Text of the Poem | Ambulances By Philip Larkin | Eureka Study Aids

1. Closed like confessionals, they thread

2. Loud noons of cities, giving back
3. None of the glances they absorb.
4. Light glossy grey, arms on a plaque,
5. They come to rest at any kerb:
6. All streets in time are visited.

7. Then children strewn on steps or road,
8. Or women coming from the shops
9. Past smells of different dinners, see
10. A wild white face that overtops
11. Red stretcher-blankets momently
12. As it is carried in and stowed,

13. And sense the solving emptiness
14. That lies just under all we do,
15. And for a second get it whole,
16. So permanent and blank and true.
17. The fastened doors recede. Poor soul,
18. They whisper at their own distress;

19. For borne away in deadened air
20. May go the sudden shut of loss
21.Round something nearly at an end,
22. And what cohered in it across
23. The years, the unique random blend
24. Of families and fashions, there

25. At last begin to loosen. Far
26. From the exchange of love to lie
27. Unreachable inside a room
28. The trafic parts to let go by
29. Brings closer what is left to come,
30. And dulls to distance all we are.