The Whitsun
Weddings
That
Whitsun, I was late getting away:
Not
till about
One-twenty
on the sunlit Saturday
Did
my three-quarters-empty train pull out,
All
windows down, all cushions hot, all sense
Of
being in a hurry gone. We ran
Behind
the backs of houses, crossed a street
Of
blinding windscreens, smelt the fish-dock; thence
The
river’s level drifting breadth began,
Where
sky and Lincolnshire and water meet.
All
afternoon, through the tall heat that slept
For
miles inland,
A
slow and stopping curve southwards we kept.
Wide
farms went by, short-shadowed cattle, and
Canals
with floatings of industrial froth;
A
hothouse flashed uniquely: hedges dipped
And
rose: and now and then a smell of grass
Displaced
the reek of buttoned carriage-cloth
Until
the next town, new and nondescript,
Approached
with acres of dismantled cars.
At
first, I didn’t notice what a noise
The
weddings made
Each
station that we stopped at: sun destroys
The
interest of what’s happening in the shade,
And
down the long cool platforms whoops and skirls
I
took for porters larking with the mails,
And
went on reading. Once we started, though,
We
passed them, grinning and pomaded, girls
In
parodies of fashion, heels and veils,
All
posed irresolutely, watching us go,
As
if out on the end of an event
Waving
goodbye
To
something that survived it. Struck, I leant
More
promptly out next time, more curiously,
And
saw it all again in different terms:
The
fathers with broad belts under their suits
And
seamy foreheads; mothers loud and fat;
An
uncle shouting smut; and then the perms,
The
nylon gloves and jewellery-substitutes,
The
lemons, mauves, and olive-ochres that
Marked
off the girls unreally from the rest.
Yes,
from cafes
And
banquet-halls up yards, and bunting-dressed
Coach-party
annexes, the wedding-days
Were
coming to an end. All down the line
Fresh
couples climbed aboard: the rest stood round;
The
last confetti and advice were thrown,
And,
as we moved, each face seemed to define
Just
what it saw departing: children frowned
At
something dull; fathers had never known
Success
so huge and wholly farcical;
The
women shared
The
secret like a happy funeral;
While
girls, gripping their handbags tighter, stared
At
a religious wounding. Free at last,
And
loaded with the sum of all they saw,
We
hurried towards London, shuffling gouts of steam.
Now
fields were building-plots, and poplars cast
Long
shadows over major roads, and for
Some
fifty minutes, that in time would seem
Just
long enough to settle hats and say
I
nearly died,
A
dozen marriages got under way.
They
watched the landscape, sitting side by side
—An
Odeon went past, a cooling tower,
And
someone running up to bowl—and none
Thought
of the others they would never meet
Or
how their lives would all contain this hour.
I
thought of London spread out in the sun,
Its
postal districts packed like squares of wheat:
There
we were aimed. And as we raced across
Bright
knots of rail
Past
standing Pullmans, walls of blackened moss
Came
close, and it was nearly done, this frail
Travelling
coincidence; and what it held
Stood
ready to be loosed with all the power
That
being changed can give. We slowed again,
And
as the tightened brakes took hold, there swelled
A
sense of falling, like an arrow-shower
Sent
out of sight, somewhere becoming rain.
