Poetry Performed Episode 032 - Spring Song by Sherwood Anderson

Hopefully, your April showers are beginning to bring May flowers, and this week, we sing a song to the spring that surrounds us, with Spring Song by Sherwood Anderson.

Before we get to the poem, I wanted to take a moment to thank you for listening to Poetry Performed. Whether this is your first listen to the show, or you’ve been with us since the beginning, thank you for being here. Don’t forget to tell your friends about this weekly dose of poetry, or to rate and review the show.

Now, onto this week’s poem.

Spring Song by Sherwood Anderson

In the forest, amid old trees and wet dead leaves, a shrine.
Men on the wet leaves kneeling.
The spirit of God in the air above a shrine.

Now, America, you press your lips to mine,
Feel on your lips the throbbing of my blood.
Christ, come to life and life calling,
Sweet and strong.

Spring. God in the air above old fields.
Farmers marking fields for the planting of the corn.
Fields marked for corn to stand in long straight aisles.

In the spring I press your body down on wet cold new-plowed ground.
Men, give your souls to me.
I would have my sacred way with you.

In the forest, amid old trees and wet dead leaves, a shrine.
Men rising from the kneeling place to sing.
Everywhere in the fields now the orderly planting of corn.

Sherwood Anderson was an American writer who lived from 1876 to 1941. He was born in Ohio, and wrote across all forms of fiction.