How distant, the departure of young men
Down valleys, or watching
The green shore past the salt-white cordage
Rising and falling.

Cattlemen, or carpenters, or keen
Simply to get away
From married villages before morning,
Melodeons play

On tiny decks past fraying cliffs of water
Or late at night
Sweet under the differently-swung stars,
When the chance sight

Of a girl doing her laundry in the steerage
Ramifies endlessly.
This is being young,
Assumption of the startled century

Like new store clothes,
The huge decisions printed out by feet
Inventing where they tread,
The random windows conjuring a street.

Added: on April 21st, 2006 at 2:27 PM | Viewed: 5208 times | Comments (6)

Poet: Philip Larkin
Poem: How Distant
Volume: High Windows
Year: Published/Written in 1965
Poem of the Day on:
May 19 2003

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