Author: Ted Hughes

“No, the serpent did not Seduce Eve to the apple. All that’s simply Corruption of the facts. Adam ate the […]

The mahogany table-top you smashed Had been the broad plank top Of my mother’s heirloom sideboard- Mapped with the scars […]

Freezing dusk is closing Like a slow trap of steel On trees and roads and hills and all That can […]

She gives him his eyes, she found them Among some rubble, among some beetles He gives her her skin He […]

This house has been far out at sea all night, The woods crashing through darkness, the booming hills, Winds stampeding […]

We sit late, watching the dark slowly unfold: No clock counts this. When kisses are repeated and the arms hold […]

When Crow was white he decided the sun was too white. He decided it glared much too whitely. He decided […]

Crow, feeling his brain slip, Finds his every feather the fossil of a murder. Who murdered all these? These living […]

The flame-red moon, the harvest moon, Rolls along the hills, gently bouncing, A vast balloon, Till it takes off, and […]

I imagine this midnight moment’s forest: Something else is alive Beside the clock’s loneliness And this blank page where my […]

I sit in the top of the wood, my eyes closed. Inaction, no falsifying dream Between my hooked head and […]

To Paint a Water Lily A green level of lily leaves Roofs the pond’s chamber and paves The flies’ furious […]

The swallow of summer, she toils all the summer, A blue-dark knot of glittering voltage, A whiplash swimmer, a fish […]

In the beginning was Scream Who begat Blood Who begat Eye Who begat Fear Who begat Wing Who begat Bone […]

I saw my world again through your eyes As I would see it again through your children’s eyes. Through your […]

Stirs its ashes and embers, its burnt sticks An eye powdered over, half melted and solid again Ponders Ideas that […]

Who owns those scrawny little feet? Death. Who owns this bristly scorched-looking face? Death. Who owns these still-working lungs? Death. […]

A cool small evening shrunk to a dog bark and the clank of a bucket – And you listening. A […]

Against the rubber tongues of cows and the hoeing hands of men Thistles spike the summer air And crackle open […]

Russia and America circle each other; Threats nudge an act that were without doubt A melting of the mould in […]

Terrifying are the attent sleek thrushes on the lawn, More coiled steel than living – a poised Dark deadly eye, […]

The tractor stands frozen – an agony To think of. All night Snow packed its open entrails. Now a head-pincering […]

He loved her and she loved him His kisses sucked out her whole past and future or tried to He […]

Once upon a time there was a person He was walking along He met the full burning moon Rolling slowly […]