Tuesday 23 September 2014

FLEUR ADCOCK'S POEM 'INCIDENT'


INCIDENT
 

When you were lying on the white sand,

a rock under your head, and smiling,

(circled by dead shells), I came to you

and you said, reaching to take my hand,

‘Lie down.’ So for a time we lay

warm on the sand, talking and smoking,

easy; while the grovelling sea behind

sucked at the rocks and measured the day.

Lightly I fell asleep then, and fell

into a cavernous dream of falling.

It was all the cave-myths, it was all

the myths of tunnel or tower or well —

Alice’s rabbit-hole into the ground,

or the path of Orpheus: a spiral staircase

to hell, furnished with danger and doubt.

Stumbling, I suddenly woke; and found

water about me. My hair was wet,

and you were lying on the grey sand

waiting for the lapping tide to take me:

watching, and lighting a cigarette.

This is a wonderful poem but painful. When I read it I felt cold with a shock of acknowledgement. I had to hide from myself what it meant to me.

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