Though I enjoy the witty cynicism in poems like "This be the Verse" and "Talking in Bed," I ultimately prefer the dark, transcendent, almost romantic Larkin in poems like "Church Going," "Here," and "High Windows." I think his other poems are humorous and I actually like his cynical attitude (most of the time) but I think the "anti-romantic" Larkin has a much more complex voice that allows the poems to be a little more rewarding. Not only are his "major" poems more rewarding (for me), but they also embody some of the same cynicism we see in other poems. If Larkin was being strictly romantic in his descriptions of churches and nature...then maybe I'd prefer the witty Larkin...but it's not like "Church Going" and "Here" are completely void of cynicism..it's definitely there along with other factors that make the poems more.
"Church Going," especially, is a poem I connect with on a pretty personal level and I think it is a good example of a poem that shows two different sides of Larkin. It's pretty clear that Larkin is not particularly religious as he dismisses religion multiple times in the poem and describes believers as "Christmas-addicts"...but still, there is amongst all of this cynicism a longing for something more, maybe not a search for God but a search for something to replace God with. This tension between feeling disconnected and cynical of religion while still feeling the need to respect the church ("...I take off / My cycle-clips in awkward reverence") is what draws me to this poem. This "awkward reverence" complicates the poem and shows a different side of Larkin that we don't see in "This be the Verse." I also enjoy the poem because it shows a different side of non-believers in general by challenging the idea that it's "easy" to be an atheist...it's not.
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