A man digs in the earth and lowers two clay pipes into the hole. One is the pipe he’s just smoked; the other belonged to a soldier who might have fought at Blenheim, Ramillies, and Malplaquet. The spade work feels ordinary, but it stirs a quiet question — what in this motion leans toward sorrow or joy? He pictures his own pipe as a token of his mortality, resting beside the soldier’s relic, both just a yard or two closer to the surface than the bones of ancient people. Those far-off strangers once saw mastodons, and in the same sunlight they laughed or wept just as he does. The mood is meditative and still, with an undercurrent of wonder. Time collapses gently: the speaker’s fleeting life, a soldier’s long-gone wars, and the immense stretch of prehistory all touch through the simple act of digging. It feels like a truce with time, intimate and unforced.
Digging — Summary
WHAT matter makes my spade for tears or mirth, Letting down two clay pipes into the earth? The one I smoked, the other a soldier Of Blenheim, Ramillies, and Malplaquet Perhaps. The dead man's immortality Lies represented lightly with my own, A yard or two nearer the living air Than bones of ancients who, amazed to see Almighty God erect the mastodon, Once laughed, or wept, in this same light of day.