Classic and Contemporary Poetry
BUCOLIC COMEDY: ON THE VANITY OF HUMAN ASPIRATIONS, by EDITH SITWELL Poet Analysis Poet's Biography First Line: In the cold wind, towers grind round Last Line: "it was a sad catastrophe!" Subject(s): Vanity | ||||||||
"In the time of King James I, the aged Countess of Desmond met her death, at the age of a hundred and forty years, through falling from an apple-tree." -- Chronicles of the times. IN the cold wind, towers grind round, Turning, turning, on the ground; In among the plains of corn Each tower seems a unicorn. Beneath a sad umbrageous tree Anne, the goose-girl, could I see -- But the umbrageous tree behind Ne'er cast a shadow on her mind -- A goose-round breast she had, goose-brains, And a nose longer than a crane's; A clarinet sound, cold, forlorn, Her harsh hair, straight as yellow corn, And her eyes were round, inane As the blue pebbles of the rain. Young Anne, the goose-girl, said to me, "There's been a sad catastrophe! The aged Countess still could walk At a hundred and forty years, could talk, And every eve in the crystal cool Would walk by the side of the clear fish-pool. But to-day when the Countess took her walk Beneath the apple-trees, from their stalk The apples fell like the red-gold crown Of those kings that the Countess had lived down, And they fell into the crystal pool; The grandmother fish enjoying the cool -- (Like the bright queens dyed on a playing-card They seemed as they fanned themselves, flat and hard) -- Floated in long and chequered gowns And darting, searched for the red-gold crowns In the Castles drowned long ago Where the empty years pass weedy-slow, And the water is flat as equality That reigns over all in the heavenly State we aspire to, where none can choose Which is the goose-girl, which is the goose . . . But the Countess climbed up the apple-tree, Only to see what she could see -- Because to persons of her rank The usual standpoint is that of the bank! . . ." The goose-girl smoothed down her feather-soft Breast . . . "When the Countess came aloft, King James and his courtiers, dressed in smocks, Rode by a-hunting the red-gold fox, And King James, who was giving the view-halloo Across the corn, too loudly blew, And the next that happened was -- what did I see But the Countess fall'n from the family tree! Yet King James could only see it was naughty To aspire to the high at a hundred and forty, 'Though if' (as he said) 'she aspired to climb To Heaven -- she certainly has, this time!'" . . . And Anne, the goose-girl, laughed, "Tee-hee, It was a sad catastrophe!" | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...THROUGH A GLASS EYE, LIGHTLY by CAROLYN KIZER EPITAPH: FOR A PREACHER by COUNTEE CULLEN THE FLESH AND THE SPIRIT by ANNE BRADSTREET THE TENTH MUSE: THE VANITY OF ALL WORLDLY THINGS by ANNE BRADSTREET THE BISHOP ORDERS HIS TOMB AT SAINT PRAXED'S CHURCH by ROBERT BROWNING ALL IS VANITY, SAITH THE PREACHER' by GEORGE GORDON BYRON AGING: ON THE VANITY OF EARTHLY GREATNESS by ARTHUR GUITERMAN THE SPIDER AND THE FLY by MARY HOWITT AN OLD WOMAN: 2. HARVEST by EDITH SITWELL |
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