Sherry Chandler

I WANDERED LONELY AS A CLOUD

I WANDERED lonely as a cloud
That floats on high o’er vales and hills,
When all at once I saw a crowd,
A host, of golden daffodils;
Beside the lake, beneath the trees,
Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.

Continuous as the stars that shine
And twinkle on the milky way,
They stretched in never-ending line
Along the margin of a bay:
Ten thousand saw I at a glance,
Tossing their heads in sprightly dance.

The waves beside them danced; but they
Out-did the sparkling waves in glee:
A poet could not but be gay,
In such a jocund company:
I gazed–and gazed–but little thought
What wealth the show to me had brought:

For oft, when on my couch I lie
In vacant or in pensive mood,
They flash upon that inward eye
Which is the bliss of solitude;
And then my heart with pleasure fills,
And dances with the daffodils. 1804.

Text from Bartleby.com.

Severn Creek

— for Gray Zeitz of Larkspur

For the third spring we trek
the disused county road,
deer prints pressing ground
made soft by yesterday’s showers.
In gray tiers, hardwoods rise up
toward the cedared bluffs.
The luscious glut of creekwater
riffles through us intimate as breath.

It’s early. Spring spurs its lime
among the branchtips–not yet
an exclamation. The trout lily
has performed its bloom,
but the Dutchman’s-breeches
are still furled like silken flags.
Fire pinks still smolder
hours shy of floral combustion,
the beds of bluebells
we hiked miles to see
already basking in the bottoms.
As we pass a bank of larkspurs,
each spiked floret asserting
its purple integrity, its tensile grace,
Gray, inspired, declares this occasion
the annual meeting of his board.

With a simple show of hands
the membership, each sprig, each
spacious leaf, reaffirms its policy
to vegetate the hills,
following by-laws to the letter
with each corporate tendril,
each dash of color, as we all assent
to raise, to resurrect, the dead.

— Richard Taylor, from Off the Record: An Anthology of Poetry by Lawyers

Poem used by permission of author.

Richard Taylor’s experimental novel Girty is now available from Wind Publications. Richard will be reading from Girty tonight at the First Friday event at the Kentucky Coffeetree Café in Frankfort. Performance begins at 7:00 pm at 235 Broadway. $10 admission, students $5. For more information or to reserve a table, please call Lizz Taylor at 502-223-8018