Most Read... John McAuliffeBill Manhire in Conversation with John McAuliffe
(PN Review 259)
Patricia CraigVal Warner: A Reminiscence
(PN Review 259)
Eavan BolandA Lyric Voice at Bay
(PN Review 121)
Joshua WeinerAn Exchange with Daniel Tiffany/Fall 2020
(PN Review 259)
Vahni CapildeoOn Judging Prizes, & Reading More than Six Really Good Books
(PN Review 237)
Christopher MiddletonNotes on a Viking Prow
(PN Review 10)
Next Issue Kirsty Gunn re-arranges the world John McAuliffe reads Seamus Heaney's letters and translations Chris Price's 'Songs of Allegiance' David Herman on Aharon Appelfeld Victoria Moul on Christopher Childers compendious Greek and Latin Lyric Book Philip Terry again answers the question, 'What is Poetry'
Poems Articles Interviews Reports Reviews Contributors
Reader Survey
PN Review Substack

This poem is taken from PN Review 37, Volume 10 Number 5, March - April 1984.

Poems Robert B. Shaw

ACCLIMATIZING

A blue spruce, transplanted,
may not remain true blue;
hydrangea petals, litmus-like,
will vary in their hue

from here, of sky at sunset
to there, of sky at noon.
Flower and fir grow color-fast
by slow turns until strewn,

besting attention's bid to span
each deepening tinge of change
until they've worn unwelcome out
in soil they came to strange.

They mock at man uprooted.
Could acid soil or base
lend him the local tincture, thus
...


Searching, please wait... animated waiting image