Submitted to:Mrs. Sunita Malhotra

Submitted By:Pratishtha AggarwalXI-B

 I do not understand this child

Though we have lived together nowIn the same house for years. I know

Nothing of him, so try to buildUp a relationship from how

He was when small. Yet have I killed The seed I spent or sown it whereThe land is his and none of mine?

We speak like strangers, there's no signOf understanding in the air.

This child is built to my designYet what he loves I cannot share. Silence surrounds us. I would have

Him prodigal, returning toHis father's house, the home he knew,Rather than see him make and move

His world. I would forgive him too,Shaping from sorrow a new love. Father and son, we both must live

On the same globe and the same land.He speaks: I cannot understand

Myself, why anger grows from grief.We each put out an empty hand,Longing for something to forgive. 

FATHER TO SON

INTRODUCTION‘Father to son’ is an autobiographical poem of Elizabeth Jennings. It describes an exclusively personal experience. However, its appeal is fairly universal. Both the father and son are poles apart. There is a generation gap between the two. They think and live differently and have become strangers to each other. Inspite of an urge for reunion, the separation continues and can’t be helped.

The British poet Elizabeth Jennings has published more than 20 books of poetry since the 1950s. She writes short, meditative lyrics that are known for their simplicity, control, and range of feeling. These qualities have linked Jennings to a group of poets, usually referred to as The Movement, who were writing in England during the 1940s and 1950s. The members of this group, poets like Kingsley Amis, Thom Gunn, Philip Larkin, and John Wain, never consciously formed a movement, but their poetry reveals a shared love for simplicity and an acceptance of regular meter and rhyme.

AUTHOR ELIZABETH JENNINGS(1926 -  2001)

Elizabeth Jennings was born on July 18, 1926, in Boston, Lincolnshire. She claims that she discovered poetry at age 13 and began to write, encouraged by a teacher and her uncle. Jennings attended St. Anne's College, Oxford, from 1945 to 1949 and was greatly stimulated by the intellectual atmosphere there.

One of Britain's most popular poets, her work was famed for its imagery, logic and emotional sensitivity

It was at this time that she began to associate with poets of The Movement; some of her first published poems appeared in Oxford Poetry 1948, edited by Kingsley Amis and James Michie. Jennings worked in the Oxford City Library from 1950 to 1958 and as a publisher's reader from 1958 to 1960. During this time she published three books of poetry and a book for children entitled "Let's Have Some Poetry!" (1960). In the early 1960s, Jennings suffered a breakdown and was confined to a hospital. The poems she wrote after her release are collected in Recoveries (1964) and The Mind Has Mountains (1966).

Jennings is an extremely prolific poet. She writes quickly, revises little, and claims that her poems "come out very clean." She differs from the other poets of The Movement in her devotion to Roman Catholicism, a theme that pervades much of her poetry. Jennings also writes about friendship, relationships, places, and art. She does not write autobiographical poems, but her religious concerns, mental illness, and other personal experiences influence the themes and insights expressed in her poetry.

Elizabeth Joan Jennings, poet, born July 18 1926; died October 26 2001

OTHER WORKS BY ELIZABETH JENNINGS

ONE FLESH 

Lying apart now, each in a separate bed,He with a book, keeping the light on late,

She like a girl dreaming of childhood,All men elsewhere---it is as if they wait

Some new event; the book he holds unread,Her eyes fixed on the shadows overhead.

Tossed up like flotsam from a former passion,How cool they lie. They hardly ever touch,

Or if they do it is like a confessionOf having little feeling--or too much.Chastity faces them , a destination

For which their whole lives were a preparation. Strangely apart, yet strangely close together,

Silence between them like a thread to holdAnd not wind in. And time itself's a feather

Touching them gently. Do they know they're old,

These two who are my father and my motherWhose fire from which I came, has now grown

cold?

The unknown child 

The child will never lie in me, and youWill never be its father. Mirrors mustReplace the real image, make it trueSo that the gentle love-making we do

Has powerful passions and a parents’ trust 

The child will never lie in me and makeOur loving careful. We must kiss and touch

Quietly, watch our reflexions breakAs in a pool that is disturbed. Oh take

My watchful love; there must not be too much 

A child lies within my mind. I seethe eyes, the hand. I see you also there.I see you waiting with an honest care,

Within my mind, within me bodily,And bird and death close to us constantly.

 

Old Age  

You were quite silent till the doctor came Kindly to question, breaking through your thoughts.

And were you glad that he recalled your name, Asked you about your pets,

Or would you rather doze there, much the same As some old cat or dog, some lump of fur Beside the fire, unmoving and unmoved,

Grateful that no-one made you speak or stir, Yet wanting to be loved

And finding it in warm sheets and soft chair? You know who gives real kindness, none the less,

Not to child's shouting like some old ones do. You feel for certain hands as though to bless,

And beg a blessing too; And then you weep, simply from happiness.

In Memory of Anyone Unknown to Me   

At this particular time I have no one Particular person to grieve for, though there must

Be many, many unknown ones going to dust Slowly, not remembered for what they have done

Or left undone. For these, then, I will grieve Being impartial, unable to deceive.

  How they lived, or died, is quite unknown, And, by that fact gives my grief purity--

An important person quite apart from me Or one obscure who drifted down alone.

Both or all I remember, have a place. For these I never encountered face to face.

  Sentiment will creep in. I cast it out

Wishing to give these classical repose, No epitaph, no poppy and no rose

From me, and certainly no wish to learn about The way they lived or died. In earth or fire

They are gone. Simply because they were human, I admire.  

Poem in Winter 

Today the children begin to hope for snowAnd look in the sky for auguries of it.It is not for such omens that we wait,

Our world may not be settled by the slowFalling of flakes to lie across our thought.And even if the snow comes down indeedWe shall still stand behind a pane of glass

Untouched by it, and watch the children pressTheir image on the drifts the snow has laid

On a winter they think they have made.This is a wise illusion.   Better to

Believe the near world is created byA wish, a shaping hand, a certain eye,

Than hide in the mind's corner as we doAs though there were no world, no fall of snow.

  

In a foreign city

You cannot speak for no one knowsYour language. You must try to catch

By glances or a steadfast gazeThe attitude of those you watch.

No conversations can amaze:Noises may find you but not speech. Now you have circled silence, stare

With all the subtlety of sight.Noise may trap ears but eye discerns

How someone on his elbows turnsAnd in the moon's long exile here

Touches another in the night.