Among the Narcissi
by Silvia Plath
| Spry, wry, and gray as these March sticks, Percy bows, in his blue peajacket, among the narcissi. He is recuperating from something on the lung. The narcissi, too, are bowing to some big thing : It rattles their stars on the green hill where Percy Nurses the hardship of his stitches, and walks and walks. There is a dignity to this; there is a formality- The flowers vivid as bandages, and the man mending. They bow and stand : they suffer such attacks! And the octogenarian loves the little flocks. He is quite blue; the terrible wind tries his breathing. The narcissi look up like children, quickly and whitely. |
The flocks of daffodils that dance and wave their yellowed heads
In mute and glowing admiration of the one walks between them
Are a static crowd, growing only beneath the grass-clad ground.
Their object of adoration is not so limited, and the sound
Of his voice is melodious and carries the words in flames
Of never-ending envy, his agile fingers with tune words weds.
And yet, those fingers plucking strings can scarcely contain
The silvered notes of glory, echoing the polished mirror round
And bursting into life as though lit by sunshine-fireworked beads.
And so those flocks, in music-time are wind-waving droopy heads
And swaying green-wand leaves in a tidal wave around them
Fixed in tribute, silent, soon to be returned to the earth-born ground.
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