TED HUGHES PAST PAPERS CONTEXT:

You went on and on. Here were reasons

To recite Chaucer. Then came the Wyf of Bath,
Your favourite character in all literature.

We were rapt. And the cows were enthralled. (2004) (CHAUCER)i

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We came where the salmon were so many,

So steady, so spaced, so far aimed
On their inner map, England could add
Only the sooty twilight of South Yorkshire
Hung with the drumming drift of Lancstars
Till the world had seemed capsizing slowly.(2005) (THAT MORNING)

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A cool small evening shrunk to a dog bark and the clank of bucket
And you listening
A spider's web tense for the dew's touch.
A pail lifted, still and brimming - mirror
To tempt a first star to a tremor.(2006) (FULL MOON AND LITTLE FRIEDA)

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Till with a sudden sharp bot stink of fox
It enters the dark hole of the head
The window is starless still; the clock ticks,
The page is printed.(2007) (THOUGHT FOX)

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....................There the body
Separated, golden and imperishable,
From its doubting thought a spirit beacon
Lit by the power of salmon(2008) (THAT MORNING)

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And how did you stop? I can't remember

You stopping, I Imagine they reeled away -
Rolling eyes, as if driven from their fodder.
I imagine I shooed them away.(2009)( CHAUCER)
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I imagine this midnight moment's forest

Something else is alive
Beside the clock's loneliness
And this blank page where my fingers move.(2010) (THOUGHT FOX)

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..... England could add

Only the sooty twilight of South Yorkshire
Hung with the drumming drift of Lancaster
Till the world had seemed capsizing slowly.(2010) (THAT MORNING)

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Through the window I see no star:

Something more near
Though deeper within darkness
Is entering the loneliness: (2010)( THOUGHT FOX)

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I imagine I shooed them away. But
Your sostenuto rendering of Chaucer
Was already perpetual, what followed
Found my attention too full
And had to go back into oblivion.(2010) CHAUCER

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..... You went on ---

And twenty cows stayed with you hypnotized.
You stopping.(2011) CHAUCER

Solemn to stand there in the pollen light

Waist-deep in wild salmon swaying massed

.
As from the hand of God (2011) THAT MORNING

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Cows are going home in the lane there, looping the hedges
with their warm wreathes of breath
A dark river of blood, many boulders,
Balancing unspilled milk.(2012) FULL MOON AND LITTLE FRIEDA

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Till, with a sudden sharp hot stink of fox

It enters the dark hole of the head
The windows is starless still; the clock ticks,
The page is printed.(2012) THOUGHT FOX

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And you could not stop. What would happen

If you were to stop? Would they attack you,
Scared by the shock of silence, or wanting more?(2013) CHAUCER

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Cows are going home in the lane there, looping the

hedges with their warm wreatches of breath.(2014) (FULL MOON AND LITTLE FRIEDA)

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Your voice went over the fields towards Grantchester,

It must have sounded lost. But the cows
Watched, then approached: they appreciated Chaucer.(2015)( CHAUCER)

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The windows is starless still; the clock ticks,
The page is printed.(2016) THOUGHT FOX

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So we stood alive in the river of light,
Among the creatures of light, creatures of light. (2017) (That Morning)
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Your voice went over the fields towards Grantchester,

It must have sounded lost. But the cows
Watched, then approached: they appreciated Chaucer. (2018) (Chaucer)

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'Moon!' you cry suddenly, 'Moon! Moon!' (2019) (Full moon & Little Frieda)

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I.SNB