The Poem That Inspired Aronofsky’s ‘Noah’

Last week in a piece that ran in The Atlantic, I interviewed Noah director Darren Aronofsky about the spiritual message, import, and inspiration behind his epic reimagining of the ancient biblical story. You can read that interview in full HERE.

During our conversation, Aronofsky talked about a prose-poem he’d written as a 13-year-old seventh grader in Brooklyn that was inspired by the Noah story and launched him on his career path as a writer. He recently discovered the actual poem in a box of childhood mementos while searching for baseball cards for his seven-year-old son.

Today, Darren’s representatives shared a PDF of his ‘The Dove’ poem, which you can see below, followed by its transcription.

J.H.S. 239

January 13, 1982

Aronofsky, Darren

7A-115-S-4

The Dove

Evil was in the world. The laughing crowd left the foolish man and his ark filled with animals when the rain began to fall. It was hopeless. The man could not take the evil crowd with him but he was allowed to bring his good family. The rain continued through the night and the cries of screaming men filled the air. The ark was afloat. Until the dove returned with the leaf, evil still existed. When the rainbows reached throughout the sky the humble man and his family knew what it meant.

The animals ran and flew freely with their new born. The fog rose and the sun shone. Peace was in the air and it soon appeared all of man’s heart.

He knew evil could not be kept away for evil and war could not be destroyed but neither was it possible to destroy peace.

Evil is hard to end and peace is hard to begin but the rainbow and the dove will always live within every mans’ heart.

 

You can read my review of Aronofsky’s Noah HERE and the transcript of my interview with his friend, collaborator, and co-writer of Noah, Ari Handel, HERE.