Soft Sift
Asked urgently to lecture
to a colleague's students
(though years since I retired) -
on Gerard Manley Hopkins,
there I stand in an unfamiliar room,
a little bothered to see my colleague
sitting there out front,
and nothing in my hand -
not even a copy of Hopkins.
Now what's the name of the big poem again?
Exiled nuns...the Channel...
storm...shipwreck...drownings...
I set out to tell them how our poet
read the report in the morning's 'Times'.
I'm about to mention the Jesuit Order
and his asking permission to write,
when noting the blankness
in the faces that I'm facing
brings me awake, in bed at home.
Sorry, Father Hopkins.
What triggered it in part
is noticing some recent book title:
Soft Sift. Oh, in an hourglass, was it?
Once I'd have recited line on line.
Max Richards
Doncaster, Melbourne
Wednesday 27 September 2006
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