Thumbing through some Robert Frost poems, I was led to this one by Maya Angelou . I don't know if Frost ever had an influence on Angelou, but certainly any American poet living today would be familiar with Frost's work. Frost and Whitman are my favorite poets, and the romantic poets ( Keats, Byron, and Shelley ) I can't bear. I find their work dense, abstruse and impenetrable. It's just a matter of taste and connectivity. I am no expert on verse, but I will accept the opinion of those who are. They warn us that Frost's poetry is deceivingly simple. If we were to try our hand at it, to put complicated emotions into simple verse, we would be tied up in knots. Anyway, Angelou's poem below, Caged Bird, touches on the plaintive cries, the longing for better things, that captive individuals must go through. You can apply the core meaning or sentiment of this poem to any situation involving imprisonment or captivity, human or animal. Think of the dog in a dank, dark
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As is already obvious to you, people in positions of power and influence often sanitize the brutish reality of life. The Peacemaker was actually a missile that could kill thousands. The murder of almost 600 baited bears last December was conveniently called a hunt. Deer management is, no doubt, not a matter of controlling their birth rate or relocating them. It's killing them. We've turned into a Kill State in the hands of tunnel-visioned politicians like DiVincenzo of Essex County. It's kill the bears, kill the geese, and kill the deer.