The Hermit

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1. The Hermit Thrush O wonderful! How liquid clear The molten gold of that ethereal tone, Floating and falling through the wood alone, A hermit-hymn poured out for God to hear! 0 holy, holy, holy! Hyaline, Long light, low light, glory of eventide! Love far away, far up. up, love divine! Little love, too, for ever, ever, near, Warm […]...
2. The Hermit Goes Up Attic Up attic, Lucas Harrison, God rest His frugal bones, once kept a tidy account By knifecut of some long-gone harvest. The wood was new. The pitch ran down to blunt The year: 1811, the score: 10, he carved Into the center rafter to represent His loves, beatings, losses, hours, or maybe The butternuts that taxed […]...
3. The Hermit WHEN Venus and Hypocrisy combine, Oft pranks are played that show a deep design; Men are but men, and friars full as weak: I’m not by Envy moved these truths to speak. Have you a sister, daughter, pretty wife? Beware the monks as you would guard your life; If in their snares a simple belle […]...
4. The Hermit of Mont-Blanc High, on the Solitude of Alpine Hills, O’er-topping the grand imag’ry of Nature, Where one eternal winter seem’d to reign; An HERMIT’S threshold, carpetted with moss, Diversified the Scene. Above the flakes Of silv’ry snow, full many a modest flow’r Peep’d through its icy veil, and blushing ope’d Its variegated hues; The ORCHIS sweet, The […]...
5. A Hermit Thrush Nothing’s certain. Crossing, on this longest day, The low-tide-uncovered isthmus, scrambling up The scree-slope of what at high tide Will be again an island, To where, a decade since well-being staked The slender, unpremeditated claim that brings us Back, year after year, lugging the Makings of another picnic- The cucumber sandwiches, the sea-air-sanctified Fig newtons-there’s […]...
6. A Last Confession What lively lad most pleasured me Of all that with me lay? I answer that I gave my soul And loved in misery, But had great pleasure with a lad That I loved bodily. Flinging from his arms I laughed To think his passion such He fancied that I gave a soul Did but our […]...
7. The Hermit WHAT moves that lonely man is not the boom Of waves that break agains the cliff so strong; Nor roar of thunder, when that travelling voice Is caught by rocks that carry far along. ‘Tis not the groan of oak tree i its prime, When lightning strikes its solid heart to dust; Nor frozen pond […]...
8. The Hermit NOW the quietude of earth Nestles deep my heart within; Friendships new and strange have birth Since I left the city’s din. Here the tempest stays its guile, Like a big kind brother plays, Romps and pauses here awhile From its immemorial ways. Now the silver light of dawn, Slipping through the leaves that fleck […]...
9. There is another Loneliness There is another Loneliness That many die without Not want of friend occasions it Or circumstances of Lot But nature, sometimes, sometimes thought And whoso it befall Is richer than could be revealed By mortal numeral...
10. Chemin De Fer Alone on the railroad track I walked with pounding heart. The ties were too close together or maybe too far apart. The scenery was impoverished: scrub-pine and oak; beyond Its mingled gray-green foliage I saw the little pond Where the dirty old hermit lives, lie like an old tear Holding onto its injuries lucidly year […]...
11. The Companion Let him answer as he will, Or be lightsome as he may, Now nor after shall he say Worn-out words enough to kill, Or to lull down by their craft, Doubt, that was born yesterday, When he lied and when she laughed. Let him and another name For the starlight on the snow, Let him […]...
12. Variations On A Theme By William Carlos Williams 1 I chopped down the house that you had been saving to live in next summer. I am sorry, but it was morning, and I had nothing to do And its wooden beams were so inviting. 2 We laughed at the hollyhocks together And then I sprayed them with lye. Forgive me. I simply do […]...
13. The Mole Said he: “I’ll dive deep in the Past, And write a book of direful days When summer skies were overcast With smoke of humble hearths ablaze; When War was rampant in the land, And poor folk cowered in the night, While ruin gaped on every hand – Of ravishing and wrath I’ll write.” Ten years […]...
14. To God the Father To the little, pitiful God I make my prayer, The God with the long grey beard And flowing robe fastened with a hempen girdle Who sits nodding and muttering on the all-too-big throne Of Heaven. What a long, long time, dear God, since you set the Stars in their places, Girded the earth with the […]...
15. Her Toys I sat her in her baby chair, And set upon its tray Her kewpie doll and teddy bear, But no, she would not play. Although they looked so wistfully Her favour to implore, She laughed at me with elfin glee And dashed them to the floor. I brought her lamb and circus clown, But it […]...
16. A Lost Angel When first we met she seemed so white I feared her; As one might near a spirit bright I neared her; An angel pure from heaven above I dreamed her, And far too good for human love I deemed her. A spirit free from mortal taint I thought her, And incense as unto a saint […]...
17. The Children of the Night For those that never know the light, The darkness is a sullen thing; And they, the Children of the Night, Seem lost in Fortune’s winnowing. But some are strong and some are weak, And there’s the story. House and home Are shut from countless hearts that seek World-refuge that will never come. And if there […]...
18. The Pelagian Drinking Song Pelagius lived at Kardanoel And taught a doctrine there How, whether you went to heaven or to hell It was your own affair. It had nothing to do with the Church, my boy, But was your own affair. No, he didn’t believe In Adam and Eve He put no faith therein! His doubts began With […]...
19. The Suicide's Argument Ere the birth of my life, if I wished it or no No question was asked me it could not be so! If the life was the question, a thing sent to try And to live on be YES; what can NO be? to die. NATURE’S ANSWER Is’t returned, as ’twas sent? Is’t no worse […]...
20. The Gift “He gave her class. She gave him sex.” Katharine Hepburn on Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers He gave her money. She gave him head. He gave her tips on “aggressive growth” mutual funds. She gave him a red rose and a little statue of eros. He gave her Genesis 2 (21-23). She gave him Genesis […]...
21. Lover's Gifts LXX: Take Back Your Coins Take back your coins, King’s Councillor. I am of those women you Sent to the forest shrine to decoy the young ascetic who had never Seen a women. I failed in your bidding. Dimly day was breaking when the hermit boy came to bathe in The stream, his tawny locks crowded on his shoulders, like […]...
22. 131. Song-Willie Chalmers WI’ braw new branks in mickle pride, And eke a braw new brechan, My Pegasus I’m got astride, And up Parnassus pechin; Whiles owre a bush wi’ donwward crush, The doited beastie stammers; Then up he gets, and off he sets, For sake o’ Willie Chalmers. I doubt na, lass, that weel ken’d name May […]...
23. Unlyric Love Song It is time to give that-of-myself which I could not at first: To offer you now at last my least and my worst: Minor, absurd preserves, The shell’s end-curves, A document kept at the back of a drawer, A tin hidden under the floor, Recalcitrant prides and hesitations: To pile them carefully in a desparate […]...
24. He came unto His own, and His own received Him not As Christ the Lord was passing by, He came, one night, to a cottage door. He came, a poor man, to the poor; He had no bed whereon to lie. He asked in vain for a crust of bread, Standing there in the frozen blast. The door was locked and bolted fast. ‘Only a beggar!’ […]...
25. Not yet 40, my beard is already white Not yet 40, my beard is already white. Not yet awake, my eyes are puffy and red, Like a child who has cried too much. What is more disagreeable Than last night’s wine? I’ll shave. I’ll stick my head in the cold spring and Look around at the pebbles. Maybe I can eat a can […]...
26. The Seeker I sought for my happiness over the world, Oh, eager and far was my quest; I sought it on mountain and desert and sea, I asked it of east and of west. I sought it in beautiful cities of men, On shores that were sunny and blue, And laughter and lyric and pleasure were mine […]...
27. The Unicorn The saintly hermit, midway through his prayers Stopped suddenly, and raised his eyes to witness The unbelievable: for there before him stood The legendary creature, startling white, that Had approached, soundlessly, pleading with his eyes. The legs, so delicately shaped, balanced a Body wrought of finest ivory. And as He moved, his coat shone like […]...
28. A Poetry Reading At West Point I read to the entire plebe class, In two batches. Twice the hall filled With bodies dressed alike, each toting A copy of my book. What would my Shrink say, if I had one, about Such a dream, if it were a dream? Question and answer time. “Sir,” a cadet yelled from the balcony, And […]...
29. The Grey Monk “I die, I die!” the Mother said, “My children die for lack of bread. What more has the merciless Tyrant said?” The Monk sat down on the stony bed. The blood red ran from the Grey Monk’s side, His hands and feet were wounded wide, His body bent, his arms and knees Like to the […]...
30. Crow's Fall When Crow was white he decided the sun was too white. He decided it glared much too whitely. He decided to attack it and defeat it. He got his strength up flush and in full glitter. He clawed and fluffed his rage up. He aimed his beak direct at the sun’s centre. He laughed himself […]...
31. Our Prayer of Thanks For the gladness here where the sun is shining at Evening on the weeds at the river, Our prayer of thanks. For the laughter of children who tumble barefooted and Bareheaded in the summer grass, Our prayer of thanks. For the sunset and the stars, the women and the white Arms that hold us, Our […]...
32. Poet And Peer They asked the Bard of Ayr to dine; The banquet hall was fit and fine, With gracing it a Lord; The poet came; his face was grim To find the place reserved for him Was at the butler’s board. So when the gentry called him in, He entered with a knavish grin And sipped a […]...
33. Captain Teach alias Black Beard Edward Teach was a native of Bristol, and sailed from that port On board a privateer, in search of sport, As one of the crew, during the French War in that station, And for personal courage he soon gained his Captain’s approbation. ‘Twas in the spring of 1717, Captajn Harnigold and Teach sailed from Providence […]...
34. Lyman, frederick, and jim (FOR THE FELLOWSHIP CLU Lyman and Frederick and Jim, one day, Set out in a great big ship Steamed to the ocean adown the bay Out of a New York slip. “Where are you going and what is your game?” The people asked those three. “Darned if we know; but all the same Happy as […]...
35. Carry On It’s easy to fight when everything’s right, And you’re mad with the thrill and the glory; It’s easy to cheer when victory’s near, And wallow in fields that are gory. It’s a different song when everything’s wrong, When you’re feeling infernally mortal; When it’s ten against one, and hope there is none, Buck up, little […]...
36. The shakes now pay attention (said the teacher) And look up here The children looked up This is william shakespeare Four centuries up On a pedestal Was shakespeare’s head He was what we call A great man The children got sore necks Looking up And some began to look down No no You mustn’t look down (said […]...
37. Heritage Now the dead past seems vividly alive, And in this shining moment I can trace, Down through the vista of the vanished years, Your faun-like form, your fond elusive face. And suddenly some secret spring’s released, And unawares a riddle is revealed, And I can read like large, black-lettered print, What seemed before a thing […]...
38. Friend, your white beard sweeps the ground Friend, your white beard sweeps the ground. Why do you stand, expectant? Do you hope to see it In one of your withered days? With your old eyes Do you hope to see The triumphal march of justice? Do not wait, friend! Take your white beard And your old eyes To more tender lands....
39. The Old Man Dreams OH for one hour of youthful joy! Give back my twentieth spring! I’d rather laugh, a bright-haired boy, Than reign, a gray-beard king. Off with the spoils of wrinkled age! Away with Learning’s crown! Tear out life’s Wisdom-written page, And dash its trophies down! One moment let my life-blood stream From boyhood’s fount of flame! […]...
40. The Pretty Lady He asked the lady in the train If he might smoke: she smiled consent. So lighting his cigar and fain To talk he puffed away content, Reflecting: how delightful are Fair dame and fine cigar. Then from his bulging wallet he A photograph with pride displayed, His charming wife and children three, When suddenly he […]...