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)

The Living Dead

~ Honouring our poetic ancestors ~

October

The green elm with the one great bough of gold

Lets leaves into the grass slip, one by one, --

The short hill grass, the mushrooms small milk-white,

Harebell and scabious and tormentil,

That blackberry and gorse, in dew and sun,

Bow down to; and the wind travels too light

To shake the fallen birch leaves from the fern;

The gossamers wander at their own will.

At heavier steps than birds' the squirrels scold.

The rich scene has grown fresh again and new

As Spring and to the touch is not more cool

Than it is warm to the gaze; and now I might

As happy be as earth is beautiful,

Were I some other or with earth could turn

In alternation of violet and rose,

Harebell and snowdrop, at their season due,

And gorse that has no time not to be gay.

But if this be not happiness, -- who knows?

Some day I shall think this a happy day,

And this mood by the name of melancholy

Shall no more blackened and obscured be.

– Edward Thomas (1868-1917)

An October poem, as October begins! After the Spring poems a couple of weeks ago, I thought I'd better acknowledge the Northern Hemisphere and give you some Autumn poetry. In this case, of course, the proliferation of references to Northern Hemisphere flora and fauna was not a problem!

The problem was that many of the possible choices were so famous that you'd probably already be familiar with them – Keats's 'Ode to Autumn' and Shelley's 'Ode to the West Wind', for instance. Beautiful indeed, but no longer surprising.

Edward Thomas (also English, though of Welsh descent) is not quite so well-known any more – though greatly esteemed and popular in his heyday, and still respected. And, of the  lesser-known autumn poems I found, this one particularly delighted me with its lyricism and rich detail.

Thomas came late to poetry, after having been a successful essayist, novelist and literary critic. He was a great friend of Robert Frost, who lived in England for a time, and Frost encouraged him to write poetry.

Wikipedia relates the sad story that they used to go walking together, and Frost's famous 'The Road Not Taken' was meant as a gentle dig at his friend for being indecisive about which route to take – but Thomas took it much more seriously. What makes this a sad story is that Thomas had been undecided about enlisting to fight in World War I and the poem decided him. As 'a mature married man', we are told, he could have avoided it, but he joined up in July 1915 and was killed in action in France in April 1917.  

He is therefore usually included among the British  'war poets' of World War I, but in fact most of his poems deal with other subjects.

An article at Poetry Foundation tells us that the likes of Walter de la Mare, Aldous Huxley and Seamus Heaney considered him one of the most important English poets. He was credited with 'introducing a modern sensibility' to twentieth century poetry, 'later found in the work of W.H. Auden and Ted Hughes'.

You can find more of his poetry at Poem Hunter; and his Amazon page contains a range of volumes of his poetry and prose as well as several biographies of which he is the subject. (I couldn't resist buying the Kindle edition pictured above. It's not only comprehensive but incredibly cheap!)

Material shared in 'The Living Dead' is presented for study and review. Poems, photos and other writings and images remain the property of the copyright owners, where applicable (older poems may be out of copyright)

Poets United Midweek Motif ~ Word

       “Poetry is an emotion that has found its thought and the thought has found words.” — Robert Frost

“A word of encouragement from a teacher to a child can change a life. A word of encouragement from a spouse can save a marriage. A word of encouragement from a leader can inspire a person to reach her potential.”— John C. maxwell

        Midweek Motif ~ Word  

Word is like air for wordsmiths to breathe. It is their voice, their world. It gives them a wonderful path, assures a magical journey and destination.

While Kipling emphasizes that words are the most powerful drug used by mankind, to Aldous Huxley words are like X-rays if used properly can go through anything.

Who can deny the huge power of words in slogans, speeches, songs, stories and poetry?

Today’s motif is Word. We would love to see Words with wings, stings and whatever you wish to have with it.

Words

by Edward Thomas

Out of us all
That make rhymes
Will you choose
Sometimes -
As the winds use
A crack in a wall
Or a drain,
Their joy or their pain
To whistle through -
Choose me,
You English words?

I know you:
You are light as dreams,
Tough as oak,
Precious as gold,
As poppies and corn,
Or an old cloak:
Sweet as our birds
To the ear,
As the burnet rose
In the heat
Of Midsummer:
Strange as the races
Of dead and unborn:
Strange and sweet
Equally,
And familiar,
To the eye,
As the dearest faces
That a man knows,
And as lost homes are:
But though older far
Than oldest yew, -
As our hills are, old, -
Worn new
Again and again:
Young as our streams
After rain:
And as dear
As the earth which you prove
That we love.

Make me content
With some sweetness
From Wales
Whose nightingales
Have no wings, -
From Wiltshire and Kent
And Herefordshire, -
And the villages there, -
From the names, and the things
No less.
Let me sometimes dance
With you,
Or climb
Or stand perchance
In ecstasy,
Fixed and free
In a rhyme,
As poets do. 

A Word

by Emily Dickinson

A word is dead

When it is said,

        Some say.

I say it just

Begins to live

        That day.

Our Words

by Ruby Archer

Our words are clouds, and fleeting shadow cast

Upon the landscape of a life. Sometimes

One rests above a hillside like a blush,

And sometimes darkens more a deep ravine:

For sunny hill—a needful, pensive charm,

For dark ravine—one more degree of gloom.

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 ~ Voice)