A Barred Owl by Richard Wilbur

Last week I learned the poem, A Barred Owl by Richard Wilbur.

The warping night air having brought the boom

Of an owl’s voice into her darkened room,

We tell the wakened child that all she heard

Was an odd question from a forest bird,

Asking of us, if rightly listened to,

“Who cooks for you?” and then “Who cooks for you?”

Words, which can make our terrors bravely clear,

Can also thus domesticate a fear,

And send a small child back to sleep at night

Not listening for the sound of stealthy flight

Or dreaming of some small thing in a claw

Borne up to some dark branch and eaten raw.

 I enjoyed learning my poem. I think that I picked a very good poem to memorize because I understood it very well. My poem was about a girl who woke up in the middle of the night because she heard an owl’s voice. Her parents told her that the owl was asking, “who cooks for you?”. I learned the poem by studying each line very carefully. When Mr. Parsons explained to me what my poem was about, it was much easier to memorize. Honestly, I did not think that I could memorize the whole poem, but I did it! All of my hard work paid off. As I was standing in front of the class, I was very nervous about messing up. After I finished reciting it, I felt relieved. Mr. Parson let my classmates and me recite our poems again. The second time I recited my poem I added different sounds such as the sound of an owl. I think I did an amazing job reciting my poem. Mr. Parson gave me a B, but I think I deserved a higher grade.