Three American sonnets to be read aloud

from American Sonnets: an anthology

David Bromwich, editor.

Robert Frost

Never again would birds' song be the same.

He would declare and could himself believe

That the birds there in all the garden round

From having heard the daylong voice of Eve

Had added to their own an oversound,

Her tone of meaning but without the words.

Admittedly an eloquence so soft

Could only have had an influence on birds

When call or laughter carried it aloft.

Be that as it may, she was in their song.

Moreover her voice upon their voices crossed

Had now persisted in the woods so long

That probably it never would be lost.

Never again would birds' song be the same.

And to do that to birds was why she came.

Delmore Schwartz

The Beautiful American Word, Sure.

The beautiful American word, Sure,

As I have come into a room, and touch

The lamp's button, and the light blooms with such

Certainty where the darkness loomed before,

As I care for what I do not know, and care

Knowing for little she might not have been,

And for how little she would be unseen,

The intercourse of lives miraculous and dear.

Where the light is, and each thing clear,

Separate from all others, standing in its place,

I drink the time and touch whatever's near,

And hope for day when the whole world has that face:

For what assures her present every year?

In dark accidents the mind's sufficient grace.

William Meredith

The Illiterate

Touching your goodness, I am like a man

Who turns a letter over in his hand

And you might think this was because the hand

Was unfamiliar but, truth is, the man

Has never had a letter from anyone;

And now he is both afraid of what it means

And ashamed because he has no other means

To find out what it says than to ask someone.

His uncle could have left the farm to him,

Or his parents died before he sent them word,

Or the dark girl changed and want him for beloved.

Afraid and letter-proud, he keeps it with him.

What would you call his feeling for the words

That keep him rich and orphaned and beloved?