On the day of the explosion Shadows pointed towards the pithead:0 mine entrance In the sun the slagheap0 slept. pile of scrap, refuse
Down the lane came men in pitboots 5 Coughing oath-edged talk and pipe-smoke, Shouldering off the freshened silence.
On e chased after rabbits; lost them; Cam e back with a nest of lark's eggs; Showed them; lodged them in the grasses.
io So they passed in beards and moleskins,1 Fathers, brothers, nicknames, laughter, Through the tall gates standing open.
At noon, there came a tremor; cows Stopped chewing for a second; sun, 15 Scarfed as in a heat-haze, dimmed.
The dead go on before us, they Are sitting in God's house in comfort, We shall see them face to face?
Plain as lettering in the chapels 20 It was said, and for a second Wives saw men of the explosion
Larger than in life they managed ? Gold as on a coin, or walking Someho w from the sun towards them,
25 On e showing the eggs unbroken.
1970 1974
This Be The Verse1
They fuck you up, your mu m and dad. They may not mean to, but they do.
1. Clothes of heavy fabric. he lies where he longed to be, / Home is the sailor, I. Cf. the elegy 'Requiem,' by Robert Louis Ste-home from sea, / And the hunter home from the venson (1850-1894), of which the final verse hill.' reads, 'This be the verse you grave for me: / Here
.
AUBADE / 2573
They fill you with the faults they had An d add some extra, just for you.
5 But they were fucked up in their turn By fools in old-style hats and coats, Wh o half the time were soppy- stern An d half at one another's throats.
Ma n hands on misery to man. 10 It deepens like a coastal shelf.2 Get out as early as you can, An d don't have any kids yourself.
Apr. ? 1971 1974
Aubade1
I work all day, and get half-drunk at night. Wakin g at four to soundless dark, I stare. In time the curtain- edges will grow light. Till then I see what's really always there:
5 Unresting death, a whole day nearer now, Making all thought impossible but how And where and when I shall myself die. Arid interrogation: yet the dread Of dying, and being dead,
10 Flashes afresh to hold and horrify.
The mind blanks at the glare. Not in remorse ?Th e good not done, the love not given, time Torn off unused?nor wretchedly because An only life can take so long to climb
15 Clear of its wrong beginnings, and may never; But at the total emptiness for ever, Th e sure extinction that we travel to And shall be lost in always. Not to be here, Not to be anywhere,
20 An d soon; nothing more terrible, nothing more true.
This is a special way of being afraid No trick dispels. Religion used to try, That vast moth-eaten musical brocade Created to pretend we never die,
25 An d specious stuff that says N o rational being Can fear a thing it will not feel, not seeing That this is what we fear?no sight, no sound, No touch or taste or smell, nothing to think with, Nothing to love or link with,
30 The anaesthetic from which none come round.
2. Underwater land off a coast 1. Music or poem announcing dawn.
.
257 4 / NADINE GORDIMER
An d so it stays just on the edge of vision,
A small unfocused blur, a standing chill
That slows each impulse down to indecision.
Most things may never happen: this one will,
35 An d realisation of it rages out
In furnace-fear when we are caught without
People or drink. Courage is no good:
It means not scaring others. Being brave
Lets no one off the grave.
