You'll enjoy today's poem more if you permit yourself the pleasure of this falcon on film.
Flying With The Birds on Devour.com
The Windhover by Gerard Manley Hopkins : The Poetry Foundation [poem] : Find Poems and Poets. Discover Poetry.
The period from now to the end of the year is a miasma of insanities in America. Families and friends make themselves crazy with revisiting old group dynamics, thinking--no, believing--things will be different this time around. This of course puts enormous pressure on everyone who's wandering through old rooms, "hoping it might be so," as Hardy says about Christmas in "The Oxen."
I don't want to add any grim poems or other downers to this mix, at least for a few days. So here again is Gerard Manley Hopkins and perhaps his most famous poem, "The Windhover." I love the fact that its being a poem of ecstasy does not in any way make it a simple-minded poem. No, this is intelligent adult joy, though fairly sexless. Or is that debatable? And what does Hopkins mean by "buckle"?
Let's digest all that with the turkey, let's gash gold-vermillion, as o'er the fields we go, burping all the way (I'll blame the bird, you can blame Hopkins).
In case today's BanjoBrain has been exhausting, here again are my recently discovered matinee idols for a pick-us-up:
YouTube - The Collins Kids - Dance & Sing
The Windhover by Gerard Manley Hopkins : The Poetry Foundation [poem] : Find Poems and Poets. Discover Poetry.
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I'm enamored of "miasma of insanities." Think I'll just enjoy that and come back later for more.
ReplyDeleteHappy Thanksgiving!
Jean, thanks. I've gotta admit, I liked it too. Maybe there really are muses, tho' mine are certainly part time at best.
ReplyDeleteGraceful bird... a beauty.
ReplyDelete"Miasma" is one of them thar words I had herd tell about, but never new the meaning thereov. Still don't.
ReplyDeleteHappy Thanksgiving, Banjo. Thanks for all the good poetry.
Indeed holidays can be a challenge but they don't seem to be going anywhere so I might as well ride with the tide..love that falcon by the way!
ReplyDeleteCame back, listened to the cute kids, read the poem, read the Hopkins' biography on the poetry site. Fascinating: Victorian seeking the way through giving up most worldly pleasures. And then he dies from polluted water.
ReplyDeleteLove the photo, Banjomyn. Your back yard? Are such big birds common in your neck of the woods?
ReplyDeleteHopkins alliteration is distracting? Almost enough to make you fall for it... and to expect it in every line of his poem. Is he longing to be a falcon? Putting cameras on the big birds backs - interesting. But it is easier to admire the bird's skill and grace from the ground, don't ya think?
Happy leftovers in all the miasma of insanity!