The poem of Jean-Joseph Rabearivelo entitled "Les Trois Oiseaux or The Three Birds."

Lead Image from Unsplash --

The word is arranged in free verse structure, there is no rhyming scheme, the closest meter is iambic and the closest stanza type is tercets.

In this poem, I noticed three grammatical sentences, and these sentences reflect the interplay of the three conventional elements of humanness: the body, the mind, and the spirit, all of which are present in this poem. The iron bird, the bird of steel, The corporeal bird, the feathered bird, and the disembodied one.

It ponders the nature of reality and how we come to construct it. In it, I see it suggests examining our place in the natural world and in society, and these sentences discuss our preoccupations with death and eternity, among other things.

The first picture is showing us the literal image of a bird that is indicated in the poem. It lacerates through the clouds and wanting to splash the sun – that is what the human brain is, our minds would always want to cut everything down so therefore we can understand the meaning behind it. In order for us to understand the wholeness of a thing, we tend to cut it, to lacerate it so we could trace back how a whole thing is made from pieces to pieces.

The second picture is showing us the bird that escaped the cage. Well, in the poem it was a tunnel. Just like the human body, we tend to always wanting to achieve what we desire. We use our force to escape and to execute. Human mind is just a thought or conceptualization, the body is what executes it.

The third picture, we see a bird spreading its wings – that is the human soul or spirit, who wanted to be free and what desire could it be. At the very end of our story, our efforts, hard works and achievements, it will all come to pass. We will always be destined to death; our soul would spread and fly out to the sky until it grants us eternal peace.

Iron birds, the birds of steel – this metaphor is referring to one of the three facets of humanness, the mind.

The corporeal bird, the feathered bird – this metaphor is referring to one of the three facets of humanness, the body.

the disembodied one—he who ravishes the custodian of the skull with a stammering song – this metaphor is referring to one of the three facets of humanness, the spirit.

The poem clearly envelope the society; the natural world; identity; death & dying; spirituality theme.