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More poems by Philip LarkinPhilip Larkin | Print this page.Print | Order a PoetryNotes Analysis of this poem.Analysis | View and Write CommentsComments (1)

Continuing To Live

Philip Larkin

Continuing to live -- that is, repeat
A habit formed to get necessaries --
Is nearly always losing, or going without.
      It varies.

This loss of interest, hair, and enterprise --
Ah, if the game were poker, yes,
You might discard them, draw a full house!
      But it's chess.

And once you have walked the length of your mind, what
You command is clear as a lading-list.
Anything else must not, for you, be thought
      To exist.

And what's the profit? Only that, in time,
We half-identify the blind impress
All our behavings bear, may trace it home.
      But to confess,

On that green evening when our death begins,
Just what it was, is hardly satisfying,
Since it applied only to one man once,
      And that one dying.

Added: 11 Mar 2002 | Last Read: 7 Nov 2009 10:54 PM | Viewed: 9665 times

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URL: http://plagiarist.com/poetry/3587/ | Viewed on 7 November 2009.
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