPS, 1958
COLLECTED
POEMS, 1961
MORE POEMS,
1961
SELECTED POETRY
AND PROSE, 1961
OXFORD ADDRESSES
ON POETRY, 1962
NEW POEMS,
1962
THE BIG GREEN
BOOK, 1962
THE SIEGE
AND FALL OF TROY, 1962
NINE HUNDRED
IRON CHARIOTS, 1963
MAN DOES,
WOMAN IS, 1964
THE HEBREW
MYTHS, 1964
MAMMON, 1964
COLLECTED
SHORT STORIES, 1964
MAJORCA OBSERVED,
1965
LOVE RESPELT,
1965
COLLECTED
POEMS, 1965
POEMS 1965-68,
1968
BEYOND GIVING,
1969
THE CRANE
BAG, 1969
POEMS 1968-1970,
1970
THE GREEN-SAILED
VESSEL, 1971
DIFFICULT
QUESTIONS, EASY ANSWERS, 1973
COLLECTED
POEMS, 1975
NEW COLLECTED
POEMS, 1977
IN BROKEN
IMAGES, 1982
ELEVEN SONGS,
1983
BETWEEN MOON
AND MOON, 1984
