ALICE OSWALD – BRITISH.
I am not sure when Alice Oswald was born – sometime in the 1960’s, and she is very much alive. WOODS ETC is her third collection, and you may recall that I have raved about her before. She is in every sense a major poet. Her use of language, her imagery, her subtle thought, her clear line, give her a voice in the tradition of the best, but so completely her own.
I chose this on called OWL, because the wood I live in is full of owls at this autumn time of year, and I love to hear them calling to one another, and sometimes, I think, to me.
OWL
last night at the joint of dawn,
an owl’s call opened the darkness
miles away, more than a world beyond this room
and immediately I was in the woods again,
poised, seeing my eyes seen,
hearing my listening heard
under a huge tree improvised by fear
dead brush falling then a star
straight through to God
founded and fixed the wood
then out, until it touched the town’s lights,
an owl elsewhere swelled and questioned
twice, like you light lean and strike
two matches in the wind.
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