Poetry: Mid-Term Break - by Seamus Heaney

The below poem is from one of Heaney's earliest collections of poetry, Death of a Naturalist (1966). There are many reproductions of the poem online, as well as amateur recitations on YouTube. However, the poem is under copyright, so I will only post the first couple stanzas below.

You can read the full poem at the Norton Introduction to Literature website.

Mid-Term Break
by Seamus Heaney

I sat all morning in the college sick bay
Counting bells knelling classes to a close,
At two o'clock our neighbors drove me home.

In the porch I met my father crying—
He had always taken funerals in his stride—
And Big Jim Evans saying it was a hard blow.

***

Note: The poem is autobiographical, and references Christopher Heaney, who died while Seamus was at St. Columb's College.