I would my soul were like the bird
That dares the vastness undeterred.
Look, where the bluebird on the bough
Breaks into rapture even now!
He sings, tip-top, the tossing elm
As tho he would a world o'erwhelm.
Indifferent to the void, he rides
Upon the wind's eternal tides.
He tosses gladly on the gale,
For well he knows he cannot fail -
Knows if the bough breaks, still his wings
Will bear him upward while he sings!
- Edwin Markham
Such a spirit of promise, of transcendence, of embracing the hero's journey. And of course, it has birds, to which I'm particularly partial.
Do you have a favorite poem that features an animal? Or one that uses couplets or iambic tetrameter lines (8 beats with a heartbeat rhythm)? Or perhaps there's a poem that a young person close to your heart has always loved that you'd like to share today...
No need to conform to any of the suggestions above, so share any poem you admire in your post today and then link back here so we can all enjoy your choice.
As always, please do support the poets who change us with their art. Try the fantastic poets.org as a place to begin.
MFB poetically,
L
3 comments:
Detail
I was watching a robin fly after a finch – the smaller bird
chirping with excitement, the bigger, its breast blazing, silent
in light-winged earnest chase – when, out of nowhere
over the chimneys and the shivering front gardens,
flashes a sparrowhawk headlong, a light brown burn
scorching the air from which it simply plucks
like a ripe fruit the stopped robin, whose two or three
cheeps of terminal surprise twinkle in the silence
closing over the empty street when the birds have gone
about their own business, and I began to understand
how a poem can happen: you have your eye on a small
elusive detail, pursuing its music, when a terrible truth
strikes and your heart cries out, being carried off.
Eamon Grennan.
@pomesallsizes
Ha! Counterpoint taken! Nature red in tooth and claw vs. nature idealized...
Thanks once again for your stellar choices, PL!
hey, i'm an english teacher over here in santa monica, ca, and i was looking for a good analysis of this poem; thanks for a wonderful job. all the background info and links are especially useful too! many thanks and nice work!
I
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