Call from the edge of the marsh, the reed. Redip with your liquid throat my need vivid as you, red-winged blackbird to be ransomed this day from the sullied word.
"O-kal-ee" "O-kal-ee" throw bright and clear to this drifting swimmer your musical spear; riding the crest of a thousand heres . . . gulping your sweetness too deep for tears.
"O-kal-ee" "O-kal-ee" so positive you call to old freedoms this fugitive.
A speaker standing near a marsh hears a red-winged blackbird call from the reeds, and the sound hits like a lifeline. The speaker is worn down by "the sullied word," which suggests tired, spoiled language, the kind of talk that dulls everything it touches. The bird's song offers a way out. It is bright and clear, and the speaker asks to be "ransomed" by it, as if held captive and waiting for someone to pay the price of release.
The imagery shifts between water and weapon. The speaker is a "drifting swimmer," aimless in the current, and the bird's call arrives like a "musical spear," piercing the drift with something sharp and alive. Taking in that sweetness is overwhelming, "too deep for tears." The repeated "O-kal-ee" mimics the real birdsong and gives the poem a ringing, almost chant-like energy. By the end, the speaker calls themselves a "fugitive," and the mood is one of relief: a brief, joyful return to something freer and more honest than words.