While I certainly never require a reason to celebrate poetry, an excuse to post a poem here will always be taken advantage of, and today it comes in the form of National Poetry Day (in the UK, but surely it’s alright to roll with it here in the States too).
The poem below is a new discovery, found just recently on tumblr, and all you need do to understand its immediate appeal for me is look at the title. The clincher, however, was the last two lines. Reading them, I can’t help but shiver. Every time.
Persephone in September
By Peter S. Beagle
The leaves are at my feet. The grass is dead.
The air is bitter as a dragonbite.
I hear the thunder moaning overhead,
Like some great creature dying in the night.
The winter wraps my shoulders like a shawl,
And I can taste the still unfallen snow.
The darkness comes like footsteps in the hall.
The winds reclaim the world, and I must go.
I take a road beyond the sight of eyes
That runs beyond the minds of walking men,
And only this I leave — a song that cries,
“Oh, I will surely, surely come again!”
And, knowing this, I turn my eyes and mark
My iron lover, crouching in the dark.
[Read other poems by Beagle here.]
Ooh, I like that eerie, haunting mood. I like that he uses such an unusual and mythical image — “a dragonbite” — to describe the sting of winter air. And it’s the next two lines (I hear the thunder moaning overhead, / Like some great creature dying in the night.) that give me the biggest chill.
Reblogged this on . and commented:
I have to share this, because the poem has such a deliciously eerie, haunting tone. Lines 3 and 4 are the ones that give me the shivery feeling Chelle mentions:
I hear the thunder moaning overhead,
Like some great creature dying in the night.
Pingback: Bitter as a dragonbite… « .