Poets United Midweek Motif ~ The Owl

 

“O you virtuous owle,

The wise Minerva’s only fowle.” — Sir Philip Sidney

SOURCE

“A serious writer is not to be confounded with a solemn writer. A serious writer may be a hawk or a buzzard or even a popinjay, but a solemn writer is always a bloody owl.”— Ernest Hemingway

       Midweek Motif ~ The Owl

Owls have been appearing in literature since a long time. To the Bard, the owl was a merry note; an elegant fowl to Edward Lear but to many others owl brought gloom.

Let’s see how you look at this most written about bird of prey.

A few owl poems for you:

Owl

by Sylvia Plath

Clocks belled twelve. Main street showed otherwise
Than its suburb of woods : nimbus—-
Lit, but unpeopled, held its windows
Of wedding pastries,

Diamond rings, potted roses, fox-skins
Ruddy on the wax mannequins
In a glassed tableau of affluence.
From deep-sunk basements

What moved the pale, raptorial owl
Then, to squall above the level
Of streetlights and wires, its wall to wall
Wingspread in control
Of the ferrying currents, belly
Dense-feathered, fearfully soft to
Look upon? Rats' teeth gut the city
Shaken by owl cry. 

The Judge Is Like The Owl

by Emily Dickinson

The Judge is like the Owl—
I've heard my Father tell—
And Owls do build in Oaks—
So here's an Amber Sill—

That slanted in my Path—
When going to the Barn—
And if it serve You for a House—
Itself is not in vain—

About the price—'tis small—
I only ask a Tune
At Midnight—Let the Owl select
His favorite Refrain. 

 The Owl

by Edward Thomas

Downhill I came, hungry, and yet not starved; 

Cold, yet had heat within me that was proof 

Against the North wind; tired, yet so that rest 

Had seemed the sweetest thing under a roof. 

Then at the inn I had food, fire, and rest, 

Knowing how hungry, cold, and tired was I. 

All of the night was quite barred out except 

An owl’s cry, a most melancholy cry 

Shaken out long and clear upon the hill, 

No merry note, nor cause of merriment, 

But one telling me plain what I escaped 

And others could not, that night, as in I went. 

And salted was my food, and my repose, 

Salted and sobered, too, by the bird’s voice 

Speaking for all who lay under the stars, 

Soldiers and poor, unable to rejoice.

Please share your new poem using Mr. Linky below and visit others in the spirit of the community—

                (Next week Susan’s Midweek Motif will be ~ Abundance)