Explore "Gulls" by William Carlos Williams on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
My townspeople, beyond in the great world, / are many with whom it were far more / profitable for me to live than here with you.
These whirr about me calling, calling! and for my own part I answer them, loud as I can, / but they, being free, pass!
I remain! Therefore, listen!
For you will not soon have another singer.
First I say this: you have seen / the strange birds, have you not, that sometimes / rest upon our river in winter?
Let them cause you to think well then of the storms / that drive many to shelter. These things / do not happen without reason.
And the next thing I say is this: / I saw an eagle once circling against the clouds / over one of our principal churches -- / Easter, it was -- a beautiful day! -- : / three gulls came from above the river / and crossed slowly seaward!
Oh, I know you have your own hymns, I have heard them -- / and because I knew they invoked some great protector / I could not be angry with you, no matter / how much they outraged true music -- / You see, it is not necessary for us to leap at each other, / and, as I told you, in the end / the gulls moved seaward very quietly.