"Shiversong" by George David Clark
Description
Topics discussed in this episode include:
-RIP N. Scott Momaday
-Gather ye old buds while ye may
-David's new collection, Newly Not Eternal
-"Iscariot's Psalm" by George David Clark
-Read the earlier version of "Shiversong" here
-The 'ol feminine-acephalous combo (we need a real name for this)
-Not rhythmic, but METRICAL modulation
-"The Snow Man" by Wallace Stevens
-Job 38
-Lear 4:1
-"The Need Of Being Versed In Country Things" by Robert Frost
-"Boy At The Window" by Richard Wilbur
-The Agony In The Garden
-"My Prime Of Youth Is But A Frost Of Cares" by Chidiock Tichborne
-"Oh no! The rancor!"
-Words are straw, and the poem is a scarecrow
Text of poem:
Shiversong
Given snow
That doesn’t flinch
To throw its pounds
Through heaven inch
By inch, that sows
A billion motes
Of chill into
This ground man can’t
Defend; and given
Wind that won’t
Begin to tell
Us how it’s driven,
Where it fell from,
What it’s meant
To blow and which
Proud limbs the clouds
Want riven since
It doesn’t dimly
Know, or even
Why the howling
Whims have pardoned
Us thus far;
Given such,
It’s hard to watch
The black-eyed scarecrow
Some fool left here
Miming care
Above the blighted
Garden, though
Tonight he seems
Intent to wrack
The soil and climb
The air, to fly,
To crash his flimsy
Cross against
The deadpan rancor
In the vast
Grim sky.
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My favorite poetry podcasts for:
Sharp thoughts and cutting truths (Matthew): Sleerickets
Lovely introspection and sensitive reflection (Alice): Poetry Says
The landscape of Ohioan poetry (Jeremy): Poetry Spotlight
Supported in part by The Ohio Poetry Association
Art by David Anthony Klug
List of the most common metrical feet:
Iamb: weak-STRONG (u /)
Trochee: STRONG-weak (/ u)
Anapest: weak-weak-STRONG (u u /)
Amphibrach: weak-STRONG-weak (u / u)
Dactyl: STRONG-weak-weak (/ u u)
Cretic: STRONG-weak-STRONG (/ u /)
Pyrrhic: weak-weak (u u)
Spondee: STRONG-STRONG (/ /)