'The Journey'- please help!

[Ace McDiggins]

Hello, I was just wondering if anyone could point me in the direction of some good poems or preferably short stories (rather than novels) that involve 'the journey' as a sort of central theme or concept. I've been having difficulty finding anything short, simple or suitable enough to include in a speech Im going to be giving. Anything that involves a mental/imaginative or spiritual journey or even better, uses actual travel and physical prgress as a metaphor for the spiritual or mental variety would be great. 'Journey to the Interior' by Margeret Atwood and 'The Rime of The Ancient Mariener' (neither of which I can use) would be good examples. Other types of media including songs or films would also be suitable. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Thank you.

[trismegistus]

"Sir Gawain and the Green Knight" is a long poem rather than a short story, but it's exactly what you're asking for.

[Isagel]

Often used - but still, the last stanza might suit your speech:

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I--
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.


Robert Frost

[Scheherazade]

The Lake Isle Of Innisfree

I will arise and go now, and go to Innisfree,
And a small cabin build there, of clay and wattles made:
Nine bean-rows will I have there, a hive for the honey-bee,
And live alone in the bee-loud glade.

And I shall have some peace there, for peace comes dropping slow,
Dropping from the veils of the morning to where the cricket sings;
There midnight's all a glimmer, and noon a purple glow,
And evening full of the linnet's wings.

I will arise and go now, for always night and day
I hear lake water lapping with low sounds by the shore;
While I stand on the roadway, or on the pavements grey,
I hear it in the deep heart's core.

William Butler Yeats

I am not sure if others would agree with me but I think this is a great poem about journeys-not-taken, roads-not-travelled. One of my favorite poems for sure. :)

[mono]

I have posted this poem elsewhere, in the 'poetry' forum, but I thought this may slightly apply to the subject.

The Way It Is

There’s a thread you follow. It goes among
things that change. But it doesn’t change.
People wonder about what you are pursuing.
You have to explain about the thread.
But it is hard for others to see.
While you hold it you can’t get lost.
Tragedies happen; people get hurt
or die; and you suffer and get old.
Nothing you do can stop time’s unfolding.
You don’t ever let go of the thread.

William Stafford

[Isagel]

The Lake Isle Of Innisfree

I am not sure if others would agree with me but I think this is a gret poem about journeys-not-taken, roads-not-travelled. One of my favorite poems for sure. :)

That is one of my favorite poems to. "peace comes dropping slow" always make me feel at ease.

Less optimistic about travels is Martinsson , in his epic poem Aniara about a spaceship that starts drifting in space - usually interpreted as Martinssons view of our society and how people struggle for meaning while drifting in a void. ( I stole my username from this poem) It contains different songs. This is one of my favorite pieces. I think it is song 13. The chief astronomer tells about deep space while holding a bowl of glass in his hand. If you are short of patience - at least read the last stanza. It is beautiful:

We're slowly coming to suspect that the space
we're traveling in is of a different sort
from what we thought whenever that word "space"
was decked out by our fantasies on Earth.

We're coming to suspect now that our drift
is even deeper then we first believed,
that knowledge is a blue naiveté
which with a measured quantity of insight
imagined that the Mystery has structure.
We now suspect that what we claim is space
and glassy clarity around Aniara's hull
is spirit, everlasting and impalpable,
that we have strayed in spiritual seas.

Our space-ship Aniara travels on
In something which exists
but does not need to take the path of thought:
a spirit greater than the world of thought.
Through God and Death and Mystery we race
on space-ship Aniara without goal or trace.
O would that we could turn back to our base
now that we realize what our space-ship is:
a little bubble in the glass of Godhead.

I shall relate what I have heard of glass
and then you'll understand. In any glass
that stands untouched for a sufficient time
gradually a bubble in the glass will move
infinitely slowly to a different point
in the body of glass, and in a thousand years
the bubble makes a journey in its glass.

[simon]

Sir Gawain and the Green Knight is a good one to use. If the author is Margaret Atwood though you might want to find a poem or short story that has more to do with the traveling of a female, which in many ancient forms is differnt than the males wanderings. I apoligize but the one I am thinking of I cannot remember.

[Ace McDiggins]

Thank you for all the responses everyone, particularly Isagel. I'm interested in the Aniara poem and 'song 13'. I'd just like to ask where you found this poem in it's entirety or where I might be able to find it (preferably online)? I've searched quite a few places and usually came up with sites in another language, probably from Sweden. Either that or I would have to buy the book which is usually out of print or there would be problems with the shipping. If you don't know where I can get it online do you think you could post it here or send it to [email protected]?

Thanks again.

[Scheherazade]

"Round the Circle" by O. Henry is also an excellent story about journey.

http://www.online-literature.com/o_henry/1046/

[Isagel]

I'm interested in the Aniara poem and 'song 13'. I'd just like to ask where you found this poem in it's entirety or where I might be able to find it (preferably online)? ?


I´m really glad you liked it. I´ve read it in swedish, so it took me some time to find an english translation.
I got this translated poem from this page. This page is an essay about Aniara. Included in that text are a couple more poems, or pieces of poems from Aniara.:

http://www.griffithobs.org/IPS%20Planetarian/IPSaniara.html

Otherwise I do not think you can find it on the internet. The link above has to most of his poems I´v been able to find online. But Amazon has the book (with a hideous cover!) for about six dollars:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/customer-reviews/1885266634/103-3258529-9353412?%5Fencoding=UTF8

Be sure that it is the translation by Klass. I think there is another one, but it´s not supposed to be as good.