Ted Hughes

Prometheus On His Crag Had such an advantageous prospect He could see, even as he slept, The aeons revolving. He could see, centre of every aeon, Like the grit in its pearl, Himself sealed on his rock. Between the aeons - dark nothing. But he could see Himself wading escaping through dark nothing From aeon to aeon, prophesying Freedom - It was his soul’s sleepwalking and he dreamed it. Only waking when the vulture woke him Into a new aeon                                to the old chains                                                               and the old agony.

Flowerlike, I loved nothing.

Love struck into his life / Like a hawk into a dovecote.

He gripped her hard so that life Should not drag her from that moment He wanted all future to cease He wanted to topple with his arms round her Off that moment’s brink and into nothing

My own affable familiar ghost has been absent for some time—

Spain was what you tried to wake up from And could not. I see you, in moonlight, Walking the empty wharf at Alicante Like a soul waiting for the ferry, A new soul, still not understanding, Thinking it is still your honeymoon In the happy world, with your whole life waiting, Happy, and all your poems still to be found.

I am not composing poetry. I am trying to get out of the flames.

The moon has stepped back like an artist gazing amazed at a work / That points at him amazed.

Nibelung wolves barbed like black pineforest / Against a red sky, over blue snow;

Blade-light, luminous black and emerald, / Flexing like the lens of a mad eye.