James Reeves (1909-1978) might be described as a jobbing writer, writing plays, poems, essays, and whatever was called for, and working as an editor and anthologist. His name rings for me a distant bell but no more. The poem below was sent to me by a friend, herself a poet. She read it first when “a gloomy adolescent.” She sent it to me not because I’m grieving but because of my interest in death, the great subject.

I like the simplicity, directness, and repetition of the poem. I have stood alone by grey sees on cloudy and heard the mournful calls of gulls (carrying, mariners thought, the souls of drowned sailors) and felt not grief but melancholy. But I imagine the day when those closest to me die and I might stand by a cold, Northern sea and feel my grief palpable.

This is Your Elegy by James Reeves

This is your elegy, the grey sea grieving –
This and the gulls’ disconsolate reply.
Beyond your hearing is their derelict cry.

Now every wave reminds me of your leaving.
There is no houseless bird more lost than I.
This is your elegy, the grey sea grieving –
This and the gulls’ disconsolate reply.

To end your absence and your unbelieving
With yet one more ‘I love you’, I would try
To call my sea-bird back from the cold sky.
This is your elegy, the grey sea grieving –
This and the gulls’ disconsolate reply.
Beyond your hearing is their derelict cry.