Skinny-dipping with Rupert Brooke, Sturdy as a Marlowe Stanza or Miltonic Ones, in a Night-time Cambridgeshire Pool
Virginia Woolf had seen him. She had seen
Him whole. She saw his soul, good-hearted, kind,
Substantial. She had seen him leaping, clean,
More clean than moonlight, and how God designed
His character and self, as sane as days
In springtime. She had seen that he had force
Not only in his diving but the blaze
Of body, perfect, as it found its course
And arc to midnight water, saw the gift
Of him to people in his ways. We call
Our minds to wonder if her mental shift
To such high praise was caused by his slim fall
To rape the pool with beauty . . . or if she
Had seen the truth by God’s pronounced decree.
~ Phillip Whidden