Poem of the Day, Jun 27/12

The Cat's Advice to Margaret, or

Margaret, quit your bitching over Golden Grove unhitching. 

Entropy,  entropy--things running down,

Like an aging mechanical toy.

Margaret, Margaret, please do not frown.

These things should be greeted with joy.

Like grist mills installed on the side of a slope,

Where the water runs down to the base,

The wheels of our being would cease to revolve,

If the water remained in its place.

We each play the game, and we each strike out,

And all of us have our own innings.

Yet the process that brings human life to an end,

Is the process that brought its beginnings.

Oh Margaret, relax! And please don’t despair,

As you’re carried along with the tide.

Universal decay is no reason for care.

Just relax!  It’s a wonderful ride.

This was inspired by Gerard Manly Hopkins' poem, Spring and Fall:  To a Young Child.  He wrote this for a little girl called Margaret, who was sad about the passing of summer and the trees shedding their leaves.   You may recall this poem.  It begins:  "Margaret, are you grieving over Golden Grove un-leaving?"  Hopkins goes on to suggest  to Margaret  that we are sad because  the seasonal death of summer plants reminds us of our own mortality.  But he says that death is inevitable, and we must accept it.  He concludes: "It is the blight you were born for--It is Margaret that you morn for."  This has been my favorite poem for many years.  Yet I suddenly decided that I needed to respond to it--to give Margaret some advice of my own.   I have changed the meter from the original, and this was deliberate. I wanted a tempo that was more upbeat--less like a funeral dirge.  But I still regard Hopkins' work as some of the best English language poetry ever written.  Check out this link.