Tuesday, February 3

wildness and discipline

"The hawk had filled the house with wildness as a bowl of lilies fills a house with scent."
The current issue of Vogue offers an excerpt from Helen Macdonald's memoir of grief and falconry, H is for Hawk, due for release on March 3 of this year. The writing is very good and the story sounds interesting, but the sentence I quoted above arrested my attention, pulling my imagination hawkward.

It is a beautiful sentence, balanced and elegant in its imagery and composition. Rhythmically, it satisfies. Emotionally and imaginatively, it challenges: what does wildness feel like? What does such a house, a home so filled feel like?

I've been too long tame. There must be in me talons and a taste for blood.

No comments:

Post a Comment