Poem Beginning with Lines by Elizabeth Barrett Browning
Audio Poem of the Day

Poem Beginning with Lines by Elizabeth Barrett Browning

B1IntermediateOctober 28, 20261 min
  • One speaker
  • Arts & culture

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Sentence 5 of 12 · 0:21

a window now and then, they had not set there. Who had set it there? Not me. I'm just a

, .

the chair, bruises the fruit, leads a child toward a dead rabbit, and bids them not weep,

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  • C10:21
  • B20:27
  • B20:27
  • B20:53

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  • 80% of the words are B1 or easier.
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  • 4 harder words (B2 and up) in the whole episode.

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0:00

I'm Jack Underwood, and this poem is, Poem Beginning with Lines by Elizabeth Barrett Browning. But I could not hide my quickening inner life from those at watch. They saw a light at a window now and then, they had not set there. Who had set it there? Not me. I'm just a

0:21

slug on the wet inner face of the discourse, chirping the wind. I've no idea what drags the chair, bruises the fruit, leads a child toward a dead rabbit, and bids them not weep, nor laugh, but sing. My childhood neighbour recalled how I rode my bike down the hill beside our house and

0:41

practised my dying, arranging my body in the bushes, lying still. All summer I did it, repeating the drama, which is how a song is made. You make a phrase and turn it over and over like a dead rabbit, finding on the other side oh look, this rabbit, dead too.

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