The Painted Ceiling

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1. Lift Not The Painted Veil Which Those Who Live Lift not the painted veil which those who live Call Life: though unreal shapes be pictured there, And it but mimic all we would believe With colours idly spread, behind, lurk Fear And Hope, twin Destinies; who ever weave Their shadows, o’er the chasm, sightless and drear. I knew one who had lifted it he […]...
2. Inscription for the Ceiling of a Bedroom Daily dawns another day; I must up, to make my way. Though I dress and drink and eat, Move my fingers and my feet, Learn a little, here and there, Weep and laugh and sweat and swear, Hear a song, or watch a stage, Leave some words upon a page, Claim a foe, or hail […]...
3. A Fire-Truck Right down the shocked street with a siren-blast That sends all else skittering to the curb, Redness, brass, ladders and hats hurl past, Blurring to sheer verb, Shift at the corner into uproarious gear And make it around the turn in a squall of traction, The headlong bell maintaining sure and clear, Thought is degraded […]...
4. Sleeping On The Ceiling It is so peaceful on the ceiling! It is the Place de la Concorde. The little crystal chandelier Is off, the fountain is in the dark. Not a soul is in the park. Below, where the wallpaper is peeling, The Jardin des Plantes has locked its gates. Those photographs are animals. The mighty flowers and […]...
5. The Maple The Maple Is a system of posture for wood. A way of not falling down For twigs that happens To benefit birds. I don’t know. I’m staring at a tree, At yellow leaves Threshed by wind and want you Reading this to be staring At the same tree. I could Cut it down and laminate […]...
6. A Prayer ‘Mid the discordant noises of the day I hear thee calling; I stumble as I fare along Earth’s way; keep me from falling. Mine eyes are open but they cannot see for gloom of night: I can no more than lift my heart to thee for inward light. The wild and fiery passion of my […]...
7. THE OLD CLOCK ON THE STAIRS L’eternite est une pendule, dont le balancier dit et redit sans Cesse ces deux mots seulement dans le silence des tombeaux: “Toujours! jamais! Jamais! toujours!” JACQUES BRIDAINE. Somewhat back from the village street Stands the old-fashioned country-seat. Across its antique portico Tall poplar-trees their shadows throw; And from its station in the hall An ancient […]...
8. Verses on Sir Joshua Reynold’s Painted Window at New College, Oxford Ah, stay thy treacherous hand, forbear to trace Those faultless forms of elegance and grace! Ah, cease to spread the bright transparent mass, With Titian’s pencil, o’er the speaking glass! Nor steal, by strokes of art with truth combin’d, The fond illusions of my wayward mind! For long, enamour’d of a barbarous age, A faithless […]...
9. When First I Came Here WHEN first I came here I had hope, Hope for I knew not what. Fast beat My heart at the sight of the tall slope Or grass and yews, as if my feet Only by scaling its steps of chalk Would see something no other hill Ever disclosed. And now I walk Down it the […]...
10. Sonnet XLII: Composed During a Walk The dark and pillowy cloud, the sallow trees, Seem o’er the ruins of the year to mourn; And, cold and hollow, the inconstant breeze Sobs thro’ the falling leaves and wither’d fern. O’er the tall brow of yonder chalky bourn, The evening shades their gather’d darkness fling, While, by the lingering light, I scarce discern […]...
11. A Good Play We built a ship upon the stairs All made of the back-bedroom chairs, And filled it full of soft pillows To go a-sailing on the billows. We took a saw and several nails, And water in the nursery pails; And Tom said, “Let us also take An apple and a slice of cake;” Which was […]...
12. WITH A PAINTED RIBBON LITTLE leaves and flow’rets too, Scatter we with gentle hand, Kind young spring-gods to the view, Sporting on an airy band. Zephyr, bear it on the wing, Twine it round my loved one’s dress; To her glass then let her spring, Full of eager joyousness. Roses round her let her see, She herself a youthful […]...
13. Painted Head By dark severance the apparition head Smiles from the air a capital on no Column or a Platonic perhaps head On a canvas sky depending from nothing; Stirs up an old illusion of grandeur By tickling the instinct of heads to be Absolute and to try decapitation And to play truant from the body bush; […]...
14. She's All My Fancy Painted Him She’s all my fancy painted him (I make no idle boast); If he or you had lost a limb, Which would have suffered most? He said that you had been to her, And seen me here before; But, in another character, She was the same of yore. There was not one that spoke to us, […]...
15. When Earth's Last Picture Is Painted When Earth’s last picture is painted and the tubes are twisted and dried, When the oldest colours have faded, and the youngest critic has died, We shall rest, and, faith, we shall need it lie down for an aeon or two, Till the Master of All Good Workmen shall put us to work anew. And […]...
16. How Many Paltry Foolish Painted Things How many paltry foolish painted things, That now in coaches trouble every street, Shall be forgotten, whom no poet sings, Ere they be well wrapped in their winding-sheet! Where I to thee eternity shall give, When nothing else remaineth of these days, And queens hereafter shall be glad to live Upon the alms of thy […]...
17. On The Death Of Dr. Benjamin Franklin Thus, some tall tree that long hath stood The glory of its native wood, By storms destroyed, or length of years, Demands the tribute of our tears. The pile, that took long time to raise, To dust returns by slow decays: But, when its destined years are o’er, We must regret the loss the more. […]...
18. Picture Of A 23-Year-Old Youth Painted By His Friend Of The Same Age, An Amature He finished the painting yesterday noon. Now He studies it in detail. He has painted him in a Gray unbuttoned coat, a deep gray; without Any vest or any tie. With a rose-colored shirt; Open at the collar, so something might be seen Also of the beauty of his chest, of his neck. The right […]...
19. Sonnet 20: A woman's face with Nature's own hand painted A woman’s face with Nature’s own hand painted Hast thou, the master-mistress of my passion; A woman’s gentle heart, but not acquainted With shifting change, as is false women’s fashion; An eye more bright than theirs, less false in rolling, Gilding the object whereupon it gazeth; A man in hue, all hues in his controlling, […]...
20. Birds Of Passage Black shadows fall From the lindens tall, That lift aloft their massive wall Against the southern sky; And from the realms Of the shadowy elms A tide-like darkness overwhelm The fields that round us lie. But the night is fair, And everywhere A warm, soft vapor fills the air, And distant sounds seem near; And […]...
21. The Sea To the Sea, to the Sea! The white gulls are crying, The wind is blowing, and the white foam is flying. West, west away, the round sun is falling. Grey ship, grey ship, do you hear them calling? The voices of my people gone before me? I will leave, I will leave the woods that […]...
22. St. John Baptist Painted by her self in the Wilderness, with Angels appearing to him, and with a Lamb by him THe Sun’s my Fire, when it does shine, The hollow Spring’s my Cave of Wine, The Rocks and Woods afford me Meat; This Lamb and I on one Dish eat: The neighbouring Herds my Garments send, My Pallet the kind Earth doth lend: Excess and Grandure I decline, M’Associates onely are Divine....
23. I Know The Face Of Falsehood And Her Tongue I know the face of Falsehood and her Tongue Honeyed with unction, Plausible with guile, Are dear to men, whom count me not among, That owe their daily credit to her smile; Such have been succoured out of great distress By her contriving, if accounts be true: Their deference now above the board, I guess, […]...
24. On a Picture Painted by her self, representing two Nimphs of DIANA's, one in a posture to Hunt, the other Batheing WE are Diana’s Virgin-Train, Descended of no Mortal Strain; Our Bows and Arrows are our Goods, Our Pallaces, the lofty Woods, The Hills and Dales, at early Morn, Resound and Eccho with our Horn; We chase the Hinde and Fallow-Deer, The Wolf and Boar both dread our Spear; In Swiftness we out-strip the Wind, An […]...
25. HERODIAS Daughter presenting to her Mother St. JOHN's Head in a Charger, also Painted by her self BEhold, dear Mother, who was late our Fear, Disarm’d and Harmless, I present you here; The Tongue ty’d up, that made all Jury quake, And which so often did our Greatness shake; No Terror sits upon his Awful Brow, Where Fierceness reign’d, there Calmness triumphs now; As Lovers use, he gazes on my Face, With […]...
26. The Witch I HAVE walked a great while over the snow, And I am not tall nor strong. My clothes are wet, and my teeth are set, And the way was hard and long. I have wandered over the fruitful earth, But I never came here before. Oh, lift me over the threshold, and let me in […]...
27. Absences It’s snowing this afternoon and there are no flowers. There is only this sound of falling, quiet and remote, Like the memory of scales descending the white keys Of a childhood piano outside the window, palms! And the heavy head of the cereus, inclining, Soon to let down its white or yellow-white. Now, only these […]...
28. In Memoriam A. H. H.: 55. The wish, that of the living whol The wish, that of the living whole No life may fail beyond the grave, Derives it not from what we have The likest God within the soul? Are God and Nature then at strife, That Nature lends such evil dreams? So careful of the type she seems, So careless of the single life; That I, […]...
29. How noteless Men, and Pleiads, stand How noteless Men, and Pleiads, stand, Until a sudden sky Reveals the fact that One is rapt Forever from the Eye Members of the Invisible, Existing, while we stare, In Leagueless Opportunity, O’ertakenless, as the Air Why didn’t we detain Them? The Heavens with a smile, Sweep by our disappointed Heads Without a syllable...
30. The Negro Mother Children, I come back today To tell you a story of the long dark way That I had to climb, that I had to know In order that the race might live and grow. Look at my face dark as the night Yet shining like the sun with love’s true light. I am the dark […]...
31. The Way Things Work is by admitting Or opening away. This is the simplest form Of current: Blue Moving through blue; Blue through purple; The objects of desire Opening upon themselves Without us; the objects of faith. The way things work Is by solution, Resistance lessened or Increased and taken Advantage of. The way things work Is that we […]...
32. Winter Landscape The three men coming down the winter hill In brown, with tall poles and a pack of hounds At heel, through the arrangement of the trees, Past the five figures at the burning straw, Returning cold and silent to their town, Returning to the drifted snow, the rink Lively with children, to the older men, […]...
33. A Solemn thing within the Soul A Solemn thing within the Soul To feel itself get ripe And golden hang while farther up The Maker’s Ladders stop And in the Orchard far below You hear a Being drop A Wonderful to feel the Sun Still toiling at the Cheek You thought was finished Cool of eye, and critical of Work He […]...
34. Death In Leamington She died in the upstairs bedroom By the light of the ev’ning star That shone through the plate glass window From over Leamington Spa Beside her the lonely crochet Lay patiently and unstirred, But the fingers that would have work’d it Were dead as the spoken word. And Nurse came in with the tea-things Breast […]...
35. There's Another Blessed Horse Fell Down When you’re lying in your hammock, sleeping soft and sleeping sound, Without a care or trouble on your mind, And there’s nothing to disturb you but the engines going round, And you’re dreaming of the girl you left behind; In the middle of your joys you’ll be wakened by a noise And a clatter on […]...
36. Hope The spirit killeth, but the letter giveth life. The week is dealt out like a hand That children pick up card by card. One keeps getting the same hand. One keeps getting the same card. But twice a day except on Saturday The wheel stops, there is a crack in Time: With a hiss of […]...
37. God Give to Men God give the yellow man An easy breeze at blossom time. Grant his eager, slanting eyes to cover Every land and dream Of afterwhile. Give blue-eyed men their swivel chairs To whirl in tall buildings. Allow them many ships at sea, And on land, soldiers And policemen. For black man, God, No need to bother […]...
38. 528. Song-On Chloris being ill Chorus-Long, long the night, Heavy comes the morrow While my soul’s delight Is on her bed of sorrow. CAN I cease to care? Can I cease to languish, While my darling Fair Is on the couch of anguish? Long, long, &c. Ev’ry hope is fled, Ev’ry fear is terror, Slumber ev’n I dread, Ev’ry dream […]...
39. Lift Every Voice and Sing Lift ev’ry voice and sing, Till earth and heaven ring, Ring with the harmonies of Liberty; Let our rejoicing rise High as the list’ning skies, Let it resound loud as the rolling sea. Sing a song full of the faith that the dark past has taught us, Sing a song full of the hope that […]...
40. Frying Pan's Theology Shock-headed blackfellow, Boy (on a pony). Snowflakes are falling Gentle and slow, Youngster says, “Frying Pan What makes it snow?” Frying Pan, confident, Makes the reply “Shake ‘im big flour bag Up in the sky!” “What! when there’s miles of it? Surely that’s brag. Who is there strong enough Shake such a bag?” “What parson […]...