Monday, May 31, 2010

The Moment - Theodore Roethke

Another - check out the earlier ones here -  by one of most astonishing poetic voices in English of the 20th century, Theodore Roethke.  His poems shift the ground beneath how we see things: I always go away with images I never imagined possible.  In this one, he begins with complexity and ends with such simple words that say and mean so much....
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The Moment

We passed the ice of pain,
And came to a dark ravine,
And there we sang with the sea;
The wide, the bleak abyss
Shifted with our slow kiss.

Space struggled with time;
the gong of midnight struck
The naked absolute.
Sound, silence sang as one.

All flowed: without, within;
Body met body, we
Created what’s to be.

What else to say? –
We end in joy.

                                                                      Theodore Roethke - American

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

One of my favorite poems. Well chosen.

Want to point out, however, that Theodore Roethke did not commit suicide as your introduction to this poem states. He had a heart attack while swimming and died from complications shortly after.

ethan0807@gmail.com

Palimpsest said...

You are correct and I corrected. I was thinking about Berryman, who committed suicide when I was an undergrad. Thank you for the "catch".