Collected Poems List of poems in Contents Preface to Collected Poems xliii Preface on the New Baroque Consciousness and the Redefinition of Poetry as Classical xlv Baroque Introductory Note by the Poet lxxvii 1. A Well of Truth 1958–1963 Dear Sir 1 A Dream So Vague 1 Why So Dejected? 1 Lines Written in the Depths of Despair 2 Epitaph 2 I Knew a Boy 2 Medusa 2 On Being Accused of Emotional Materialism, i.e. Of Knowing What He Wants 3 The Oath 3 A Life’s Theme in an Image (A Fragment of a Destroyed Poem) 3 The Double 3 Stallion 4 At the Grave’s Edge (A Fragment) 4 Angels 5 On Revisiting the Greek Islands 6 Elegy on a Neglected Graveyard in Sciathos 6 Chopped-Up Pentameters 6 Blind 7 I Will Call On My Love Again 7 Young and Old 7 The House of Unreason 8 Two Songs from The Molten Owl’s Song 8 The Persistent Woman 8 Ode to a Prospect from a Window Frame 9 Nudity of Heavens and Man 9 Externals 10 Two Men Hanged 10 Beauty 11 The Lone Sailsman in Exile 11 Stratford 11 Lament of the Farrash 11 The New Man 11 Faces of the Ages 12 Sunday Morning 12 Chiaroscuro 13 Sun-Light 13 Earthquake 13 Notes 13 2. A Stone Torch-Basket 1963–1965 The Expatriate (A Dramatic Monologue set in Japan) 14 I. Wheel 14 II. Mirror 15 III. Cinders 15 IV. Dawn 16 The Seventeenth Century Pilgrim 16 Binsey Green 17 And Scholars Will Ask 17 Odi Et Amo 17 The Nomad 17 The Priest Refuses Death 18 Twilight (First Version) 18 Twilight (Second Version) 18 The Oceanographer at Night 19 Postscript to Bruegel in Tokyo: Dream and Reality 19 Winter in Nara (An Investigation of the Relation between Culture and Death, Civilisation 20 and Eternity) Christ of the Sea-Spray 21 Song of Three Thames-Daughters 22 Notes 22 3. The Early Education and Making of a Mystic 1965–1966 The Early Education and Making of a Mystic 24 1. Folkestone 24 2. Holy Grey 24 3. 3Cricket Captain 25 4. New Year’s Eve Dance 25 5. History like the Rushing Dee 26 6. Corps Camp 26 7. Murder in the Dark 27 8. Leaving School 27 9. Etna 27 10. Office Love 28 11. The London Hell 28 12. A Destiny 29 13. The Underground Dead 29 14. An Awakening in London 29 15. Crimes and Virtues 30 16. The Power by the Lake 31 17. The Cricket Club Dance 31 18. A Tearful Surrender 32 19. Hitch-Hiking back from Greece 32 20. A Twirled Stem 33 21. Drugtaking 33 22. A Coffined Counterpane 34 23. A Grubby Soul 34 24. An Amateur Fortune-Teller 35 25. Bookstealing 35 26. Private Eye 36 27. An Isaiah Infected 36 28. Smallpox Alley, Baghdad 36 29. A Priest at the Ambassador’s 37 30. Dover Sole and a Whistle 37 31. Three Closenesses 38 32. Quarrel with a Friend 38 33. A Death 39 34. The Splitting of the Dark at the Strawberry Hill Pond 39 35. Demiurge among the Bikinis 40 36. Advice to a Student 40 37. An American Professor 40 38. Paradise Valley 41 39. A Garden Temple 41 40. Satori 42 41 Andrizesthe 43 42.A Vast Palace and a Chiming Clock 43 Notes 44 4. The Silence 1965–1966 The Silence 45 I. Dying: Shadow 45 II. In the Underworld: Moon on the Northern Dead 51 III. Rising: Reflection on the Clouded Ground 65 Notes 79 5. The Wings and the Sword 1966–1969 Archangel 87 Blighty 94 An Inner Home 97 The Conductor (Or: At The Royal Albert Hall) 98 Two Moral Letters after Horace 99 An Epistle to an Admirer of Oliver Cromwell (Advice to a Young Revolutionary going into 99 Politics) Epistle to His Imperial Highness, on His Birthday 102 A Well-Glazed Jar (A Fragment) 104 A Heresy 105 A Shrub and Smiling Leaders 105 The Rubbish Dump at Nobe, Japan (An Investigation of Nature and History, Pattern and 106 Meaning) Haikus 107 Tankas 107 Sakura-Ba 107 A Chambermaid Lies on the Beach in a White Mini and Laments 107 An Incense Cone Burns in a Storm 108 Blood in the Eye 108 Night: Cathedral and Tower 108 I Have Seen 108 High over Calcutta: A Castle in Spain 109 Steamed Up 109 A Poet Reads the Fire 109 The Greenfly and the Money Spiders 110 Storm and Fire 110 Johnson McViters 110 A Small Boy looks ahead during his Summer Holidays 110 Nonsense Rhymes for Children 111 Barbary Shores (The Exile) 112 Notes 113 6. Old Man in a Circle 1967 Old Man in a Circle 116 I. Uncleanness after the Sunset 116 II. Purging under the Moon 121 III. Dawn over Mount Brocken 125 Savonarola (A Fragment) 128 Notes 128 7. The Gates of Hell 1969–1972 Orpheus Across the Frontier 131 Providence Which Takes 131 A Banged Door and a Strong Gin-Punch 132 Well, Dried Grasses, Dead Butterfly 132 Lump like a Cannon-Stone 132 Two Damnations 133 Sparkling Pavements and Red Rose-Hips 133 Hopeless 133 A Nothingness 134 The Death of Ought 134 Feast: Skull on a Beach 134 Marquess 135 Geisha 135 Muffin Man 135 Gates of Hell 136 Au Revoir 136 A Wheeled-Away Staircase 136 The Good-Bye 136 Wrecked 137 Despair like Bellbind 137 A Small Girl’s Curfew 137 A Drowning in Anguish 138 Cairo 138 Way of Loss 138 Ghadames Spring (Poems like Bubbles) 138 Eurydice Lost: Expectation and a Tear 139 The Fall 139 The Spectre 139 Like a Fruit Machine 140 Danger 140 A Death of Sorts 140 On the Waterfront 140 The Escape 141 Kingdom of Windows 141 Oran: Hell Remembered Again 141 Despair 142 Rain and Sun: A Being like a Snowstorm 142 Faces in Smoke 142 Chamber in Hell 143 Throne 143 Me 143 Thinking Cold 144 Sailor 144 The Wind 144 Orpheus-Philoctetes at High Beach 144 Three, two, one. Aging: An Autumn Leaf and Holly 145 The Overcoat 145 The Wreck 145 Leaking 146 The Hour of Butterflies 146 Dictator 146 Full-Time Lovers 146 The Sacrifice 147 Journey’s End 147 October Sea; Abyss 147 Room like a Merry-Go-Round 148 To Think! 148 My Hell 148 Love like Willow 149 My Shopwindow 149 Weathervane and Wind 149 Christmas: Feathers and a White Bedspread 149 January 150 Knot 150 Frost on the Tongue 151 Traitors’ Gate 151 Orpheus-Prometheus in the Blackweir Region of Hell 151 Lost Calm 151 Summer Fatigue 152 Disentangled 152 Heart 152 Flow: Moon and Sea 152 Visions: Golden Flower, Celestial Curtain 153 More Visions: The Judge 153 Visions: The Pit and the Moon 153 Visions: Shield of God 154 Flowers in the Soul 154 Orpheus: Holy Fool 154 Fever: Fire and Mercury 154 December 4th 155 An Amputated Limb 155 February Budding, Half Term 155 A Stolen Hour 156 March: Crocuses 156 Hell, March 156 Miniature Rose 156 Law of the Seed 157 A Glacier in the Heart 157 The Void and the Snowdrop 157 Pure Water of Eternity 157 Self-Planting Corn, Graveyard Hawthorn 158 Bruised Plum 158 Time and Eternity (First Version) 158 Visions: Raid on the Gold Mine 159 The Furnace 159 Vision: Snatched by God, a Blue Light 159 Vision: Love like a Grid 159 Rose, Golden 160 Red Rose and Potato-Peeler 160 Ivy and Rainbow 160 Tattershall 161 The Meaning of Life 161 Obida (Hurt) 161 Under a Muslin Net 161 Guy Fawkes Night 162 Shooting 162 Hope and Fear 162 Next Morning: Sunrise and Smoked Glass 163 Tagetes like Shopgirls 163 Possibilities: Dead Leaves and Oak 164 A Bathroom Mirror and a Shadow 164 Will like a Mountain Peak 164 Mirroring: An Ache like a Ripple 164 Birthday like a Gong 165 Starless Caves and Starlit Beach 165 Nature like Meccano 165 Standard: Christmas 166 Gagged 166 Face 166 Blackheath Fog 167 Eyes That See Through The Dark 167 A Tongue at Low Tide 167 Fire like an Adder’s Tongue 168 Jealous Oath 168 A Woman like Thunder 168 Pleasantries like Crowbars 169 The Wind that is Wild 169 Dreams like Haggard Faces 170 Three 170 A Past like Shaving Lather 170 The Rainbow in the Water Shower 171 Wheat Germ 171 A Pond like a Well 171 Delilah of the Sidewalks 171 Justice like a Clown’s Kiss 172 Success 172 Life like Lilac 172 The Midas Touch 173 Mephistopheles 173 Sea-Wails 173 Masks 174 Sunbathing 174 Fountain 174 Thistles 175 Angles 175 The Pearl 175 The Code 176 Six Songs to be Set to Music: Breaking 176 Kentish Girl (A Ballad) 177 Song: I Can’t Count The Red Sun 177 Time To End It All 178 Song: The Orange Lady 178 Black Chestnut 178 Notes 179 8. The Flight 1970 The Flight 181 I. A Green Country 181 II. Chamber in Hell 183 III. Waves on the Shingle 186 IV. Gull over a Clay Pyramid 187 Notes 190 9. A Bulb in Winter 1972–1974 Carnations 191 Fragment 191 Carving Knife 191 On the Death, caused by the Israeli Bombing of Damascus, of a Norwegian UN 192 Observer, his Wife and Child Scar 192 Sand 193 Nets 193 Sweet and Sour (On Memnos) 193 Your Brother 194 A Tree that is Wild 194 Snowman 194 Doctor 194 Heavy in Heart (Leaves Falling) 195 Bulbs 195 The Singer 196 The Sun (Remembrance Day) 196 When I Am Old 197 Violets 197 Time 197 Years like Ashes 198 Cold Men, A Cold Sky 198 Taoists 199 I Am Risen 199 Society: The Spring in my Being 199 Providence 199 Toad-Like 200 Time like a Well-Shut Album 200 Key 200 You Who 201 Certificate 201 Séance for a Dead Woman 201 The Heart of a Violet 202 See-Saw 202 Ode: Spring 202 A Buried Heart 202 Jigsaw 203 Clean 203 The Yellowhammer 203 Treasure Trove 204 Yew 204 Integrated Studies 204 Knight 204 The Waterfall Stopped and Cried 205 Copper Fountain 205 Golden City 205 Eternity Ring 206 Night: Silence and Sea (A Second Honeymoon) 206 At Battle: Violent Event, Serene Nature 206 Caves 206 At Bognor 207 Closed 207 Shrivelled 207 Silent Pool 208 Chased 208 Breakwater 208 Trap 208 Trunks 209 Fire and Waterfall 209 Common Entrance 209 Ode to Solzhenitsyn 209 Back and Forth (A Budget of Flowers) (First Version) 210 Back and Forth (A Budget of Flowers) (Second Version) 210 Bird on the Spring 210 Half Way Through 211 Urn 211 A Bitter Pill 211 Painting 212 My Bird 212 Ice 212 Walking Stick 213 Gift like a Flutter 213 The Graveyard 213 A Pear 213 Peace 214 Goldfish 214 Arundel 214 Pain 215 A Chill like Smoke 215 A Feeling like an Acorn 215 Water Music 215 Migrations 216 Rhododendron 216 The Undefeated 216 Notes 216 10.