From First Known When Lost:
In the meantime, we have the wind. And poems about the wind.
Providence
White roses shatter, overblown,
by the breath of a little wind undone,
yet the same air passing scarcely stirs
the tall dark green perpetual firs.John Hewitt, Scissors for a One-Armed Tailor: Marginal Verses 1929-1954 (1974)
“Providence” feels like a haiku: a report on experience. (To borrow from Edmund Blunden.) However, a word such a “providence” would likely be avoided by a haiku poet. Too subjective. Of course, I am completely open to the possibility that what the wind does may well be “providence”: I am not in any way criticizing Hewitt’s use of the word.
Hewitt, like a good haiku poet, tells us exactly what he saw. The difference is that he gives us a hint. A haiku poet would leave us to draw our own conclusions. Or, better yet, would leave us to draw no conclusions at all, but only see the World as it is, or, perhaps more accurately, as the haiku poet saw it in a moment of passing time.
Enough of that. I do not wish to create the impression that I am quibbling about “Providence”: I think it is a lovely poem. As is this, another poem about the wind of Ireland.
Afterpeace
This wind that howls about our roof tonight
And tears live branches screaming from great trees
Tomorrow may have scarcely strength to ruffle
The rabbit’s back to silver in the sun.Patrick MacDonogh, Poems (edited by Derek Mahon) (The Gallery Press 2001).
Of course, poets cannot help but bring humans into their apostrophes about the wind. Thus, for instance, they say that the wind “sighs” or “moans” or “cries.” This is to be expected. All poetry, all art, is an attempt to place ourselves into the World in the hope of making sense of things, however briefly. It is not surprising that, in doing so, we see ourselves (or come upon ourselves) in the World.
Moreover, we mustn’t forget that the beautiful particulars of the World include human beings. The wind. People.
The Wind Shifts
This is how the wind shifts:
Like the thoughts of an old human,
Who still thinks eagerly
And despairingly.
The wind shifts like this:
Like a human without illusions,
Who still feels irrational things within her.
The wind shifts like this:
Like humans approaching proudly,
Like humans approaching angrily.
This is how the wind shifts:
Like a human, heavy and heavy,
Who does not care.Wallace Stevens, Harmonium (Alfred A. Knopf 1923).
We are the wind and the wind is us. The wind is us and we are the wind.
Séamus Sweeney 