Robert Graves visits London and wishes he was back in Deya. Photo: Dave Hendley, poem: Tim Turnbull.

Robert Graves at County Hall. © Dave Hendley 1973.

Sic Transit Gloria Mundi by Tim Turnbull

All aboard now, you children of Demeter,
sling up your canvas haversacks and bedding
on the roof-rack, load the plonk and bread in,
and scrunch into the battered Ford twelve seater.
Discard your wooly hats and your windcheaters;
the weather’s always sunny where we’re heading.
Sing, as if a festival or a wedding
were the destination. Fear won’t defeat us

on our way. Pass the carafe of sangria
as we speed on through the brilliant foothills
of the island. Love and wine make us brave
in face of our enemy, so that we are
exultant first, resigned, and lastly tranquil
on the minibus that bears us to our graves.

… for The London Column. © Tim Turnbull 2012.

David Secombe:

This week we feature some photos from Dave Hendley‘s 1970s archive; I say ‘archive’, but in fact the ones we are running were rescued from Dave’s mother’s attic, and are survivors of an ill-advised cull that Dave made of his work some decades ago. The photo above was taken for The Times; a photo call at an event to honour Graves, who looks massively uncomfortable – which is perhaps unsurprising, given that he hated to leave his beloved home in Deya, Mallorca for any reason whatsoever.

Graves’s tomb, Deya, Mallorca. © David Secombe 1990.