Review of The Fish, the Man, and the Spirit by Leigh Hunt

The Fish, the Man, and the Spirit by Leigh Hunt (b. 1784), a friend of Shelley and Keats, was offered by Poets.org's Poem-A-Day on March 3, 2013.  The piece consists of three linked, rhyming sonnets.  In the first, a man criticizes fish-kind.  In the second, a fish takes up the narrative, insulting mankind's appearance and customs, even going so far as to say,

With the first sight of thee didst make our race


For ever stare!

In the third, the fish turns into a man and then a spirit and sings of the amazing spark that dwells within all life.  Mr. Hunt reminds us to seek the beautiful in everything, especially in all that lives.