In Praise of Creation

 Elizabeth Jennings (18 July 1926- 26 October 2001) 

In praise of creation

Born in the United Kingdom in Boston, Lincolnshire, she moved to Oxford when she was 6 years old and stayed there for the rest of her life. She attended Oxford University as a student in St Anne's College, and started publishing her poetry in local periodicals like Oxford Poetry and British journals such as The Spectator and New English Weekly. She became a librarian at the Oxford City library. At the age of 27, she published her first book, Poems (1953). The next year, her second book was published, A Way of Looking (1954), which won the Somerset Maugham prize and set off her public recognition as a poet. With the prize money, she lived for several months in Rome, which inspired her greatly. She was a Roman Catholic with religious beliefs and imagination, and although she suffered from mental illness at one point in her life, her poetry is recognized for its simplicity of form and its traditionalism, and she was inspired by such great poets as Gerard Manley Hopkins and W.H. Auden in her lyric poetry. She is considered to be part of a movement in poetry in England called The Movement, which included Philip Larkin, Kingsley Amis and Thom Gunn. She was honored with the title Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) by Queen Elizabeth II in 1992 . 

 "In Praise of Creation" The form of the poem is simple.

 It is alternate rhyme ABAB, with no ending rhyme or formal complexity at the end, as some traditional poems do have in their rhyme scheme. The simplicity creates a clarity and starkness : the drama of the poem is in the imagery, rather than the rhymes, and the lack of rhymes creates a kind of open-endedness and unexpected freedom which can be unsettling. 

As we can notice, a religious theme of the poem is reflected in its title. Often in prayers, praise is given to God, good things in life, things we are thankful for and the wonders of the world. Here the world is considered a "Creation", rather than a natural phenomenon which evolved by accident or chance. Yet we can ask ourselves, who creates? There is no mention of God in the poem, and we can also think of a great artist who creates a work of art, like the poet who creates a poem.

 "In praise of Creation" can mean praise of the the world or simply praise of creating something. It's a pun. This play on words can be seen as witty, ironic, urbane and unsentimental or earnest, sentimental and traditional. Repetition In stanza one and stanza two, 'one' is repeated, 'that one', 'one time only'. This creates a feeling of loneliness or distance. "One star" seems distant, far away, unreachable. It appears in early evening at the beginning of the night, or at the end of the night, when the light is too bright to see other stars. "One flash of the tiger's eye" suggests anger or excitement, as if the big cat is ready to pounce. The play on words, 'one bird, one star' suggests that the bird by itself is a 'star', a thing of beauty that stands out by itself, a kind of showy decoration or more darkly, the last one before the extinction of a species, if it is an endangered species. This creates irony. Is the the tiger going to eat the bird? How ironic. One endangered species eating another one. Or perhaps, if the poem was written in the fifties, one spectacular "star" eating another one. 

In stanza two, we have a repetition of two infinitives, "to order, to rule". This creates a contrast with stanza one. The law of the land creates a kind of kingdom, a kind of order, with an authority that organizes everything with a strong intention. Enjambment In stanza one, the first two lines show three individuals, separated by commas and then line 3 brings them surpisingly together. 'They' are all doing the same thing, "purely asserting what they are, /without ceremony (they) testify." A witness testifies in a trial. A witness gives evidence of what he or she knows, what he or she saw and experienced. The animals work together, to show the truth of what they are, to show something true about the world, with a kind of direct assertiveness. This gives them authority. They are not performing in a ceremony, they are simply being what they are, and that suggests an honesty and genuine innocence in the way that animals behave. They are not pretending, Even if one animal is a predator and the other the prey, this is the nature of things, and not a crime, but a kind of honesty in the natural world. Alliteration and Assonance : Alliteration of the consonant "t" creates a rhythm, and a quicker pace. 'Tiger trapped' suggests limits. "To testify to order, to rule" also suggests limits and the articulation of different parts of the world in an organized way: 'One time', 'a certain time'. The world sounds perhaps a bit cold and analytical. Assonance of "o"/"oo" /'u' contrasts with this: "How", "of birds', 'moon' and 'full', 'sometimes', 'cut', give a kind of sadness, as if someone is howling or crying ('boo hoo!', or 'ow!'). Images of sadness: 'mate one time only', 'cut thinly', 'tiger trapped', 'cage of skin', 'waiting for years to be stared at', 'The season sinks'.

These are sad, depressing images. Mating one time only seems a bit lonely or fatal, since it suggest that a life cycle allows for one mating before reproduction and then death. When you cut something thinly, that can be nice and delicate, but it also suggests poverty, as if there is a need to save something carefully. A 'trapped tiger' is in captivity and cannot escape or live in its natural habitat. " Cage of skin" is an awful image and suggests that just being alive in our skin is a kind of limitation, a kind of imprisonment. " Waitng for years' suggest patience, but also frustration and it is disappointing to find that the wait is only 'to be stared at' under scrutiny or a critical eye, or in a zoo. 'The season sinks' suggests a decay or degeneration of the time, as if the season ends in disappointment. Images of Energy and passion: The tiger, 'watchful over creation' seems peaceful, a kind of guardian who takes care of the world, a powerful and beautiful custodian of it, almost replacing a god. 'Pounding blood' is compared to 'drums' that 'begin', as if there is dancing and music, an energetic rhythm of life in the pulse of the excited tiger. 'The tigress's shadow' over him, suggests contact, mating, and excitement, 'darkness', 'a passion', 'a scent' suggests nighttime activity. This is visual and olfactory imagery that give the tiger and tigress life. The use of particples, '-ing words' gives dynamism. 

The world is in movement, in action in stanzas four and five, 'turning, turning'. 'Birds 'folding' their wings creates a peaceful movement, as if they are coming to rest or sleep. The moon 'waiting' is personified, like a human, active, but also passive, 'stared at'. Verbs in the present tense like "sieves", "beats" and "sinks" also create a dynamism of action, as if all of this is happening right now, at the present time or always. The message of the poet: a preference for emotion and passion over reason? The alliteration of "b" in the fourth stanza seems to emphasize this idea, 'blood beats beyond reason', the notion that our heart, our blood is more powerful than our thoughts and arguments. Is rationality no match for instinct and animal desires? A "sky full of birds" is an image of plenty, and also an indication that the birds are all migrating together at a certain time of year, instinctively. It is their instinct which orders the world, their passion for life, rather than a rational motivation or decision. Interestingly, it is the instinct and passion that creates 'order' and 'rules', rather than any rational decision. 'The season seives' or selects and reduces ('tamiser') 'the earth to its one sure element': This is a confusing image.

 The four elements are 'earth', wind, 'fire' and 'air' in medieval mythology. In modern day science, there are 103 elements. What is the earth's one sure element- earth? Or waters like "the blood"? The poem's conclusion rests on this mysterious assertion. And we become "satisfied things". Man's place in creation Man only really appears in the final lines of the poem. "Staring at" the moon, "his mind ajar'. The play on words of "ajar" is funny. The man's mind is open, undecided, amazed, or is he collecting everything to add it to his studies and possessions, capturing everything in 'a jar' like an insect? Man seems to be speculating, thinking, staring a bit passively and helplessly at all of these animals and the natural world around him. He might be filled with awe and wonderment, but he does not seem very important and lacks the assertion of more brutal, instinctive animals. 

The absence of any god in the poem suggests the loneliness of man, as if he is the only thing that is capable of trying to think about and understand the world, seeing its order and trying helplessly to understand it. 'Man' is also shown as a male figure here, but like the tiger overshadowed by the tigress, a bit clueless. Is he still the only real authority in the world?

source: Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elizabeth_Jennings, consulted 30 Aug. 2018 and GCSE Bitesize, www.bbc.co.uk.