Poetic One Little Word

             Tara Smith at A Teaching Life is hosting Poetry Friday today from the snowy east, and it's her birthday!  Thanks Tara, and happiest of birthdays to you this special Friday!

         At the beginning of the month, when I shared my One Little Word here, more than one person shared a poem with me that connected, and several times since I have discovered other references to my word, which is wander.  I now have, through my own discovery and through gifts, a growing file of poems and a few quotes that have some connection to wander. The word is "hanging on", so much that some poems have been now appearing more than once! Serendipity, destiny?  Whatever the reason, I am thrilled to have discovered so much just here in January, and I'm starting a scrapbook of sorts about the word in all its permutations.
photo credit: rottnapples via photopin cc



          I was first sent this poem, The Song of Wandering Aengus by W.B. Yeats by Tabatha Yeatts of The Opposite of Indifference, always kind and someone who shares beauty in poetry often, among other things that make us think!  I have researched it, found that most who write about it share its Celtic background with the poem's character connecting to the god Aengus Og, including other leanings toward magic and fairies, the thoughts of eternal longing for someone or something. If you are interested in more, good articles/posts are numerous.  Here is one link by author Kelly Fineman.  I love the poem for my own interests of course, for my word's connection and that despite the fact it speaks of a man with eternal longing for a woman, I read it with the idea of a life's quest, wandering to see what can be made of the rest of my life.

            Finally, just last week, the poem surfaced again on The Writer's Almanac, and here you may hear Tom O'Bedlam read it. Also, Judy Collins has recorded the poem as a song, although she has changed some of the words.  Please wander through the different links and enjoy the beautiful words.

The poem begins:

I went out to the hazel wood,

Because a fire was in my head,

And cut and peeled a hazel wand,

And hooked a berry to a thread;

       and the rest can be found on The Writer's Almanac, link above.

Photo-LBaie