Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, RESURGAT, by HERBERT H. LONGFELLOW


Poetry Explorer

Classic and Contemporary Poetry

RESURGAT, by                    
First Line: All the morning I have been peering at a flower
Last Line: I will give everything to the wind.
Subject(s): Flowers


All the morning I have been peering at a flower,
And rebuking it in my thoughts.
The flower is wasteful and audacious --
It courts poverty and want.
As I look at the flower many maxims come into my mind.
I am distressed.

The flower has not chosen proper companions --
It grows saucily in dried grass --
In a place that is illkept.
Very near it is a garden that is orderly and quiet.
Where everything grows as it should.
The garden is always beautiful.
It will be beautiful tomorrow.

All the morning the flower has wasted its color.
It is tossed about by the wind.
It squirms in the wind.
It is shameless.
If I were not here no one would see it.
The flower is jaunty and insolent.
By tomorrow the wind will have torn it to pieces.

But I have forgotten that my back is toward the garden,
That I have not been looking at the garden.
I have been looking only at the flower.
I have absorbed the color of the flower.
I am holding my head in imitation of the flower.
The tugging wind has caught me.
I am resisting it gleefully.
I have become the happy companion of the flower.
Tomorrow we shall travel together.
Wherever I go tomorrow I shall go with the flower.
I do not care for the garden.
I have forgotten my maxims.
I have become wasteful and audacious.
I will give everything to the wind.





Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!


Other Poems of Interest...
Home: PoetryExplorer.net