"Joining Tide Without Intent"

"JOINING TIDE WITHOUT INTENT"

JAMES LAW

Neurosurgical Technician

May 26, 1939 - December 25, 1986

This plaque is on campus at the University of California, San Francisco. The quote is from a poem by Thom Gunn called “Words for Some Ash.”

Now you are a bag of ash

Scattered on a coastal ridge, 

Where you watched the distant crash, 

Ocean on a broken edge.

Death has wiped away each sense; 

Fire took muscle, bone, and brains; 

Next may rain leach discontents

From your dust, wash what remains

Deeper into damper ground

Till the granules work their way

Down to unseen streams, and bound

Briskly in the water’s play;

May you lastly reach the shore, 

Joining tide without intent, 

Only worried any more

By the current’s argument.

 

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