Monday, 5 April 2010

Philip Larkin: Absences


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Rain patters on a sea that tilts and sighs.
Fast-running floors, collapsing into hollows,
Tower suddenly, spray-haired. Contrariwise,
A wave drops like a wall: another follows,
Wilting and scrambling, tirelessly at play
Where there are no ships and no shallows.

Above the sea, the yet more shoreless day,
Riddled by wind, trails lit-up galleries:
They shift to giant ribbing, sift away.

Such attics cleared of me! Such absences!







Absences: Philip Larkin, 1950 (from The Less Deceived, 1955)

Spring Storm Forming (30.3.10): photos by Tom Raworth, 2010
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3 comments:

  1. STEPHEN RATCLIFFE5 April 2010 at 08:02

    Thanks also for these -- words and pictures from across the proverbial pond. Tom's pictures catch something of what I was seeing -- at eye level -- yesterday paddling out into the windblown channel.

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  2. STEPHEN RATCLIFFE6 April 2010 at 08:31

    Tom,

    Also here, your page says "1 comment" but nothing seems to be here -- maybe it was here that I wrote something about TR's striking photos of such storm-tossed waters (what I'd seen at eye level paddling out into channel the day before). . . .

    ReplyDelete
  3. TC6 April 2010 at 09:20

    [Steve, yegads, another disappearance.

    Trying to remember what Ray Lewis said: Pain is only temporary...?

    Anyway here is this latest "lost" comment:]

    STEPHEN RATCLIFFE has left a new comment on your post "Philip Larkin: Absences":

    Thanks also for these -- words and pictures from across the proverbial pond. Tom's pictures catch something of what I was seeing -- at eye level -- yesterday paddling out into the windblown channel.



    Posted by STEPHEN RATCLIFFE to TOM CLARK at 5 April 2010 08:02

    ReplyDelete