“The Night-Wind” by Emily Bronte

        Emily Jane Bronte was born on July 30, 1818, in England.  She died at the young age of 30. Emily felt that her health was compromised by the harsh local climate and unsanitary conditions at home.  She caught a severe cold at the funeral of her brother, which was said to have led to tuberculosis.  She initially refused to be treated.  By the time she agreed to see a physician, it was too late for her. Ms. Bronte was a poet, novelist, and a governess.  She is best remembered for her only novel, Wuthering Heights.  She wrote under the pen name of Ellis Bell. 

In summer's mellow midnight,

A cloudless moon shone through

 Our open parlour window

 And rosetrees wet with dew.

 

 I sat in silent musing,

 The soft wind waved my hair;

 It told me Heaven was glorious

 And sleeping Earth was fair.

 

 I needed not its breathing

 To bring such thoughts to me,

 But still it whispered lowly,

 "How dark the woods will be!

 

 "The thick leaves in my murmur

 Are rustling like a dream,

 And all their myriad voices

 Instinct with spirit seem."

 

 I said "Go, gentle singer

 Thy wooing voice is kind

 But do not think its music

 Has power to reach my mind.

 

 "Play with the scented flower,

 The young tree's supple bough,

 And leave my human feelings

 In their own course to flow."

 

 The Wanderer would not leave me;

 Its kiss grew warmer still -

 "O come", it sighed so sweetly,

 "I'll win thee 'gainst thy will."

 

 "Have we not been from childhood friends?

 Have I not loved thee long?

 As long as though hast loved the night

 Whose silence wakes my song.

 

 "And when thy heart is laid at rest

 Beneath the church-yard stone

 I shall have time enough to mourn

 And thou to be alone."

         The setting for this captivating poem by Emily Bronte is on a cloudless summer night as the speaker sits mesmerized by the enchanting view that is visible through her open parlour window. There is a slight wind lightly blowing as the poem describes, “The thick leaves in my murmur are rustling like a dream…” suggestive of wind gently stirring the leaves on the trees.  The speaker appears to be a female by the tone of the poem and such wording as “The soft wind waved my hair…”  The first line of the poem reveals the temporal setting (time) -- “In summer’s mellow midnight…” The exact location as far as city or state or country is not disclosed.  This seems to more easily allow the readers to put themselves in the speaker’s shoes, to sense what she is experiencing on this summer evening.

This poem initially was comforting and seemed to almost lure the readers into a dreamlike, mystical state with its gentle words and the beautiful, soft pictures that it painted in one’s mind.  However, the poem subsequently took on a rather dark, sinister feeling as the night and its inhabitants (including the wind and the dark woods) seemed to be trying to seduce the speaker and to lure her into the blackness and what may lie beyond.   The speaker’s imagination gets carried away with the bewitching night.  Perhaps she is lonely and a bit depressed, and her inner fears surface on this dark night.  It’s such a situation where one hears and sees things that aren’t truly there, and reality and fantasy become confused.  The speaker fights back against these images in her mind and to pull herself out of this dark place.

            Personification plays a part in this poem as the wind speaks and seduces.   There are four-line stanzas with the second and fourth line rhyming.  The words are very descriptive.  The poem has a nice flow and is very effective at inviting the readers to experience the situation with the speaker.

“Alzheimer’s” by Kelly Cherry

Kelly Cherry was born in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, on December 21, 1940.   She was the daughter of a violinist, and her early exposure to music has had a profound effect on her work.  Her work includes poetry, novels, short fiction stories, and memoirs.  

He stands at the door, a crazy old man Back from the hospital, his mind rattling
like the suitcase, swinging from his hand,
That contains shaving cream, a piggy bank,
A book he sometimes pretends to read,
His clothes. On the brick wall beside him
Roses and columbine slug it out for space, claw the mortar.
The sun is shining, as it does late in the afternoon
in England, after rain.
Sun hardens the house, reifies it,
Strikes the iron grillwork like a smithy
and sparks fly off, burning in the bushes--
the rosebushes--
While the white wood trim defines solidity in space.
This is his house. He remembers it as his,
Remembers the walkway he built between the front room
and the garage, the rhododendron he planted in back,
the car he used to drive. He remembers himself,
A younger man, in a tweed hat, a man who loved
Music. There is no time for that now. No time for music,
The peculiar screeching of strings, the luxurious
Fiddling with emotion.
Other things have become more urgent.
Other matters are now of greater import, have more
Consequence, must be attended to. The first
Thing he must do, now that he is home, is decide who
This woman is, this old, white-haired woman
Standing here in the doorway,
Welcoming him in.

         This moving poem by Kelly Cherry entitled Alzheimer’s paints a vivid picture of an all too common ailment.   The simple, one-word title informs the reader immediately of the focus of the poem, allowing us to associate the text of the poem with a victim of Alzheimer’s disease from the very beginning.  The speaker’s tone initially seems rather harsh and insensitive as the man suffering from Alzheimer’s is described as “a crazy old man back from the hospital, his mind rattling like the suitcase, swinging from his hand that contains shaving cream, a piggy bank, a book he sometimes pretends to read…”   One can almost sense impatience and frustration from the speaker.  The picture the speaker paints is initially not flattering and doesn’t seem to portray the “real” man – the man who raised a family, who built the walkway between the front room and the garage at the very house described in the poem, who planted rhododendron in the backyard, and who loved music.   As the poem progresses, the tone seems to convey a sadness, pity, a sense of despair.   One thinks of this stricken man as he returns home from the hospital.  Life around him continues as always with the sun shining, rain falling, flowers blooming.  This gentleman’s world, however, is in turmoil as his memory fails him.  While he can remember certain things such as his house, the car he used to drive, and how he loved music, he cannot remember his own wife.   The man’s confusion is almost palpable.

         The style of this poem by Kelly Cherry seems to be free form.  Within this 29-line poem, there are no stanzas, no rhyming, or alliteration, and sentences end in the middle of lines.