Old Age - “Departing Light”
Robert Gray’s mother has submitted to old age: “She is hung/like her hanging mouth/ in the dignity/of her bleariness, and says that she is /perfectly all right. It is impossible to get her to complain/ or to register anything.” Even though the mother’s situation, is unnerving she does not voice any grievances because she is contented with nature’s order. The mother endorses dignity because she receives the upshots of old age without whining.
Dissolution - “Harbour Dusk”
“Harbour Dusk” calls attention to the final stages of a day: “She and I came wandering/ there through an empty park,/and we laid our hands on a stone parapet’s/fading life. Before us, across the oily, aubergine dark/of the harbour, we could make out yachts –/beneath an overcast sky, that was mauve underlit.” The blankness of the park hints that people have retreated to their homes, while the dark habor amplifies the vanishing of the day. As depicted here, the sky becomes a sign of the closure of the day through its ‘underlit’ form. Robert Gray and his companion bear witness on the finale of a day.
