Grief

Lost in the Bush – in memory …

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Australia is a very large country. There are fast areas of remote land. And in some places the bush is very dense and not easily penetrated. From time-to-time people get lost due to misadventure and those that plan walking in these areas need to take extreme care especially taking plenty of water.

Unfortunately, I have just experienced such a situation firsthand involving the brother of a close friend, Peter Willoughby, who became lost in the HollyBank Forest Reserve in northern Tasmania in early October. After extensive searching he could not be found. I will not go into details of the situation that caused him to become lost. Below is my memorial poem. My prayers are for all those who have to come to terms with such a loss.

 Lost in the Bush
in memory of Peter Willoughby

there are special places time itself forgets,
where no foot treads, where gum and bark in secret reign;
the Bush endures all weather, all regret,
impervious to loss, indifferent to pain

the centuries pass untouched by human hand,
    while inside the Bush’s wanton stare,
                 nature in silence evolves the land
                             never knowing the life that’s there
but sometimes fate, in tragic circumstance,
                draws a man to wander a path unknown;
                           remaining unseen by the searching glance
and the Bush receives a body — quietly, as its own

                        forever held in nature’s keep,
                        where earth and memory together sleep.
         
Richard Scutter 15 October 2025


Edgar Allan Poe – Female connectivity

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Edgar Allan Poe was born in Boston in 1809, the same year as Tennyson.  He was a poet, editor, and literary critic who is best known for his poetry and short stories, particularly his tales involving mystery and the macabre. He is widely regarded as one of the central figures of Romanticism and Gothic fiction in the United States and of early American literature. And he was the first American to rely entirely on his literary writing to make a living.

“Annabel Lee” was Edgar Allan Poe’s last poem and unpublished at the time of his death. He regarded it as his most significant poem and made pains to ensure that it would be published. It is thought that it is in connection with his first childhood love a cousin, Virginnia Eliza Clemn who he married when he was 26 and she 13. The marriage lasted eleven years ending when Virginia died of tuberculosis in 1847.

Here is the poem …

Annabel Lee

It was many and many a year ago,
In a kingdom by the sea,
That a maiden there lived whom you may know
By the name of Annabel Lee; —
And this maiden she lived with no other thought
Than to love and be loved by me.
 
I was a child and she was a child,
In this kingdom by the sea;
But we loved with a love that was more than love —
I and my Annabel Lee —
With a love that the wingéd seraphs in Heaven
Coveted her and me.
 
And this was the reason that, long ago,
In this kingdom by the sea,
A wind blew out of a cloud, chilling
My beautiful Annabel Lee;
So that her high-born kinsmen came
And bore her away from me,
To shut her up in a sepulchre,
In this kingdom by the sea.
 
The angels, not half so happy in Heaven,
Went envying her and me —
Yes! — that was the reason (as all men know,
In this kingdom by the sea)
That the wind came out of the cloud by night,
Chilling and killing my Annabel Lee.
 
But our love it was stronger by far than the love
Of those who were older than we —
Of many far wiser than we —
And neither the angels in Heaven above,
Nor the demons down under the sea,
Can ever dissever my soul from the soul
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee: —
 
For the moon never beams, without bringing me dreams
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;
And the stars never rise, but I feel the bright eyes
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee: —
And so, all the night-tide, I lie down by the side
Of my darling — my darling — my life and my bride,
In her sepulcher there by the sea —
In her tomb by the sounding sea.

Edgar Allan Poe (1809 – 1849)

The angels in heaven were jealous of her, so she was quite an earth angel – metaphorically speaking.

The locked forever connection with beloved “Annabel Lee” suggests a spiritual afterlife association. So many people express deeper connectivity with a beloved partner after he or she dies. In regard to poetry Thomas Hardy comes to mind.

Edgar Allan Poe on Wikipedia … https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edgar_Allan_Poe

Tonight I can write the saddest lines – Pablo Neruda

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Tonight I Can Write The Saddest Lines

Tonight I can write the saddest lines.
Write, for example,'The night is shattered
and the blue stars shiver in the distance.'
The night wind revolves in the sky and sings.

Tonight I can write the saddest lines.

Tonight I can write the saddest lines.
I loved her, and sometimes she loved me too.

Through nights like this one I held her in my arms
I kissed her again and again under the endless sky.

She loved me sometimes, and I loved her too.
How could one not have loved her great still eyes.

To think that I do not have her. To feel that I have lost her.
To hear the immense night, still more immense without her.
And the verse falls to the soul like dew to the pasture.

What does it matter that my love could not keep her.
The night is shattered and she is not with me.

This is all. In the distance someone is singing. In the distance.

My soul is not satisfied that it has lost her.
My sight searches for her as though to go to her.
My heart looks for her, and she is not with me.

The same night whitening the same trees.
We, of that time, are no longer the same.
I no longer love her, that's certain, but how I loved her.

My voice tried to find the wind to touch her hearing.

Another's. She will be another's. Like my kisses before.
Her void. Her bright body. Her infinite eyes.
I no longer love her, that's certain, but maybe I love her.

Love is so short, forgetting is so long.
Because through nights like this one I held her in my arms
my soul is not satisfied that it has lost her.

Though this be the last pain that she makes me suffer
and these the last verses that I write for her.

Pablo Neruda (1904 - 1973)

He was twenty when he wrote this poem. It was published in the year 1924. Clearly this is a poem about grief associated afer the breakup of a love affair very early in life. And early stages too in the grief process emphasised by the statement my soul is not satisfied that it has lost her. To not have the physical intimacy of the relationship in the first days of the breakup is shattered at night time. The night the time the loss is magnified – to hear the immense night, still more immense without her.

The intense pain of not having physical connection is overwhelming and this dominates the poem. I like the single line stanzas that allow the reader to spend time deliberating on the sad state of affairs. The monologue and the repetition give emphasis to his sad emotional state.

But there appears to me a searching question on what is love. Apart from the physical aspects on knowing her body and the sexual union in lines such as –

I no longer love her, that’s certain, but how I loved her.
I no longer love her, that’s certain, but maybe I love her.

Maybe he is looking at other aspects of her that connect with deeper meaning. Attributes such as integrity, compassion, personal goals, philosophy … aspects that could form a common bond beyond the physical.

This is the probably a sad reflection on a first love. At least the first more meaningful love relationship for he authored the poem at the age of twenty, so hopefully over time he had more success. His ‘Memoirs’ detail his relationships with many women. Although he extolled the beauty of woman in his love poetry his treatment of women was sadly lacking. But of course the product of the time he lived. His love sonnets were very much a tribute to his third wife Matilde Urrudia.

A Dog Has Died – Pablo Neruda

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A Dog Has Died

My dog has died.
I buried him in the garden
next to a rusted old machine.
Some day I'll join him right there,
but now he's gone with his shaggy coat,
his bad manners and his cold nose,
and I, the materialist, who never believed
in any promised heaven in the sky
for any human being,
I believe in a heaven I'll never enter.
Yes, I believe in a heaven for all dogdom
where my dog waits for my arrival
waving his fan-like tail in friendship.
Ai, I'll not speak of sadness here on earth,
of having lost a companion
who was never servile.
His friendship for me, like that of a porcupine
withholding its authority,
was the friendship of a star, aloof,
with no more intimacy than was called for,
with no exaggerations:
he never climbed all over my clothes
filling me full of his hair or his mange,
he never rubbed up against my knee
like other dogs obsessed with sex.
No, my dog used to gaze at me,
paying me the attention I need,
the attention required
to make a vain person like me understand
that, being a dog, he was wasting time,
but, with those eyes so much purer than mine,
he'd keep on gazing at me
with a look that reserved for me alone
all his sweet and shaggy life,
always near me, never troubling me,
and asking nothing.
Ai, how many times have I envied his tail
as we walked together on the shores of the sea
in the lonely winter of Isla Negra
where the wintering birds filled the sky
and my hairy dog was jumping about
full of the voltage of the sea's movement:
my wandering dog, sniffing away
with his golden tail held high,
face to face with the ocean's spray.
Joyful, joyful, joyful,
as only dogs know how to be happy
with only the autonomy
of their shameless spirit.
There are no good-byes for my dog who has died,
and we don't now and never did lie to each other.

So now he's gone and I buried him,
and that's all there is to it.

Pablo Neruda (1904 - 1973)

This is Neruda’s pet dog and the first thing to notice is that there is no naming of the dog other than dog. 
The emphasis is on the fact that he is Dog.

S1 … A straightforward statement that the dog has died and been buried.

S2 … Neruda will have similar fate. He reflects on the attributes that are commonly associated with a dog. Looking at the negative side of dog. Although Neruda has no believe in heaven his dog will be there and waiting for him in Dog Heaven.

S3 … his dog was not a close dog … rather distant like a star … there was no intimacy of touch that is common with a dog as pet

S4 … it looks as though the Dog gazes at the pathetic creature that is Neruda … he is there out of duty but what a waste of dog time … never troubles his owner

S5 … and when Neruda takes dog for a walk along the coast at Isla Negro (at the cottage in Chile where Neruda lived), Neruda is jealous at the natural happy full of life spirit that Dog shows on the walk … and I love the line full of the voltage of the sea’s movement … perhaps Neruda, in contrast is depressed, the poem was written near the end of his life.

S6 … no goodbyes necessary, a honest relationship

S7 … In line with the first stanza the Dog is buried and gone and that’s the end. As though a full stop on grief. I think he loved his dog very much despite wallowing in self-pity and using such a degrading tone.

This is certainly a different poem than one usually associates with Neruda. Most people would associate Neruda with his famous love sonnets.

Bobowler – Liz Berry – Comments

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Bobowler
Darkling herald, 
see her flower-face on a waning moon 
and spake her name aloud 
to conjure the voice 
of one you loved and let slip 
through the wing gauze of jeth. 

In the owl-light,
when loneliness shines
through your bones like a bare bulb, 
she'll come for you, 
little psyche bringing missives 
from the murmuring dark.  

She comes to all the night birds:
cuckoos, thieves, the old uns 
and the babies in their dimlit wums, 
the boy riding his bike 
up Beacon Hill, heart thundering 
like a strange summer storm. 

And the messages she carries 
in her slow soft flight? 
Too tender to speak of, too heartsore, 
but this: I am waiting. 
The love that lit the darkness between us 
has not been lost. 
Liz Berry (1980 –
from her book 'The Republic of Motherhood'.

Liz Berry is a Black Country poet in that she lives and writes poetry in connection with that area known as the Black Country in England an area in the midlands near Birmingham and her book entitled the same includes the use of the local dialect and it won the Forward Prize for the Best First Collection in 2014.

She very kindly sent a reading of the above poem for our U3A Poetry Appreciation Group in Canberra last week. It was wonderful to hear her, and I was totally mesmerized by the touch of humour that pervaded her presentation along with the pronunciation of the local vernacular.

Bobowler = a large moth in the local language
Jeth = deth
Cuckoos = lovers
dimlit wums = homes

Here are my comments …

S1 – quite a pretty moth and shaped in conjunction with the moon appropriately associated with the night as it seeks light … darkling is a not a common usage word and what came to mind was darkling in connection with Thomas Hardy and The Darkling Thrush … but the moth is a herald to the memory of someone loved who let slip through the wing gauze of death … wing in relation to the moth and the flight from life … but the voice of the departed can be conjured into life … indicating a touch of magic in the recreation in her mind … something very special in the relationship.

S2 – Interesting that owl is integrated in the Bobowler title. I do like the way this second stanza expresses how loneliness and loss is subjugated through bones like a bare bulb and bringing missives; messages out of the murmuring night. Missives is an interesting word having a contractual flavour. The subtle shadow communication of the person loved is likened to the flutter of a moth against the light of the bulb. The analogy with the seeking of light.

S3 – A wider generic communication perhaps … she comes to all … of those much loved that have departed … bringing messages … whether to lovers, the aged, babies in their homes (dimlit wums) … or something very specific as a boy struggling on a bike up Beacon Hill … the departed are continually fluttering into our lives to live again so to speak … linked in the mind

S4 – The messages are back to the personal … tender and likened to the slow soft flight of the moth. Love is rekindled and never lost. The love that lit the darkness between us may imply more than just the separation by death.

An example of how something simple in nature like a moth flitting against a light bulb can be used for poetic expression. And how seeking light can be transferred into seeking connection with the dead. And the use of the old dialect may help the recall.

Liz Berry on Wikipedia

Everyone Sang – Siegfried Sassoon

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Everyone Sang
Everyone suddenly burst out singing;
And I was filled with such delight 
As prisoned birds must find in freedom, 
Winging wildly across the white 
Orchards and dark-green fields; on - on - and out of sight.
Everyone's voice was suddenly lifted; 
And beauty came like the setting sun: 
My heart was shaken with tears; and horror 
Drifted away ... O, but Everyone 
Was a bird; and the song was wordless; the singing will never be done.
Siegfried Sassoon (1886 – 1967)

Yesterday was ‘Remembrance Day’ it also coincided with the easing in Canberra of the restrictions associated with the virus.

This well-known poem is all about freedom and release from war.

The first stanza highlights the immediacy of the release in a sudden outburst of joy. But there is a hint of the transient nature of this emotion with the disappearance of the birds in the last line of the stanza on – and out of sight.

The second stanza shows the joy to be short lived being counteracted by grief – and beauty came like the setting sun. And ends with the dramatic statement – and the song was wordless; the singing will never be done. The song being wordless; without meaning. Siegfried Sassoon remembers those that died in the war and those that are maimed and unable to join the celebration.

In similar fashion there is a degree of immediate relief at the easing of virus-restrictions counteracted by the unease that the virus is still a threat to life. And for those families that have lost members there is that on-going shadow to life. We are fortunate for currently there are no virus-related patients in Canberra hospitals.

Siegfried Sassoon on Wikipedia     

Surprised by Joy – William Wordsworth – comments

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Surprised by Joy

Surprised by joy—impatient as the Wind
I turned to share the transport—Oh! with whom
But Thee, long buried in the silent Tomb,
That spot which no vicissitude can find?
Love, faithful love, recalled thee to my mind—
But how could I forget thee?—Through what power,
Even for the least division of an hour,
Have I been so beguiled as to be blind
To my most grievous loss!—That thought’s return
Was the worst pang that sorrow ever bore,
Save one, one only, when I stood forlorn,
Knowing my heart’s best treasure was no more;
That neither present time, nor years unborn
Could to my sight that heavenly face restore.
William Wordsworth (1750 – 1830)

This sonnet is based on Wordsworth’s daughter Catherine, who died in 1812, aged just three. The poem reflects on a moment of happiness that instinctively came to him in relation to the joy brought to him by his daughter. And it could be a moment long after the death based on long buried.


Looking at that memorable first line – Surprised by joy—impatient as the Wind. It appears that something has triggered remembrance and a joyful remembrance. It could have been an object associated with the infant or a word spoken by someone; but whatever it was it brought instant joy. And whatever it was love was at the core – love, faithful love, recalled thee to my mind. And the effect was a need for an expansion of this feeling. The Wind is personified; and the wind is impatient. It often comes rattling at your door demanding recognition. In the same way Wordsworth is impatient for an expansion to his joy. And then he states emphatically that it is impossible to forget his daughter – But how could I forget thee? Indicating perhaps that it is a renewed reflection, suggesting a little guilt.

The last six lines promote the grievous thought on never ever seeing Catherine again; and never ever being able to share again. And time does continually distance us from those we love and have died. And, like Wordsworth, we all must come to terms with this as time minimises the gold in our own personal life.

Metaphorically we collect gold coins over the years and quite often we forget we hold them in our pocket. However, from time to time we take them out and look at their face value.

vicissitude = change in circumstance or fortune


William Wordsworth on Wikipedia

A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning – John Donne

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A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning 
As virtuous men pass mildly away,
    And whisper to their souls to go,
 Whilst some of their sad friends do say
    The breath goes now, and some say, No:
So let us melt, and make no noise,
    No tear-floods, nor sigh-tempests move;
 'Twere profanation of our joys
    To tell the laity our love.
Moving of th' earth brings harms and fears,
    Men reckon what it did, and meant;
 But trepidation of the spheres,
    Though greater far, is innocent.
Dull sublunary lovers' love
    (Whose soul is sense) cannot admit
 Absence, because it doth remove
    Those things which elemented it.
But we by a love so much refined,
    That our selves know not what it is,
 Inter-assured of the mind,
    Care less, eyes, lips, and hands to miss.
Our two souls therefore, which are one, 
   Though I must go, endure not yet
 A breach, but an expansion,
    Like gold to airy thinness beat.
If they be two, they are two so
    As stiff twin compasses are two; 
Thy soul, the fixed foot, makes no show 
   To move, but doth, if the other do.
And though it in the center sit,
    Yet when the other far doth roam,
 It leans and hearkens after it,
    And grows erect, as that comes home.
Such wilt thou be to me, who must, 
   Like th' other foot, obliquely run;
 Thy firmness makes my circle just,
    And makes me end where I begun.
John Donne (1572 – 1631)

Valediction = the action of farewell … a statement or address made at that time

S1 … well this sets the scene on the way you should say farewell … it also illustrates the spiritual journey from earthy presence to that of eternity … a gentle passing of the soul … a farewell from one state to another.

S2 … Do not sound trumpets of sorrow and moaning when making a farewell to a loved one. This only cheapens that love. Let it be an internal grief rather than a display to the public combined with a spiritual recognition of the love

S3 … Then the metaphor of describing the physical earthly relationship with that of the spirit in terms of world natural happenings that are seen such as earthquakes with what is happening in the far-flung regions of the universe where nought can be seen with the human eye. Interesting that JD regards the distant regions as innocent, I suppose not contaminated by human existence.

S4 … Concentration on the sensual aspect and the loss of physical contact. This is a non-acceptance of the absence. For those more spiritually inclined there is no absence because a spiritual connection exists. Holding on the spiritual connection is not easy at the time of immediate grief.

S5 … The physical aspect of love is defined by – the eyes, lips, and touch of hands. This is compared with the spiritual aspect held in the mind by thought and prayer.

S6 … Two souls as one … an expansion – like the beating of gold. Apparently, gold can be beaten into very thin sheet … a transformation process, is likened to that of the separation process … properties remain but in a different ‘shape’

S7 … The compass is used as a way of defining a permanent relationship between the two people. The fixed part is the one left behind / the one loved. You then circle around this central figure. The central arm of the compass always following and facing you as you move. It is poetic to think of our creator acting like this, following and supporting us in every move.

S8 … The fixed part leans towards the lover if far away from centre. And the two arms of a compass can come together for close contact.

S9 … JD declares the importance of the circle. The circle is seen as perfect. It is only perfected by the firmness of the central arm. And, of course, the circle is endless; back to the starting point again; the origin love.

This is a poem all about contrasting physical and earthly love with that of the spirit. At the same time advising not sounding trumpets of sorrow and moaning when making a farewell to a loved one. And that there should be no mourning because a spiritual identity is on-going in the relationship based on love. There is a difference between mourning and grief.

mourning = the expression of an experience that is the consequence of an event in life involving loss, causing grief.

grief = intense sorrow, an emotional state

The spiritual connection is often a very background compensation.

There is plenty of analysis of this well-known poem on the Internet – A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning Poem Summary and Analysis | LitCharts

John Donne on Wikipedia

And when thinking of the circle I remember the T. S. Eliot plaque in the church at East Coker, Somerset commemorating his life. His famous well-known words – in my beginning is my end … in my end is my beginning.

Parting is such sweet sorrow. I will say goodbye until tomorrow.