Poem of the Day: ‘Independent Blossoms’

Influenced by Whitman, Rihani is credited with introducing free verse into Arabic literature. Among his English writings, he published an early collection of rhymed poems, including this odd poem.

Alois Kalvoda, 'In the Rose Garden.' Wikimedia Commons

The Lebanese-American poet Ameen Rihani (1876–1940) inhabited two cultures, traveling between Lebanon, where he was born, and New York City, where he had initially moved with a brother at the age of twelve. As a journalist and translator, he worked in Arabic, while as a poet, he wrote in English. Influenced by Walt Whitman, Rihani is credited with introducing free verse into Arabic literature. Among his English writings, he published an early collection of rhymed poems, including this odd poem, “Independent Blossoms.” In two stanzas of dimeter lines, with an intricate rhyme scheme of aabcddbc, a tree’s blossoms are lorded over and lamented by the birds year after year. But, in turn, the tree’s blossoms lord it over the roses, which are soon forgotten and faded.

Independent Blossoms
by Ameen Rihani

When the spring boughs were told
Soon the rose will unfold
    Herself in the bower
           Of which she is queen,
Their blossoms, beguiling
The sad leaves, said smiling :
    “No slaves to a flower
        Have we ever been.”

Our lords are the birds.
And they love not in words ;
    They sing when we smile
           And sob when we fall ;
Her lord is the liar—
The thief or the buyer—
    Who smells her the while
           She lives, and that’s all.

___________________________________________ 

With “Poem of the Day,” The New York Sun offers a daily portion of verse selected by Joseph Bottum with the help of the North Carolina poet Sally Thomas, The Sun’s associate poetry editor. Tied to the day, or the season, or just individual taste, the poems will be typically drawn from the lesser-known portion of the history of English verse. In the coming months we will be reaching out to contemporary poets for examples of current, primarily formalist work, to show that poetry can still serve as a delight to the ear, an instruction to the mind, and a tonic for the soul. 


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