The Voice
One feather is a bird,
I claim; one tree, a wood;
In her low voice I heard
More than a mortal should;
And so I stood apart,
Hidden in my own heart.
And yet I roamed out where
Those notes went, like the bird,
Whose thin song hung in air,
Diminished, yet still heard:
I lived with open sound,
Aloft, and on the ground.
That ghost was my own choice,
The shy cerulean bird;
It sang with her true voice,
And it was I who heard
A slight voice reply;
I heard; and only I.
Desire exults the ear:
Bird, girl, and ghostly tree,
The earth, the solid air –
Their slow song sang in me;
The long noon pulsed away,
Like any summer day.
~~
Theodore Roethke (1908-1963)
from Words for the Wind, 1957
[Poem is in the public domain in Canada]
"The Voice" read by Theodore Roethke. Courtesy Theodore Roethke - Topic.
(Poem begins at 1:40)
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