The Green caldron - University Library

March, 1962 7
I have looked upon those brilHant creatures,
And now my heart is sore.
All's changed since I, hearing at twilight,
The first time on this shore.
The bell-beat of their wings above my head,
Trod with a lighter tread.
Unwearied still, lover by lover,
They paddle in the cold
Companionable streams, or climb the air.
Their hearts have not grown old
Passion or conquest, wander where they will,
Attend upon them still.
But now they drift on the still water
Mysterious, beautiful.
Among what rushes will they build.
By what lake's edge or pool
Delight men's eyes, when I awake some day
To find they have flown away?
What is a poem good for? Good-for-nothing, I have heard some say.
Nonsense to read such foolishness.
What is a poem made of? Only words. One might say that words
themselves are only blobs of sound by which we label objects and their
behavior. Psychologists say they are symbols used in place of real experience.
A philosopher once said that men sometimes think without words. The words
of a poem can set our unlabeled thoughts to music and meaning. We all
have seen the quiet beauty of a fall evening, but few could say.
The trees are in their autumn beauty,
The woodland paths are dry;
Under the October twilight the water
Mirrors a still sky.
What is a poem? Describing the structural characters of a poem suggests
a chemical formula. If a poem is a collection of words which form a rhythmic
picture of an idea, then a poem is like the chemical equation in so far as it
in a unity, an equality. The words do equal the idea. But to say, "Nineteen
years ago I first counted the swans," is as complete an equality as,
The nineteenth autumn has come upon me
Since I first made my count.
The meaning is basically the same in both. What makes the one sound flat
and solid, like a slab of concrete, and the other sound as round and light as
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