A psalm by Richard Wilbur
April 01, 2011
National Poetry Month begins today in the USA. I can't promise I'll share more poetry here this month than I ordinarily do, but I wanted to inaugurate the month with a poem I've recently read and thought was quite lovely:
Psalm
Give thanks for all things
On the plucked lute, and likewise
The harp of ten strings.Have the lifted horn
Greatly blare, and pronounce it
Good to have been born.Lend the breath of life
To the stops of the sweet flute
Or capering fife,And tell the deep drum
To make, at the right juncture,
Pandemonium.Then, in grave relief,
Praise too our sorrows on the
Cello of shared grief.
From Richard Wilbur's Anterooms: New Poems and Translations.
Happy poetry month to all!