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Today, on February 9th, 2010, the site contains 196 poets, 8,692 poems and 8,017 comments.
Philip Larkin - Continuing To Live

Continuing to live -- that is, repeat
A habit formed to get necessaries --
Is nearly always losing, or going without.
      It varies.

This loss of interest, hair, and enterprise --
Ah, if the game were poker, yes,
You might discard them, draw a full house!
      But it's chess.

And once you have walked the length of your mind, what
You command is clear as a lading-list.
Anything else must not, for you, be thought
      To exist.

And what's the profit? Only that, in time,
We half-identify the blind impress
All our behavings bear, may trace it home.
      But to confess,

On that green evening when our death begins,
Just what it was, is hardly satisfying,
Since it applied only to one man once,
      And that one dying.

Added: Feb 20 2003 | Viewed: 9584 times | Comments (0)


Continuing To Live - Comments and Information

Poet: Philip Larkin
Poem: Continuing To Live

Year: Published/Written in 24
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