IN summer-heat or in wintertime glistening, Days when you marry, or triumph, or die, I would dispel deathly boredom by listening For a soft peal yet unheard in the sky. There it approaches, and coldly I wait for it, Wait to get hold of it, leave it for dead. While my attention is strained ahead straight for it, It pulls a nearly invisible thread. Wind from the sea? or are singing-birds calling there From Paradise? Does Time stop and stay fast? Or is the May's apple-blossom a-falling there In snowy rain? Does an angel fly past? Time is prolonged. Every wonder it cherishes; Light, tumult, motion around me appear. Wildly the future reflects all that perishes, Nothing is present or pitiful here. Finally, force inconceivable filling it, Strains a new soul from its birth to the day, -- Curses, as thunder, attack the soul, killing it Reason, creative, subdues it, -- to slay. Then in a shivering cage I shut wearily That happy bird who once flew about merrily. This was the bird that would take death from me, This was the bird that would set the soul free. There is the cage. Heavy, iron I fashioned it. Golden it gleams in the sun's setting fire. There is the bird for you. Once so impassioned it Swings on the hoop as it sings to the wire. Clipped are its wings; all by heart now it sings to me -- Say, would you listen and stand by the door? Singing may please you, -- but weariness clings to me. Once more I wait, and know boredom once more. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...THE HAWK by WILLIAM BUTLER YEATS THE LOVER MOURNS FOR THE LOSS OF LOVE by WILLIAM BUTLER YEATS A BOY'S SUMMER SONG by PAUL LAURENCE DUNBAR THE LAST POST by ROBERT RANKE GRAVES TO JOHN DONNE (1) by BEN JONSON FOOTLIGHT MOTIFS: 2. PHOEBE FOSTER by FRANKLIN PIERCE ADAMS EDINBURGH AFTER FLODDEN by WILLIAM EDMONSTOUNE AYTOUN |