Talking in Bed
Talking in Bed - meaning Summary
Silence Within Physical Closeness
Larkin's "Talking in Bed" presents a domestic scene where physical closeness heightens, rather than eases, emotional distance. The poem contrasts the expectation that intimacy should make honest speech easier with the growing silence between partners. External images (wind, clouds, towns) underscore an indifferent world and the poem closes on the painful linguistic dilemma: how to find words that are both true and kind, revealing modern loneliness within partnership.
Read Complete AnalysesTalking in bed ought to be easiest, Lying together there goes back so far, An emblem of two people being honest. Yet more and more time passes silently. Outside, the wind's incomplete unrest Builds and disperses clouds in the sky, And dark towns heap up on the horizon. None of this cares for us. Nothing shows why At this unique distance from isolation It becomes still more difficult to find Words at once true and kind, Or not untrue and not unkind.
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