For the poem, "An Ordinary Day," by Norman Maccaig I need a line by line explanation along with figures of speech used, such as personification,...

In "An
Ordinary Day," the poet describes a number of ordinary phenomena of nature that he saw when
he took a walk.  Some of these things are:

*"The
light glittered on the water"

*"Cormorants [a type of bird] stood
on a tidal rock

With their wings spread out,
Stopping no
traffic"

*"Various ducks

Shilly-shallied [moved
in an undecided way] here and there"

*"Small flowers"
attracted bees

*"Long weeds in the clear water" swayed in the
wind

*"A cow

Started a moo but
thought
Better of it"

The poet concludes
with the observation:

how ordinary
Extraordinary
things are or
How extraordinary ordinary
Things are

The poet seems to be asking: Are these beautiful sights really
extraordinary, but we think they are ordinary because we do not pay enough attention to them?
 Or, are all ordinary things really extraordinarily beautiful, if we only would pay attention to
them?

This style of turning around simple phrases to create questions is a
primaryin this poem.  Other examples are:

*I took my mind
a walk

Or my mind took me a walk

*The light glittered on
the water

Or the water glittered in the light.

*And my
mind observed to me

Or I to it

The
poet also uses more conventional figures of speech; some examples are:

 (speaking of non-human objects as if they
were human):

Small flowers
Were
dong their level best
To bring to their kerb bees

Flowers don't consciously try to bring bees to themselves (at least I don't
think they do!)

(a comparison that does not use the
word "like" or "as"):

Long weeds in the clear
Water did Eastern dances

Weeds don't actually dance the way people do; they appear to be
dancing as the wind causes them to sway.

(a comparison that does use the
word "like" or "as"):

Small
flowers
Were dong their level best
To bring to their kerb bees
like
Aerial charabancs

A charabanc was a kind of open-topped horse-drawn bus that was common in England in the
1920's and '30's.  The poet is comparing the flight of the bees to the movement of
charabancs.