Former UK poet laureate's tribute to Queen Elizabeth II: Read here | World News - Hindustan Times
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Former UK poet laureate's tribute to Queen Elizabeth II: Read here

Sep 19, 2022 12:04 PM IST

Queen Elizabeth II's Funeral: Carol Ann Duffy, former Poet Laureate, is a professor of contemporary poetry at Manchester Metropolitan University.

Carol Ann Duffy, former Poet Laureate wrote a poem called ‘Daughter’ to mark Queen Elizabeth II's funeral which is being held in London on Monday. Carol Ann Duffy, a poet and playwright, was appointed by Queen Elizabeth II as Britain's poet laureate in 2009.

Queen Elizabeth's Funeral: Tower Bridge is reflected on a picture of Britain's Queen Elizabeth II in London.(AFP)
Queen Elizabeth's Funeral: Tower Bridge is reflected on a picture of Britain's Queen Elizabeth II in London.(AFP)

Carol Ann Duffy is a professor of contemporary poetry at Manchester Metropolitan University. Duffy resigned from the position of Poet Laureate in 2019. Duffy was the first female poet, the first Scottish-born poet and the first openly gay poet to hold the Poet Laureate position.

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Here's the poem Duffy shared ahead of Queen Elizabeth's funeral:

"Your mother’s daughter, you set your face

to the road

that ran by the river; abaft you, the castle,

its aphasiac ballroom,

lowered flag. Stoic, your contour a arch on a coin,

you followed the hearse

through sorrow’s landscape- a farmer, stood

on a tractor,

lifting his tweed cap; a aggregation of anglers

shouldering their rods.

And now the villagers, silently raising

their adaptable phones.

Then babies captivated aloft in the towns, to one day

be informed they were there.

But you had your mother’s eyes, as a horse ran free

in a field;

a pheasant flared from a hedge

like a befuddled bouquet;

journeying on by a autumn of aberrant love.

How they craned to glimpse their lives again

in her death; reminded

of Time’s adamant removals, their own bereavements,

as she passed.

The boost of the high arch over a amaze of water;

a faculty of ascending

into anointing ablaze which attenuated into cloud.

Nine further apathetic grey mile to the Old Town; the aftermost mile

a aristocratic mile,

where they aggregate ten-deep as your mother showed you

what she had meant.

Nightfall and cloudburst abreast London. Even the motorways paused;

thousands of headlights in rain

as you adumbral her still; smatterings of applause

from verges and bridges.

Soon abundant they would appear to apperceive this had continued been

the Age of Grief;

that History was once advanced of them. The acme of ice melting

on the roof of the world.

Tonight, childhood’s palace; the iPhone torches bond back

to medieval flame.

So you slowed and accustomed with her, her alone daughter,

and alone her daughter."

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