To be first in the fields,
Up with the groundmists and crows,
To be older and grateful,
Survivor of heartbreak,
Heaviness of being, lowlands of the mind.
The woods deep and still
Grow distinctly more strange
The longer i stand, in full possession
Of whatever kept between us,
To be turning as a ghost
For a new perspective across the pale valley
Turning toward the western sea of air
Where the extravagant passed once
Under full sail into the longed-for.
—With lines from a dozen Heaney poems,
written over two decades, bent to a purpose.
