Poetry has always been a cherished medium and art form for people to explore and express complex thoughts and emotions. The artistic profundity of poems is not limited to the application of fancy metaphors alone; it evokes deep emotional responses and catharsis for both the poet and the readers. It has the scope to tackle and express subject matters that are often left unaddressed or completely discarded due to the inability of other mediums to comprehend emotional depth.
Thus, poetry has often served as a vehicle to articulate thoughts about the sublime—about God, Beauty, and Nature. In the reckless pursuit of economic development and materialistic possessions, simple truths of life, such as Nature and the Environment, often get forgotten under the mounting pile of discourses on economic advancement. Yet, the truths of Nature have always been present, imbued with a somewhat eternal quality.
The simplicity of a clear blue sky, the greenery of a leaf, the eventuality of spring, the lushness of fruit, and the silence of a pond are not new. These phenomena have always existed for billions of years, and human beings have experienced, embraced, and expressed their beauty. Here are a few poems on Nature that bring us closer to it, opening a space for contemplative reflection and silence.
The Old Pond By Matsuo Basho – A Haiku
古池や 蛙飛び込む 水の音
Furu ike ya
kawazu tobikomu
mizu no oto
An ancient pond
Frog jumps.
Splash!
A haiku is like an ocean contained in a drop. It compresses the wealth of human experiences and imagination into a few syllables—17 to be precise. Basho’s Old Pond is one of the most famous haikus known worldwide. The evocation of a simple natural setting, like a quiet and serene pond into which a frog jumps, resonates on a deeper level, opening metaphorical reflections on the nature of the mind, thoughts, and consciousness. Here, a simple description of nature—a staple feature of haikus—holds profound potential for deeper contemplation and rumination on nature and the human soul. But the spirit of haiku lies in its brevity, so the less said about it, the better.
To Autumn by William Blake
O Autumn, laden with fruit, and stained
With the blood of the grape, pass not, but sit
Beneath my shady roof; there thou mayst rest,
And tune thy jolly voice to my fresh pipe,
And all the daughters of the year shall dance!
Sing now the lusty song of fruits and flowers.
“The narrow bud opens her beauties to
The sun, and love runs in her thrilling veins;
Blossoms hang round the brows of Morning, and
Flourish down the bright cheek of modest Eve,
Till clust’ring Summer breaks forth into singing,
And feather’d clouds strew flowers round her head.
The spirits of the air live on the smells
Of fruit; and Joy, with pinions light, roves round
The gardens, or sits singing in the trees.”
Thus sang the jolly Autumn as he sat;
Then rose, girded himself, and o’er the bleak
Hills fled from our sight; but left his golden load.
Blake’s poem is ripe with imaginative visualization of Autumn as a gentle, happy, and solemn figure celebrating the lushness of fruits and flowers and harmonizing with the poet on the synchronicity between blossoming flowers, freshness of morning, and human love. Even though William Blake was a famous illustrator who often complimented his poems with engraved paintings, here, we feature DallE’s AI take on it.
The Brook by Lord Alfred Tennyson
I come from haunts of coot and hern,
I make a sudden sally
And sparkle out among the fern,
To bicker down a valley.
By thirty hills I hurry down,
Or slip between the ridges,
By twenty thorpes, a little town,
And half a hundred bridges.
Till last by Philip’s farm I flow
To join the brimming river,
For men may come and men may go,
But I go on for ever.
I chatter over stony ways,
In little sharps and trebles,
I bubble into eddying bays,
I babble on the pebbles.
With many a curve my banks I fret
By many a field and fallow,
And many a fairy foreland set
With willow-weed and mallow.
I chatter, chatter, as I flow
To join the brimming river,
For men may come and men may go,
But I go on for ever.
I wind about, and in and out,
With here a blossom sailing,
And here and there a lusty trout,
And here and there a grayling,
And here and there a foamy flake
Upon me, as I travel
With many a silvery waterbreak
Above the golden gravel,
And draw them all along, and flow
To join the brimming river
For men may come and men may go,
But I go on for ever.
I steal by lawns and grassy plots,
I slide by hazel covers;
I move the sweet forget-me-nots
That grow for happy lovers.
I slip, I slide, I gloom, I glance,
Among my skimming swallows;
I make the netted sunbeam dance
Against my sandy shallows.
I murmur under moon and stars
In brambly wildernesses;
I linger by my shingly bars;
I loiter round my cresses;
And out again I curve and flow
To join the brimming river,
For men may come and men may go,
But I go on for ever.
Lord Alfred Tennyson’s poem seems to mimic and follow the course of the brook through its sonorous rhymes, song-like quality, and the flow of meaning, which moves gaily like the brook. It is a beautiful meditation on the wilderness of the brook—the path it takes and the elements it meets along the way—which keeps reminding the reader of an eternal truth: that “men may come and men may go, but I go on forever.” Thus, the poem serves as a humble reminder of human ephemerality in contrast to the incomprehensible vastness of nature. Not only are human beings small and recent compared to nature, but they will also fade away forever, while nature will endure.
I Wandered Lonely As A Cloud by William Wordsworth
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.
Often, the simple beauty of nature can be so profound that it leaves an everlasting impact on the human soul. Wordsworth’s Daffodils is a famous example, where an uneventful encounter with daffodils leaves the poet entranced by their beauty. The poem invites us to contemplate and experience the simple beauty of nature for ourselves. At every corner, at every turn, lies a glimpse of nature waiting to take our breath away.
