Response to the night mail

Justin, you thought right ... . it is one of his not-so-famous poems, from a 1936 short documentary ( some 30 min) by the British Post Office, by Harry Watt and Basil Wright, music by Benjamin Britten, produced by John Grierson, sound by Alberto Cavalcanti ( who would later become a famous film director ) Here is the poem : Night Mail by W.H.Auden This is the night mail crossing the border, Bringing the cheque and the postal order, Letters for the rich, letters for the poor, The shop at the corner and the girl next door. Pulling up Beattock, a steady climb - The gradient's against her, but she's on time. Past cotton grass and moorland boulder Shovelling white steam over her shoulder, Snorting noisily as she passes Silent miles of wind-bent grasses. Birds turn their heads as she approaches, Stare from the bushes at her black-faced coaches. Sheep-dogs cannot turn her course, They slumber on with paws across. In the farm she passes no one wakes, But a jug in the bedroom gently shakes. Dawn freshens, the climb is done. Down towards Glasgow she descends Towards the steam rugs yelping down the glade of cranes, Towards the fields of apparatus, the furnaces Set on the dark plain like gigantic chessmen. All Scotland waits for her: In the dark glens, beside the pale-green lochs Men long for news. Letters of thanks, letters from banks, Letters of joy from girl and boy, Receipted bills and invitations To inspect new stock or visit relations, And applications for situations And timid lovers' declarations And gossip, gossip from all the nations, News circumstantial, news financial, Letters with holiday snaps to enlarge in, Letters with faces scrawled in the margin, Letters from uncles, cousins, and aunts, Letters to Scotland from the South of France, Letters of condolence to Highlands and Lowlands Notes from overseas to Hebrides - Written on paper of every hue, The pink, the violet, the white and the blue, The chatty, the catty, the boring, adoring, The cold and official and the heart outpouring, Clever, stupid, short and long, The typed and printed and the spelt all wrong. Thousands are still asleep Dreaming of terrifying monsters, Or of friendly tea beside the band at Cranston's or Crawford's, Asleep in working Glasgow, asleep in well-set Edinburgh, Asleep in granite Aberdeen, They continue their dreams; And shall wake soon and long for letters, And none will hear the postman's knock Without a quickening of the heart, For who can hear and fell himself forgotten?

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