I STOOD knee-deep within a field of grain, And felt a sudden flash of facile wings That off the ground rose straight into the blue. And looking, saw it was the lark, a wight In all my days I had not glimpsed at home, And now must find beyond the foam-white seas For the first time. This child of ecstasy Shook down roulades of song, and clove the air Up, up and ever up toward very heaven, A speck of buoyant life against the sky, And bird-kind's one embodiment of soul In God-aspiring flight. Across my mind Rushed Shakespeare's hymn and Shelley's heavenly lay, Wherein this bird, etherealized, becomes More beautiful, and less of mortal mold; Until half-dazed I stood, nor hardly knew Whether I heard the descant of the lark, Or those dear singers of the human race Make subtle music for my brooding ear. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...BLUEFLAGS by WILLIAM CARLOS WILLIAMS STANZAS IN MEMORY OF THE AUTHOR OF OBERMANN by MATTHEW ARNOLD SAINT BRANDAN by MATTHEW ARNOLD TO JOHN DRYDEN, ESQ.; POET LAUREATE AND HISTOGRAPHER ROYAL by PHILIP AYRES THE AGNOSTIC by MATHILDE BLIND |