Midstream they met. Challenger and champion,
They fought a war for honour
Fierce, sharp, but with no honour:
Each had a simple aim and sought it quickly.
The combat over, the victor sailed away
Broken, but placid as is the gift of swans,
Leaving his rival to his shame alone.
I listened for a song, according to story,
But this swan’s death was out of character-
No giving up of the grace of life
In a sad lingering music.
I saw the beaten swan rise on the water
As though to outreach pain, its webbed feet
Banging the river helplessly, its wings
Loose in a last hysteria. Then the neck
Was floating like a rope and the swan was dead.
It drifted away and all around it swan’s-down
Bobbed on the river like children little boats.
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The sadness in the death of the Swan overwhelms me. The poet has written such a vivid description of the silent 'swansong' one cannot help but use imagination to see the animal in pain, so close to death, then to wash away along the with the river current.
Incredibly descriptive, sad too and it certainly affected this reader.
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