Carl Sandburg

The South Wind Say So

The South Wind Say So - meaning Summary

Reassurance from the South

The poem presents the south wind as a voice of reassurance. Natural signs — the oriole, climbing leaves, and crickets — repeat familiar seasonal songs that promise continuity. The speaker responds with simple, determined affirmations: people will endure, come together, and rebuild their hearts because the south wind "says so." It reads as a brief, hopeful meditation on survival and communal persistence grounded in nature's rhythms.

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IF the oriole calls like last year when the south wind sings in the oats, if the leaves climb and climb on a bean pole saying over a song learnt from the south wind, if the crickets send up the same old lessons found when the south wind keeps on coming, we will get by, we will keep on coming, we will get by, we will come along, we will fix our hearts over, the south wind says so.

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