Belonging

Related poetry:

1. Tonight I Can Write Tonight I can write the saddest lines. Write, for example, ‘The night is starry And the stars are blue and shiver in the distance.’ The night wind revolves in the sky and sings. Tonight I can write the saddest lines. I loved her, and sometimes she loved me too. Through nights like this one I […]...
2. Saddest Poem I can write the saddest poem of all tonight. Write, for instance: “The night is full of stars, And the stars, blue, shiver in the distance.” The night wind whirls in the sky and sings. I can write the saddest poem of all tonight. I loved her, and sometimes she loved me too. On nights […]...
3. Time to play It is a pristine page, clean on the blue screen Where I compose, I don’t expect it to stay that way As words glow from blunt, abused fingers, as insistent Sounds in my head translate into sentence structures, As lips articulate the rhythms and the sounds of the Jumbled lexis as swiftly as I can […]...
4. Far Rockaway “the cure of souls.” Henry James The radiant soda of the seashore fashions Fun, foam and freedom. The sea laves The Shaven sand. And the light sways forward On self-destroying waves. The rigor of the weekday is cast aside with shoes, With business suits and traffic’s motion; The lolling man lies with the passionate sun, […]...
5. Lullaby Softly lie down And close your eyes so blue Worry no more For tonight I’ll watch over you Gently rest your head Against my soothing chest For here in my arms You’ve found a safe place to rest Sleep sweet child In peaceful undisturbed dreams And don’t awake Until the morning beams...
6. Out of ideas If I don’t write something good tonight I will sleep Without the comforting Canopus of deep believers, If I sleep at all, and this light which ignites My enormous poetic conceit and guides my muse Will suffer and die, my hands be stilled. Tomorrow I might read these words and endure The bite of astral […]...
7. Safe-home don’t be so lazy maisie maisie Don’t be so lazy please I know it’s snowing And a hard wind’s blowing But nobody knows At the rate we’re going What time we’ll get home tonight Keep to the path for me timothy timothy Keep to the path for me please My legs are aching And my […]...
8. 'Twas awkward, but it fitted me ‘Twas awkward, but it fitted me An Ancient fashioned Heart Its only lore its Steadfastness In Change unerudite It only moved as do the Suns For merit of Return Or Birds confirmed perpetual By Alternating Zone I only have it not Tonight In its established place For technicality of Death Omitted in the Lease...
9. St. Francis And The Sow The bud Stands for all things, Even those things that don’t flower, For everything flowers, from within, of self-blessing; Though sometimes it is necessary To reteach a thing its loveliness, To put a hand on its brow Of the flower And retell it in words and in touch It is lovely Until it flowers again […]...
10. Historion No man hath dared to write this thing as yet, And yet I know, how that the souls of all men great At times pass athrough us, And we are melted into them, and are not Save reflexions of their souls. Thus am I Dante for a space and am One Francois Villon, ballad-lord and […]...
11. Dream Song 127: Again, his friend's death made the man sit still Again, his friend’s death made the man sit still And freeze inside—his daughter won first price— His wife scowled over at him— It seemed to be Hallowe’en. His friend’s death had been adjudged suicide, Which dangles a trail Longer than Henry’s chill, longer than his loss And longer than the letter that he wrote That […]...
12. Indian Summer Like a deep blue wave Of passion You shore into the room Where I sit waiting quietly, Open-booked. We have moved through days, Loss, pain To hold this moment, This picture postcard seascape Of gentle harbouring. You say ‘I knew you were here I could smell you’ And effortlessly I sway To seal my fate. […]...
13. "I Love You Sweatheart&quot A man risked his life to write the words. A man hung upside down (an idiot friend Holding his legs?) with spray paint To write the words on a girder fifty feet above A highway. And his beloved, The next morning driving to work…? His words are not (meant to be) so unique. Does she […]...
14. Serenade So sweet the hour, so calm the time, I feel it more than half a crime, When Nature sleeps and stars are mute, To mar the silence ev’n with lute. At rest on ocean’s brilliant dyes An image of Elysium lies: Seven Pleiades entranced in Heaven, Form in the deep another seven: Endymion nodding from […]...
15. Jeremy Carlisle Passer-by, sin beyond any sin Is the sin of blindness of souls to other souls. And joy beyond any joy is the joy Of having the good in you seen, and seeing the good At the miraculous moment! Here I confess to a lofty scorn, And an acrid skepticism. But do you remember the liquid […]...
16. I know of people in the Grave I know of people in the Grave Who would be very glad To know the news I know tonight If they the chance had had. ‘Tis this expands the least event And swells the scantest deed My right to walk upon the Earth If they this moment had....
17. A Sphinx Close-mouthed you sat five thousand years and never Let out a whisper. Processions came by, marchers, asking questions you Answered with grey eyes never blinking, shut lips Never talking. Not one croak of anything you know has come from your Cat crouch of ages. I am one of those who know all you know and […]...
18. Lily-Bell and Thistledown Song I Awake! Awake! for the earliest gleam Of golden sunlight shines On the rippling waves, that brightly flow Beneath the flowering vines. Awake! Awake! for the low, sweet chant Of the wild-birds’ morning hymn Comes floating by on the fragrant air, Through the forest cool and dim; Then spread each wing, And work, and sing, Through […]...
19. XXXIV (You are the daughter of the sea) You are the daughter of the sea, oregano’s first cousin. Swimmer, your body is pure as the water; Cook, your blood is quick as the soil. Everything you do is full of flowers, rich with the earth. Your eyes go out toward the water, and the waves rise; Your hands go out to the earth […]...
20. Talisman it is written The act of writing is Holy words are Sacred and your breath Brings out the God in them I write these words Quickly repeat them Softly to myself This talisman for you Fold this prayer Around your neck fortify Your back with these Whispers May you walk ever Loved and in love […]...
21. Love And Marilyn Monroe (after Spillane) Let us be aware of the true dark gods Acknowledgeing the cache of the crotch The primitive pure and pwerful pink and grey private sensitivites Wincing, marvelous in their sweetness, whence rises the future. Therefore let us praise Miss Marilyn Monroe. She has a noble attitude marked by pride and candor She takes […]...
22. All or Nothing All or Nothing The final race. the final decision All disgrace or fortune all Either I fall or I stand tall; All or Nothing No compromises this time No catholic design Either I win or I lose; And I, don’t get to choose. All or Nothing The final fight All hells lose in this frenzied […]...
23. We Astronomers We astronomers are nomads, Merchants, circus people, All the earth our tent. We are industrious. We breed enthusiasms, Honour our responsibility to awe. But the universe has moved a long way off. Sometimes, I confess, Starlight seems too sharp, And like the moon I bend my face to the ground, To the small patch where […]...
24. All That's Not Love All that’s not love is the dearth of my days, The leaves of the volume with rubric unwrit, The temple in times without prayer, without praise, The altar unset and the candle unlit. Let me survive not the lovable sway Of early desire, nor see when it goes The courts of Life’s abbey in ivied […]...
25. Evening Song Of Senlin from Senlin: A Biography It is moonlight. Alone in the silence I ascend my stairs once more, While waves, remote in a pale blue starlight, Crash on a white sand shore. It is moonlight. The garden is silent. I stand in my room alone. Across my wall, from the far-off moon, A rain of fire […]...
26. The Missal Makers To visit the Escurial We took a motor bus, And there a guide mercurial Took charge of us. He showed us through room after room, And talked hour after hour, Of place, crypt and royal tomb, Of pomp and power. But in bewilderment of grace What pleased me most of all Were ancient missals proud […]...
27. Dream Song 61: Full moon. Our Narragansett gales subside Full moon. Our Narragansett gales subside And the land is celebrating men of war More or less, less or more. In valleys, thin on headlands, narrow & wide Our targets rest. In us we trust. Far, near, The bivouacs of fear Are solemn in the moon somewhere tonight, In turning time. It’s late for gratitude, […]...
28. On Cheating The Fiddler “Then we will have tonight!” we said. “Tomorrow – may we not be dead?” The morrow touched our eyes, and found Us walking firm above the ground, Our pulses quick, our blood alight. Tomorrow’s gone – we’ll have tonight!...
29. R. T. S. L. (1917-1977) As for that other thing Which comes when the eyelid is glazed And the wax gleam From the unwrinkled forehead Asks no more questions Of the dry mouth, Whether they open the heart like a shirt To release a rage of swallows, Whether the brain Is a library for worms, On the instant of that […]...
30. MORNINGS LIKE THIS Mornings like this I awaken and wonder How I have moved so far, how I have moved so little And yet in essence stayed the same Always passionate for the unattainable For Joan Baez to make me her analyst, To tour Ireland with Eddie and Finbar Furey To be made a Chevalier des Palmes for […]...
31. Chorus Give away her gowns, Give away her shoes; She has no more use For her fragrant gowns; Take them all down, Blue, green, blue, Lilac, pink, blue, From their padded hangers; She will dance no more In her narrow shoes; Sweep her narrow shoes From the closet floor....
32. Water Babes We were water babes, born in the arms of a sparkling brook That patiently took us into its heart. At the very start we Were never far from its shingly banks, playing amid ranks Of serried wildflowers. When one of us all but drowned In a careless encounter the stream buoyed her up in a […]...
33. A few kind words A few kind words, what can be bought with that? In essence just a clique of tidy prose, A verb, a noun, perhaps an adjectival phrase Offered in the form of venal praise – and be surprised at what it buys. Like a fleeting smile it’s currency outweighs The simple form, a hint of urbane […]...
34. All The Things You Are Not Yet for tess Tonight there’s a crowd in my head: All the things you are not yet. You are words without paper, pages Sighing in summer forests, gardens Where builders stub out their rubble And plastic oozes its sweat. All the things you are, you are not yet. Not yet the lonely window in midwinter With […]...
35. Infelice Walking swiftly with a dreadful duchess, He smiled too briefly, his face was pale as sand, He jumped into a taxi when he saw me coming, Leaving my alone with a private meaning, He loves me so much, my heart is singing. Later at the Club when I rang him in the evening They said: […]...
36. A Blue Valentine (For Aline) Monsignore, Right Reverend Bishop Valentinus, Sometime of Interamna, which is called Ferni, Now of the delightful Court of Heaven, I respectfully salute you, I genuflect And I kiss your episcopal ring. It is not, Monsignore, The fragrant memory of your holy life, Nor that of your shining and joyous martyrdom, Which causes me […]...
37. Poets to Come POETS to come! orators, singers, musicians to come! Not to-day is to justify me, and answer what I am for; But you, a new brood, native, athletic, continental, greater than before known, Arouse! Arouse-for you must justify me-you must answer. I myself but write one or two indicative words for the future, I but advance […]...
38. It's Raining In Love I don’t know what it is, but I distrust myself when I start to like a girl a lot. It makes me nervous. I don’t say the right things or perhaps I start to examine, evaluate, compute what I am saying. If I say, “Do you think it’s going to rain?” and she says, “I […]...
39. TO WILLIAM E. CHANNING The pages of thy book I read, And as I closed each one, My heart, responding, ever said, “Servant of God! well done!” Well done! Thy words are great and bold; At times they seem to me, Like Luther’s, in the days of old, Half-battles for the free. Go on, until this land revokes The […]...
40. Master And Mistress As if I were composed of dust and air, The shape confronting me upon the stair (Athlete of shadow, lighted by a stain On its disjunctive breast I saw it plain ) Moved through my middle flesh. I turned around, Shaken and it was marching without sound Beyond the door; and when my hand was […]...