The Children

Related poetry:

1. Good-Children Street There’s a dear little home in Good-Children street – My heart turneth fondly to-day Where tinkle of tongues and patter of feet Make sweetest of music at play; Where the sunshine of love illumines each face And warms every heart in that old-fashioned place. For dear little children go romping about With dollies and tin […]...
2. Children Selecting Books In A Library With beasts and gods, above, the wall is bright. The child’s head, bent to the book-colored shelves, Is slow and sidelong and food-gathering, Moving in blind grace… yet from the mural, Care The grey-eyed one, fishing the morning mist, Seizes the baby hero by the hair And whispers, in the tongue of gods and children, […]...
3. 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 […]...
4. The Cry Of The Children Do ye hear the children weeping, O my brothers, Ere the sorrow comes with years? They are leaning their young heads against their mothers, And that cannot stop their tears. The young lambs are bleating in the meadows, The young birds are chirping in the nest, The young fawns are playing with the shadows, The […]...
5. When the Children Come Home On a lonely selection far out in the West An old woman works all the day without rest, And she croons, as she toils ‘neath the sky’s glassy dome, ‘Sure I’ll keep the ould place till the childer come home.’ She mends all the fences, she grubs, and she ploughs, She drives the old horse […]...
6. Writing often it is the only Thing Between you and Impossibility. No drink, No woman’s love, No wealth Can Match it. Nothing can save You Except Writing. It keeps the walls From Failing. The hordes from Closing in. It blasts the Darkness. Writing is the Ultimate Psychiatrist, The kindliest God of all the Gods. Writing stalks […]...
7. Turtle Now I see it It nudges with its bulldog head The slippery stems of the lilies, making them tremble; And now it noses along in the wake of the little brown teal Who is leading her soft children From one side of the pond to the other; she keeps Close to the edge And they […]...
8. The Children Dancing Away, sad thoughts, and teasing Perplexities, away! Let other blood go freezing, We will be wise and gay. For here is all heart-easing, An ecstasy at play. The children dancing, dancing, Light upon happy feet, Both eye and heart entrancing Mingle, escape, and meet; Come joyous-eyed and advancing Or floatingly retreat. Now slow, now swifter […]...
9. Children of Lir WE woke from our sleep in the bosom where cradled together we lay: The love of the dark hidden Father went with us upon our way. And gay was the breath in our being, and never a sorrow or fear Was on us as, singing together, we flew from the infinite Lir. Through nights lit […]...
10. Good and Bad Children Children, you are very little, And your bones are very brittle; If you would grow great and stately, You must try to walk sedately. You must still be bright and quiet, And content with simple diet; And remain, through all bewild’ring, Innocent and honest children. Happy hearts and happy faces, Happy play in grassy places […]...
11. Sonnet XXII: With Fools and Children To Folly With fools and children, good discretion bears; Then, honest people, bear with Love and me, Nor older yet, nor wiser made by years, Amongst the rest of fools and children be; Love, still a baby, plays with gauds and toys, And, like a wanton, sports with every feather, And idiots still are running […]...
12. The Return of the Children “They” Traffics and Discoveries Neither the harps nor the crowns amused, nor the cherubs’ dove-winged races Holding hands forlornly the Children wandered beneath the Dome, Plucking the splendid robes of the passers-by, and with pitiful! faces Begging what Princes and Powers refused: “Ah, please will you let us go home?” Over the jewelled floor, nigh […]...
13. The Dream of the Children THE CHILDREN awoke in their dreaming While earth lay dewy and still: They followed the rill in its gleaming To the heart-light of the hill. Its sounds and sights were forsaking The world as they faded in sleep, When they heard a music breaking Out from the heart-light deep. It ran where the rill in […]...
14. The Ship of Death I Now it is autumn and the falling fruit And the long journey towards oblivion. The apples falling like great drops of dew To bruise themselves an exit from themselves. And it is time to go, to bid farewell To one’s own self, and find an exit From the fallen self. II Have you built […]...
15. Children Come to me, O ye children! For I hear you at your play, And the questions that perplexed me Have vanished quite away. Ye open the eastern windows, That look towards the sun, Where thoughts are singing swallows And the brooks of morning run. In your hearts are the birds and the sunshine, In your […]...
16. Against Writing about Children When I think of the many people Who privately despise children, I can’t say I’m completely shocked, Having been one. I was not Exceptional, uncomfortable as that is To admit, and most children are not Exceptional. The particulars of Cruelty, sizes Large and X-Large, Memory gnawing it like A fat dog, are ordinary: Mean Miss […]...
17. In Praise of Songs that Die AFTER HAVING READ A GREAT DEAL OF GOOD CURRENT POETRY IN THE MAGAZINES AND NEWSPAPERS Ah, they are passing, passing by, Wonderful songs, but born to die! Cries from the infinite human seas, Waves thrice-winged with harmonies. Here I stand on a pier in the foam Seeing the songs to the beach go home, Dying […]...
18. The Children of Lir Out upon the sand-dunes thrive the coarse long grasses; Herons standing knee-deep in the brackish pool; Overhead the sunset fire and flame amasses And the moon to eastward rises pale and cool. Rose and green around her, silver-gray and pearly, Chequered with the black rooks flying home to bed; For, to wake at daybreak, birds […]...
19. Among Children I walk among the rows of bowed heads The children are sleeping through fourth grade So as to be ready for what is ahead, The monumental boredom of junior high And the rush forward tearing their wings Loose and turning their eyes forever inward. These are the children of Flint, their fathers Work at the […]...
20. God Has Pity On Kindergarten Children God has pity on kindergarten children, He pities school children less. But adults he pities not at all. He abandons them, And sometimes they have to crawl on all fours In the scorching sand To reach the dressing station, Streaming with blood. But perhaps He will have pity on those who love truly And take […]...
21. The Ballad Of The Children Of The Czar 1 The children of the Czar Played with a bouncing ball In the May morning, in the Czar’s garden, Tossing it back and forth. It fell among the flowerbeds Or fled to the north gate. A daylight moon hung up In the Western sky, bald white. Like Papa’s face, said Sister, Hurling the white ball […]...
22. Prayer for Children Gracious Lord, our children see, By Thy mercy we are free; But shall these, alas! remain Subjects still of Satan’s reign? Israel’s young ones, when of old Pharaoh threaten’d to withhold, Then Thy messenger said, “No; Let the children also go!” When the angel of the Lord, Drawing forth his dreadful sword, Slew with an […]...
23. As Children bid the Guest "Good Night&quot As Children bid the Guest “Good Night” And then reluctant turn My flowers raise their pretty lips Then put their nightgowns on. As children caper when they wake Merry that it is Morn My flowers from a hundred cribs Will peep, and prance again....
24. The Wicked Postman Why do you sit there on the floor so quiet and silent, tell me, Mother dear? The rain is coming in through the open window, making you all Wet, and you don’t mind it. Do you hear the gong striking four? It is time for my brother To come home from school. What has happened […]...
25. Squatter's Children On the unbreathing sides of hills They play, a specklike girl and boy, Alone, but near a specklike house. The Sun’s suspended eye Blinks casually, and then they wade Gigantic waves of light and shade. A dancing yellow spot, a pup, Attends them. Clouds are piling up; A storm piles up behind the house. The […]...
26. Foreign Children Little Indian, Sioux, or Crow, Little frosty Eskimo, Little Turk or Japanee, Oh! don’t you wish that you were me? You have seen the scarlet trees And the lions over seas; You have eaten ostrich eggs, And turned the turtle off their legs. Such a life is very fine, But it’s not so nice as […]...
27. The End of the World Here, at the end of the world, The flowers bleed As if they were hearts, The hearts ooze a darkness Like india ink, & poets dip their pens in & they write. “Here, at the end of the world,” They write, Not knowing what it means. “Here, where the sky nurses on black milk, Where […]...
28. Two Children Two children (small), one Four, one Five, Once saw a bee go in a hive, They’d never seen a bee before! So waited there to see some more. And sure enough along they came A dozen bees (and all the same!) Within the hive they buzzed about; Then, one by one, they all flew out. […]...
29. Other Children “Little child of my five senses And of my tenderness.” Let us cradle our loves, We will have good children. Well cared for, We will fear nothing on earth, Happiness, good fortune, prudence, Our loves And this leap from age to age, From the order of a child to that of an old man, Will […]...
30. Civilization Send your army home to their wives and children. It is late. Your soldiers are burdened, thirsty. Lock the doors, the windows, and here in darkness lie down beside me. Speak of anything we possess in common: Ground or law or sense. Only speak it softly. Spiders crawl the crevices. Violent voices ruin their balance, […]...
31. Pencils PENCILS Telling where the wind comes from open a story. Pencils Telling where the wind goes end a story. These eager pencils Come to a stop .. only.. when the stars high over Come to a stop. Out of cabalistic to-morrows Come cryptic babies calling life A strong and a lovely thing. I have seen […]...
32. Our Guardian Angels and Their Children Where a river roars in rapids And doves in maples fret, Where peace has decked the pastures Our guardian angels met. Long they had sought each other In God’s mysterious name, Had climbed the solemn chaos tides Alone, with hope aflame: Amid the demon deeps had wound By many a fearful way. As they beheld […]...
33. Warning to Children Children, if you dare to think Of the greatness, rareness, muchness Fewness of this precious only Endless world in which you say You live, you think of things like this: Blocks of slate enclosing dappled Red and green, enclosing tawny Yellow nets, enclosing white And black acres of dominoes, Where a neat brown paper parcel […]...
34. Home, My Little Children, Hear Are Songs For You COME, my little children, here are songs for you; Some are short and some are long, and all, all are new. You must learn to sing them very small and clear, Very true to time and tune and pleasing to the ear. Mark the note that rises, mark the notes that fall, Mark the time […]...
35. Two Children Give me your hand, oh little one! Like children be we two; Yet I am old, my day is done That barely breaks for you. A baby-basket hard you hold, With in it cherries four: You cherish them as men do gold, And count them o’er. And then you stumble in your walk; The cherries […]...
36. The Poor Children Take heed of this small child of earth; He is great; he hath in him God most high. Children before their fleshly birth Are lights alive in the blue sky. In our light bitter world of wrong They come; God gives us them awhile. His speech is in their stammering tongue, And his forgiveness in […]...
37. Sonnet 11 XI A Book was writ of late call’d Tetrachordon; And wov’n close, both matter, form and stile; The Subject new: it walk’d the Town a while, Numbring good intellects; now seldom por’d on. Cries the stall-reader, bless us! what a word on A title page is this! and some in file Stand spelling fals, while […]...
38. Among School Children I I walk through the long schoolroom questioning; A kind old nun in a white hood replies; The children learn to cipher and to sing, To study reading-books and histories, To cut and sew, be neat in everything In the best modern way – the children’s eyes In momentary wonder stare upon A sixty-year-old smiling […]...
39. The Other Under my bowels, yellow with smoke, It waits. Under my eyes, those milk bunnies, It waits. It is waiting. It is waiting. Mr. Doppelganger. My brother. My spouse. Mr. Doppelganger. My enemy. My lover. When truth comes spilling out like peas It hangs up the phone. When the child is soothed and resting on the […]...
40. The Children's Hour Between the dark and the daylight, When the night is beginning to lower, Comes a pause in the day’s occupation, That is know as the children’s hour. I hear in the chamber above me The patter of little feet, The sound of a door that is opened, And voices soft and sweet. From my study […]...