John Anthony Ciardi (June 24, 1916 – March 30, 1986) was an American poet, translator, and etymologist. While primarily known as a poet and translator of Dante’s Divine Comedy, he also wrote several volumes of children’s poetry, pursued etymology, contributed to the Saturday Review as a columnist and long-time poetry editor, directed the Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference in Vermont, and recorded commentaries for National Public Radio.
WHITE HERON
John Ciardi
In 1959, Ciardi published a book on how to read, write, and teach poetry, How Does a Poem Mean?, which has proven to be among the most-used books of its kind. At the peak of his popularity in the early 1960s, Ciardi also had a network television program on CBS, Accent. Ciardi’s impact on poetry is perhaps best measured through the younger poets whom he influenced as a teacher and as editor of the Saturday Review.
What lifts the heron leaning on the air
I praise without a name. A crouch, a flare,
a long stroke through the cumulus of trees,
a shaped thought at the sky – then gone. O rare!
Saint Francis, being happiest on his knees,
would have cried Father! Cry anything you please
But praise. By any name or none. But praise
the white original burst that lights
the heron on his two soft kissing kites.
When saints praise heaven lit by doves and rays,
I sit by pond scums till the air recites
It’s heron back. And doubt all else. But praise.
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A New Fable of the Grasshopper and the Ant
JOHN J. PLENTY & FIDDLER DAN
John Ciardi
Ten years ago, or maybe twenty,
There lived an ant named John J. Plenty.
And every day, come rain, come shine,
John J. would take his place in line
With all the other ants. All day
He hunted seeds to haul away,
Or beetle eggs, or bits of bread
These he would carry on his head
Back to his house. And John J., he
Was happy as an ant can be
When he was carrying a load
Big as a barn along the road.
The work was hard, but all John J.–
Or any other ant-would say
Was “More! Get more! No time to play!
Winter is coming!”
So all day,
All summer long, while birds were singing,
John J. Plenty kept on bringing
Beetle eggs, and crumbs, and seeds,
Moth-hams, flower-fuzz, salad-weeds,
Grub-sausages, the choicer cuts
Of smoked bees, aphid butter, nuts,
And everything else you ever thought of
That ants prefer to have a lot of.
As soon as he put one load away
In his cellar bin, he would turn and say,
“More! Get more! No time to play!
Winter is coming!”
Now, sad to tell,
John J. had a sister and loved her well,
Until one day she met-alas!-
A grasshopper hopping about in the grass
And playing the fiddle, and wrong or right,
(Though it’s rare among ants)
it was love at first sight.
“Don’t!” cried John J. “You ’11 come a cropper!”
But he couldn’t stop long enough to stop her,
For winter was coming, as you recall,
And there was a load he just had to haul.
So John J. Plenty’s sister ran
Away with the grasshopper. Fiddler Dan,
His name was. All be ever carried
Was the fiddle he fiddled. Well, they married.
And all day long fro1n rose to rose
Dan played the music the summer knows,
Of the sun and rain through the tall corn rows,
And of time as it comes, and of love as it grows.
And all the summer stirred to hear
The voice of the music. Far and near
The grasses swayed, and the sun and shade
Danced to the love the music played.
And Dan played on for the world to turn,
While his little wife lay on a fringe of fern,
And heard the heart of summer ringing,
Sad and sweet to the fiddle’s singing.
So the sun came up and the sun went down.
So summer changed from green to brown.
So autumn changed from brown to gold.
And the music sang, “The world grows old,
But never my song. The song stays new,
My sad sweet love, as the thought of you.”
And summer and autumn dreamed and found
The name of the world in that sad sweet sound
Of the music telling how time grows old.
Fields held their breath to hear it told.
The trees bent down from the hills to hear.
A flower uncurled to shed a tear
For the sound of the music. And field and hill
Woke from that music, sad and still.
John J. Plenty trudged along
With a load and a half. He heard the song.
He heard the music far and near.
“Get more!” he cried . “It ‘s a1most here!
Winter is coming! As for those twoLet
them fiddle on. I have work to do!
Let them fiddle the hairs right off the bow.
When once it comes time for the ice and snow,
You can bet that fiddle of theirs will fall still.
They had better stay away from my hill
When that time comes.” So said John J.,
As he carried his load and a half away.
“They’ll get nothing from me!” So said John J.
And sure enough, there came a day
When the snow can1e down. It came to stay.
It chilled from forty to thirty to twenty.
“Just as I said,” said John J. Plenty,
It chilled from. twenty to ten to zero.
“I must shut the door,” said our provident hero.
He knew the music had fallen still.
But just to be sure, he stood on the sill
And listened and listened-not a sound,
Not a song to be heard for miles around.
“Just as I told them!” John J. said.
And he shut his door.
And he went to bed.
He woke up hungry. He looked at his food
Piled high as the ceiling, and all of it good.
“Well, now, some moth-ham would be fine.
With two poached beetle-eggs-divine!
And maybe a glass of thistle-wine!”
And so John J. sat down to dine.
He had, in fact, heaped up his plate,
When a voice inside him cried out”Wait!
What if this time the winter stayed on
Until all your hard-earned food was gone?
You had better wait a day or two
To see what winter is going to do.
You worked so hard to carry this stuff,
But can you be sure you carried enough?”
So John J. Plenty waited and fasted.
As for the winter it lasted
and lasted
And the grasses sway, and the sun and shade
Dance when they hear the music played.
It was Dan, still singing for time to turn
While his little wife lay on a fringe off fern
And heard the heart of the springtime ringing
Sweet and new as the fiddle’s singing.
John J. Plenty ah, my dears!
Listened, and couldn’t believe his ears!
Or maybe he was too weak on his feet
From all that food he hadn’t dared eat.
He took one wobbly step, and -fop!
He fell on his face and had to stop.
He fell on his face and he couldn’t move.
While the music sang its sad sweet love.
And he had to listen all night and all day
To what the music had to say.
He had to listen all day and all night
While the music sang the birds to flight,
The flowers to bloom, the trees to bud.
And there lay John J.-in the mud!
And-Fiddlers grow thin and their hands turn blue
When winter comes, but they pull through.
There’s this about music-and, oh, it’s true!-
It never stays stopped. Just listen, and you
WilI hear it start over, as sweet and new
As the first pale leaves and the first spring dew.
-And that’s what John J. never knew.