I Saw a Jolly Hunter 125
Timothy Winters 98
CHESTERTON, G.K. (1874–1936)
The Rolling English Road 160
COPE, WENDY (1945–)
A Christmas Poem 74
Loss 66
CUMMINGS, E.E. (1894–1962)
somewhere i have never travelled, gladly beyond 41
DE LA MARE, WALTER (1873–1956)
The Listeners 183
DUFFY, CAROL ANN (1955–)
Prayer 150
DUNN, DOUGLAS (1942–)
Modern Love 69
ELIOT, T.S. (1885–1965)
Little Gidding (I) 158
The Waste Land (II. A Game of Chess) 186
EWART, GAVIN (1916–95)
A 14-Year-Old Convalescent Cat in the Winter 172
FROST, ROBERT (1874–1963)
Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening 117
GRAVES, ROBERT (1895–1985)
Welsh Incident 85
HARDY, THOMAS (1840–1928)
‘If It’s Ever Spring Again’ 170
HARRISON, TONY (1937–)
Long Distance II 135
HEANEY, SEAMUS (1939–)
Blackberry-Picking 169
Digging 156
Follower 97
Mid-Term Break 128
HEGLEY, JOHN (1953–)
Autumn Verses 33
HENRI, ADRIAN (1932–)
Without You 52
HOUSMAN, A.E. (1859–1936)
In Valleys Green and Still 101
Into My heart An Air That Kills 176
HUGHES, TED (1930–98)
The Horses 118
The Thought-Fox 153
View of a Pig 132
Wind 116
JOSEPH, JENNY (1932–)
Warning 20
KIPLING, RUDYARD (1865–1936)
If— 15
LARKIN, PHILIP (1922–85)
Ambulances 134
An Arundel Tomb 39
Church Going 147
Deceptions 72
Going, Going 83
The Whitsun Weddings 87
This Be the Verse 100
Toads 79
LAWRENCE, D.H.(1885–1930)
Bavarian Gentians 114
LEE, LAURIE (1914–97)
April Rise 111
Christmas Landscape 161
MACBETH, GEORGE (1932–92)
The Miner’s Helmet 102
MACNEICE, LOUIS (1907–63)
Meeting Point 50
McCRAE, JOHN (1872–1918)
In Flanders Fields 124
McGOUGH, ROGER (1937–)
At Lunchtime 181
Comeclose and Sleepnow 67
Let Me Die a Youngman’s Death 123
Vinegar 60
MITCHELL, ADRIAN (1932–)
Fifteen Million Plastic Bags 185
MORGAN, EDWIN (1920–)
Strawberries 59
MUIR, EDWIN (1887–1959)
The Horses 179
OWEN, WILFRED (1893–1918)
Dulce et Decorum Est 29
The Send-Off 139
PATTEN, BRIAN (1946–)
A Blade of Grass 73
Portrait of a Young Girl Raped at a Suburban Party 68
PLATH, SYLVIA (1932–63)
Daddy 30
Lady Lazarus 22
PUGH, SHEENAGH (1950–)
Sometimes 144
RAINE, CRAIG (1944–)
A Martian Sends a Postcard
Home 77
SASSOON, SIEGFRIED (1886–1967)
Base Details 138
The Death-Bed 129
SILKIN, JON (1930–)
Death of a Son 136
SMITH, STEVIE (1902–71)
Not Waving but Drowning 131
The Singing Cat 58
SPENDER, STEPHEN (1909–95)
I think continually of those who were truly great 163
STALLWORTHY, JON (1935–)
The Almond Tree 45
SUMMERS, HAL (1911–)
My Old Cat 34
THOMAS, DYLAN (1914–53)
Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night 19
Fern Hill 167
Poem in October 173
The Force That Through the Green Fuse Drives the Flower 171
from Under Milk Wood 55
THOMAS, R.S. (1913–2000)
A Peasant 115
The Bright Field 143
WALKER, ALICE (1944–)
Did This Happen to Your Mother?
Did Your Sister Throw Up a Lot? 70
WATKINS, VERNON (1906–67)
Peace in the Welsh Hills 112
WILLIAMS, HUGO (1942–)
Tides 65
YEATS, W.B. (1865–1939)
An Irish Airman Foresees His Death 26
He Wishes for the Cloths of Heaven 62
Sailing to Byzantium 151
The Second Coming 189
ZEPHANIAH, BENJAMIN (1958–)
Dis Poetry 154
What If 14
INDEX OF FIRST LINES
The page references in this index correspond to the printed edition from which this ebook was created. To find a specific word or phrase from the index, please use the search feature of your ebook reader.
A
All the way to the hospital 45
And after this quick bash in the dark 68
At Christmas little children sing and merry bells jingle 74
Autumn is strange stuff 33
B
Barely a twelvemonth after 179
Before the Roman came to Rye or out to Severn strode 160
Bent double, like old beggars under sacks 29
Between my finger and my thumb 156
‘But that was nothing to what things came out 85
C
Calm is the landscape when the storm has passed 112
Carry her over the water 44
Caxtons are mechanical birds with many wings 77
Closed like confessionals, they thread 134
Come, friendly bombs, and fall on Slough 90
Dis poetry is like a riddim dat drops 154
Do not go gentle into that good night 19
Down the close, darkening lanes they sang their way 139
E
Even so distant, I can taste the grief 72
H
Had I the heavens’ embroidered cloths 62
He drowsed and was aware of silence heaped 129
Here among long-discarded cassocks 106
I
I climbed through woods in the hour-before-dawn dark 118
I have done it again 22
I have seen the sun break through 143
I imagine this midnight moment’s forest 153
I know that I shall meet my fate 26
I love a man who is not worth 70
I sat all morning in the college sick bay 128
I saw a jolly hunter 125
I think continually of those who were truly great 163
I thought it would last my time 83
I want him to have another living summer 172
I was walking in a government warehouse 185
Iago Prytherch his name, though, be it allowed 115
If ever I saw blessing in the air 111
If I were fierce, and bald, and short of breath 138
If it’s ever spring again 170
If you can keep your head when all about you 15
If you can keep your money when governments about you 14
In Flanders fields the poppies blow 124
In valleys green and still 101
Into my heart an air that kills 176
‘Is there anybody there?’ said the Traveller 183
it is afterwards 67
It is summer, and we are in a house 69
It was a little captive cat 58
It was my thirtieth year to heaven 173
K
Kind o’er the kinderbank leans my M
yfanwy 61
L
Late August, given heavy rain and sun 169
Let me die a youngman’s death 123
Let me take this other glove off 95
M
Mary stood in the kitchen 103
Midwinter spring is its own season 158
Miss J. Hunter Dunn, Miss J. Hunter Dunn 42
My father wore it working coal at Shotts 102
My father worked with a horse-plough 97
My old cat is dead 34
N
Nobody heard him, the dead man 131
Not every man has gentians in his house 114
Now as I was young and easy under the apple boughs 167
Now is the time for the burning of the leaves 120
O
Once I am sure there’s nothing going on 147
One night a man had a dream 54
P
Pretty women wonder where my secret lies 27
S
She died in the upstairs bedroom 126
Side by side, their faces blurred 39
Some days, although we cannot pray, a prayer 150
Something has ceased to come along with me 136
sometimes 60
Sometimes things don’t go, after all 144
somewhere i have never travelled, gladly beyond 41
Stop all the clocks, cut off the telephone 140
T
That is no country for old men. The young 151
That Whitsun, I was late getting away 87
The bells of waiting Advent ring 145
The Chair she sat in, like a burnished throne 186
The day he moved out was terrible 66
The force that through the green fuse drives the flower 171
The hop-poles stand in cones 21
The pig lay on a barrow dead 132
There were never strawberries 59
They fuck you up, your mum and dad 100
This house has been far out at sea all night 116
This is the Night Mail crossing the Border 81
Though my mother was already two years dead 135
Time was away and somewhere else 50
Timothy Winters comes to school 98
To-night the wind gnaws 161
Turning and turning in the widening gyre 189
W
What seas did you see 55
When the bus stopped suddenly 181
When I am an old woman I shall wear purple 20
Whose woods these are I think I know 117
Why should I let the toad work 79
Without you every morning would be like going back to work after a holiday 52
Y
You ask for a poem 73
You do not do, you do not do 30
You may write me down in history 35
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
The page references in this section correspond to the printed edition from which this ebook was created. To find a specific word or phrase, please use the search feature of your ebook reader.
The publishers would like to acknowledge the following for permission to reproduce copyright material. Every effort has been made to trace copyright holders but in a few cases this has proved impossible. The publishers would be interested to hear from any copyright holders not here acknowledged.
14. ‘What If’ was first commissioned by the BBC for National Poetry Day. Copyright © Benjamin Zephaniah 1996.
15. A.P. Watt on behalf of The National Trust for Places of Historic Interest or Natural Beauty for ‘If—’ from Rudyard Kipling’s Verse: Definitive Edition.
19, 167, 171, 173. ‘Do not go gentle into that good night’, ‘Fern Hill’, ‘The force that through the green fuse drives the flower’ and ‘Poem in October’ from The Collected Poems by Dylan Thomas, published by J.M. Dent. Reprinted by permission of David Higham Associates.
20. ‘Warning’ from Selected Poems by Jenny Joseph, published by Bloodaxe Books (1992). Reprinted by permission of John Johnson Ltd.
21. ‘The Midnight Skaters’ from Poems 1914–1930 by Edmund Blunden, published by Macmillan. Reprinted by permission of The Peters Fraser and Dunlop Group.
22, 30. Faber and Faber Ltd for ‘Lady Lazarus’ and ‘Daddy’ from Collected Poems by Sylvia Plath.
26, 62, 151, 189. A.P. Watt on behalf of Michael Yeats for ‘An Irish Airman Foresees His Death’, ‘He Wishes for the Cloths of Heaven’, ‘Sailing to Byzantium’ and ‘The Second Coming’ from The Collected Poems of W.B. Yeats.
27, 35. ‘Phenomenal Woman’ and ‘Still I Rise’ from And Still I Rise by Maya Angelou. Copyright © 1978 by Maya Angelou. Reprinted by permission of Virago Press and Random House, Inc.
33. ‘Autumn Verses’ is from Love Cuts by John Hegley, published by Methuen, London (1995). Copyright © John Hegley 1995.
34. ‘My Old Cat’ by Hal Summers is reprinted by permission of the author.
39, 83, 87, 100, 134. Faber and Faber Ltd for ‘An Arundel Tomb’, ‘Going, Going’, ‘The Whitsun Weddings’, ‘This Be the Verse’ and ‘Ambulances’ from Collected Poems by Philip Larkin.
41. ‘somewhere I have never travelled, gladly beyond’ is reprinted from Complete Poems 1904–1962, by E.E. Cummings, edited by George J. Firmage, by permission of W.W. Norton & Company. Copyright © 1991 by the Trustees for the E.E. Cummings Trust and George James Firmage.
42, 61, 90, 95, 106, 126, 145. John Murray for ‘A Subaltern’s Love-song’, ‘Myfanwy’, ‘Slough’, ‘In Westminster Abbey’, ‘Diary of a Church Mouse’, ‘Death in Leamington’ and ‘Christmas’ from Collected Poems by John Betjeman.
44, 81, 140. Faber and Faber Ltd for ‘Carry Her Over the Water’, ‘Night Mail’ and ‘Stop all the clocks’ (IX from Twelve Songs) from Collected Poems by W.H. Auden.
45. ‘The Almond Tree’ from Root and Branch by Jon Stallworthy, published by Chatto & Windus.
50. ‘Meeting Point’ from Collected Poems by Louis MacNeice, published by Faber and Faber Ltd. Reprinted by permission of David Higham Associates.
52. ‘Without You’ from Collected Poems by Adrian Henri, published by Allison & Busby (1986). Copyright © Adrian Henri 1986. Reproduced by permission of the author c/o Rogers, Coleridge & White Ltd, 20 Powis Mews, London W11 1JN.
55. Extract from Under Milk Wood by Dylan Thomas, published by J.M. Dent. Reprinted by permission of David Higham Associates.
58, 131. James MacGibbon for ‘The Singing Cat’ and ‘Not Waving but Drowning’ from The Collected Poems of Stevie Smith (Penguin Twentieth Century Classics).
59. Carcanet Press for ‘Strawberries’ from Collected Poems (1990) by Edwin Morgan.
60, 67, 181. ‘Vinegar’, ‘Comeclose and Sleepnow’ and ‘At Lunchtime’ from Blazing Fruit by Roger McGough. Reprinted by permission of The Peters Fraser and Dunlop Group on behalf of Roger McGough.
65. ‘Tides’ is from Love Life by Hugo Williams. Reprinted by permission of the author.
66, 74. Faber and Faber Ltd for ‘Loss’ and ‘A Christmas Poem’ from Serious Concerns by Wendy Cope.
68. ‘Portrait of a Young Girl Raped at a Suburban Party’ from Notes to the Hurrying Man by Brian Patten, published by George Allen and Unwin Ltd (1969). Copyright © Brian Patten 1969. Reproduced by permission of the author c/o Rogers, Coleridge & White Ltd, 20 Powis Mews, London W11 1JN.
69. Faber and Faber Ltd for ‘Modern Love’ from Selected Poems by Douglas Dunn.
70. ‘Did This Happen to Your Mother? Did Your Sister Throw Up a Lot?’ from Good Night Willie Lee, I’ll See You in the Morning by Alice Walker, published by The Women’s Press. Reprinted by permission of David Higham Associates.
72, 79, 147. ‘Deceptions’, ‘Toads’ and ‘Church Going’ are reprinted from The Less Deceived by Philip Larkin by permission of The Marvell Press, England and Australia.
73. ‘A Blade of Grass’ from Love Poems by Brian Patten, published by George Allen and Unwin Ltd (1981). Copyright © Br
ian Patten 1981. Reproduced by permission of the author c/o Rogers, Coleridge & White Ltd, 20 Powis Mews, London W11 1JN.
77. ‘A Martian Sends a Postcard Home’ is from The Onion, Memory by Craig Raine. Reprinted by permission of the author.
85. Carcanet Press for ‘Welsh Incident’ from Complete Poems (1995) by Robert Graves.
97, 128, 156, 169. Faber and Faber Ltd for ‘Follower’, ‘Mid-Term Break’, ‘Digging’ and ‘Blackberry-Picking’ from Opened Ground by Seamus Heaney.
98, 103, 125. ‘Timothy Winters’, ‘Ballad of the Bread Man’ and ‘I Saw a Jolly Hunter’ from Collected Poems by Charles Causley, published by Macmillan. Reprinted by permission of David Higham Associates.
101, 176. The Society of Authors as the literary representative of the Estate of A.E. Housman for ‘In Valleys Green and Still’ and ‘Into my Heart An Air That Kills’.
102. Shiel Land Associates for ‘The Miner’s Helmet’ from Collected Poems 1958–1982 by George MacBeth, published by Hutchinson.
111, 161. ‘April Rise’ and ‘Christmas Landscape’ from Selected Poems by Laurie Lee. Reprinted by permission of The Peters Fraser and Dunlop Group.
112. ‘Peace in the Welsh Hills’ by Vernon Watkins is reprinted by permission of Gwen Watkins. Copyright © Gwen Watkins.
114. Laurence Pollinger Ltd and the Estate of Frieda Lawrence Ravagli for ‘Bavarian Gentians’ from The Complete Poems of D.H. Lawrence.
115, 143. ‘A Peasant’ and ‘The Bright Field’ are from Collected Poems 1945–1990 by R.S. Thomas, published by J.M. Dent, a division of the Orion Publishing Group.
116, 118, 153. Faber and Faber Ltd for ‘Wind’, ‘The Horses’ and ‘The Thought-Fox’ from The Hawk in the Rain by Ted Hughes.
117. The Estate of Robert Frost for ‘Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening’ from The Poetry of Robert Frost edited by Edward Connery Lathem, published by Jonathan Cape.
120. The Society of Authors as the literary representative of the Estate of Laurence Binyon for ‘The Burning of the Leaves’.
123. ‘Let Me Die a Youngman’s Death’ from The Mersey Sound by Roger McGough. Reprinted by permission of The Peters Fraser and Dunlop Group on behalf of Roger McGough.
129, 138. ‘The Death-Bed’ and ‘Base Details’ by Siegfried Sassoon. Copyright Siegfried Sassoon by permission of George Sassoon.
132. Faber and Faber Ltd for ‘View of a Pig’ from Lupercal by Ted Hughes.
135. ‘Long Distance II’ is from Selected Poems by Tony Harrison. Copyright © Tony Harrison.
136. ‘Death of a Son’ from Selected Poems by Jon Silkin, published by Sinclair-Stevenson.
144. Seren for ‘Sometimes’ from Selected Poems by Sheenagh Pugh, published by Seren (1990).