Poetry International Poetry International
Poem

Gillian Clarke

In the Reading Room

In the Reading Room

In the Reading Room

You scan the stream, silver-eyed as a heron
searching the surface for what might betray
a halt in the flow, pentameter’s delay,
a master’s faded words, his lexicon.

Before you, found in an old book
marking a page, a longhand manuscript.
Look, where the knib unloaded ink and dipped
and rose again, leaving a blot on the downstroke,

writing by candlelight in another century,
wind in the chimney, maybe, the pen’s small sound.
You write: ‘Anonymous. Date a mystery.
Some words illegible. No signature found.’

Yet the poem sings in your mind from the silent archive
and all the dead words speak, aloud, alive.
Close

In the Reading Room

You scan the stream, silver-eyed as a heron
searching the surface for what might betray
a halt in the flow, pentameter’s delay,
a master’s faded words, his lexicon.

Before you, found in an old book
marking a page, a longhand manuscript.
Look, where the knib unloaded ink and dipped
and rose again, leaving a blot on the downstroke,

writing by candlelight in another century,
wind in the chimney, maybe, the pen’s small sound.
You write: ‘Anonymous. Date a mystery.
Some words illegible. No signature found.’

Yet the poem sings in your mind from the silent archive
and all the dead words speak, aloud, alive.

In the Reading Room

Sponsors
Gemeente Rotterdam
Nederlands Letterenfonds
Stichting Van Beuningen Peterich-fonds
Prins Bernhard cultuurfonds
Lira fonds
Versopolis
J.E. Jurriaanse
Gefinancierd door de Europese Unie
Elise Mathilde Fonds
Stichting Verzameling van Wijngaarden-Boot
Veerhuis
VDM
Partners
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