Michael Shepherd - ! ! Celebrating Philip Larkin

He looks out at you from the photograph
or rather, doesn’t: eyes wide but blank,
thick lenses would place your image
in a plane you don’t inhabit;

like a fish that in an aquarium
suddenly swims direct toward you
stopping at the glass to stare a moment:
was there a meeting? What
are you to the fish?

So, nothing. Then next day,
he’s propping his bike against the wall,
bending down to take off his cycle clips;
caught so close, you exchange
English noises: the weather,
a joke or was it, delivered deadpan:
but the sound of him stays with you:
melancholy and yet celebrating
the confidence in being ordinary.

Then next day, the poetry:
starts matter-of-fact, regretful,
doesn’t miss a thing around him,
sharp eyes hiding behind pebble lenses: then,
dives with us into the sea of greatness:
calls us, reels us in, enslaves the heart
with voice that speaks beyond all melancholy;
haunted by the completeness of eternity.

Michael Shepherd

http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/celebrating-philip-larkin/