Wednesday, March 16, 2011

In Memoriam - Nicholas Hughes 1962 - 2009

Nicholas Hughes, son of poets Sylvia Plath and Ted Hughes, on the occasion of his father's 1998 funeral.

In a poem written in 1962, "Nick and the Candlestick", his mother wrote:


          The pain
          You wake to is not yours.


In "Life after Death" -- a poem addressed to the mother of his children --  Ted Hughes wrote:


          Your son's eyes ...
          So perfectly your eyes,
          Became wet jewels,
          The hardest substance of the purest pain
          As I fed him in his high white chair.


Two years ago today, at his home near Fairbanks, Alaska, Nicholas Hughes opted out.


May all departed souls, both the faithful and the unfaithful, rest in peace.

1 comment:

  1. this great bluish, glistening boy shot out onto the bed in a wave of tidal water that drenched all four of us to the skin, howling lustily...Sylvia penned..

    Nicholas of the fish, of the baked pecan pie, of the ohness of life ...in birth we begin to die..odd..profound...living/dying at once..

    There's a Tedness to his face...that face carrying a thousand poems..

    With loving thoughts, Nicholas ~ where ever you are, this for you:

    http://images.smh.com.au/ftsmh/ffximage/2009/02/26/327047335_gallery__437x400.jpg

    ReplyDelete