A Teamster's Farewell

Related poetry:

1. People Who Must I PAINTED on the roof of a skyscraper. I painted a long while and called it a day’s work. The people on a corner swarmed and the traffic cop’s whistle never let up all afternoon. They were the same as bugs, many bugs on their way- Those people on the go or at a standstill; […]...
2. Blue Island Intersection SIX street ends come together here. They feed people and wagons into the center. In and out all day horses with thoughts of nose-bags, Men with shovels, women with baskets and baby buggies. Six ends of streets and no sleep for them all day. The people and wagons come and go, out and in. Triangles […]...
3. Stripes POLICEMAN in front of a bank 3 A. M. … lonely. Policeman State and Madison… high noon… mobs… cars… parcels… lonely. Woman in suburbs… keeping night watch on a sleeping typhoid patient… only a clock to talk to… lonesome. Woman selling gloves… bargain day department store… furious crazy-work of many hands slipping in and out […]...
4. Mr. Mine Notice how he has numbered the blue veins In my breast. Moreover there are ten freckles. Now he goes left. Now he goes right. He is buiding a city, a city of flesh. He’s an industrialist. He has starved in cellars And, ladies and gentlemen, he’s been broken by iron, By the blood, by the […]...
5. Some People some people never go crazy. Me, sometimes I’ll lie down behind the couch For 3 or 4 days. They’ll find me there. It’s Cherub, they’ll say, and They pour wine down my throat Rub my chest Sprinkle me with oils. Then, I’ll rise with a roar, Rant, rage – Curse them and the universe As […]...
6. 117. Song-Farewell to Eliza FROM thee, Eliza, I must go, And from my native shore; The cruel fates between us throw A boundless ocean’s roar: But boundless oceans, roaring wide, Between my love and me, They never, never can divide My heart and soul from thee. Farewell, farewell, Eliza dear, The maid that I adore! A boding voice is […]...
7. Mungojerrie And Rumpelteazer Mungojerrie and Rumpelteazer were a very notorious couple of cats. As knockabout clown, quick-change comedians, tight-rope walkers and acrobats They had extensive reputation. They made their home in Victoria Grove That was merely their centre of operation, for they were incurably given to rove. They were very well know in Cornwall Gardens, in Launceston Place […]...
8. Circles of Doors I LOVE him, I love him, ran the patter of her lips And she formed his name on her tongue and sang And she sent him word she loved him so much, So much, and death was nothing; work, art, home, All was nothing if her love for him was not first Of all; the […]...
9. A Farewell to Agassiz How the mountains talked together, Looking down upon the weather, When they heard our friend had planned his Little trip among the Andes How they’ll bare their snowy scalps To the climber of the Alps When the cry goes through their passes, “Here comes the great Agassiz!” “Yes, I’m tall,” says Chimborazo, “But I wait […]...
10. Speaking Of Operations I know something wonderful-wonderful; So strange it will quite startle you; So strange and absurd and unusual It seems it can hardly be true! I know something wonderful-wonderful; You’ll hardly believe it can be- You know my appendix? Well, honest, I’ve still got it inside of me!...
11. Mammy Hums THIS is the song I rested with: The right shoulder of a strong man I leaned on. The face of the rain that drizzled on the short neck of a canal boat. The eyes of a child who slept while death went over and under. The petals of peony pink that fluttered in a shot […]...
12. Policeman G To Policeman G. the Inspector said: “When you pass the ‘shops’ you must turn your head; If you took a wager, that would be a sin; So you’ll earn no stripes if you run them in.” Mush-a-ring-tiy-ah, Fol-de-diddle-doh! To the House Committee, the Inspector said: “‘Tis a terrible thing how the gamblers spread, For they […]...
13. 427. Song-Whistle and I'll come to you Chorus.-O WHISTLE, an’ I’ll come to ye, my lad, O whistle, an’ I’ll come to ye, my lad, Tho’ father an’ mother an’ a’ should gae mad, O whistle, an’ I’ll come to ye, my lad. But warily tent when ye come to court me, And come nae unless the back-yett be a-jee; Syne up […]...
14. 276. Song-Whistle o'er the lave o't FIRST when Maggie was my care, Heav’n, I thought, was in her air, Now we’re married-speir nae mair, But whistle o’er the lave o’t! Meg was meek, and Meg was mild, Sweet and harmless as a child- Wiser men than me’s beguil’d; Whistle o’er the lave o’t! How we live, my Meg and me, How […]...
15. The Fitzroy Blacksmith Under the spreading deficit, The Fitzroy Smithy stands; The smith, a spendthrift man is he, With too much on his hands; But the muscles of his brawny jaw Are strong as iron bands. Pay out, pay put, from morn till night, You can hear the sovereigns go; Or you’ll hear him singing “Old Folks at […]...
16. Christmas in a box the policeman on the streets Found christmas in a box Tipped it down a manhole It wasn’t wearing socks A little old lady nearby – The poor sod’s done no harm She got hit with a truncheon For spreading false alarm The policeman then went home Pleased his job was done Called for his christmas […]...
17. 137. Song-Farewell to the Banks of Ayr THE GLOOMY night is gath’ring fast, Loud roars the wild, inconstant blast, Yon murky cloud is foul with rain, I see it driving o’er the plain; The hunter now has left the moor. The scatt’red coveys meet secure; While here I wander, prest with care, Along the lonely banks of Ayr. The Autumn mourns her […]...
18. The Irish Unionist's farewell to Greta Hellastrom in 1922 Golden haired and golden hearted I would ever have you be, As you were when last we parted Smiling slow and sad at me. Oh! the fighting down of passion! Oh! the century-seeming pain- Parting in this off-hand fashion In Dungarvan in the rain. Slanting eyes of blue, unweeping Stands my Swedish beauty where Gusts […]...
19. The Bell From Europe The tower bell in the Tenth Street Church Rang out nostalgia for the refugee Who knew the source of bells by sound. We liked it, but in ignorance. One meets authorities on bells infrequently. Europe alone made bells with such a tone, Herr Mannheim said. The bell Struck midnight, and it shook the room. He […]...
20. The City of Sleep “The Brushwood Boy” The Day’s Work Over the edge of the purple down, Where the single lamplight gleams, Know ye the road to the Merciful Town That is hard by the Sea of Dreams Where the poor may lay their wrongs away, And the sick may forget to weep? But we pity us! Oh, pity […]...
21. A Garden In Chicago In the mid-city, under an oiled sky, I lay in a garden of such dusky green It seemed the dregs of the imagination. Hedged round by elegant spears of iron fence My face became a moon to absent suns. A low heat beat upon my reading face; There rose no roses in that gritty place […]...
22. Main Street (For S. M. L.) I like to look at the blossomy track of the moon upon the sea, But it isn’t half so fine a sight as Main Street used to be When it all was covered over with a couple of feet of snow, And over the crisp and radiant road the ringing sleighs […]...
23. Devonshire Street W.1 The heavy mahogany door with its wrought-iron screen Shuts. And the sound is rich, sympathetic, discreet. The sun still shines on this eighteenth-century scene With Edwardian faience adornment Devonshire Street. No hope. And the X-ray photographs under his arm Confirm the message. His wife stands timidly by. The opposite brick-built house looks lofty and calm […]...
24. Gamblers All sometimes you climb out of bed in the morning and you think, I’m not going to make it, but you laugh inside Remembering all the times you’ve felt that way, and You walk to the bathroom, do your toilet, see that face In the mirror, oh my oh my oh my, but you comb your […]...
25. He Bids His Beloved Be At Peace I hear the Shadowy Horses, their long manes a-shake, Their hoofs heavy with tumult, their eyes glimmering white; The North unfolds above them clinging, creeping night, The East her hidden joy before the morning break, The West weeps in pale dew and sighs passing away, The South is pouring down roses of crimson fire: O […]...
26. Psalm of Those Who Go Forth Before Daylight THE POLICEMAN buys shoes slow and careful; The teamster buys gloves slow and careful; They take care of their feet and hands; They live on their feet and hands. The milkman never argues; He works alone and no one speaks to him; The city is asleep when he is on the job; He puts a […]...
27. The Plunge I would bathe myself in strangeness: These comforts heaped upon me, smother me! I burn, I scald so for the new, New friends, new faces, Places! Oh to be out of this, This that is all I wanted – save the new. And you, Love, you the much, the more desired! Do I not loathe […]...
28. Memoir of a Proud Boy HE lived on the wings of storm. The ashes are in Chihuahua. Out of Ludlow and coal towns in Colorado Sprang a vengeance of Slav miners, Italians, Scots, Cornishmen, Yanks. Killings ran under the spoken commands of this boy With eighty men and rifles on a hogback mountain. They killed swearing to remember The shot […]...
29. Inexpensive Progress Encase your legs in nylons, Bestride your hills with pylons O age without a soul; Away with gentle willows And all the elmy billows That through your valleys roll. Let’s say goodbye to hedges And roads with grassy edges And winding country lanes; Let all things travel faster Where motor car is master Till only […]...
30. Real Estate News ARMOUR AVENUE was the name of this street and door signs on empty houses read “The Silver Dollar,” “Swede Annie” and the Christian names of madams such as “Myrtle” and “Jenny.” Scrap iron, rags and bottles fill the front rooms hither and yon and signs in Yiddish say Abe Kaplan & Co. are running junk […]...
31. Manhole Covers The beauty of manhole covers what of that? Like medals struck by a great savage khan, Like Mayan calendar stones, unliftable, indecipherable, Not like the old electrum, chased and scored, Mottoed and sculptured to a turn, But notched and whelked and pocked and smashed With the great company names (Gentle Bethlehem, smiling United States). This […]...
32. Ballade Of A Great Weariness There’s little to have but the things I had, There’s little to bear but the things I bore. There’s nothing to carry and naught to add, And glory to Heaven, I paid the score. There’s little to do but I did before, There’s little to learn but the things I know; And this is the […]...
33. Trinity Place THE GRAVE of Alexander Hamilton is in Trinity yard at the end of Wall Street. The grave of Robert Fulton likewise is in Trinity yard where Wall Street stops. And in this yard stenogs, bundle boys, scrubwomen, sit on the tombstones, and walk on the grass of graves, speaking of war and weather, of babies, […]...
34. The jaffa and jerusalem railway A tortuous double iron track; a station here, a station there; A locomotive, tender, tanks; a coach with stiff reclining chair; Some postal cars, and baggage, too; a vestibule of patent make; With buffers, duffers, switches, and the soughing automatic brake This is the Orient’s novel pride, and Syria’s gaudiest modern gem: The railway scheme […]...
35. The Storm 1 Against the stone breakwater, Only an ominous lapping, While the wind whines overhead, Coming down from the mountain, Whistling between the arbors, the winding terraces; A thin whine of wires, a rattling and flapping of leaves, And the small street-lamp swinging and slamming against the lamp pole. Where have the people gone? There is […]...
36. The Farewell XXVIII And now it was evening. And Almitra the seeress said, “Blessed be this day and this place and your spirit that has spoken.” And he answered, Was it I who spoke? Was I not also a listener? Then he descended the steps of the Temple and all the people followed him. And he reached his […]...
37. Who Learns My Lesson Complete? WHO learns my lesson complete? Boss, journeyman, apprentice-churchman and atheist, The stupid and the wise thinker-parents and offspring-merchant, clerk, porter and customer, Editor, author, artist, and schoolboy-Draw nigh and commence; It is no lesson-it lets down the bars to a good lesson, And that to another, and every one to another still. The great laws […]...
38. Dickeyville Grotto The priest never used blueprints, but worked all The many designs out of his head. Father Wilerus, Transplanted Alsatian, Built around This plain Wisconsin Redbrick church A coral-reef en- Crustation meant, The brochure says, To glorify America And heaven simul- Taneously. Thus: Mary and Columbus And the Sacred Heart Equally enthroned In a fantasia of […]...
39. The Sun Have you ever seen Anything In your life More wonderful Than the way the sun, Every evening, Relaxed and easy, Floats toward the horizon And into the clouds or the hills, Or the rumpled sea, And is gone And how it slides again Out of the blackness, Every morning, On the other side of the […]...
40. Momus Momus is the name men give your face, The brag of its tone, like a long low steamboat whistle Finding a way mid mist on a shoreland, Where gray rocks let the salt water shatter spray Against horizons purple, silent. Yes, Momus, Men have flung your face in bronze To gaze in gargoyle downward on […]...