Of Poetry, Seclusion and Hope

Posted on : March 30, 2020
Author : AGA Admin

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The world is in the grip of a pandemic, confining a significant section of  humankind to their homes and fundamentally metamorphosing the way people travel, work, as well as comprehend life, which for the moment has come to a standstill. Even as humanity ponders over the adjustments that would persist beyond the termination of the pandemic, “what life might look like on the other side”, the present state, characterised by an anxious, almost deathly stillness, can perhaps be alleviated to an extent  by rediscovering oneself via  the medium of poetry.  In a departure form the past, a handful of  poems, reflecting solitude, confinement and rediscovery of oneself at the crossroads of life with hope being the  underlying constant comprise the reflections, this week.

‘I wandered lonely as a Cloud’

 

I wandered lonely as a cloud

That floats on high o’er vales and hills,

When all at once I saw a crowd,

A host, of golden daffodils;

Beside the lake, beneath the trees,

Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.

 

Continuous as the stars that shine

And twinkle on the milky way,

They stretched in never-ending line

Along the margin of a bay:

Ten thousand saw I at a glance,

Tossing their heads in sprightly dance.

 

The waves beside them danced; but they

Out-did the sparkling waves in glee:

A poet could not but be gay,

In such a jocund company:

I gazed—and gazed—but little thought

What wealth the show to me had brought:

 

For oft, when on my couch I lie

In vacant or in pensive mood,

They flash upon that inward eye

Which is the bliss of solitude;

And then my heart with pleasure fills,

And dances with the daffodils.

 

William Wordsworth-1804

 

 

This Lime-tree Bower my Prison

 

Well, they are gone, and here must I remain,

This lime-tree bower my prison! I have lost

Beauties and feelings, such as would have been

Most sweet to my remembrance even when age

Had dimm’d mine eyes to blindness! They, meanwhile,

Friends, whom I never more may meet again,

On springy heath, along the hill-top edge,

Wander in gladness, and wind down, perchance,

To that still roaring dell, of which I told;

The roaring dell, o’erwooded, narrow, deep,

And only speckled by the mid-day sun;

Where its slim trunk the ash from rock to rock

Flings arching like a bridge;—that branchless ash,

Unsunn’d and damp, whose few poor yellow leaves

Ne’er tremble in the gale, yet tremble still,

Fann’d by the water-fall! and there my friends

Behold the dark green file of long lank weeds,

That all at once (a most fantastic sight!)

Still nod and drip beneath the dripping edge

Of the blue clay-stone.

 

Samuel Taylor Coleridge-1797

 

 

 

Keeping Quiet

Now we will count to twelve

and we will all keep still

for once on the face of the earth,

let’s not speak in any language;

let’s stop for a second,

and not move our arms so much.

It would be an exotic moment

without rush, without engines;

we would all be together

in a sudden strangeness.

Fishermen in the cold sea

would not harm whales

and the man gathering salt

would not look at his hurt hands.

Those who prepare green wars,

wars with gas, wars with fire,

victories with no survivors,

would put on clean clothes

and walk about with their brothers

in the shade, doing nothing.

What I want should not be confused

with total inactivity.

Life is what it is about…

If we were not so single-minded

about keeping our lives moving,

and for once could do nothing,

perhaps a huge silence

might interrupt this sadness

of never understanding ourselves

and of threatening ourselves with

death.

Now I’ll count up to twelve

and you keep quiet and I will go.

Pablo Neruda

(1950s , published posthumously in 1974)

 

Childhood’s Retreat

 

It’s in the perilous boughs of the tree  

out of blue sky     the wind  

sings loudest surrounding me.

 

And solitude,   a wild solitude’s reveald,  

fearfully,   high     I’d climb  

into the shaking uncertainties,

 

part out of longing,   part     daring myself,

part to see that

widening of the world,   part

 

to find my own, my secret

hiding sense and place, where from afar  

all voices and scenes come back

 

—the barking of a dog,   autumnal burnings,

far calls,   close calls—   the boy I was

calls out to me

here the man where I am   “Look!

 

I’ve been where you

most fear to be.

Robert Duncan-1968

 

“This is the time to be slow,

Lie low to the wall Until the bitter weather passes.”

 

Try, as best you can, not to let

The wire brush of doubt

Scrape from your heart

All sense of yourself

And your hesitant light.

 

If you remain generous,

Time will come good;

And you will find your feet

Again on fresh pastures of promise,

Where the air will be kind

And blushed with beginning.

John O’Donohue

 Excerpt from his books, To Bless the Space Between Us (US) / Benedictus (Europe)

 

The Bend in the Road

 

 

Sometimes we come to life’s crossroads

And we view what we think is the end.

But God has a much wider vision

And he knows that it’s only a bend-

 

The road will go on and get smoother

And after we’ve stopped for a rest,

The path that lies hidden beyond us

Is often the path that is best.

 

So rest and relax and grow stronger,

Let go and let God share your load

And have faith in a brighter tomorrow-

You’ve just come to a bend in the road.

Helen Steiner Rice