Most Read... John McAuliffeBill Manhire in Conversation with John McAuliffe
(PN Review 259)
Patricia CraigVal Warner: A Reminiscence
(PN Review 259)
Eavan BolandA Lyric Voice at Bay
(PN Review 121)
Joshua WeinerAn Exchange with Daniel Tiffany/Fall 2020
(PN Review 259)
Vahni CapildeoOn Judging Prizes, & Reading More than Six Really Good Books
(PN Review 237)
Christopher MiddletonNotes on a Viking Prow
(PN Review 10)
Next Issue Kirsty Gunn re-arranges the world John McAuliffe reads Seamus Heaney's letters and translations Chris Price's 'Songs of Allegiance' David Herman on Aharon Appelfeld Victoria Moul on Christopher Childers compendious Greek and Latin Lyric Book Philip Terry again answers the question, 'What is Poetry'
Poems Articles Interviews Reports Reviews Contributors
Reader Survey
PN Review Substack

This poem is taken from PN Review 9, Volume 6 Number 1, September - October 1979.

Notes on a Visit David Wright

1.
Arrival
I landed at Jan Smuts at noon;
A cousin met, and drove me home;
The early summer smiled
Where I was born, and am exiled;
Green willows wept, jacarandas
Blew over windy verandahs
While morning-glory crept
Up pergola and parapet
Whose engardened villas slant
White roofs below Witwatersrand,
The suburbs of an earlier time
Once gimcrack, now uncertain.
Uncertainty's what I read
Upon those tatty and beloved
Arcades of bottle-stores and fruit
...


Searching, please wait... animated waiting image