Alan Seeger
Sonnet II
Her courts are by the flux of flaming ways, Between the rivers and the illumined sky Whose fervid depths reverberate from on high Fierce lustres mingled in a fiery haze. They mark it inland;
Sonnet IX
Amid the florid multitude her face Was like the full moon seen behind the lace Of orchard boughs where clouded blossoms part When Spring shines in the world and in the heart. As the
Sonnet 06
Oh, you are more desirable to me Than all I staked in an impulsive hour, Making my youth the sport of chance, to be Blighted or torn in its most perfect flower; For I
Sonnet XII
Like as a dryad, from her native bole Coming at dusk, when the dim stars emerge, To a slow river at whose silent verge Tall poplars tremble and deep grasses roll, Come thou no
Do You Remember Once
Do you remember once, in Paris of glad faces, The night we wandered off under the third moon’s rays And, leaving far behind bright streets and busy places, Stood where the Seine flowed down
The Wanderer
To see the clouds his spirit yearned toward so Over new mountains piled and unploughed waves, Back of old-storied spires and architraves To watch Arcturus rise or Fomalhaut, And roused by street-cries in strange
Kyrenaikos
Lay me where soft Cyrene rambles down In grove and garden to the sapphire sea; Twine yellow roses for the drinker’s crown; Let music reach and fair heads circle me, Watching blue ocean where
The Need to Love
The need to love that all the stars obey Entered my heart and banished all beside. Bare were the gardens where I used to stray; Faded the flowers that one time satisfied. Before the
The Deserted Garden
I know a village in a far-off land Where from a sunny, mountain-girdled plain With tinted walls a space on either hand And fed by many an olive-darkened lane The high-road mounts, and thence
Sonnet 04
If I was drawn here from a distant place, ‘Twas not to pray nor hear our friend’s address, But, gazing once more on your winsome face, To worship there Ideal Loveliness. On that pure
Sonnet XI
When among creatures fair of countenance Love comes enformed in such proud character, So far as other beauty yields to her, So far the breast with fiercer longing pants; I bless the spot, and
I Loved
I loved illustrious cities and the crowds That eddy through their incandescent nights. I loved remote horizons with far clouds Girdled, and fringed about with snowy heights. I loved fair women, their sweet, conscious
To England at the Outbreak of the Balkan War
A cloud has lowered that shall not soon pass o’er. The world takes sides: whether for impious aims With Tyranny whose bloody toll enflames A generous people to heroic war; Whether with Freedom, stretched
At the Tomb of Napoleon
I stood beside his sepulchre whose fame, Hurled over Europe once on bolt and blast, Now glows far off as storm-clouds overpast Glow in the sunset flushed with glorious flame. Has Nature marred his
Sonnet XV
Above the ruin of God’s holy place, Where man-forsaken lay the bleeding rood, Whose hands, when men had craved substantial food, Gave not, nor folded when they cried, Embrace, I saw exalted in the