Tom Raworth: July 19, 1938 - February 8, 2017
On the Electricity
i.m. Tom Raworth
1
Something’s wrong with our bathroom light.
‘... all the immortality we have’, I read
in words by Alexander Shurbanov,
and immediately the bulb flickers off;
or, another time, words from Osip Mandelstam,
‘the unknown soldier’s laid / In his famous grave’
when exactly that same fault happens, the same,
as if it were trying to tell me something.
2
Then, again, like those ‘Ironic points of light’
flashing across Auden’s dark – now ours –
an attic window’s on–off opposite
sends its Morse-code message to the stars.
i.m. Tom Raworth
1
Something’s wrong with our bathroom light.
‘... all the immortality we have’, I read
in words by Alexander Shurbanov,
and immediately the bulb flickers off;
or, another time, words from Osip Mandelstam,
‘the unknown soldier’s laid / In his famous grave’
when exactly that same fault happens, the same,
as if it were trying to tell me something.
2
Then, again, like those ‘Ironic points of light’
flashing across Auden’s dark – now ours –
an attic window’s on–off opposite
sends its Morse-code message to the stars.
Peter Robinson