Over the land there lies a long shadow,
westward reaching wings of darkness.
The Tower trembles; to the tombs of kings
doom approaches. The Dead awaken;
for the hour is come for the oath breakers:
at the Stone of Erech they shall stand again
and hear there a horn in the hills ringing.
Whose shall the horn be? Who shall call them
from the grey twilight, the forgotten people?
The heir of him to whom the oath they swore.
From the North he shall come, need shall drive him:
he shall pass the Door to the Paths of the Dead.
I know I said I didn't like free verse. yeah, well, there's an exception to every rule (...except this one. har har. couldn't help it). I need to stop trying to analyze why I like things -- it's so hard to put it into words, I can't put it into words correctly anyway, and it sort of spoils the thing for me since I generally like it because it makes me feel all warm and fuzzy inside.
there, I admitted my motivation for most things. warm fuzzies. woot.
besides, what if you get a kick out of good poetry not because of warm fuzzies, but because you like practicing the goose-step to its meter? ("the assyrian came down like a wolf on the fold...") or what if you need lyrics to rap? (can I give you a suggestion? try taylor swift's "love story". rapper's delight, no joke, and I like hot butter on my breakfast toast.) this is really not for you, in those cases.
I guess, then, this is pretty exclusively for me, which means I will ramble unintelligibly. you're basically listening to me talking to myself.
if you don't mind eavesdropping...
a lot of the poems in return of the king are free verse, but they're fierce and determined. I can see aragorn saying them with an "it is not this day!" look on his face. ...or éomer, if it's éomer. :T
Out of doubt, out of dark to the day's rising
I came singing in the sun, sword unsheathing.
To hope's end I rode and to heart's breaking:
Now for wrath, now for ruin and a red nightfall!
it's a strong man's lament for his sister. I want to cry for the sweetness. it's as good as pippin's "steward of gondor" song, if you can believe that. (and I love pippin.)
then comes legolas, thinking of the cry of gulls, and again we know the fellowship will be broken one day -- not just parted.
Silver flow the streams from Celos to Erui
In the green fields of Lebennin!
Tall grows the grass there. In the wind from the Sea
The white lilies sway,
And the golden bells are shaken of mallos and alfirin
In the green fields of Lebennin,
In the wind from the Sea!
"And then softly, to his own surprise, there at the vain end of his long journey and his grief, moved by what thought in his heart he could not tell, Sam began to sing."
how sweet.
In western lands beneath the Sun
the flowers may rise in Spring,
the trees may bud, the waters run,
the merry finches sing.
Or there maybe 'tis cloudless night
and swaying beeches bear
the Elven-stars as jewels white
amid their branching hair.
Though here at journey's end I lie
in darkness buried deep,
beyond all towers strong and high,
beyond all mountains steep,
above all shadows rides the Sun
and Stars forever dwell:
I will not say the Day is done,
nor bid the Stars farewell.
the songs are a contrast, themselves. they not only speak of contrasts, but they often come at dark times when singing seems out of place. I love how tolkien blends them into the narrative pretty seamlessly.
to note it for a moment, the narrative rises to its climax soon after sam's song. they make it to mount doom; gollum does indeed have one last part in the story; frodo and sam wonder what stories will be told that they will miss, now that they're here "at the end of all things"; and that is how gwaihir finds them.
the fellowship is reunited. the fellowship is broken. cue "into the west".
"'To the Sea! To the Sea! The white gulls are crying,
The wind is blowing, and the white foam flying.
West, west away, the round sun is falling.
Grey ship, grey ship, do you hear them calling,
The voices of my people that have gone before me?
I will leave, I will leave the woods that bore me;
For our days are ending and our years failing.
I will pass the wide waters lonely sailing.
Long are the waves on the Last Shore falling,
Sweet are the voices in the Lost Isle calling,
In Eressëa, in Elvenhome that no man can discover,
Where the leaves fall not: land of my people for ever!'
And so singing Legolas went away down the hill."
in honor of tolkien, I read the story that originated the "west of the moon, east of the sun" phrase. I love how it rings with the feeling of farewell, the idea that 'where I am going, you cannot come' -- a parting that is such sweet sorrow I can't stop reading it... and the "road goes ever on and on" motif is a beautiful one.
Still round the corner there may wait
A new road or a secret gate;
And though I oft have passed them by
A day will come at last when I
Shall take the hidden paths that run
West of the Moon, East of the Sun.
and the series ends.
The road goes ever on and on
Out from the door where it began.
Now far ahead the Road has gone,
Let others follow it who can!
"Then Frodo kissed Merry and Pippin, and last of all Sam, and went aboard; and the sails were drawn up, and the wind blew, and slowly the ship slipped away down the long grey firth; and the light of the glass of Galadriel that Frodo bore glimmered and was lost. And the ship went out into the High Sea and passed on into the West, until at last on a night of rain Frodo smelled a sweet fragrance on the air and heard the sound of singing that came over the water. And then it seemed to him that as in his dream in the house of Bombadil, the grey rain-curtain turned all to silver glass and was rolled back, and he beheld white shores and beyond them a far green country under a swift sunrise."
- - -
I guess that sort of turned out of an "LOTR poetry discussion" into a "ramble about LOTR everything".
oh well. staying on topic isn't why I started this blog. I wanted to think more about literature, and this definitely helped me think.
I would suggest, though, if you want to think: don't read this, go write your own thoughts. it's quite a wonderful experience. :)
