Poem of the Day: "The Park" by Harry Clifton

"The Park" by Harry Clifton is the Songs of Eretz Poem of the Day for March 25, 2014.  A link to the poem may be found here:  http://www.poetryfoundation.org/poetrymagazine/poem/183327.

Born, raised, and educated in Dublin, Harry Clifton (b. 1952) (pictured) became a world traveler, living and working throughout Europe, Africa, Asia, and North America.  He currently teaches at University College Dublin, and is considered by critics to be one of the most important Irish poets of our time.  Reference to this and additional biographical information may be found here:  http://www.poetryfoundation.org/bio/harry-clifton.


"The Park" is presented in ten tercets of free verse.  Frequent use of enjambment gives the poem a lilting flow.  Some stanzas have a stand-alone haiku-like quality, despite going over seventeen syllables.  I will allow my readers to discover and decide which ones fall into this category.

The first stanza introduces the second person pronoun, which may refer to the reader, the readers (all of you), or perhaps to a park bench.  This ambiguity is not irksome.  Rather, it serves to fuse the reader(s) with the several delightful aspects of a perfect escape to a beautiful park on a perfect in a season for which "there is no name."