The poem
In a dark time, the eye begins to see, I meet my shadow in the deepening shade; I hear my echo in the echoing wood-- A lord of nature weeping to a tree, I live between the heron and the wren, Beasts of the hill and serpents of the den.
What's madness but nobility of soul At odds with circumstance? The day's on fire! I know the purity of pure despair, My shadow pinned against a sweating wall, That place among the rocks--is it a cave, Or winding path? The edge is what I have.
A steady storm of correspondences! A night flowing with birds, a ragged moon, And in broad day the midnight come again! A man goes far to find out what he is-- Death of the self in a long, tearless night, All natural shapes blazing unnatural light.
Dark,dark my light, and darker my desire. My soul, like some heat-maddened summer fly, Keeps buzzing at the sill. Which I is I? A fallen man, I climb out of my fear. The mind enters itself, and God the mind, And one is One, free in the tearing wind.
i really like this poem, the third stanza is my favorite. it's really intense if not pleasent. does anyone know of if any other poems by him are well known?
I am in my english class right now and the computers won't let me acseas the poetry forom. But i need help on finding a good simle poem. HELP!!
This is my favorite Roethke poem. It is such a wonderful description of depression and/or grief. The seduction and beauty of it, as well as its darkness.
"My Papa's Waltz" is fairly well known, and "Elegy for Jane."