At Noon

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This poem by Elizabeth Jennings originally appeared in the May 1956 edition of The London Magazine, alongside poetry by Philip Larkin, Kingsley Amis and Thom Gunn as part of the Young English Poets series.

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Lying upon my bed I see 
Full noon at ease. Each way I look
A world established without me 
Proclaims itself. I take a book 
And flutter through the pages where
Sun leaps through shadows. And I stare

Straight through the words and find again
A world that has no need of me.
The poems stride against the strain
Of complex rhythms. Separately
I lie and struggle to become
More than a centre to this room.

I want the ease of noon outside 
Also the strength of words which move
Against their music. All the wide 
And casual day I need to stuff 
With my own meaning, and the book
Of poems reflect me where I look. 

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Elizabeth Jennings was born in Boston, Lincolnshire, in 1926 and read English at St Anne’s College, Oxford. Her first book was awarded a Somerset Maugham Award, and many other distinctions followed, including a CBE.

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