End of the century, 1984

Death

Synthetic winds have blown away
Material dust, but this one room
Rebukes the constant violet ray
And dustless sheds a dusty gloom.
Wrecked on the outmoded past
Lie North and Hillard, Virgil, Horace,
Shakespeare's bones are quiet at last,
Dead as Yeats or William Morris.
Have not the inmates earned their rest?
A hundred circles traversed they
Complaining of the classic quest
And, each inevitable day,
Illogically trying to place
A ball within an empty space.



Birth

Every loss is now a gain
For every chance must follow reason.
A crystal palace meets the rain
That falls at its appointed season.
No book disturbs the lucid line
For sun-bronzed scholars tune their thought
To Telepathic Station 9
From which they know just what they ought:
The useful sciences; the arts
Of telesalesmanship and Spanish
As registered in Western parts;
Mental cremation that shall banish
Relics, philosophies and colds --
Manana-minded ten-year-olds.



The Phoenix

Worlds have died that they may live,
May plume again their fairest feathers
And in their clearest songs may give
Welcome to all spontaneous weathers.
Bacon's colleague is called Einstein,
Huxley shares Platonic food,
Violet rays are only sunshine
Christened in the modern mood,
In this house if in no other
Past and future may agree,
Each herself, but each the other
In a curious harmony,
Finding both a proper place
In the silken gown's embrace.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
Posted: Feb 2011
About this poem:
Eileen Maud O'Shaughnessy was the wife of Eric Arthur Blair- better known by his pen-name 'George Orwell'.
The poem was written in 1934, intended as a look 50 years into the future...

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Comments (5)

Fellsman
Thanks for posting this Hek. The poetry is sublime and enlightening. Glad you were able to dig this out.

Regards

Bill cheers
Macduff5
This is an impressive piece. I've read "1984" and " Animal Farm" again as recently as last year. I didn't realize his wife was that talented. Thanks for sharing. cheers
Hekamaat
Eileen O'Shaughnessy held a Master's degree in psychology (...and that in the early 30s!)
She gave it up to live with a down-and-out writer in a drafty, damp and cold cottage without even a proper bathroom.

During the wedding, she insisted that the part about "Obediance" be removed from the vows; Eric consented.

They spend the first few weeks fighting like cat and dog; in a letter she wrote:
"I lost my habit of punctual correspondence during the first few weeks of marriage because we quarrelled so continuously & really bitterly that I thought I'd save time & just write one letter to everyone when the murder or separation had been accomplished."

In her correspondence, she used a nickname for her husband:
"Pig"...


Those two famous books would never have been written without her.
She died on march 29th 1945 during a routine operation:
The day Winston Smith was born.

Violet rays are only sunshine...
boyshchrm6
Thanks Hekamaat for the submission and a bit of a history lesson
awesome poem. angel thumbs up
Macduff5
And George or Eric didn't last much longer...interesting stuff...thanks Hek.
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