Poetry Magazine
A Shadow on the Wall
A shadow on the wall
boughs stirred by the noonday wind
that’s enough earth
and for the eye
enough celestial participation.
How much further do you want to go? Refuse
the bossy insistence
of new impressions—
lie there still,
behold your own fields,
your estate,
dwelling especially
on the poppies,
unforgettable
because they transported the summer—
where did it go?
Source: Poetry (March 2011).
Biography
Gottfried Benn (1886-1956) served in the German army’s medical corps during WWI and used his clinical experiences as inspiration for his first collections of poetry, Morgue und andere Gedichte (1912) and Fleisch (1917).
Poems by Gottfried Benn
Poem Categorization
SUBJECT Living, Life Choices, Nature, Summer, Trees & Flowers
POET’S REGION Germany
Poetic Terms Free Verse
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