Exhortation: Summer 1919

Related poetry:

1. An Exhortation Chameleons feed on light and air: Poets’ food is love and fame: If in this wide world of care Poets could but find the same With as little toil as they, Would they ever change their hue As the light chameleons do, Suiting it to every ray Twenty times a day? Poets are on this […]...
2. The Waking I wake to sleep, and take my waking slow. I feel my fate in what I cannot fear. I learn by going where I have to go. We think by feeling. What is there to know? I hear my being dance from ear to ear. I wake to sleep, and take my waking slow. Of […]...
3. God's Skallywags The God of Scribes looked down and saw The bitter band of seven, Who had outraged his holy law And lost their hope of Heaven: Came Villon, petty thief and pimp, And obscene Baudelaire, And Byron with his letcher limp, And Poe with starry stare. And Wilde who lived his hell on earth, And Burns, […]...
4. Indian Summer A soft veil dims the tender skies, And half conceals from pensive eyes The bronzing tokens of the fall; A calmness broods upon the hills, And summer’s parting dream distills A charm of silence over all. The stacks of corn, in brown array, Stand waiting through the placid day, Like tattered wigwams on the plain; […]...
5. Nancy Knapp Well, don’t you see this was the way of it: We bought the farm with what he inherited, And his brothers and sisters accused him of poisoning His fathers mind against the rest of them. And we never had any peace with our treasure. The murrain took the cattle, and the crops failed. And lightning […]...
6. RAIN IN SUMMER How beautiful is the rain! After the dust and heat, In the broad and fiery street, In the narrow lane, How beautiful is the rain! How it clatters along the roofs, Like the tramp of hoofs How it gushes and struggles out From the throat of the overflowing spout! Across the window-pane It pours and […]...
7. Luke Havergal Go to the western gate, Luke Havergal, There where the vines cling crimson on the wall, And in the twilight wait for what will come. The wind will moan, the leaves will whisper some Whisper of her, and strike you as they fall; But go, and if you trust her she will call. Go to […]...
8. The Idea of Ancestry Taped to the wall of my cell are 47 pictures: 47 black Faces: my father, mother, grandmothers (1 dead), grand- Fathers (both dead), brothers, sisters, uncles, aunts, Cousins (1st and 2nd), nieces, and nephews. They stare Across the space at me sprawling on my bunk. I know Their dark eyes, they know mine. I know […]...
9. December, 1919 Last night I heard your voice, mother, The words you sang to me When I, a little barefoot boy, Knelt down against your knee. And tears gushed from my heart, mother, And passed beyond its wall, But though the fountain reached my throat The drops refused to fall. ‘Tis ten years since you died, mother, […]...
10. Summer Dawn My sleeping children are still flying dreams In their goose-down heads. The lush of the river singing morning songs Fish watch their ceilings turn sun-white. The grey-green pike lances upstream Kale, like mermaid’s hair Points the water’s drift. All is morning hush And bird beautiful. I only, I didn’t have flu....
11. On the Idle Hill of Summer On the idle hill of summer, Sleepy with the flow of streams, Far I hear the steady drummer Drumming like a noise in dreams. Far and near and low and louder On the roads of earth go by, Dear to friends and food for powder, Soldiers marching, all to die. East and west on fields […]...
12. Hymn 23 part 1 Absent from the body, and present with the Lord. 2 Cor. 5:8. Absent from flesh! O blissful thought! What unknown joys this moment brings! Freed from the mischiefs sin has brought, From pains, and fears, and all their springs. Absent from flesh! illustrious day! Surprising scene! triumphant stroke That rends the prison of my clay; […]...
13. The Echoing Green The Sun does arise, And make happy the skies. The merry bells ring, To welcome the Spring. The sky-lark and thrush, The birds of the bush, Sing louder around, To the bells cheerful sound. While our sports shall be seen On the Echoing Green. Old John, with white hair Does laugh away care, Sitting under […]...
14. A Death Song What cometh here from west to east awending? And who are these, the marchers stern and slow? We bear the message that the rich are sending Aback to those who bade them wake and know. Not one, not one, nor thousands must they slay, But one and all if they would dusk the day. We […]...
15. 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, […]...
16. All the Hills and Vales Along All the hills and vales along Earth is bursting into song, And the singers are the chaps Who are going to die perhaps. O sing, marching men, Till the valleys ring again. Give your gladness to earth’s keeping, So be glad, when you are sleeping. Cast away regret and rue, Think what you are marching […]...
17. The Little Girl Lost In futurity I prophesy see. That the earth from sleep. (Grave the sentence deep) Shall arise and seek For her maker meek: And the desart wild Become a garden mild. In the southern clime, Where the summers prime Never fades away; Lovely Lyca lay. Seven summers old Lovely Lyca told, She had wandered long. Hearing […]...
18. Sonnet Oh for a poet-for a beacon bright To rift this changless glimmer of dead gray; To spirit back the Muses, long astray, And flush Parnassus with a newer light; To put these little sonnet-men to flight Who fashion, in a shrewd mechanic way, Songs without souls, that flicker for a day, To vanish in irrevocable […]...
19. SUMMER FEVER The unsettled trees seem to share My tensions of body and mind: Unable to move before the shell of the wind, Yielding as much as their nature allows, They will break if pushed too far, Splinter to show the white flesh of their wood And sweet transparencies of sap. If 1 am pushed too far […]...
20. Portrait Number Five: Against A New York Summer I’d walk her home after work Buying roses and talking of Bechsteins. She was full of soul. Her small room was gorged with heat And there were no windows. She’d take off everything But her pants And take the pins from her hair Throwing them on the floor With a great noise. Like Crete. We […]...
21. Sleeping at last Sleeping at last, the trouble and tumult over, Sleeping at last, the struggle and horror past, Cold and white, out of sight of friend and of lover, Sleeping at last. No more a tired heart downcast or overcast, No more pangs that wring or shifting fears that hover, Sleeping at last in a dreamless sleep […]...
22. City That Does Not Sleep In the sky there is nobody asleep. Nobody, nobody. Nobody is asleep. The creatures of the moon sniff and prowl about their cabins. The living iguanas will come and bite the men who do not dream, And the man who rushes out with his spirit broken will meet on the street corner The unbelievable alligator […]...
23. Summer Some men there are who find in nature all Their inspiration, hers the sympathy Which spurs them on to any great endeavor, To them the fields and woods are closest friends, And they hold dear communion with the hills; The voice of waters soothes them with its fall, And the great winds bring healing in […]...
24. Tis the Last Rose of Summer Tis the last rose of summer Left blooming alone; All her lovely companions Are faded and gone: No flower of her kindred, No rose-bud is nigh, To reflect back her blushes, Or give sigh for sigh. I’ll not leave thee, thou lone one! To pine on the stem; Since the lovely are sleeping, Go, sleep […]...
25. When on a Summer's Morn When on a summer’s morn I wake, And open my two eyes, Out to the clear, born-singing rills My bird-like spirit flies. To hear the Blackbird, Cuckoo, Thrush, Or any bird in song; And common leaves that hum all day Without a throat or tongue. And when Time strikes the hour for sleep, Back in […]...
26. A Summer Evening Churchyard, Lechlade, Gloucestershire THE wind has swept from the wide atmosphere Each vapour that obscured the sunset’s ray, And pallid Evening twines its beaming hair In duskier braids around the languid eyes of Day: Silence and Twilight, unbeloved of men, Creep hand in hand from yon obscurest glen. They breathe their spells towards the departing day, Encompassing the […]...
27. Exhortation to Prayer What various hindrances we meet In coming to a mercy seat! Yet who that knows the worth of prayer, But wishes to be often there? Prayer makes the darken’d cloud withdraw, Prayer climbs the ladder Jacob saw, Gives exercise to faith and love, Brings every blessing from above. Restraining prayer, we cease to fight; Prayer […]...
28. The Victims Of The Little Box Not even in a dream Should you have anything to do With the little box If you saw her full of stars once You’d wake up Without heart or soul in your chest If you slid your tongue Into her keyhole once You’d wake up with a hole in your forehead If you ground her […]...
29. Blessed Among Women To The Signora Cairoli Blessed was she that bare, Hidden in flesh most fair, For all men’s sake the likeness of all love; Holy that virgin’s womb, The old record saith, on whom The glory of God alighted as a dove; Blessed, who brought to gracious birth The sweet-souled Saviour of a man-tormented earth....
30. The Red Poppy The great thing Is not having A mind. Feelings: Oh, I have those; they Govern me. I have A lord in heaven Called the sun, and open For him, showing him The fire of my own heart, fire Like his presence. What could such glory be If not a heart? Oh my brothers and sisters, […]...
31. All That I Owe The Fellows Of The Grave All that I owe the fellows of the grave And all the dead bequeathed from pale estates Lies in the fortuned bone, the flask of blood, Like senna stirs along the ravaged roots. O all I owe is all the flesh inherits, My fathers’ loves that pull upon my nerves, My sisters tears that sing […]...
32. My Mother On An Evening In Late Summer 1 When the moon appears And a few wind-stricken barns stand out In the low-domed hills And shine with a light That is veiled and dust-filled And that floats upon the fields, My mother, with her hair in a bun, Her face in shadow, and the smoke From their cigarette coiling close To the faint […]...
33. Psalm 89 part 6 v.47ff L. M. Mortality and hope. A funeral psalm. Remember, Lord, our mortal state, How frail our life! how short the date! Where is the man that draws his breath Safe from disease, secure from death’? Lord, while we see whole nations die, Our flesh and sense repine and cry, “Must death for ever rage […]...
34. Dreams are well but Waking's better Dreams are well but Waking’s better, If One wake at morn If One wake at Midnight better Dreaming of the Dawn Sweeter the Surmising Robins Never gladdened Tree Than a Solid Dawn confronting Leading to no Day...
35. Ghosts Some ghosts are women, Neither abstract nor pale, Their breasts as limp as killed fish. Not witches, but ghosts Who come, moving their useless arms Like forsaken servants. Not all ghosts are women, I have seen others; Fat, white-bellied men, Wearing their genitals like old rags. Not devils, but ghosts. This one thumps barefoot, lurching […]...
36. ON THE DIVAN HE who knows himself and others Here will also see, That the East and West, like brothers, Parted ne’er shall be. Thoughtfully to float for ever ‘Tween two worlds, be man’s endeavour! So between the East and West To revolve, be my behest! 1833.*...
37. An Indian Summer Day on the Prarie (IN THE BEGINNING) THE sun is a huntress young, The sun is a red, red joy, The sun is an indian girl, Of the tribe of the Illinois. (MID-MORNING) The sun is a smouldering fire, That creeps through the high gray plain, And leaves not a bush of cloud To blossom with flowers of rain. […]...
38. Further in Summer than the Birds Further in Summer than the Birds Pathetic from the Grass A minor Nation celebrates Its unobtrusive Mass. No Ordinance be seen So gradual the Grace A pensive Custom it becomes Enlarging Loneliness. Antiquest felt at Noon When August burning low Arise this spectral Canticle Repose to typify Remit as yet no Grace No Furrow on […]...
39. Out of White Lips OUT of white lips a question: Shall seven million dead ask for their blood a little land for the living wives and children, a little land for the living brothers and sisters? Out of white lips:-Shall they have only air that sweeps round the earth for breath of their nostrils and no footing on the […]...
40. God lay dead in heaven God lay dead in heaven; Angels sang the hymn of the end; Purple winds went moaning, Their wings drip-dripping With blood That fell upon the earth. It, groaning thing, Turned black and sank. Then from the far caverns Of dead sins Came monsters, livid with desire. They fought, Wrangled over the world, A morsel. But […]...