Two Poets

Two poets have been in the news. Firstly, Louise Glück won the Nobel Prize for Literature. I rather like the following lines from her poem 'Vespers', which say it like it is, for me at least.

"In your extended absence, you permit me

use of earth, anticipating

some return on investment. I must report

failure in my assignment, principally

regarding the tomato plants."

And Derek Mahon, Irish poet and 'aesthete with a penchant for left-wingery', died at the beginning of the month. He also tells it like it is, this time with perhaps a wider pertinence. These lines are from 'Afterlives':

"What middle-class shits we are

To imagine for one second
That our privileged ideals
Are divine wisdom..."