Renunciation

Related poetry:

1. Song From Amphitryon Air Iris I love, and hourly I die, But not for a lip, nor a languishing eye: She’s fickle and false, and there we agree, For I am as false and as fickle as she. We neither believe what either can say; And, neither believing, we neither betray. ‘Tis civil to swear, and say things […]...
2. An Ancient Gesture I thought, as I wiped my eyes on the corner of my apron: Penelope did this too. And more than once: you can’t keep weaving all day And undoing it all through the night; Your arms get tired, and the back of your neck gets tight; And along towards morning, when you think it will […]...
3. Renunciation It’s a jade branch on the floor, broken in two, love, Or a stain raised on the lapped grains of a suede glove. It’s the lace, blown by a strong breeze, of an old gown With the cranes crying at night, lost in their long sound. It’s a vase made from the noon light in […]...
4. Renunciation is a piercing Virtue Renunciation is a piercing Virtue The letting go A Presence for an Expectation Not now The putting out of Eyes Just Sunrise Lest Day Day’s Great Progenitor Outvie Renunciation is the Choosing Against itself Itself to justify Unto itself When larger function Make that appear Smaller that Covered Vision Here...
5. The Fairies Break Their Dances The fairies break their dances And leave the printed lawn, And up from India glances The silver sail of dawn. The candles burn their sockets, The blinds let through the day, The young man feels his pockets And wonders what’s to pay....
6. 45. My Girl she's Airy: A Fragment MY girl she’s airy, she’s buxom and gay; Her breath is as sweet as the blossoms in May; A touch of her lips it ravishes quite: She’s always good natur’d, good humour’d, and free; She dances, she glances, she smiles upon me; I never am happy when out of her sight....
7. An Imitation Of Anacreon PAINTER in Paphos and Cythera famed Depict, I pray, the absent Iris’ face. Thou hast not seen the lovely nymph I’ve named; The better for thy peace. Then will I trace For thy instruction her transcendent grace. Begin with lily white and blushing rose, Take then the Loves and Graces… But what good Words, idle […]...
8. I Feel (Verse Libre) I feel Very much Like taking Its unholy perpetrators By the hair Of their heads (If they have any hair) And dragging them around A few times, And then cutting them Into small, irregular pieces And burying them In the depths of the blue sea. They are without form And void,/ Or at least The […]...
9. Song in a Minor Key There’s a place I know where the birds swing low, And wayward vines go roaming, Where the lilacs nod, and a marble god Is pale, in scented gloaming. And at sunset there comes a lady fair Whose eyes are deep with yearning. By an old, old gate does the lady wait Her own true love’s […]...
10. The Fish Although you hide in the ebb and flow Of the pale tide when the moon has set, The people of coming days will know About the casting out of my net, And how you have leaped times out of mind Over the little silver cords, And think that you were hard and unkind, And blame […]...
11. Dreams While on my lonely couch I lie, I seldom feel myself alone, For fancy fills my dreaming eye With scenes and pleasures of its own. Then I may cherish at my breast An infant’s form beloved and fair, May smile and soothe it into rest With all a Mother’s fondest care. How sweet to feel […]...
12. Zummer An' Winter When I led by zummer streams The pride o’ Lea, as naighbours thought her, While the zun, wi’ evenen beams, Did cast our sheades athirt the water; Winds a-blowen, Streams a-flowen, Skies a-glowen, Tokens ov my jay zoo fleeten, Heightened it, that happy meeten. Then, when maid an’ man took pleaces, Gay in winter’s Chris’mas […]...
13. Krinken Krinken was a little child, It was summer when he smiled. Oft the hoary sea and grim Stretched its white arms out to him, Calling, “Sun-child, come to me; Let me warm my heart with thee!” But the child heard not the sea, Calling, yearning evermore For the summer on the shore. Krinken on the […]...
14. Carbonara eyes Nicky said I couldn’t write, she’s got a charming Sense of social etiquette – given she’s a bitch (the canine sort, can’t spell for shit or even write A word) but then she has the most expressive eyes. So what she said was no surprise, she’d heard My lamentations, licked my hands, rested forepaws On […]...
15. This Moment, Yearning and Thoughtful THIS moment yearning and thoughtful, sitting alone, It seems to me there are other men in other lands, yearning and thoughtful; It seems to me I can look over and behold them, in Germany, Italy, France, Spain-or far, far away, in China, or in Russia or India-talking other dialects; And it seems to me if […]...
16. March Elegy I have enough treasures from the past To last me longer than I need, or want. You know as well as I. . . malevolent memory Won’t let go of half of them: A modest church, with its gold cupola Slightly askew; a harsh chorus Of crows; the whistle of a train; A birch tree […]...
17. For An Unknown Lady Lady, if you’d slumber sound, Keep your eyes upon the ground. If you’d toss and turn at night, Slip your glances left and right. Would the mornings find you gay, Never give your heart away. Would they find you pale and sad, Fling it to a whistling lad. Ah, but when his pleadings burn, Will […]...
18. Behind a Wall I own a solace shut within my heart, A garden full of many a quaint delight And warm with drowsy, poppied sunshine; bright, Flaming with lilies out of whose cups dart Shining things With powdered wings. Here terrace sinks to terrace, arbors close The ends of dreaming paths; a wanton wind Jostles the half-ripe pears, […]...
19. THE FRIENDLY MEETING Lovingly I’ll sing of love; Ever comes she from above. THE FRIENDLY MEETING. IN spreading mantle to my chin conceald, I trod the rocky path, so steep and grey, Then to the wintry plain I bent my way Uneasily, to flight my bosom steel’d. But sudden was the newborn day reveal’d: A maiden came, in […]...
20. To the Tune of The fragrance of the pink lotus Fails, the jade mat hints of autumn. Softly I unfasten my silk cloak, Who is sending a letter from Among the clouds? When the swan message returns, The balcony is flooded with moonlight. The blossoms drift on, the water flows. There is the same yearning of the heart, But […]...
21. To One In Paradise Thou wast all that to me, love, For which my soul did pine- A green isle in the sea, love, A fountain and a shrine, All wreathed with fairy fruits and flowers, And all the flowers were mine. Ah, dream too bright to last! Ah, starry Hope! that didst arise But to be overcast! A […]...
22. Unlyric Love Song It is time to give that-of-myself which I could not at first: To offer you now at last my least and my worst: Minor, absurd preserves, The shell’s end-curves, A document kept at the back of a drawer, A tin hidden under the floor, Recalcitrant prides and hesitations: To pile them carefully in a desparate […]...
23. Authorship You say that father write a lot of books, but what he write I don’t Understand. He was reading to you all the evening, but could you really Make out what he meant? What nice stores, mother, you can tell us! Why can’t father Write like that, I wonder? Did he never hear from his […]...
24. Take Back the Virgin Page Written on Returning a Blank Book Take back the virgin page, White and unwritten still; Some hand, more calm and sage, The leaf must fill. Thoughts come, as pure as light Pure as even you require; But, oh! each word I write Love turns to fire. Yet let me keep the book: Oft shall my […]...
25. Penelope name meaning thread weaver or duck (these may be guesses from obscurity) Ten-year faithful wife whilst her husband Was gallivanting round the islands Deceiving the suitors by her shroud-unpicking Or maybe not such a savoury dame having A high time with those after her favours Allegedly allowing hermes up her skirts And becoming the mother […]...
26. Over The Alley Here in my office I sit and write Hour on hour, and day on day, With no one to speak to from morn till night, Though I have a neighbour just over the way. Across the alley that yawns between A maiden sits sewing the whole day long; A face more lovely is seldom seen […]...
27. At Cheyenne Young Lochinvar came in from the West, With fringe on his trousers and fur on his vest; The width of his hat-brim could nowhere be beat, His No. Brogans were chuck full of feet, His girdle was horrent with pistols and things, And he flourished a handful of aces on kings. The fair Mariana sate […]...
28. Au Bal [Dedicated to Horace Sheridan-Bickers] A vision of flushed faces, shining limbs, The madness of the music that entrances All life in its delirium of dances! The white world glitters in the void, and swims Through the infinite seas of transcendental trances. Yea! all the hoarded seed of all my fancies Bursts in a shower of […]...
29. Maya That I should make much of myself and turn it on all sides, Thus casting colored shadows on thy radiance – such is thy Maya. Thou settest a barrier in thine own being And then callest thy severed self in myriad notes. This thy self-separation has taken body in me. The poignant song is echoed […]...
30. Love Poem There is always something to be made of pain. Your mother knits. She turns out scarves in every shade of red. They were for Christmas, and they kept you warm While she married over and over, taking you Along. How could it work, When all those years she stored her widowed heart As though the […]...
31. On Leaving Some Friends At An Early Hour Give me a golden pen, and let me lean On heaped-up flowers, in regions clear, and far; Bring me a tablet whiter than a star, Or hand of hymning angel, when ’tis seen The silver strings of heavenly harp atween: And let there glide by many a pearly car Pink robes, and wavy hair, and […]...
32. Drinking Alone I take my wine jug out among the flowers To drink alone, without friends. I raise my cup to entice the moon. That, and my shadow, makes us three. But the moon doesn’t drink, And my shadow silently follows. I will travel with moon and shadow, Happy to the end of spring. When I sing, […]...
33. Double Red Daisies Double red daisies, they’re my flowers, Which nobody else may grow. In a big quarrelsome house like ours They try it sometimes-but no, I root them up because they’re my flowers, Which nobody else may grow. Claire has a tea-rose, but she didn’t plant it; Ben has an iris, but I don’t want it. Daisies, […]...
34. The Red Blaze is the Morning The Red Blaze is the Morning The Violet is Noon The Yellow Day is falling And after that is none But Miles of Sparks at Evening Reveal the Width that burned The Territory Argent that Never yet consumed...
35. Epilogue Those blessиd structures, plot and rhyme Why are they no help to me now I want to make Something imagined, not recalled? I hear the noise of my own voice: The painter’s vision is not a lens, it trembles to caress the light. But sometimes everything I write With the threadbare art of my eye […]...
36. A Curse For A Nation I heard an angel speak last night, And he said ‘Write! Write a Nation’s curse for me, And send it over the Western Sea.’ I faltered, taking up the word: ‘Not so, my lord! If curses must be, choose another To send thy curse against my brother. ‘For I am bound by gratitude, By love […]...
37. The Stolen Child Where dips the rocky highland Of Sleuth Wood in the lake, There lies a leafy island Where flapping herons wake The drowsy water-rats; There we’ve hid our faery vats, Full of berries And of reddest stolen cherries. Come away, O human child! To the waters and the wild With a faery, hand in hand, For […]...
38. At leisure is the Soul At leisure is the Soul That gets a Staggering Blow The Width of Life before it spreads Without a thing to do It begs you give it Work But just the placing Pins Or humblest Patchwork Children do To Help its Vacant Hands...
39. The Avenue Now that we’ve come to the end I’ve been trying to piece it together, Not that distance makes anything clearer. It began in the half-light While we walked through the dawn chorus After a party that lasted all night, With the blackbird, the wood-pigeon, The song-thrush taking a bludgeon To a snail, our taking each […]...
40. How many schemes may die How many schemes may die In one short Afternoon Entirely unknown To those they most concern The man that was not lost Because by accident He varied by a Ribbon’s width From his accustomed route The Love that would not try Because beside the Door It must be competitions Some unsuspecting Horse was tied Surveying […]...