Poetry Explorer

Classic and Contemporary Poetry

AGED HEAD, by                    
First Line: This is the ice that in the end shall claim
Last Line: To plumb abstraction that includes the flesh?
Subject(s): Death; Dead, The


This is the ice that in the end shall claim
The patient earth—this the unbreathing night
That gathers from the poles to starve the flame
Of blood and flower. Here in my pitying sight
Moves a quenched universe, as now might move
Within the eye of God a perished star;
And I observe the orbit in the groove,
The law that leads an empty shape too far.
The living have no claim; we are a call,
A puzzle to beset his lowered head.
But there are those he knew—and they are all.
His loyalties have shifted to the dead.
Why should we come with voices shrill and fresh
To plumb abstraction that includes the flesh?





Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!


Other Poems of Interest...
Home: PoetryExplorer.net