"To a Waterfowl" is a poem by American poet William Cullen Bryant, first published in 1818.
"To a Waterfowl" is a poem by American poet William Cullen Bryant, first published in 1818.
The narrator questions where the waterfowl is going and questions his motives for flying. He warns the waterfowl that he could possibly find danger, traveling alone. But this waterfowl is not alone; it is being led by some Power. As the waterfowl disappears out of the narrator's sight, the narrator reflects on God's guidance in his own life. The narrator is sure that God has led this waterfowl, and that the waterfowl had faith in the narrator. Now, the narrator's faith is strengthened. He knows that God is guiding him as well. [1]
As the narrator sees God directing the waterfowl, the narrator is reminded of God's guidance in his own life. Through his observance in nature, the narrator is reconnected with his faith in God. [2]
Bryant wrote the poem in July 1815. [3] He was inspired after walking from Cummington to Plainfield to look for a place to settle as a lawyer. The duck, flying across the sunset, seemed to Bryant as solitary a soul as himself, and he wrote the poem that evening. [4]
"To a Waterfowl" was first published in the North American Review in Volume 6, Issue 18, March 1818. [5] It was later published in the collection Poems in 1821. [1]
Matthew Arnold praised it as "the best short poem in the language", [5] and the poet and critic Richard Wilbur has described it as "America's first flawless poem".[ citation needed ] The narrator in George du Maurier's "Peter Ibbetson" calls it "the most beautiful poem in the world".[ citation needed ]
"To a Waterfowl" is written in iambic trimeter and iambic pentameter, consisting of eight stanzas of four lines. The poem represents early stages of American Romanticism through celebration of Nature and God's presence within Nature.
Bryant is acknowledged as skillful at depicting American scenery but his natural details are often combined with a universal moral, as in "To a Waterfowl". [6]
Poetry is a form of literature that uses aesthetic and often rhythmic qualities of language − such as phonaesthetics, sound symbolism, and metre − to evoke meanings in addition to, or in place of, a prosaic ostensible meaning. A poem is a literary composition, written by a poet, using this principle.
Poetry analysis is the process of investigating a poem's form, content, structural semiotics and history in an informed way, with the aim of heightening one's own and others' understanding and appreciation of the work.
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William Cullen Bryant was an American romantic poet, journalist, and long-time editor of the New York Evening Post. Born in Massachusetts, he started his career as a lawyer but showed an interest in poetry early in his life. He soon relocated to New York and took up work as an editor at various newspapers. He became one of the most significant poets in early literary America and has been grouped among the fireside poets for his accessible, popular poetry.
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The William Cullen Bryant Homestead is the boyhood home and later summer residence of William Cullen Bryant (1794–1878), one of America's foremost poets and newspaper editors. The 155-acre (63 ha) estate is located at 205 Bryant Road in Cummington, Massachusetts, overlooks the Westfield River Valley and is currently operated by the non-profit Trustees of Reservations. It is open to the public on weekends in summer and early fall for tours with an admission fee.
"When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloom'd" is a long poem written by American poet Walt Whitman (1819–1892) as an elegy to President Abraham Lincoln. It was written in the summer of 1865 during a period of profound national mourning in the aftermath of the president's assassination on 14 April of that year.
Kindred Spirits (1849) is a painting by Asher Brown Durand, a member of the Hudson River School of painters. It depicts the painter Thomas Cole, who had died in 1848, and his friend, the poet William Cullen Bryant, in the Catskill Mountains. The landscape painting, which combines geographical features in Kaaterskill Clove and a minuscule depiction of Kaaterskill Falls, is not a literal depiction of American geography. Rather, it is an idealized memory of Cole's discovery of the region more than twenty years prior, his friendship with Bryant, and his ideas about American nature.
This glossary of literary terms is a list of definitions of terms and concepts used in the discussion, classification, analysis, and criticism of all types of literature, such as poetry, novels, and picture books, as well as of grammar, syntax, and language techniques. For a more complete glossary of terms relating to poetry in particular, see Glossary of poetry terms.
This is a glossary of poetry.
Nationality words link to articles with information on the nation's poetry or literature.
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A line is a unit of language into which a poem or play is divided. The use of a line operates on principles which are distinct from and not necessarily coincident with grammatical structures, such as the sentence or single clauses in sentences. Although the word for a single poetic line is verse, that term now tends to be used to signify poetic form more generally. A line break is the termination of the line of a poem and the beginning of a new line.
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