T.S. Eliot. East Coker from The Four Quartets, Part 1.
IIn my beginning is my end. In successionHouses rise and fall, crumble, are extended,Are removed, destroyed, restored, or in their placeIs an open field, or a factory, or a by-pass.Old stone to new building, old timber to new fires,Old fires to ashes, and ashes to the earthWhich is already flesh, fur and faeces,Bone of man and beast, cornstalk and leaf.Houses live and die: there is a time for buildingAnd a time for living and for generationAnd a time for the wind to break the loosened paneAnd to shake the wainscot where the field-mouse trotsAnd to shake the tattered arras woven with a silent motto. In my beginning is my end. Now the light fallsAcross the open field, leaving the deep laneShuttered with branches, dark in the afternoon,Where you lean against a bank while a van passes,And the deep lane insists on the directionInto the village, in the electric heatHypnotised. In a warm haze the sultry lightIs absorbed, not refracted, by grey stone.The dahlias sleep in the empty silence.Wait for the early owl. In that open fieldIf you do not come too close, if you do not come too close,On a summer midnight, you can hear the musicOf the weak pipe and the little drumAnd see them dancing around the bonfireThe association of man and womanIn daunsinge, signifying matrimonie—A dignified and commodiois sacrament.Two and two, necessarye coniunction,Holding eche other by the hand or the armWhiche betokeneth concorde. Round and round the fireLeaping through the flames, or joined in circles,Rustically solemn or in rustic laughterLifting heavy feet in clumsy shoes,Earth feet, loam feet, lifted in country mirthMirth of those long since under earthNourishing the corn. Keeping time,Keeping the rhythm in their dancingAs in their living in the living seasonsThe time of the seasons and the constellationsThe time of milking and the time of harvestThe time of the coupling of man and womanAnd that of beasts. Feet rising and falling.Eating and drinking. Dung and death. Dawn points, and another dayPrepares for heat and silence. Out at sea the dawn windWrinkles and slides. I am hereOr there, or elsewhere. In my beginning.ENJOY MOREThe Ceylon Press publishes a range of podcasts including The History Of Sri Lanka; the off-grid Jungle Diaries podcast; Island Stories, the podcast that explores what makes Sri Lanka, Sri Lankan; the Wild Isle Podcast: Stories from Sri Lanka’s Nature; a range of complete Audio Books about Sri Lanka; as well as Poetry from The Jungle. All these, along with eBooks, dictionaries, guides and companions can be found at www.theceylonpress.com, based at The Flame Tree Estate & Hotel in the jungle northwest of Kandy: www.flametreeestate.com. The copyright of this podcast recording is David Swarbrick @The Ceylon Press 2025. POETRY FROM THE JUNGLE GRATEFULLY ACKNOWLEDGES THE COPYRIGHT CREDIT: "East Coker," the second of T.S. Eliot's Four Quartets, was first published in the UK in the Easter edition of the New English Weekly in 1940 and in the US in the Partisan Review's May 1940 issue. Copyright for "East Coker" and the other poems in Four Quartets is held by T.S. Eliot's estate.
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