MLI Home → Writings → Poetry → To an Unborn Mole → Notes → Fifth Draft

To a Mole Unborn (fifth draft)
Clément Marot and Mark L. Irons
9 March 1999

---

    Little mole
    In your hole,
    Darkness hide.
 4  Why reside
    In this cell?
    Leave your shell
    With a kick.
 8  Axe and pick
    Soon you'll raise.
    Through long days
    Don't stay pent,
12  Resident,
    Hid away.
    End your stay;
    You shall mine
16  Stone divine,
    Gems and ore.
    There is more
    Work to do.
20  Join we who
    Delve and dig
    (Zag and zig);
    We're your kin,
24  All born in
    Tunnels deep.
    Darkness keep
    Cloaked your soul,
28  Little mole.

---

Things took an unexpected turn with this draft. Looking at the last draft, I'd realized that there was almost no mention of being ill. Instead, it was more like the author was waiting for the poem's subject to come and work... as if the little Mole hadn't been born yet. So that's what this version is addressed to: an unborn Mole.

The change of subject from a sick Mole to an unborn Mole makes this feel like a different branch of descent than another version of the same poem. Nevertheless, it might be better than the original line.

Notes

1. Line 6 implies that Moles hatch from eggs. Or perhaps it's just a metaphor.

2. Now lines 18-9 feel rather clunky. How can there be "more work to do" if out little Mole hasn't yet done any?

3. Lines 24-5 work well on their own but still don't tie together with the closing. Perhaps if line 26 read "We will keep", but then "Cloaked" doesn't make much sense and must be changed.

---

Previous: Fourth Draft ··· Next: Sixth Draft

MLI Home → Writings → Poetry → To an Unborn Mole → Notes → Fifth Draft