I realized it was about your wife's death; I still think it needs some way to
complete the circle.  I liked your poem a great deal.

kol tuv, Ryfkah


In a message dated 9/1/02 10:37:12 PM, [log in to unmask] writes:

<< I am grateful to you all for your reading and commenting.
I am sorry that it appears to go nowhere for so many of you. I do not like
explaining poems and feel they should require no explanation -a poem is
itself.
 The key to the poem's theme is in the first strophe with " a death". Now you
cannot know that I refer to the death of my wife who had died 3 weeks before
this episode. I could have hit you over the head with this in the first place
but felt it better hinted at, I seem to have that wrong. Perhaps if ' a death
' became ' the death' it might help.
Ryfkah asks' what happens to unpacking' and in fact that was taking place all
the time as I watched what was perhaps a young love unfold below me, but I
was unpacking my feelings. I had chosen to go away after her death to get
away from people asking me how I was and felt. The truth was I didn't know
how I was or felt.
The backcloth of the sea was a filling in of detail as I looked around from
the window at life going on heedless of my grief.
I hope this helps the poem make sense and will look to embed this as subtly
as possible in the poem.
Again thank you all for your time and trouble. regards Arthur.
 >>