Irony

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1. Irony Always, sweetheart, Carry into your room the blossoming boughs of cherry, Almond and apple and pear diffuse with light, that very Soon strews itself on the floor; and keep the radiance of spring Fresh quivering; keep the sunny-swift March-days waiting In a little throng at your door, and admit the one who is plaiting Her […]...
2. The Things We Dare Not Tell The fields are fair in autumn yet, and the sun’s still shining there, But we bow our heads and we brood and fret, because of the masks we wear; Or we nod and smile the social while, and we say we’re doing well, But we break our hearts, oh, we break our hearts! for the […]...
3. In a Disused Graveyard The living come with grassy tread To read the gravestones on the hill; The graveyard draws the living still, But never anymore the dead. The verses in it say and say: “The ones who living come today To read the stones and go away Tomorrow dead will come to stay.” So sure of death the […]...
4. Riddle Where far in forest I am laid, In a place ringed around by stones, Look for no melancholy shade, And have no thoughts of buried bones; For I am bodiless and bright, And fill this glade with sudden glow; The leaves are washed in under-light; Shade lies upon the boughs like snow....
5. Elizabeth Gone 1. You lay in the nest of your real death, Beyond the print of my nervous fingers Where they touched your moving head; Your old skin puckering, your lungs’ breath Grown baby short as you looked up last At my face swinging over the human bed, And somewhere you cried, let me go let me […]...
6. Blindness OUR true hearts are forever lonely: A wistfulness is in our thought: Our lights are like the dawns which only Seem bright to us and yet are not. Something you see in me I wis not: Another heart in you I guess: A stranger’s lips-but thine I kiss not, Erring in all my tenderness. I […]...
7. At Night The wind is singing through the trees to-night, A deep-voiced song of rushing cadences And crashing intervals. No summer breeze Is this, though hot July is at its height, Gone is her gentler music; with delight She listens to this booming like the seas, These elemental, loud necessities Which call to her to answer their […]...
8. Sea Poppies Amber husk Fluted with gold, Fruit on the sand Marked with a rich grain, Treasure Spilled near the shrub-pines To bleach on the boulders: Your stalk has caught root Among wet pebbles And drift flung by the sea And grated shells And split conch-shells. Beautiful, wide-spread, Fire upon leaf, What meadow yields So fragrant a […]...
9. I Wait For You I wait for you. The years in silence pass And as the image, one, I wait for you again. The distance is in flame and clear one as glass, I, silent, wait with sadness, love and pain. The distance is in flame, and you are coming fast, But I’m afraid that you will change your […]...
10. Shells (Morecombe Bay February 2004) Grey skies, cold and bitter wind A share of a damp mattress In an unheated room. You follow orders from the brother To the man who let your cousin die In a truck approaching Dover. Your parents wait back home With nothing but pain and a photo of you Smiling through […]...
11. A Sort Of A Song Let the snake wait under His weed And the writing Be of words, slow and quick, sharp To strike, quiet to wait, Sleepless. -through metaphor to reconcile The people and the stones. Compose. (No ideas But in things) Invent! Saxifrage is my flower that splits The rocks....
12. The Elephant Is Slow To Mate The elephant, the huge old beast, is slow to mate; He finds a female, they show no haste they wait For the sympathy in their vast shy hearts slowly, slowly to rouse As they loiter along the river-beds and drink and browse And dash in panic through the brake of forest with the herd, And […]...
13. Teddy Bear O Teddy Bear! with your head awry And your comical twisted smile, You rub your eyes do you wonder why You’ve slept such a long, long while? As you lay so still in the cupboard dim, And you heard on the roof the rain, Were you thinking. . . what has become of him? And […]...
14. The Song Of The Jellicles Jellicle Cats come out tonight, Jellicle Cats come one come all: The Jellicle Moon is shining bright Jellicles come to the Jellicle Ball. Jellicle Cats are black and white, Jellicle Cats are rather small; Jellicle Cats are merry and bright, And pleasant to hear when they caterwaul. Jellicle Cats have cheerful faces, Jellicle Cats have […]...
15. 1914 IV: The Dead These hearts were woven of human joys and cares, Washed marvellously with sorrow, swift to mirth. The years had given them kindness. Dawn was theirs, And sunset, and the colours of the earth. These had seen movement, and heard music; known Slumber and waking; loved; gone proudly friended; Felt the quick stir of wonder; sat […]...
16. RHYMED DISTICHS RHYMED DISTICHS. [The Distichs, of which these are given as a Specimen, are about forty in number.] WHO trusts in God, Fears not His rod. THIS truth may be by all believed: Whom God deceives, is well deceived. HOW? when? and where? No answer comes from high; Thou wait’st for the Because, and yet thou […]...
17. 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 full-moon-beams to the ferny floor Of summer woods through flower and foliage pour, So to my being’s innermost recess Flooded the […]...
18. On Carpaccio's Picture: The Dream of St. Ursula Swept, clean, and still, across the polished floor From some unshuttered casement, hid from sight, The level sunshine slants, its greater light Quenching the little lamp which pallid, poor, Flickering, unreplenished, at the door Has striven against darkness the long night. Dawn fills the room, and penetrating, bright, The silent sunbeams through the window pour. […]...
19. Moon Fishing When the moon was full they came to the water. Some with pitchforks, some with rakes, Some with sieves and ladles, And one with a silver cup. And they fished til a traveler passed them and said, “Fools, To catch the moon you must let your women Spread their hair on the water Even the […]...
20. Mariposa Butterflies are white and blue In this field we wander through. Suffer me to take your hand. Death comes in a day or two. All the things we ever knew Will be ashes in that hour, Mark the transient butterfly, How he hangs upon the flower. Suffer me to take your hand. Suffer me to […]...
21. Barnacles My soul is sailing through the sea, But the Past is heavy and hindereth me. The Past hath crusted cumbrous shells That hold the flesh of cold sea-mells About my soul. The huge waves wash, the high waves roll, Each barnacle clingeth and worketh dole And hindereth me from sailing! Old Past let go, and […]...
22. The Womb Up from the evil day Of wattle and of woad, Along man’s weary way Dark Pain has been the goad. Back from the age of stone, Within his brutish brain, What pleasure he has known Is ease from Pain. Behold in Pain the force That haled Man from the Pit, And set him such a […]...
23. Florida The state with the prettiest name, The state that floats in brackish water, Held together by mangrave roots That bear while living oysters in clusters, And when dead strew white swamps with skeletons, Dotted as if bombarded, with green hummocks Like ancient cannon-balls sprouting grass. The state full of long S-shaped birds, blue and white, […]...
24. Landscape of a Pissing Multitude The men kept to themselves: They were waiting for the swiftness of the last cyclists. The women kept to themselves: They were expecting the death of a boy on a Japanese schooner. They all kept to themselves- Dreaming of the open beaks of dying birds, The sharp parasol that punctures A recently flattened toad, Beneath […]...
25. Psalm 123 Pleading with submission. O thou whose grace and justice reign Enthroned above the skies, To thee our hearts would tell their pain, To thee we lift our eyes. As servants watch their master’s hand, And fear the angry stroke; Or maids before their mistress stand, And wait a peaceful look; So for our sins we […]...
26. England, My England WHAT have I done for you, England, my England? What is there I would not do, England, my own? With your glorious eyes austere, As the Lord were walking near, Whispering terrible things and dear As the Song on your bugles blown, England Round the world on your bugles blown! Where shall the watchful sun, […]...
27. In The Garden One moment alone in the garden, Under the August skies; The moon had gone but the stars shone on, – Shone like your beautiful eyes. Away from the glitter and gaslight, Alone in the garden there, While the mirth of the throng, in laugh and song, Floated out on the air. You looked down through […]...
28. The Redeemer Darkness: the rain sluiced down; the mire was deep; It was past twelve on a mid-winter night, When peaceful folk in beds lay snug asleep; There, with much work to do before the light, We lugged our clay-sucked boots as best we might Along the trench; sometimes a bullet sang, And droning shells burst with […]...
29. Dead Cow Farm An ancient saga tells us how In the beginning the First Cow (For nothing living yet had birth But Elemental Cow on earth) Began to lick cold stones and mud: Under her warm tongue flesh and blood Blossomed, a miracle to believe: And so was Adam born, and Eve. Here now is chaos once again, […]...
30. The Dawn of Darkness COME earth’s little children pit-pat from their burrows on the hill; Hangs within the gloom its weary head the shining daffodil. In the valley underneath us through the fragrance flit along Over fields and over hedgerows little quivering drops of song. All adown the pale blue mantle of the mountains far away Stream the tresses […]...
31. A Memory Of Youth The moments passed as at a play; I had the wisdom love brings forth; I had my share of mother-wit, And yet for all that I could say, And though I had her praise for it, A cloud blown from the cut-throat North Suddenly hid Love’s moon away. Believing every word I said, I praised […]...
32. Or from that Sea of Time 1 OR, from that Sea of Time, Spray, blown by the wind-a double winrow-drift of weeds and shells; (O little shells, so curious-convolute! so limpid-cold and voiceless! Yet will you not, to the tympans of temples held, Murmurs and echoes still bring up-Eternity’s music, faint and far, Wafted inland, sent from Atlantica’s rim-strains for the […]...
33. Wait Wait, for now. Distrust everything, if you have to. But trust the hours. Haven’t they Carried you everywhere, up to now? Personal events will become interesting again. Hair will become interesting. Pain will become interesting. Buds that open out of season will become lovely again. Second-hand gloves will become lovely again, Their memories are what […]...
34. The Sonnets To Orpheus: IV O you tender ones, walk now and then Into the breath that blows coldly past, Upon your cheeks let it tremble and part; Behind you it will tremble together again. O you blessed ones, you who are whole, You who seem the beginning of hearts, Bows for the arrows and arrows’ targets Tear-bright, your lips […]...
35. Holy Sonnet III: O Might Those Sighs And Tears Return Again O might those sighs and tears return again Into my breast and eyes, which I have spent, That I might in this holy discontent Mourn with some fruit, as I have mourned in vain; In mine Idolatry what showers of rain Mine eyes did waste! what griefs my heart did rent! That sufferance was my […]...
36. Self-Discipline WHEN the soul sought refuge in the place of rest, Overborne by strife and pain beyond control, From some secret hollow, whisper soft-confessed, Came the legend of the soul. Some bright one of old time laid his sceptre down So his heart might learn of sweet and bitter truth; Going forth bereft of beauty, throne, […]...
37. Tangibles (Washington, August, 1918)I HAVE seen this city in the day and the sun. I have seen this city in the night and the moon. And in the night and the moon I have seen a thing this city gave me nothing of in the day and the sun. The float of the dome in the […]...
38. Journey Into The Interior In the long journey out of the self, There are many detours, washed-out interrupted raw places Where the shale slides dangerously And the back wheels hang almost over the edge At the sudden veering, the moment of turning. Better to hug close, wary of rubble and falling stones. The arroyo cracking the road, the wind-bitten […]...
39. In Faith When the soft sweet wind o’ the south went by, I dwelt in the light of a dark brown eye; And out where the robin sang his song, We lived and loved, while the days were long. In the sweet, sweet eves, when the moon swung high, We wandered under the starry sky; Or sat […]...
40. A Golden Day The subtle beauty of this day Hangs o’er me like a fairy spell, And care and grief have flown away, And every breeze sings, “all is well.” I ask, “Holds earth or sin, or woe?” My heart replies, “I do not know.” Nay! all we know, or feel, my heart, Today is joy undimmed, complete; […]...