Tombeau

THE DEATH OF KROPOTKIN                                                                                              










             
Emma said there had been snow
and a keen wind sighing in the withered branches
And I imagined little details
sheepswool caught in the thorns
red berries and a prophet's dead face on the pillow.


She said he had died in peace
and the eternal intelligence on his brow
had seemed like a light in the dark unlit hut
And I imagined steel-rimmed glasses
on a side-table and eyes forever hidden.


She said there had been a great concourse of people
walking out from Moscow
or the nearest station poor humble people -
Lenin had let them come to sidle lovingly past his silent form.
 Several hundred people,
simple people fur caps down to their ears
their padded trousers crisscrossed with string
standing there on the obliterated road waiting for the cortege.










                                                                                                                Herbert Read