A Ninth Birthday

Related poetry:

1. Thinking of My Brothers in Shantung on the Ninth Day of the Ninth Month Alone now in a strange country, Feeling myself a stranger, On this bright festival day I doubly pine for my kinsfolk. Far away, I know my brothers Will be climbing the heights With dogwood sprays in their jackets, And one man missing!...
2. The Unappeasable Host The Danaan children laugh, in cradles of wrought gold, And clap their hands together, and half close their eyes, For they will ride the North when the ger-eagle flies, With heavy whitening wings, and a heart fallen cold: I kiss my wailing child and press it to my breast, And hear the narrow graves calling […]...
3. A Birthday My heart is like a singing bird Whose nest is in a water’d shoot; My heart is like an apple-tree Whose boughs are bent with thickset fruit; My heart is like a rainbow shell That paddles in a halcyon sea; My heart is gladder than all these Because my love is come to me. Raise […]...
4. 201. Birthday Ode for 31st December, 1787 AFAR 1 the illustrious Exile roams, Whom kingdoms on this day should hail; An inmate in the casual shed, On transient pity’s bounty fed, Haunted by busy memory’s bitter tale! Beasts of the forest have their savage homes, But He, who should imperial purple wear, Owns not the lap of earth where rests his royal […]...
5. Old Ireland FAR hence, amid an isle of wondrous beauty, Crouching over a grave, an ancient, sorrowful mother, Once a queen-now lean and tatter’d, seated on the ground, Her old white hair drooping dishevel’d round her shoulders; At her feet fallen an unused royal harp, Long silent-she too long silent-mourning her shrouded hope and heir; Of all […]...
6. If I were dead ‘IF I were dead, you’d sometimes say, Poor Child!’ The dear lips quiver’d as they spake, And the tears brake From eyes which, not to grieve me, brightly smiled. Poor Child, poor Child! I seem to hear your laugh, your talk, your song. It is not true that Love will do no wrong. Poor Child! […]...
7. Reliance Not to the swift, the race: Not to the strong, the fight: Not to the righteous, perfect grace: Not to the wise, the light. But often faltering feet Come surest to the goal; And they who walk in darkness meet The sunrise of the soul. A thousand times by night The Syrian hosts have died; […]...
8. A Birthday Song. To S. G For ever wave, for ever float and shine Before my yearning eyes, oh! dream of mine Wherein I dreamed that time was like a vine, A creeping rose, that clomb a height of dread Out of the sea of Birth, all filled with dead, Up to the brilliant cloud of Death o’erhead. This vine bore […]...
9. A Prayer for a Mother's Birthday Lord Jesus, Thou hast known A mother’s love and tender care: And Thou wilt hear, while for my own Mother most dear I make this birthday prayer. Protect her life, I pray, Who gave the gift of life to me; And may she know, from day to day, The deepening glow of Life that comes […]...
10. Not A Child ‘Not a child: I call myself a boy,’ Says my king, with accent stern yet mild, Now nine years have brought him change of joy; ‘Not a child.’ How could reason be so far beguiled, Err so far from sense’s safe employ, Stray so wide of truth, or run so wild? Seeing his face bent […]...
11. Ninth Inning He woke up in New York City on Valentine’s Day, Speeding. The body in the booth next to his was still warm, Was gone. He had bought her a sweater, a box of chocolate Said her life wasn’t working he looked stricken she said You’re all bent out of shape, accusingly, and when he She […]...
12. 395. Sonnet on the Author's Birthday SING on, sweet thrush, upon the leafless bough, Sing on, sweet bird, I listen to thy strain, See aged Winter, ‘mid his surly reign, At thy blythe carol, clears his furrowed brow. So in lone Poverty’s dominion drear, Sits meek Content with light, unanxious heart; Welcomes the rapid moments, bids them part, Nor asks if […]...
13. Reconciliation I BEGIN through the grass once again to be bound to the Lord; I can see, through a face that has faded, the face full of rest Of the earth, of the mother, my heart with her heart in accord, As I lie ‘mid the cool green tresses that mantle her breast I begin with […]...
14. Babyhood A baby shines as bright If winter or if May be On eyes that keep in sight A baby. Though dark the skies or grey be, It fills our eyes with light, If midnight or midday be. Love hails it, day and night, The sweetest thing that may be Yet cannot praise aright A baby. […]...
15. All Things Will Die Clearly the blue river chimes in its flowing Under my eye; Warmly and broadly the south winds are blowing Over the sky. One after another the white clouds are fleeting; Every heart this May morning in joyance is beating Full merrily; Yet all things must die. The stream will cease to flow; The wind will […]...
16. To the Memory of Mrs. Lefroy who died Dec:r 16 my Birthday The day returns again, my natal day; What mix’d emotions with the Thought arise! Beloved friend, four years have pass’d away Since thou wert snatch’d forever from our eyes. The day, commemorative of my birth Bestowing Life and Light and Hope on me, Brings back the hour which was thy last on Earth. Oh! bitter […]...
17. At the sixty-ninth station (after hiroshige – stations of oi) Here at the sixty-ninth station Of the gregokaido road I have a sense of completion That is not completed yet The long journey to this moment Has many disparate paths Fragments of people within me Have stuttered their broken mantras What a bowl of uneasy pieces Litters the well […]...
18. The Fires Men make them fires on the hearth Each under his roof-tree, And the Four Winds that rule the earth They blow the smoke to me. Across the high hills and the sea And all the changeful skies, The Four Winds blow the smoke to me Till the tears are in my eyes. Until the tears […]...
19. The Double Ninth Festival To the tune of “Intoxicated Under the Shadow of Flowers” Light mists and heavy clouds, Melancholy the long dreary day. In the golden censer The burning incense is dying away. It is again time For the lovely Double-Ninth Festival; The coolness of midnight Penetrates my screen of sheer silk And chills my pillow of jade. […]...
20. A Birthday “Aug.” 10, 1911. Full moon to-night; and six and twenty years Since my full moon first broke from angel spheres! A year of infinite love unwearying – No circling seasons, but perennial spring! A year of triumph trampling through defeat, The first made holy and the last made sweet By this same love; a year […]...
21. The Pity Of Love A pity beyond all telling Is hid in the heart of love: The folk who are buying and selling, The clouds on their journey above, The cold wet winds ever blowing, And the shadowy hazel grove Where mouse-grey waters are flowing, Threaten the head that I love....
22. Ninon De Lenclos, On Her Last Birthday So let me have the rouge again, And comb my hair the curly way. The poor young men, the dear young men They’ll all be here by noon today. And I shall wear the blue, I think- They beg to touch its rippled lace; Or do they love me best in pink, So sweetly flattering […]...
23. Lotus Hurt by the Cold How many times, like lotus lilies risen Upon the surface of a river, there Have risen floating on my blood the rare Soft glimmers of my hope escaped from prison. So I am clothed all over with the light And sensitive beautiful blossoming of passion; Till naked for her in the finest fashion The flowers […]...
24. Krishna I PAUSED beside the cabin door and saw the King of Kings at play, Tumbled upon the grass I spied the little heavenly runaway. The mother laughed upon the child made gay by its ecstatic morn, And yet the sages spake of It as of the Ancient and Unborn. I heard the passion breathed amid […]...
25. The Oldest Song “These were never your true love’s eyes. Why do you feign that you love them? You that broke from their constancies, And the wide calm brows above them! This was never your true love’s speech. Why do you thrill when you hear it? You that have ridden out of its reach The width of the […]...
26. 466. Ode for General Washington's Birthday NO Spartan tube, no Attic shell, No lyre Æolian I awake; ‘Tis liberty’s bold note I swell, Thy harp, Columbia, let me take! See gathering thousands, while I sing, A broken chain exulting bring, And dash it in a tyrant’s face, And dare him to his very beard, And tell him he no more is […]...
27. In Memoriam A. H. H.: 126. Love is and was my Lord and King Love is and was my Lord and King, And in his presence I attend To hear the tidings of my friend, Which every hour his couriers bring. Love is and was my King and Lord, And will be, tho’ as yet I keep Within his court on earth, and sleep Encompass’d by his faithful guard, […]...
28. Poem On His Birthday In the mustardseed sun, By full tilt river and switchback sea Where the cormorants scud, In his house on stilts high among beaks And palavers of birds This sandgrain day in the bent bay’s grave He celebrates and spurns His driftwood thirty-fifth wind turned age; Herons spire and spear. Under and round him go Flounders, […]...
29. Twelve Years The line That remained, that Became true: . . . your House in Paris become The alterpiece of your hands. Breathed through thrice, Shone through thrice. ………………. It’s turning dumb, turning deaf Behind our eyes. I see the poison flower In all manner of words and shapes. Go. Come. Love blots out its name: to […]...
30. Cor Cordium O heart of hearts, the chalice of love’s fire, Hid round with flowers and all the bounty of bloom; O wonderful and perfect heart, for whom The lyrist liberty made life a lyre; O heavenly heart, at whose most dear desire Dead love, living and singing, cleft his tomb, And with him risen and regent […]...
31. On your birthday, today On your birthday, today, there is time to reflect On the essence of our intimacy, From a beginning in the spring-tide of youth To an afterward secured in the distant mist, And for what reason and to what end it endures. Each year I feel the consequence, keen With up-welling of sentiment, Where new love […]...
32. Poem For My 43rd Birthday To end up alone In a tomb of a room Without cigarettes Or wine Just a lightbulb And a potbelly, Grayhaired, And glad to have The room. …in the morning They’re out there Making money: Judges, carpenters, Plumbers, doctors, Newsboys, policemen, Barbers, carwashers, Dentists, florists, Waitresses, cooks, Cabdrivers… And you turn over To your left […]...
33. All Day I Hear the Noise of Waters All day I hear the noise of waters Making moan, Sad as the sea-bird is when, going Forth alone, He hears the winds cry to the water’s Monotone. The grey winds, the cold winds are blowing Where I go. I hear the noise of many waters Far below. All day, all night, I hear them […]...
34. Affinity YOU and I have found the secret way, None can bar our love or say us nay: All the world may stare and never know You and I are twined together so. You and I for all his vaunted width Know the giant Space is but a myth; Over miles and miles of pure deceit […]...
35. From This Hour the Pledge is Given From this hour the pledge is given, From this hour my soul is thine: Come what will, from earth of heaven, Weal or woe, thy fate be mine. When the proud and great stood by thee, None dared thy rights to spurn; And if now they’re false and fly thee, Shall I, too, falsely turn? […]...
36. A Birthday Wish I wish you love and laughter, Happiness and cheer, I hope that you’ll have fun Today… And throughout the coming Year. I hope your aspirations will Become reality… I hope you’ll be exactly what You really want to be. But most of all I hope this Birthday’s better than the Rest… For you’re a special […]...
37. Hope in Failure THOUGH now thou hast failed and art fallen, despair not because of defeat, Though lost for a while be thy heaven and weary of earth be thy feet, For all will be beauty about thee hereafter through sorrowful years, And lovely the dews for thy chilling and ruby thy heart-drip of tears. The eyes that […]...
38. Hymn (FROM THE GERMAN OF MARTIN LUTHER) O heart of mine! lift up thine eyes And see who in yon manger lies! Of perfect form, of face divine It is the Christ-child, heart of mine! O dearest, holiest Christ-child, spread Within this heart of mine thy bed; Then shall my breast forever be A chamber consecrate […]...
39. Benediction NOW the rooftree of the midnight spreading, Buds in citron, green, and blue: From afar its mystic odours shedding, Child, on you. Now the buried stars beneath the mountain And the vales their life renew, Jetting rainbow blooms from tiny fountains, Child, for you. In the diamond air the sun-star glowing, Up its feathered radiance […]...
40. For A Thirteenth Birthday You have read War and Peace. Now here is Sister Carrie, Not up to Tolstoy; still It will second the real world: Predictable planes and levels, Pavement that holds you, Stairs that lift you, Ice that trips you, Nights that begin after sunset, Four lunar phases, A finite house. I give you Dreiser Although (or […]...