Wednesday 13 April 2011

TO AUTUMN - KEATS

 
“The foliage has been losing its freshness through the month of August, and here and there a yellow leaf shows itself like the first gray hair amidst the locks of a beauty who has seen one season too many.” - Oliver Wendell Holmes

The autumnal mood has certainly taken hold of me with all this gray rainy weather we have been having, so what better for Poetry Wednesday than the old favourite, possibly what is th most anthologised poem in the English Language:

TO AUTUMN
John Keats (1795-1821)
1.
SEASON of mists and mellow fruitfulness,
Close bosom-friend of the maturing sun;
Conspiring with him how to load and bless
With fruit the vines that round the thatch-eves run;
To bend with apples the moss’d cottage-trees,
And fill all fruit with ripeness to the core;
To swell the gourd, and plump the hazel shells
With a sweet kernel; to set budding more,
And still more, later flowers for the bees,
Until they think warm days will never cease,
For Summer has o’er-brimm’d their clammy cells.

2.
Who hath not seen thee oft amid thy store?
Sometimes whoever seeks abroad may find
Thee sitting careless on a granary floor,
Thy hair soft-lifted by the winnowing wind;
Or on a half-reap’d furrow sound asleep,
Drows’d with the fume of poppies, while thy hook
Spares the next swath and all its twined flowers:
And sometimes like a gleaner thou dost keep
Steady thy laden head across a brook;
Or by a cyder-press, with patient look,
Thou watchest the last oozings hours by hours.

3.
Where are the songs of Spring? Ay, where are they?
Think not of them, thou hast thy music too,—
While barred clouds bloom the soft-dying day,
And touch the stubble plains with rosy hue;
Then in a wailful choir the small gnats mourn
Among the river sallows, borne aloft
Or sinking as the light wind lives or dies;
And full-grown lambs loud bleat from hilly bourn;
Hedge-crickets sing; and now with treble soft
The red-breast whistles from a garden-croft;
And gathering swallows twitter in the skies.

And here is the poem read out also…

3 comments:

  1. Hello:
    Re-reading the Keats, and then again to hear it read, it comes as no surprise that the poetry has endured and continues so to do.

    The autumnal image appeared unexpectedly to us, for as we move well into spring it is easy to overlook that in the southern hemisphere it is the onset of autumn. But no matter, for all seasons are special and we should not wish to be without them.

    We wonder if you have seen the fairly recent film based on Keats' life? Although well reviewed here, we just felt that it might prove to be a little whimsical and have, therefore, avoided it to date.

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  2. This is amazing! Thanks for sharing.

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  3. This is one of my all time favorite poems. Many thanks for the audio of it. It is beautifully done!

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