Text of poem - The Presence. I pray and incur silence. Some take that silence for refusal. I feel the power that, invisible, catches me by the sleeve, nudging towards the long shelf that has the book on it I will take down and read and find the antidote to an ailment. I know its ways with me; how it enters my life, is present rather before I perceive it, sunlight quivering on a bare wall. Is it consciousness trying to get through? Am I under regard? It takes me seconds to focus, by which time it has shifted its gaze, looking a little to one side, as though I were not here. It has the universe to be abroad in. There is nothing I can do but fill myself with my own silence, hoping it will approach like a wild creature to drink there, or perhaps like Narcissus to linger a moment over its transparent face.

‘The Presence’ - #RSThomas
(Between Here and Now, Macmillan)
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