#philp larkin

[parabola-magazine]

The Trees by Philip Larkin

The trees are coming into leaf Like something almost being said; The recent buds relax and spread, Their greenness is a kind of grief. Is it that they are born again And we grow old? No, they die too. Their yearly trick of looking new Is written down in rings of grain. Yet still the unresting castles thresh In fullgrown thickness every May. Last year is dead, they seem to say, Begin afresh, afresh, afresh.

―Philp Larkin, High Windows (Faber and Faber 1974).

Art Credit: Gustav Klimt, Flower Garden, 1906 - 1908, oil on canvas, 110 x 110 cm

#nationalpoetrymonth

[theweird0-blog]

They fuck you up, your mum and dad. They may not mean to, but they do. They fill you with the faults they had And add some extra, just for you. But they were fucked up in their turn By fools in old-style hats and coats, Who half the time were soppy-stern And half at one another's throats. Man hands on misery to man. It deepens like a coastal shelf. Get out as early as you can, And don't have any kids yourself

Philp Larkin, This Be The Verse.

[ruby-who]

No one can tie you down or set you free.

- Philip Larkin

[mooochelle]

The Mower

Philip Larkin The mower stalled, twice; kneeling, I found A hedgehog jammed up against the blades, Killed. It had been in the long grass. I had seen it before, and even fed it, once. Now I had mauled its unobtrusive world Unmendably. Burial was no help: Next morning I got up and it did not. The first day after a death, the new absence Is always the same; we should be careful Of each other, we should be kind While there is still time.