I picked up this book from a pile that were free, otherwise unwanted. I think it was part of a legacy from a previous generation of poety lovers who had passed it to a poetry club I help run. The title of the book immediately reminded me of a chapter in the Proost anthology Learning to Love, which we called faith/doubt. I wondered if someone might pick up that book
Poems of Doubt and Belief was published in 1964. What poems that we are writing now will strike people who pick up a random book in sixty years? What poems from this book might still resonate?
Consider the different worlds. In 1964, poets lived in the shadow of a recent world war. Perhaps they had fought or lost loved ones. The place of religion was so much more central. The wonderful thing is that through this poetry, we are taken not to their place in history, but to the immediacy of their experience, their longings, their yearnings for the divine.
Here is one random section from poem from the book called ‘They come out singing’ by the poet Jon Silkin. I loved it because it seemed to be exploring a path that I would recognise from my own journey into Celtic mysticism. But then again, that might be how I am reading it. Such is poetry.
