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Title of Poem: The Marsh in Early Spring
Poet: Rhina P. Espaillat
Source: The Shadow I Dress In (2004)
Rating: 4 out of 5 laurels.
What does a marsh look like in early spring?
Rhina's poem "The Marsh In Early Spring" is her desrcription of a marsh in first days of springtime.
The poem is in sonnet form - 14 lines and 10 syllables for each line
The poem begins with a background of a blue sky and clouds-
"The marsh in early spring, that patient view
accommodating clouds and changing blue,"
Rhina's marsh consists of salty water looking at the sky above. They are snakes on its brown soil. There are weeds, flying gulls, grasses, boats (oars) and rain. The marsh rises and falls like a tide. The marsh is moving and at rest at the same time.
I wonder if the word "oars" in her poem means "boats" or "sails" since the wind usually blows against the sails of the boats travelling between shores.
What do you call the poetic technique whereby a poet uses a part of object to represent the bigger whole object? Rhina seems to be using this poetic technique whereby she uses the word "oars" instead of "boats" or "sails".
Rhina seems to say that the marsh does not understand what it sees or hears like the sea, the cry of the gulls, the grasses and the sky. In her last poetic lines -
"The marsh will never fathom what it reads,
the sea that salts its grasses, the gull's cry,
nothing inscribed in what we call the sky."
Rhina could be right.
Nature poems is one of Rhina's favorite themes. She likes to write her poems in rhyme and well-measured syllables.
Poet from Massachusetts
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by Rhina P. Espaillat
Source: The Shadow I Dress In , p. 87
The marsh in early spring, that patient view
accommodating clouds and changing blue,
reflects both in a deeply shallow gaze
where everything finds room and nothing stays
Stippled with rain or rifled as by oars
plied by the wind in passing between shores,
the marsh is neither different not the same,
both moving and at rest, like tide or flame.
Heaven is what it looks at and then makes
double, below in silty brown where snakes
crook their thick muscled length through tangled weeds.
The marsh will never fathom what it reads,
the sea that salts its grasses, the gull's cry,
nothing inscribed in what we call the sky.
--------------------
Hummingbird
by Rhina P. Espaillat
Source: The Shadow I Dress In, p. 74
In the apple tree whose fruit is always lop-
sided but sweet, red sugar-water swings
in a clear feeder with a hook on top.
The humingbird, like all awaited things,
lives in its absence, gives delight all day
by almost darting on imagine wings
into the shade where common creatures play
half-noticed. Neighbors tell me no one knows
if hummingbirds will venture here, or stay
long enough to be seen, where traffic goes,
But what is there to lose? For the one great
solace we have is patience to suppose
desire, at least, endures, and soon or late
what we call down should find us, if we wait.
-------------------
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Title of Poem: Hummingbird
Poet: Rhina P. Espaillat
Source: The Shadow I Dress In (2004)
Rating: 4 out of 5 laurels.
Rhina's poem Hummingbird caught my attention because I have a poem about a hummingbird too.
Hummingbirds are very small birds about two inches long. The bird's wings move so fast like a fly. The first time I saw a hummingbird was in the year 2003 here in San Jose, California. I thought hummingbirds were huge birds. They are so tiny like the hummingbird I saw here in our residence in California.
The character in the poem is a bird lover who awaits the coming of the hummingbird which the character attracts with a feeder with a red sugar water.
Birdwatchers are patient since they have to wait for the bird they like to watch. It usually takes hours before the bird arrives on the spot they expect the bird will appear.
I am no ornithologist and no bird enthusiast because I don't have the patience to wait for these little creatures to come by my window.
Yet, ornithologists and bird enthusiasts find happiness in watching birds for hours.
This poems is rhymed as aba, cdc, efe, ghg, ii.
It is like a sonnet with a couplet at the end.
Most of Rhina's poems follow a traditional form like the sonnet. She also likes to compose poems in rhyme.
This nature poem reveals the joy of bird watching.
Hence, this poem is nominated Best Poem of the Year 2004 by Muses Review.
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