As I Walked Out One Evening by W.H. Auden - Animated Short Project

The production of this animated short project for now will be completed by me, a prospect that is as thrilling as it is only slightly daunting! This project holds deep personal significance for me, having been a concept I've gradually developed over many years, primarily in my thoughts. While I have a wealth of ideas for it, the project would benefit greatly from a more dedicated and focused approach to ideation, technique development, and thematic exploration. I remain flexible and open to evolving the ideas and imagery I've come up with so far. Below, I outline what I have accomplished to date followed by some ideas/concept imagery, followed by a copy of the poem itself for reference.

Current Project Status

Developed a series of loose, sequential thumbnails depicting scenes.
Produced rough drawings and studies.
Created a collection of illustrations for three stanzas to explore imagery and mood.
Compiled a rough animatic for a scene segment
Currently using W.H. Auden’s own reading of the poem for sound/voiceover. [Youtube link]

Comic strip with scenes accompanying poetic lines. Depicts various figures, landscapes, maps of Africa and China, jumping salmon, ocean, and geese in sky. Text includes phrases like “walking down Bristol Street,” “love has no ending,” and “till the ocean is folded.”

Comic strip with watercolor illustrations and text. Top row shows rabbits, people with flowers, clocks, and a large face. Middle row depicts a surreal landscape, skull, snow-covered valley, and two people dancing. Bottom row includes a diver, hands in water, a cupboard, and a bed. Each panel contains poetic text about time, nature, and existential themes.

A 12-panel comic strip with watercolor illustrations in blue and gray tones. Each panel depicts various scenes and includes handwritten text. Themes include a cracked teacup, beggars, a giant, a mirror, and a cityscape at night. Each scene appears to convey a whimsical or surreal narrative.

Auden portrait-character studies - pen, ink, graphite on toned paper

'O plunge your hands in water' animatic 1

'O plunge your hands in water' animatic 2

Painting of a nighttime scene with two figures walking by a canal under a bridge, with a brick building and full moon in the background.

Person looking out of a window at a figure walking on the street at night in a mysterious setting.

Illustration of hands touching a white surface on a circular plate on a table, with a blue and brown background.

As I Walked Out One Evening

by W.H.Auden

(via Poets.org)

As I walked out one evening,
Walking down Bristol Street,
The crowds upon the pavement
Were fields of harvest wheat.

And down by the brimming river
I heard a lover sing
Under an arch of the railway:
‘Love has no ending.

‘I’ll love you, dear, I’ll love you
Till China and Africa meet,
And the river jumps over the mountain
And the salmon sing in the street,

‘I’ll love you till the ocean
Is folded and hung up to dry
And the seven stars go squawking
Like geese about the sky.

‘The years shall run like rabbits,
For in my arms I hold
The Flower of the Ages,
And the first love of the world.’

But all the clocks in the city
Began to whirr and chime:
‘O let not Time deceive you,
You cannot conquer Time.

‘In the burrows of the Nightmare
Where Justice naked is,
Time watches from the shadow
And coughs when you would kiss.

‘In headaches and in worry
Vaguely life leaks away,
And Time will have his fancy
To-morrow or to-day.

‘Into many a green valley
Drifts the appalling snow;
Time breaks the threaded dances
And the diver’s brilliant bow.

‘O plunge your hands in water,
Plunge them in up to the wrist;
Stare, stare in the basin
And wonder what you’ve missed.

‘The glacier knocks in the cupboard,
The desert sighs in the bed,
And the crack in the tea-cup opens
A lane to the land of the dead.

‘Where the beggars raffle the banknotes
And the Giant is enchanting to Jack,
And the Lily-white Boy is a Roarer,
And Jill goes down on her back.

‘O look, look in the mirror,
O look in your distress:
Life remains a blessing
Although you cannot bless.

‘O stand, stand at the window
As the tears scald and start;
You shall love your crooked neighbour
With your crooked heart.’

It was late, late in the evening,
The lovers they were gone;
The clocks had ceased their chiming,
And the deep river ran on.