Not Waving but Drowning (original) (raw)

"Not Waving but Drowning" is a poem by the British poet Stevie Smith. It was published in 1957, as part of a collection of the same title. The most famous of Smith's poems, it gives an account of a drowned man, whose distressed thrashing in the water had been mistaken for waving. The poem was accompanied by one of Smith's drawings, as was common in her work.