R.S. Thomas Five Poems: Ninetieth Birthday, Good, The Way of It, The Visit and Death of a Poet.

The first two poems see the bird-watching priest-poet paying a visit to elderly parishioners. His dislike of the machine of course included cars and tractors but, it would appear from elsewhere, extended even as far as vacuum cleaners.

The third poem is a reflection on his life with Mildred Elsi Eldridge(!909-1981), an established artist at 25 who sold all she had on show in the 1936 Royal Academy Exhibition and ran a Bentley. According to their son Gwydion she cooked four meals for her husband every day for 50 years and latterly painted in a miserable damp room with her feet in a cardboard box warmed by a small electric fire. But, it would appear,she also managed to give her husband the occasional hard time. Although having a curious compulsion to be exceptionally hard on himself Thomas was very sensitive to criticism from others.

The fourth poem is an account of a visit by someone who came to vent her anger in his presence. My suspicion that she had not come to denounce another parishioner but was angry with something he had done arises from a sense that, far from being pleased with himself that he had managed to see this person off without even speaking to her, he recognises that he had, in some way, failed her. Perhaps this arises from his observation that a woman might have the capacity to offer a devastating personal critique while smiling all the while to let us know that she still cares about us in spite of the fact we are a total dead loss,

She came for deliverance and he sent her away with a stone.




The Visit

She was small;
Composed in her way
Like music. She sat
In the chair I had not
Offered, smiling at my left
Shoulder. I waited on
For the sentences her smile
Sugared.
That the tongue
Is a whip needed no
Proving. And yet her eye
Fondled me. It was clear
What anger brought her
To my door would not unleash
The coils. Instead she began
Rehearsing for her
Departure. As though ashamed
Of a long stay, she rose,
Touched the tips of my cold
Hand with hers and turned
To the closed door. I remember
Not opening it.