Arise my body, my small body, we have striven
Enough, and He is merciful; we are forgiven.
Arise small body, puppet-like and pale, and go,
White as the bed-clothes into bed, and cold as snow,
Undress with small, cold fingers and put out the light,
And be alone, hush'd mortal, in the sacred night,
-A meadow whipt flat with the rain, a cup
Emptied and clean, a garment washed and folded up,
Faded in colour, thinned almost to raggedness
By dirt and by the washing of that dirtiness.
Be not too quickly warm again. Lie cold; consent
To weariness' and pardon's watery element.
Drink up the bitter water, breathe the chilly death;
Soon enough comes the riot of our blood and breath.
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Comments
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I look at this as a sort of fusion. It breaks some rules while sticking closely to others simultaneously.
Which I find interesting.
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A.A. Ah¿?
This poem reminds me of my old friend, mentor and colleague, Watt The Farouk. As in the tantric mantra - “Oh my beloved leader Watt The Farouk are you on about¿?”
I get hints of some kind of exploration of the link between spiritual and corporeal – at least assuming he is in fact speaking internally… which I did; but not sure what is meant…
The enjambment lines 1-2 strikes me as a little hokey but it is very difficult to judge how it was then – after all a cliché wasn’t clichéd when it was coined… in fact it is simply a victim of its own success!
If it was on AP general list I would have probably questioned the use of whipt = whipped… but since C. S. was a lecturer in medieval and renaissance English - if he liked it – it suits me fine¡!
I was a bit disappointed – not a false-backed wardrobe in sight – but since he hung out with J. R. R. Tolkien (among others) I guess he had to get real sometimes…
I shall be very interested to see what the right answer is though¡!
Edited on Oct 15, 3:28 because ''.
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