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Coloring Page Poems: The Darkling Thrush by Thomas Hardy

By Will Willingham 3 Comments

Coloring Page Poems The Darkling Thrush by Thomas Hardy
We’ve heard that coloring pages can be a good way to alleviate stress. And of course, we know that poetry is also a fine way to reduce stress. So what could be better than putting the two together? This year, we’re introducing a series of fun Coloring Page Poems that you can print, color, and doodle your way to relaxation and stress relief. Today, we offer “The Darkling Thrush” by Thomas Hardy.

Download Coloring Page Poems The Darkling Thrush by Thomas Hardy Now

Coloring Page Poems The Darkling Thrush by Thomas Hardy

The Darkling Thrush

I leant upon a coppice gate
     When Frost was spectre-grey,
And Winter’s dregs made desolate
     The weakening eye of day.
The tangled bine-stems scored the sky
     Like strings of broken lyres,
And all mankind that haunted nigh
     Had sought their household fires.

The land’s sharp features seemed to be
     The Century’s corpse outleant,
His crypt the cloudy canopy,
     The wind his death-lament.
The ancient pulse of germ and birth
     Was shrunken hard and dry,
And every spirit upon earth
     Seemed fervourless as I.

At once a voice arose among
     The bleak twigs overhead
In a full-hearted evensong
     Of joy illimited;
An aged thrush, frail, gaunt, and small,
     In blast-beruffled plume,
Had chosen thus to fling his soul
     Upon the growing gloom.

So little cause for carolings
     Of such ecstatic sound
Was written on terrestrial things
     Afar or nigh around,
That I could think there trembled through
     His happy good-night air
Some blessed Hope, whereof he knew
     And I was unaware.

—Thomas Hardy

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Photo by Kelly Colgan Azar,  Creative Commons license via Flickr. Post and illustration by LW Lindquist.

___________

How to Write a Poem 283 high

How to Write a Poem uses images like the buzz, the switch, the wave—from the Billy Collins poem “Introduction to Poetry”—to guide writers into new ways of writing poems. Excellent teaching tool. Anthology and prompts included.

“How to Write a Poem is a classroom must-have.”
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Will Willingham
Will Willingham
Director of Many Things; Senior Editor, Designer and Illustrator at Tweetspeak Poetry
I used to be a claims adjuster, helping people and insurance companies make sense of loss. Now, I train other folks with ladders and tape measures to go and do likewise. Sometimes, when I’m not scaling small buildings or crunching numbers with my bare hands, I read Keats upside down. My first novel is Adjustments.
Will Willingham
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Filed Under: Bird Poems, Blog, Coloring Page Poems, Nature Poems, Poems, poetry, poetry teaching resources

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About Will Willingham

I used to be a claims adjuster, helping people and insurance companies make sense of loss. Now, I train other folks with ladders and tape measures to go and do likewise. Sometimes, when I’m not scaling small buildings or crunching numbers with my bare hands, I read Keats upside down. My first novel is Adjustments.

Trackbacks

  1. Coloring Page Poems: The Darkling Thrush by Thomas Hardy – D.B. Mauldin says:
    February 11, 2017 at 12:35 pm

    […] Source: Coloring Page Poems: The Darkling Thrush by Thomas Hardy […]

    Reply
  2. By Heart: "The Darkling Thrush" + New Longfellow Challenge | says:
    January 31, 2020 at 5:00 am

    […] Coloring Page Poems: The Darkling Thrush by Thomas Hardy […]

    Reply
  3. Poets and Poems: Donna Hilbert and "Threnody" - Tweetspeak Poetry says:
    January 25, 2022 at 11:01 am

    […] Wordsworth, Keats, and Shelley wrote lament poems, as did Sir Walter Scott and Thomas Hardy (The Darkling Thrush). With In Memoriam, Tennyson may have written a lament epic. Dylan Thomas and Pablo Neruda wrote […]

    Reply

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