". Arranged Words: Willows

16 May 2013

Willows





Bird song fills the air and
hard-headed woodpeckers do the drill. 

Over the winter the willow trees took a bit of a beating, but they, too, have been touched by spring. When the wind blows, their long branches sweep the ground like a conceited maestro taking bows. 

What could be better than a day spent under the willows with a good book? And if you should grow tried of reading, you can walk to the pond and check out a family or two of turtles sunning themselves on a log. 

The willows remind me of the Coleridge's poem:  This Lime-Tree Bower My Prison. A touch of self-pity  invades the first verse of the poem. [ Because of an injury--perhaps a sprained or broken ankle?, Coleridge had been left behind while his friends went walking, so he wrote Lime-Tree Bower. 1]  By the time he was penning the second verse, he realized that his friends were experiencing the delight that he, too, shared by remembering the walk and by being in the bower. Nature, the great liberator, never failed, it seemed, to renew his spirit. 

A delight
Comes sudden on my heart, and I am glad
As I myself were there! Nor in this bower,
this little lime-tree bower, have I not marked
Much that has soothed me. Pale beneath the blaze
Hung the transparent foliage; and I watched
Some broad and sunny leaf, and loved  to see
The shadow of the leaf and stem above
Dappling its sunshine! ...


Through the late twilight: and though now the bat
Wheels silent by, and not a swallow twitters,
Yet still the solitary humblebee
Sings in the bean-flower! Henceforth I shall know
That Nature ne'er deserts the wise and pure

Samuel Taylor Coleridge



[1]  M.H. Abrams, General Editor
5th edition The Major Authors The Norton Anthology of English Literature,
W.W. Norton & Company, New York 1987
Pages 1534-35









2 comments:

Eve said...

Thanks for sharing this Dixie =). Sometimes I forget how much I not only love to write poetry, but how much I love to read it. As for the Willow tree, it drew me to read on. The willow is one of my favorite trees. To be honest I just love nature & the elements & how it all connects. And thanks for sending me the link to your blog site. Take care lovely lady =)

Dixie @ Arranged Words said...


I agree with your comments about nature. If we listen carefully,the divine in nature whispers poems in our ears and inscribes sublime words on our hearts.
Do keep writing poems, Eve!