On A Friend’s Escape From Drowning Off The Norfolk Coast
In the poem “On A Friend’s Escape From Drowning Off The Norfolk Coast”, the speaker describes, in the minutest details, how a friend of his nearly drowned in the sea during a visit to a beach in Norfolk with his family.
The poem begins with the friend already in trouble. He is further away from shore than he’d like and desperately trying to get back, but the waves are too strong to overcome. As he is continuously pushed under water, he can see his young son playing on the beach, seemingly unfazed by his father’s struggle. His cries eventually waken the boy’s mother and she immediately dashes into the ocean, dragging him to shore.
The poem closes with the friend and his fiancée lying on the beach, catching their breaths after the near-death-experience, while their son laughs at them, oblivious to what nearly happened.
At Thurgarton Church
In the poem “At Thurgarton Church” the speaker is visiting an old church ruin and the graveyard next to it on a cold December evening and contemplates his own mortality and life choices.
In the first three stanzas, the speaker describes the church from the outside as very bare and dark, which is further emphasized by the gloomy, dark weather. In stanzas 4 to 7, the speaker is inside the old church. While he describes the interior of the church as just as bare, cold and unwelcoming as the outside, he is mesmerized by the atmosphere of Death and is unable to leave until he can see the moon through the church windows and can hear the sounds of nature from outside.
In stanzas 8 to 16, the speaker has finally left the church but feels compelled to walk through the adjoining graveyard, contemplating that the graves do not feel like peaceful resting places but like something more sinister. The dead still feel very present, restless and as if they are yearning for a peace unavailable to them at this place. This atmosphere is also mirrored in the nature surrounding the graveyard, giving a voice to the dead. Everything appears without hope for the speaker, paralyzed and unhappy in death.
In stanzas 17 to 19, the speaker focuses on the small grave of a dog that seemingly refused to leave the graveyard after its master’s death and died here itself. The speaker remembers the dog with more fondness than any of the humans and commiserates that even the dog’s own death didn’t bring back the love of its owner.
In stanza 19, the speaker finally mentions god for the first time, stating that no one will receive any blessing from god. In stanzas 20 to 24, the speaker reveals his belief that the faith in a god and a merciful afterlife is what drives people to live an unhappy life as they can never live up to the standards set by that god. This faith would motivate them to ignore the reality of how anger, frustration and hurt naturally make a person act and chastise themselves for their natural reactions.
In the final five stanzas, the speaker confesses to feeling his own mortality and to worrying about what will happen to him after his death. In the end however, his disbelief in mercy after death prevails.
Grandfather, Grandfather
The poem “Grandfather, Grandfather” is a dialogue between a grandfather and his granddaughter about pandas in a zoo.
The first stanza consists of the granddaughter speech. Having realized that the pandas at the zoo appear to play in a “rather sadly” (l. 5) manner and yearn for a place far away, she wants to know what it is that they say to each other.
In the second stanza, the grandfather replies. While he doesn’t answer her actual question, he gently chides her from trying to take away everything from the pandas. Now that they are trapped in an unfamiliar environment, constantly observed by humans, they deserve at least the privacy and secrecy of their minds and private communication.
