The calm before the stir.
"Make me thy lyre, even as the forest is:
What if my leaves are falling like its own?"Those lines may sound all too familiar. You may read the entire poem here. It's Percy Bysshe Shelley's Ode to the West Wind. Those verses, along with a few others are my most favorite from that poem. A powerful poem as I prefer to call it.I will tell you how this poem makes me feel, but I hope you won't call me delusional. Or over-imaginative even.
Reading the 'Ode' makes me feel like I'm standing on the edge of a high cliff. With eyes closed I can feel the West Wind blowing, making dead leaves swirl all around me. The soft white cloth of my dress billows at its strength, my hair blown in organized disarray. And with all my hearts desire I wish I were the dead leaf, the wave or the cloud borne and blown by this untamed wind.
But I am not. I open my eyes instead and with all the strength I could muster,scream unto the invisible, everything that I keep and hold back inside me, to be spirited away to who knows where.
"Make me thy lyre..." Indeed, am I trying to flirt with you that you may play me with your gentleness?"Even as the forest is: What if my leaves are falling like its own?..." Now why does this part make me sad? As if lamenting old-age while I'm still at the prime of my youth. Do I also have that dilemma?
I will give this a fitting close, with the final lines of the said Ode. Whatever you make of these lines, just reading them gives me goosebumps.
The trumpet of a prophecy! O Wind,If Winter comes, can Spring be far behind?
