I Wonder What It Feels Like to be Drowned?

By Robert Graves

1895.7.24-1985.12.7

Look at my knees,
That island rising from the steamy seas!
The candles a tall lightship; my two hands
Are boats and barges anchored to the sands,
With mighty cliffs all round;
They're full of wine and riches from far lands....
I wonder what it feels like to be drowned?

I can make caves,
By lifting up the island and huge waves
And storms, and then with head and ears well under
Blow bubbles with a monstrous roar like thunder,
A bull-of-Bashan sound.
The seas run high and the boats split asunder....
I wonder what it feels like to be drowned?

The thin soap slips
And slithers like a shark under the ships.
My toes are on the soap-dish--that's the effect
Of my huge storms; an iron steamer's wrecked.
The soap slides round and round;
He's biting the old sailors, I expect....
I wonder what it feels like to be drowned?

DayPoems Poem No. 2734
<a href="http://www.daypoems.net/poems/2734.html">I Wonder What It Feels Like to be Drowned? by Robert Graves</a>

The DayPoems Poetry Collection, www.daypoems.net
Timothy Bovee, editor

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