My Proper Life
1.
- Elijah
- Martha, Mary and Housework
- The Entertainer
- A Dainty Dish
- Thinking about Heaven
- Mission Sundays
- Upturn
- Bicycles
- Learning to Whistle
- Crisis? What Crisis?
- Away for the Week
- Away for the Week — One More Thing
- Non Credo
- Remains
- Christmas Atheist
- Eclipses
- Birthplace
- Self-Portrait
- A Child's Farewell
- Evening Visitor
- The Navigator
- Over Tennyson Down
- On His Circumcision
- Internal Eclogue at 60
- On his 70th Birthday
- Senior Moments
- Unauthorised Absence
- ‘The Leaving It’
- Prayer before Death
- Funeral Oration, by the Deceased
2.
- Hôtel des Medicis
- Bons Appétits 1977
- Topless is More
- Your Morning Yoga
- Strawberries
- Sunday Morning
- Anniversary
- Confession
- Rendezvous
- CDs
- The Stalker
- One in a Bed
- Three in a Bed
- Shadows are Ageless
- Our Time
- Laughing over Books
- Tracks
- Harbingers
- Evening Walk
- ‘This Living Hand’
- Intermission
- Pastry Islands
- Afternoon walk: 20 March 2024
- In the Hospital
3.
- The Season Shifts
- The Walker
- Jewish Funeral
- After a Quarrel
- Second Chance
- Thames Between Greenwich and the Tower
- The Fall from National Esteem of a Poet Laureate
- Bequest
- Pretty Polly Put the Kettle On
- Express Dairy
- Smokers at Greater London House, Camden Town
- Him Indoors
- Two Trees 03/04
- Snowdrops
- The Mimosa Tree
- Rough Winds
- Up All Night
- Aloft
- Divorcees
- Small Moment on the Great Western
- She who had Loved Horses
- The Innocents
- Cross-Channel Ferry
- A Song for England
- The Squirrel and the Conkers
- Desolate
- Offspring
- Arts Minister Briefs Journalists
- Home-thoughts, from Home
- Car Wash
- In a Station of the Underground
- The Twelfth of July
- At Cross Keys
- Embracing on Escalators
- The Lake Poets
- Hares at Aldegrove Airport
- The Vernacular
- A Gift from David Hammond
- The Least You Can Say
- Tribute
- ‘For this Relief, Much Thanks’
- Sunny Morning in the Park
- Quintet
- Frosterley Marble
- Donkey Work
- Bluebells at a Distance
- Prisoners
- A Morning Full of Birdsong
- The Tree Planter
- Footfall
- Pisser Willy’s Teeth
- The Morning After the Curry Night Before
4.
- Snake by the River
- Familiarity Need Not Breed Contempt
- Sketches in Andalucía
- We Came with the Rain
- Animal Rescue Squad
- Sketches in Tuscany
- The Italian Family at Lunch
- The Italian Family at the Seaside
- Beside the Sea, the Sea
- Vision
- A Kingfisher in August
- As Anacondas Go
- The Interior Life of Insects
- A Vase of Marigolds
- Cruelty
- Prepare for Landing
- My Proper Life
- Chapel of Rest
- Cut Cornfield
- Evening Swim
- 29.12.08
- Near Olmi-Cappella
- Vacheries
- Voyeur
- The Squirrels and the Nut Trees
- In an Angle of the Wall
- An Argument of Fowls
- After Frost’s ‘After Apple-Picking’
- Chorus of the Guardian Cats of Montmartre Cemetery
- The River
- Partridges in September
- ‘Architecte!’
- Short and Sweet
- In Cléguer Cemetery
- The Plough
- Deer at Twilight
- Bright Eyes
- Wind-blown acanthus
- Two Epithalamia, Offering Similar Advice
- Paul, I should like…
- Made in Northampton, Western Australia
- Near Albi
- In Mowbray, Cape Town
- High Flyer
- While Ye May…
- Chestnuts
- Mishap
- At a Breton Pardon
- At Fort Bloqué
- Samuel Palmer’s Moon
- The Peach Tree
- Cold Spring
- Horn Solo
- Late Season Clear-up
- Barn and Screech
- Ariel Geometry
- Apprentice Carnivore
- The Bees in the Antirrhinums
- Encouragement
- Hailstorm
5.
- New Style
- The Searchers
- Liberation
- Leda Ponders Yeats’s Sonnet
- The Prisoner
- New Year’s Day 2005, at the Window
- Epiphany 2006
- Wedding Party
- The Zealots
- At a Banking Crisis
- Her Night Thoughts
- Too Much History
- The Rescuing of Starfish
- As John Donne Tells Us…
- Pleasure’s Bargain
- Good Friday, 2013. Driving Westward
- Penelope was Right…
- Clouds
- Out of City
- The Spider on my Copy of The Origin of Species
- A Hope Denied
- Legacy
- Drummer
- Fabbro contro Falso
- Inauguration Day: January 2017
- Inauguration Day: January 2025
- Auden versus Shelley
- Body and Soul
- Billets Doux
- ‘He had imagined women were quite different to what he saw I was’
- 24 September 2019
- Things
- The Priests of Mammon at a Pandemic
- The Locked-down Citizenry at a Pandemic
- Stern Words to Self during the Lockdown
- ‘The Back End of a Bad Year’
- In the Pink
- Cassandra, Marie and Helen: Memo to Pierre
- Laura in Heaven: Letter to Francesco on Earth
- Lesbia: Billet Doux to Gaius Valerius
- Corinna and Cypassis Compare Notes on Ovid’s Elegies
- Vanna, Lagia and Anon Reply to Dante’s Invitation
- Chloë Bites Back
- Metaphysical Speculation
- Ukraine 1
- Ukraine 2
- Ukraine 3
- Ukraine 4
- Unwelcome Visitor
- A Humble Petition
- Ubiquity
- Life. Afterlife?
- Rising Irritation at Rising Intonation
- Hobbyhorse
- ‘How did we do?’
6.
I am indebted to Robert Graves’s magisterial and comprehensive The Greek Myths for much of the information in this series of poems.
7.
- Victor Hugo — Tomorrow, at dawn…
- Victor Hugo — The Retreat from Moscow
- Victor Hugo — Boaz Asleep
- Victor Hugo — The Lions
- The Woman in the Moon
- The Cow
- After the Battle
- Dante — Guido i’ vorrei
- Petrarch — Era il giorno ch’ al sol si scoloraro
- Petrarch — Lassare il velo o per sole o per ombra
- Petrarch — Movesi il vecchierel canuto et bianco
- Petrarch — Son animali al mondo de sì altera
- Petrarch — Non al suo amante più Diana piacque
- Elusive Quarry
- Petrarch — Quel foco ch' i' pensai che fosse spento
- Petrarch — Beato in sogno et di languir contento
- Petrarch — O misera et orribil visione!
- Petrarch — Oimè il bel viso, oimè il soave sguardo
- Petrarch — L’ardente nodo ov’ io fui, d’ora in ora
- Petrarch — Se lamentar augelli, o verdi fronde
- Petrarch — Mai non fui in parte ove sì chiar vedessi
- Petrarch — Quante fiate al mio dolce ricetto
- The Revenant
- Petrarch — Quand’ io veggio dal ciel scender l’Aurora
- A Broken Truce
- The Call
- An Interview in Heaven
- Ronsard — Ores la crainte et ores l’esperance
- French Gentleman Prefers Blondes
- Stanzas
- Ronsard — Marie, qui voudroit vostre nom retourner
- Ronsard — L’autre jour que j’estois sur le haut d’un degré
- A Lover Goes to Law
- Ronsard — Ces longues nuicts d’hyver, où la Lune ocieuse
- Michael Loves Tom
- Montale — Lemons
- Don’t Ask us for the Word…
- Pale City Boy, on Holiday, in Thoughtful Mood
- Don’t Seek the Refuge of the Shade…
- To K.
- My Life, I Don’t Expect You to Provide…
- The Sunflower
- Often, it’s Life’s Evils that I’ve Met
- That Part of Me was Mere Outside
- Portovenere
- Study this Stranger’s Face
- Montale — Gloria del disteso mezzogirono
- Montale — Felicità raggiunta, si cammina
- Drought and Absence
- Montale — Forse un mattino andando in un’aria di vetro
- A Memory of War
- Your Fingers Felt their Way…
- The Line of Children Dancing on the Beach
- A Lost Cicada
- The Water in the Well whose Pulley Creaks
- The Cardboard Ships Rest on the Burning Shore
- The Hoopoe
- Above the Graffiti’d Wall
- Montale — Mediterranean
- Montale — The Eel
- The Hermit Crab
- Three Lyrics by Ungaretti
- Autumn
- Autumn Day
- Rilke: The Panther
- Rilke: The Swan
- Rilke: The Carousel
- Rilke: The Spirit Ariel
- Rilke: Orpheus. Eurydice. Hermes
- Rilke: Sonnets to Orpheus Part One: XXI
- Rilke: Sonnets to Orpheus Part Two: XXV
- Virgil — The Aeneid, book 2
- Virgil — Choose your Season, Choose your Ground
- Virgil — A Storm at Harvest Time
- Virgil — Signs of Rain and of Fair Weather
- Virgil — Soil types
- Virgil — The Poet Envies the Farmers
- Virgil — The Ideal Breeding Cow
- Virgil — Frustrated Bulls
- Virgil — The Old Man at Tarentum
- Virgil — Aristaeus and the Bees
- A View of Mount Soracte
- Chloë Shies Away
- Vintage Stuff
- Maecenas’ Birthday
- The Perils of Garlic
- Ovid — The Mistress and the Maid
- Ovid — Pythagoras on Change
- Twelve Epigrams after Martial
- Twelve Poems by Catullus
- Machado — In April, a Thousand Waters
- The Loved One Sleeps on the Breast of the Poet
- Machado — To a Dry Elm
- Parting Words
- Apuleius on Sappho
- Appeal to Aphrodite
- An Invitation
- Abstinence Makes the Heart Grow Fonder
- Green
- No Accounting for Taste
- Unobtainable
- A Sister’s Plea
- Hairstyles
- A Rebuke
- Distracted
- Moon and Stars
- At First Sight
- Strictly Metrical
- Hesperus
- Solitary
- I Longed for You…
- Like Wind…
- To a Wealthy, Uncultured Woman
- Such Sweet Sorrow
- Adieu
- ‘Endless and Singing’
- Two Views of Power
8.
Memoir
Occurrences
Madame Menez - The Story So Far
Marcovaldo or Seasons in the City
(Italo Calvino — Marcovaldo ovvero Le stagioni in città)
Grateful thanks to Arturo Tosi for his essential help
- Spring 1 Mushrooms in the city
- Summer 2 The park-bench holiday
- Autumn 3 The municipal pigeon
- Winter 4 A city lost in the snow
- Spring 5 The wasp treatment
- Summer 6 A Saturday of sun, sand and sleep
- Autumn 7 The lunch box
- Winter 8 The forest on the autostrada
- Spring 9 Good air
- Summer 10 A journey with the cows
- Autumn 11 The poisonous rabbit
- Winter 12 The wrong stop
- Spring 13 Where the river is bluer
- Summer 14 Moon and GNAC
- Autumn 15 The rain and the leaves
- Winter 16 Marcovaldo at the supermarket
- Spring 17 Smoke, wind and soap bubbles
- Summer 18 The whole city to himself
- Autumn 19 The obstinate cats’ garden
- Winter 20 Father Christmas’s children
The Dinard Butterfly
(Eugenio Montale — Farfalla di Dinard)
