At The Grave Of Edmund Blunden Copyright © James Knox Whittet 2010

Reading by Richard Whiting

I live still to love still things quiet and unconcerned

We search along footpaths of lush, drenched grass
to find your grave to voice the words you wrote,
knowing our own voices will one day pass;
above our bent heads, those tear gas clouds float.

Below your resting place, the traffic drones
more softly than thunder of distant guns
that shook your faith in all you'd ever known
when waves of blood – spattered mud eclipsed suns.

You lie now licked by the cold tongue of sleep,
having found the stillness you loved and sought
on summer evenings like this when leaves weep
with raindrops that sound like musical notes.

You glimpsed mysteries beneath the mundane:
that orderly dance of beauty and pain.