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Endings by Derek Walcott

Endings
Derek Walcott

Things do not explode,
they fail, they fade,

as sunlight fades from the flesh,
as the foam drains quick in the sand,

even love’s lightning flash
has no thunderous end,

it dies with the sound
of flowers fading like the flesh

from sweating pumice stone,
everything shapes this

till we are left
with the silence that surrounds Beethoven’s head.

MARGINALIA

Good night, Derek Walcott, sir. Thank you for your poems. Rest easy now.

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Collected Poems 1948-1984 by Derek Walcott

SHARED WITH GRATITUDE

This poem appeared in Collected Poems 1948-1984 by Derek Walcott by Derek Walcott, published by Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 1986. (Available on: Amazon • Bookshop)

ABOUT DEREK WALCOTT

Born on the island of Saint Lucia, a former British colony in the West Indies, poet and playwright Derek Walcott was trained as a painter but turned to writing as a young man. He published his first poem in the local newspaper at the age of 14. Five years later, he borrowed $200 to print his first collection, 25 Poems, which he distributed on street corners. Walcott’s major breakthrough came with the collection In a Green Night: Poems 1948-1960 (1962), a book which celebrates the… (more)

Read more poems by Derek Walcott • Find books by this poet on Amazon • Bookshop • Or view my library

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