Classic and Contemporary Poetry
THE GREAT BLUE HERON; A WARNING, by CELIA LEIGHTON THAXTER Poet Analysis Poet's Biography First Line: The great blue heron stood all alone Last Line: "betwixt you and the being called man." Subject(s): Herons; Hunting; Mankind; Hunters; Human Race | ||||||||
The great blue heron stood all alone by the edge of the solemn sea on a broken boulder of gray trap stone. He was lost in a reverie. And when I climbed the low rough wall at the top of the sloping beach to gather the driftwood great and small left scattered to dry and bleach, I saw, as if carved from the broken block on which he was standing, the bird like a part of the boulder of blue-gray rock, for never a feather he stirred. I paused to watch him. Below my breath: "Oh beautiful creature," I cried, "Do you know you are standing here close to your death, by the brink of the quiet tide? You cannot know of the being called Man! The lord of creation is he, and he slays all earth's creatures wherever he can in the air or the land or the sea. He's not a hospitable friend. If he sees some wonderful, beautiful thing that runs in the woodland, or floats in the breeze on the banner-like breadth of its wing, straight he goes for his gun, its sweet life to destroy for mere pleasure of killing alone. He will ruin its beauty and quench all its joy though tis useless to him as a stone." Then I cried aloud, "Fly, before over the sand this lord of creation arrives with his shot and his powder and gun in his hand for the spoiling of innocent lives." O, stately and graceful and slender and tall the heron stood silent and still as if careless of warning and deaf to my call unconscious of danger or ill. "Fly! Fly to some lonelier place and fly fast, to the very North Poleanywhere!" Then he rose and soared high, and swept eastward at last trailing long legs and wings in the air. "Now perhaps you may live and be happy," I said. "Sail away, beauty, fast as you can. Put the width of the earth and the breadth of the sea betwixt you and the being called Man." | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...HOW MUCH EARTH by PHILIP LEVINE THE SHEEP IN THE RUINS by ARCHIBALD MACLEISH THE CONQUERORS by PHYLLIS MCGINLEY THE MARMOZET by HILAIRE BELLOC MEN, WOMEN, AND EARTH by ROBERT BLY BROTHERS: 3. AS FOR MYSELF by LUCILLE CLIFTON MAY MORNING by CELIA LEIGHTON THAXTER SPANIARDS' GRAVES AT THE ISLES OF SHOALS by CELIA LEIGHTON THAXTER |
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