In A Dark Time Poem by Theodore Roethke

In A Dark Time

Rating: 3.8


In a dark time, the eye begins to see,
I meet my shadow in the deepening shade;
I hear my echo in the echoing wood--
A lord of nature weeping to a tree.
I live between the heron and the wren,
Beasts of the hill and serpents of the den.
What's madness but nobility of soul
At odds with circumstance? The day's on fire!
I know the purity of pure despair,
My shadow pinned against a sweating wall.
That place among the rocks--is it a cave,
Or a winding path? The edge is what I have.

A steady storm of correspondences!
A night flowing with birds, a ragged moon,
And in broad day the midnight come again!
A man goes far to find out what he is--
Death of the self in a long, tearless night,
All natural shapes blazing unnatural light.

Dark, dark my light, and darker my desire.
My soul, like some heat-maddened summer fly,
Keeps buzzing at the sill. Which I is I?
A fallen man, I climb out of my fear.
The mind enters itself, and God the mind,
And one is One, free in the tearing wind.

COMMENTS OF THE POEM
Richard Vandervoort 10 May 2009

IN A DARK TIME is a great poem of mood and tone, of a man's encounter with 'self' or 'Self', a searching for his truer, deepest identity. 'Which I is I? ' the speaker asks. Anyone who ever experienced an 'identity crisis' may identify with this poem. Richard Lee Van Der Voort, M.A.

18 3 Reply
Dawn Fuzan 11 May 2014

Well written theo

14 4 Reply
* Sunprincess * 11 February 2016

.........excellent lines ★ A man goes far to find out what he is- Death of the self in a long, tearless night,

4 4 Reply
Richard 10 January 2018

Nice poem, I liked the words. Buzz buzz

1 6 Reply
P. Mason 27 January 2017

I've read this over serval times...I enjoy surveying other folks darkness, I suppose because so much of my own work dwells in dark places too. With each reading I pick up one or two additional nuances to where Roethkes darkness lies...I'd like to ask if I am correct in my thinking here. But, alas, can not because Ted is dead. So it goes...

4 1 Reply
Dr Dillip K Swain 28 August 2021

I know the purity of pure despair... great expectation

1 0 Reply
danny 02 May 2021

green

1 0 Reply
hi 02 May 2021

bye

1 0 Reply
bar bar 02 May 2021

rawr

1 0 Reply
Chinedu Dike 21 October 2019

Well expressed thoughts and feelings. An insightful work of art. Thanks for sharing...................................

1 0 Reply
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Theodore Roethke

Theodore Roethke

Michigan / United States
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