The Poetry of Birds: edited by Simon Armitage and Tim Dee

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a b c d e The Conference of the Birds by Attar, edited and translated by Sholeh Wolpé, W. W. Norton & Co 2017 ISBN 0393292193 Persian text of The Conference of Birds, with recitation in Persian by members of the Chamekhan Group.

Valley of Detachment, where all desires and attachments to the world are given up. Here, what is assumed to be “reality” vanishes. This poem by Shakespeare has been called the first metaphysical poem, and takes as its focus the two birds, the mythical phoenix (which is famed for being able to rise from the ashes of its own funeral pyre) and the turtledove (associated with love). It was published as a sort of supplement to a much longer poem by Robert Chester, which also focused on the phoenix and turtledove. Heilpern, John (1978)[1977]. Conference of the Birds. The Bobs Merrill Company, Inc. ISBN 0-672-52489-9 Shelley’s poem is as much about poetic inspiration as it is about the bird itself. As so often with Romantic poetry, the self of the poet, the stuff of poetic creativity, the individual soul of the artist, is at one with nature’s awe-inspiring beauty and majesty. We have analysed this poem here.

Valley of Unity, where the Wayfarer realizes that everything is connected and that the Beloved is beyond everything, including harmony, multiplicity, and eternity. Collection at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. Folio from an illustrated Persian manuscript dated c.1600. Paintings by Habiballah of Sava (active ca. 1590–1610), in ink, opaque watercolor, gold, and silver on paper, dimensions 25,4 x 11,4cm. [7] I stood there, and it was entertaining to my soul - my thirsty soul who had seen naught but the mirage of life instead of its sweetness.

But these are quibbles. With its lashings of Clare, Hardy and Edward Thomas, The Poetry of Birds is a powerful statement of the continuing life of the Romantic tradition, through Lawrence and Hughes down to Kathleen Jamie and Alice Oswald today. Clare remains supreme among British bird poets, and "To the Snipe" is one of the centrepieces here. More than just a description of the snipe's watery home patch, the poem becomes a miniature ecosystem in its own right: Paul Farley's "For the House Sparrow, in Decline", meanwhile, tenderly imagines "a roofless world where no one hears your cheeps / only a starling's modem mimicry / will remind you how you once supplied / the incidental music of our lives''. Once again birds provide a metaphor for the crisis of our time.Birds are everywhere in poetry, so compiling this list of ten of the greatest bird poems has involved leaving many great poems out. However, we hope that the selection below will suggest the wondrous variety to be found among English-language poets and their descriptions of birds. What’s your favourite bird poem?

Valley of Poverty and Annihilation, where the self disappears into the universe and the Wayfarer becomes timeless, existing in both the past and the future. Masani, R. P. (tr.) (2001), Conference of the Birds: A Seeker's Journey to God, Weiser Books, ISBN 1609252233 . Beside the symbolic use of the Simorgh, the allusion to China is also very significant. According to Idries Shah, China as used here, is not the geographical China, but the symbol of mystic experience, as inferred from the Hadith (declared weak by Ibn Adee, but still used symbolically by some Sufis): "Seek knowledge; even as far as China". [4] There are many more examples of such subtle symbols and allusions throughout the Mantiq. In modern poetry, birds have been just as visible – and not simply as ornament. Ted Hughes found in birds the symbols of his own concerns, first in the shining, terrible, power of The Hawk in the Rain whose "wings hold all creation in a weightless quiet" and later going as far as to forge his own gospel story in Crow.Attar, Harvey & Masani, Conference of the Birds: A Seeker's Journey to God, Weiser Books, 2001, ISBN 1-57863-246-3