help with John Clare poems?

[Jennifer]

I love the poem "I am" but I want at least two more poems that reflect his life and his feelings. Also, I have somewhat of a hard time interpreting them so if you could help me out...


also, could someone tell me the meaning of "I am" just so I know I have it right? it would help a lot.

thanks!
xoxo
I think "I am" means that nobody knows who he is, because they're not him. he's basically saying that he's different and unless you live his life you will never really know who or what he is.

[*~Milieu~*]

Jennifer, why don't you share what you believe "I am" means and we can tell you how you did. I think all of Clare's poems reflect his life, here is another for you to look at:

Autumn

The thistledown's flying, though the winds are all still,
On the green grass now lying, now mounting the hill,
The spring from the fountain now boils like a pot;
Through stones past the counting it bubbles red-hot.

The ground parched and cracked is like overbaked bread,
The greensward all wracked is, bents dried up and dead.
The fallow fields glitter like water indeed,
And gossamers twitter, flung from weed unto weed.

Hill-tops like hot iron glitter bright in the sun,
And the rivers we're eying burn to gold as they run;
Burning hot is the ground, liquid gold is the air;
Whoever looks round sees Eternity there.

My favorite is:The Mouse's Nest

I found a ball of grass among the hay
And proged it as I passed and went away
And when I looked I fancied something stirred
And turned again and hoped to catch the bird
When out an old mouse bolted in the wheat
With all her young ones hanging at her teats
She looked so odd and so grotesque to me
I ran and wondered what the thing could be
And pushed the knapweed bunches where I stood
When the mouse hurried from the crawling brood
The young ones squeaked and when I went away
She found her nest again among the hay.
The water o’er the pebbles scarce could run
And broad old cesspools glittered in the sun.