Let the tigers come
Cracked bandage of bone,
edging colours
of fired earth,
east-west lay
the troubled sores,
of such a dalliance with steel.
Deep in the night the tigers come,
and lap the blood
from my marrow well.
This peace of mind,
this picture still,
to feel the rough tongues will,
Then I loop and coil,
to my anaemic rise,
blind by colours full.
I wait the day,
for eventide light,
and let the tigers come again.
The Tyger -- William Blake
Cracked bandage of bone,
edging colours
of fired earth,
east-west lay
the troubled sores,
of such a dalliance with steel.
Deep in the night the tigers come,
and lap the blood
from my marrow well.
This peace of mind,
this picture still,
to feel the rough tongues will,
Then I loop and coil,
to my anaemic rise,
blind by colours full.
I wait the day,
for eventide light,
and let the tigers come again.
The Tyger -- William Blake
The Tyger
ReplyDeleteTyger Tyger, burning bright,
In the forests of the night;
What immortal hand or eye,
Could frame thy fearful symmetry?
In what distant deeps or skies.
Burnt the fire of thine eyes?
On what wings dare he aspire?
What the hand, dare seize the fire?
And what shoulder, & what art,
Could twist the sinews of thy heart?
And when thy heart began to beat,
What dread hand? & what dread feet?
What the hammer? what the chain,
In what furnace was thy brain?
What the anvil? what dread grasp,
Dare its deadly terrors clasp!
When the stars threw down their spears
And water'd heaven with their tears:
Did he smile his work to see?
Did he who made the Lamb make thee?
Tyger Tyger burning bright,
In the forests of the night:
What immortal hand or eye,
Dare frame thy fearful symmetry?
--William Blake
"Fire is ... a symbol/metaphor for God in both the oldest Middle Eastern religion that we know of, that of Zarathustra, and in the Rig Veda (Agni). The second line with its inversion of “forests of the night” again tells us this is no ordinary Tyger but one meant to make us aware of the Divine. Night has forests and in them shines the fire the tiger is. What is this night but the primeval one and if so what is this Tyger but the first Life – hence uncreatable/Energy and God himself?... This awe inspiring Tyger was not made, but begotten of the Father before all worlds. Asking a series of questions, comparing creating the Tyger to an act by a blacksmith in his forge, bringing in Vulcan [the Roman god of volcanoes and blacksmiths], Blake drives us to the conclusion that the Tyger was perhaps not created though he gives no conclusive answer to his questions. His reference to the angels/stars who threw down their spears in admiration in the Book of Job at God’s unmatched power shown in his manifold creation, only goes to increase our wonder at his having perhaps unleashed in the Tiger a force that is equal to or can become greater than Himself or the Lamb [symbolically Jesus the son of God; in Blake's "Songs of Experience," "The Tyger" was a counterpoint to the poem "The Lamb" in his "Songs of Innocence"], which brings us to the crux of the poem which is about the complex relationship between the creator and the created as well as the golden bond or thread that unites them, and about the power of the balance in Nature between what can bring about good as well as if misused bring about evil, namely the latent force in the Tyger seen in his fiery eyes, heart’s sinews and brain – showing us what matters is the soul and spirit of the Tyger and not its brawn, to Blake. Or its stripes which underlie the poem again as implicit metaphor for energy and matter, if not good and evil.... Ultimately, the Tyger is man – humankind and humanity, in all his potential.... So it is not surprising that in the last stanza that seems to be a way of making it a circular and cyclic poem he replaces “could” with “dare” – to show that he has given the Tyger in his artistic vision the same place as God has Christ, as his equal and peer."
-- A. V. Koshy