The Pleasure Steamers
by Andrew Motion
II.
The river repeats itself, and I
repeat myself watching it; here is
my hand on the bridge as it was
this morning, and here in a crevice
of moss the match I dropped then.
Everything waits for me till I live
far enough forward to find it changed:
now what I see in the twilight
as logs, rotate on the current
as sluggish and matted as what
I guessed must have been hidden
early today. There was a van
drawn up by the rushes, and on the mud
a diver, easing his mask off,
calling 'I couldn't see anything'.
Neither could I. Just clouds
on indolent stretches of water,
and somewhere beneath it
an absence of light, increasing,
swelling towards me like rain.
[from The Pleasure Steamers (1978): Carcanet]
© Copyright Carcanet Press Ltd. Reproduced for personal use only: do not circulate.