I have been reading a lot of Mary Oliver's poetry and found it impossible not to write a poem in imitation -- really only imitating her desire to "pay attention." She goes another important step and adds an observation, a personal discovery, or probing question that is deeply meaningful. She has thought deeply. I'm afraid I haven't her depth. But here is "Geese"
They announce their arrival
With a few honks seconds
before they descend,
Not in formaion as for migration--
They are locals with grzing
routines and preferences.
The black webbed feet extend forward
brakes to take the shock
of fiteen pounds dropped to earth.
Never a stagger or bounce, solid pefect landing.
They fold their wide wings
and set to work combing the grass.
Often one stands, head held high,
watching. I do not know if he's the gander
guarding his flock of geese.
He is not larger or differently marked.
Why don't I know simple facts
about the daily visitors to my lawn?
3 comments:
This is a fine poem with a very warm familiar feel to it. There might be a better way to work the sentiment of the last line into the poem in a different way - with 'wishing' instead of wondering why you don't know more about your daily visitors. - just a thought -..and in the second stanza, you might replace 'they' (which you have already used in the first stanza) with 'these locals' have grazing routines and preferences.'...and in the 3rd stanza, are you saying the webbed feet are brakes or that they brake to take the shock? I'm a big fan of punctuation to clarify meaning. - In the first stanza, a comma after 'honks' maybe? These are small things, and I may seem picky, but I think the poem does succeed in giving a nice image - so it's worth working on.
Small picky things are often the most helpful and certainly always worth taking into consideration. Thank you.
And I would say to anyone reading this and interested in poetry, you should click of kasscho above and read the poem she publishedon her blog a couple days abo about writing poetry.
Small picky things are often the most helpful and certainly always worth taking into consideration. Thank you.
And I would say to anyone reading this and interested in poetry, you should click of kasscho above and read the poem she publishedon her blog a couple days abo about writing poetry.
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