Poetry Never Dies...

Somehow, the words of the Romantic Poets have found me again recently, and I didn't even know how much I needed them until just a few days ago when I decided to open up one of my old university textbooks- Major British Poets of the Romantic Period, by William Heath.

Of all the Romantics, William Wordsworth has always had a special place in my life, even though his life took place over two hundred years ago.

It's funny how that is, isn't it? Writers have this ability to touch us way beyond their living years, because their words live on, dream on, and put dreams into their readers, no matter how long ago the words were written.

Recently, I decided to go through my romantic poetry book, and start with Wordsworth. I've been reading his Lyrical Ballads, one section at a time, before I go to bed at night. I forgot how whimsical and often commical these old writers could be, despite what initially feels like an older, more serious structure of writing. And each character, each little tale, pulls me into a world of poetry that I wish I was a part of. But then I realize that just in reading, and taking the time to hear what Wordsworth and other romantic poets wanted to say, I am included, or made connected to that past.

There is something so magical and incomparable to that.

I am looking forward to revisiting John Keats' poetry too. A contemporary of Wordsworth's, Keats shared some of Wordsworth's Romantic ideas. In one particular poem, Keats discusses the everlasting power of poetry. I was pleasantly surprised to find this poem in an email this afternoon. It was a great piece to read on this rainy, Sunday afternoon in spring. It reminded me of all the life that goes on around us, even the quiet, still ones that we don't often see. It reminded me that all of life is forever full of ideas for poetry. And that we are often surrounded by so many different poetic moments. We just have to take the time to look, or listen.

On the Grasshopper and the Cricket by John Keats

The poetry of earth is never dead:
When all the birds are faint with the hot sun,
And hide in cooling trees, a voice will run
From hedge to hedge about the new-mown mead;
That is the Grasshopper's—he takes the lead
In summer luxury,—he has never done
With his delights; for when tired out with fun
He rests at ease beneath some pleasant weed.
The poetry of earth is ceasing never:
On a lone winter evening, when the frost
Has wrought silence, from the stove there shrills
The Cricket's song, in warmth increasing ever,
And seems to one in drowsiness half lost,
The Grasshopper's among some grassy hills.