IT’S hard to know if you’re alive… When steel and fire go roaring thr… One moment you’ll be crouching at… Traversing, mowing heaps down half… The next, you choke and clutch at…

He had met hours of the clock he n… Dumb, dragging, mirthless hours co… Bone—chilling, hungry hours when t… Bequeathing earth and heaven to gh… And will not hear man groan chaine…

An ancient saga tells us how In the beginning the First Cow (For nothing living yet had birth But Elemental Cow on earth) Began to lick cold stones and mud:

‘Gabble—gabble . . . brethren . .… My window glimpses larch and heath… I hardly hear the tuneful babble, Not knowing nor much caring whethe… The text is praise or exhortation,

At Viscount Nelson’s lavish funer… While the mob milled and yelled ab… A General chatted with an Admiral… “One of your colleagues, Sir, rem… That Nelson’s exit, though to be…

Call it a good marriage — For no one ever questioned Her warmth, his masculinity, Their interlocking views; Except one stray graphologist

On her shut lids the lightning fli… Thunder explodes above her bed, An inch from her lax arm the rain… Discrete she lies, Not dead but entranced, dreamlessl…

Sing baloo loo for Jenny And where is she gone? Away to spy her mother’s land, Riding all alone. To the rich towns of Scotland,

Listen now this time Shortly to my rhyme That herewith starts About certain kind hearts In those stricken parts

He, of his gentleness, Thirsting and hungering Walked in the Wilderness; Soft words of grace he spoke Unto lost desert—folk

Father is quite the greatest poet That ever lived anywhere. You say you’re going to write grea… I chose that first: it’s unfair. Besides, now I can’t be the great…

When outside the icy rain Comes leaping helter—skelter, Shall I tie my restive brain Snugly under shelter? Shall I make a gentle song

Through long nursery nights he sto… By my bed unwearying, Loomed gigantic, formless, queer, Purring in my haunted ear That same hideous nightmare thing,

My familiar ghost again Comes to see what he can see, Critic, son of Conscious Brain, Spying on our privacy. Slam the window, bolt the door,

Feet and faces tingle In that frore land: Legs wobble and go wingle, You scarce can stand. The skies are jewelled all around,