"In that great poem A Refusal to Mourn the Death, by Fire, of a Child
in London, with its dark, magnificent, proud movement, we see Death
in its reality -- as a return to the beginning of things, as a robing,
a sacred investiture in those who have been our friends since the
beginning of Time. Bird, beast, and flower have their part in the
making of mankind. The water drop is holy, the wheat ear a place of
prayer. The 'fathering and all-humbling darkness' itself is a
begetting force. Even grief, even tears, are a begetting. 'The
stations of the breath' are the stations of the Cross."
-- Edith Sitwell
Is the unstated fact that the poem is about a child who died in the
Blitz make this a political poem? Does knowing or not knowing it
change the poem?
--
===================================
Jon Corelis www.geocities.com/jgcorelis/
===================================
|