Your weekly slice of Poetry

Happy New Year! I apologize for not sending out a Poetry Pie last week; the previous week was full of Christmas busyness, parties, and some general laziness. I'm happy, however, to start this new year with some fresh selections for your enjoyment.

The Coronet

Andrew Marvell (1621—1678)

The two most important lines of a poem are the first and the last. A poem that starts well will hook you in for the full experience, and a poem that ends well can make the whole poem memorable. This is an example of a poem that ends very well. The poem concludes, much like a Shakespearean sonnet, with two rhyming lines (a couplet) that provide the turn or the key to understanding the work as a whole.

This poem often enters my mind when considering my work and how it can be used to honor Christ. We often have grand visions of how our daily work will bring glory to God, visions that are just as often tainted with our pride. This "serpent" must be crushed, and so with it our work. Yet, there is still a hope of redemption. Even after it is judged and purged of our sin, it can still stand as a beautiful work to the glory of God.

The Eagle

Alfred, Lord Tennyson (1809—1892)

"The Eagle" is a masterclass in poetic form and technique. It is quite short, but undeniably evocative. It is composed of two tercets (three line stanzas), where each line is in iambic tetrameter (four feet per line). The tercet itself is quite interesting... it doesn't have as "square" of a feel as, say, a couplet (two lines) or a quatrain (four lines). It almost has a feeling of being too much and too little at the same time.

You can get quite nerdy when it comes to the specific sounds and consonants he uses here, so I'll try to restrain myself to just a few. First, see his repeated use of c consonants in the first and second lines ("clasps... crag... crooked... close..."). This is a harder consonant sound, fitting with the image of a weathered bird clinging to the rough rock of a cliff.

Second, focus on the last line, specifically the word "thunderbolt." This word ends with a t sound which (similar to the c) is harder and naturally forces you to pause as you are reading. What this does is accentuate the ending words of the poem to a dramatic effect: "he falls." All of this is subtle, yet still necessary to the effectiveness of the poem.

The Lighthouse

Martin Rizley

This is an interesting poem by a modern author on the Thridrangar Lighthouse in Iceland. It is full of captivating imagery, likening the lighthouse to a king surveying the waters as his kingdom. What makes this a good poem is because it transports you there and gives you fresh images in your mind. It helps you to see something that you will (most likely) never see in person.

The Vision of the Beloved

Abram Newcomer

I'll end this edition of Poetry Pie with the first poem to exist on my blog. This is actually one of the poems that prompted me to start this whole blog-thing in the first place. The poem itself still interests me. I find myself re-remembering what is in it and why things are phrased the way that they are. Since its imagery is mostly from Revelation, I'm intrigued whenever I find new connections with it and some theme in the Bible. It stands on its own now and still surprises me with what it says.

If you're interested, leave a comment on which poems you enjoyed. And as always, thanks for reading and have a great week!