With reference to the poem "Radiance" by David Malouf: Martin Duwell writes that Malouf’s poems often start with being about one subject, and shift into another: “Radiance,” for example, which begins as a list of the different ways in which vision comes to people, moves on to deal with the way these people come to us after death. How does the poem “Radiance” deal with the essence of this statement? Discuss with close reference to language, form, and structure.

David Malouf's poem "Radiance" is found in his collection work entitled Earth Hour. This poem, as mentioned in the post, "begins as a list of the different ways in which vision comes to people, moves on to deal with the way these people come to us after death." The poet's work, here, is similar to a sonnet. Although the poem does not follow the structure of a sonnet, it does possess the shift (volta) typically found in a sonnet.
The poem is written using non-rhyming couplets. For me as a reader, the use of couplet allows for pondering of what is "said" in pieces. As one reads the paired lines, it should make them reflect on why Malouf writes in such a way. It should make readers want to continue reading because of the desire for what is to come next.
For the first sixteen couplets, Malouf uses third-person pronouns. This seems to alienate the reader from what is going on. By using the pronouns "them" and "they," the reader is excluded from the action (death). It is not until the seventeenth couplet that Malouf draws the reader in with the use of the first person pronoun "we." Readers are the "we" Malouf's speaker addresses. Here, the poem changes and becomes far more personal. "We," the readers, now have a place in the poem.
Another change happens when the poem's message moves from the dead being by themselves to the dead's ability to "join with us." The dead become the companions of the living: "waist high at our table/a commotion, a companionable/cloud." It seems that Malouf is making a statement about one's death and one's life after death. If the dead faced a hard or "not so gentle death," he or she may be present in the lives of the living by causing a commotion. If death was a "nudge," the dead may simply be a companion to the living.
Malouf's poem appears to be a statement on what he believes life after death to look like. Since no one really knows, Malouf's poem does give readers something to ponder about when their own time comes.