Tag: Poetry

In response to a comment to yesterday’s blog, I said I’d publish on my blog of today a story I once heard about six mice and an elephant. I was a little confused. The story is actually about six blind men and an elephant. The story is quite old but is captured here in a poem by John Saxe in the 1800’s. It speaks to people’s opinions of what life is all about. Here is the story…

The Blind Men and the Elephant
John Godfrey Saxe (1816-1887)

It was six men of Indostan To learning much inclined, Who went to see the Elephant (Though all of them were blind), That each by observation Might satisfy his mind.

The First approached the Elephant, And happening to fall Against his broad and sturdy side, At once began to bawl: “God bless me! but the Elephant Is very like a WALL!”

The Second, feeling of the tusk, Cried, “Ho, what have we here, So very round and smooth and sharp? To me ’tis mighty clear This wonder of an Elephant Is very like a SPEAR!”

The Third approached the animal, And happening to take The squirming trunk within his hands, Thus boldly up and spake: “I see,” quoth he, “the Elephant Is very like a SNAKE!”

The Fourth reached out an eager hand, And felt about the knee “What most this wondrous beast is like Is mighty plain,” quoth he: “‘Tis clear enough the Elephant Is very like a TREE!”

The Fifth, who chanced to touch the ear, Said: “E’en the blindest man Can tell what this resembles most; Deny the fact who can, This marvel of an Elephant Is very like a FAN!”

The Sixth no sooner had begun About the beast to grope, Than seizing on the swinging tail That fell within his scope, “I see,” quoth he, “the Elephant Is very like a ROPE!”

And so these men of Indostan Disputed loud and long, Each in his own opinion Exceeding stiff and strong, Though each was partly in the right, And all were in the wrong.

This poem by Byron Herbert Reece was given to me recently and some of my musician friends came to mind. I share it with these friends today and with all other musicians and artists…and we are all artists.

I took my fiddle
That sings and cries
To a hill in the middle
of Paradise.

I sat at the base
Of a golden stone
In that holy place
To play alone.

I tuned the strings
And began to play,
And a crowd of wings
Were bent my way.

A voice said
Amid the stir:
“We that were dead
O fiddler,

“With purest gold
Are robed and shod,
And we behold
The face of God.

Our Halls can show
No thing so rude
As your horsehair bow,
Or your fiddewood;

And yet can they
So well entrance
If you but play
Then we must dance!”

Byron Herbert Reece