Seamus Heaneys last-known poem was described by the poet laureate, Carol Ann Duffy, as heartbreakingly prescient Heaney chose Edward Thomass great poem, As The Teams Head Brass, which he wrote in 1916 shortly before he asked to be posted to the front – a decision that led to his death at Arras the following year. In response Heaney wrote In a Field , completed in June, two months before his own death and now published for the first time. In a field by Seamus Heaney And there I was in the middle of a field, The furrows once called scores still with their gloss, The tractor with its hoisted plough just gone Snarling at an unexpected speed Out on the road. Last of the jobs, The windings had been ploughed, furrows turned Three ply or four round each of the four sides Of the breathing land, to mark it off And out. Within that boundary now Step the fleshy earth and follow The long healed footprints of one who arrived From nowhere, unfamiliar and de-mobbed, In buttoned khaki and buffed army boots, Bruising the turned-up acres of our back field To stumble from the windings magic ring And take me by a hand to lead me back Through the same old gate into the yard Where everyone has suddenly appeared, All standing waiting.
Posted on: Mon, 28 Oct 2013 22:55:59 +0000
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