Manners

Related poetry:

1. Two Old Crows Two old crows sat on a fence rail. Two old crows sat on a fence rail, Thinking of effect and cause, Of weeds and flowers, And nature’s laws. One of them muttered, one of them stuttered, One of them stuttered, one of them muttered. Each of them thought far more than he uttered. One crow […]...
2. Sonnet 85: My tongue-tied Muse in manners holds her still My tongue-tied Muse in manners holds her still, While comments of your praise, richly compiled, Reserve their character with golden quill, And precious phrase by all the Muses filed. I think good thoughts, whilst other write good words, And like unlettered clerk still cry “Amen” To every hymn that able spirit affords In polished form […]...
3. Sonnet 39: O, how thy worth with manners may I sing O, how thy worth with manners may I sing, When thou art all the better part of me? What can mine own praise to mine own self bring? And what is’t but mine own when I praise thee? Even for this let us divided live, And our dear love lose name of single one, That […]...
4. Why the Jackass Laughs The Boastful Crow and the Laughing Jack Were telling tales of the outer back: “I’ve just been travelling far and wide, At the back of Bourke and the Queensland side; There isn’t a bird in the bush can go As far as me,” said the old black crow. “There isn’t a bird in the bush […]...
5. 484. Song-Saw you my dear, my Philly O SAW ye my Dear, my Philly? O saw ye my Dear, my Philly, She’s down i’ the grove, she’s wi’ a new Love, She winna come hame to her Willy. What says she my dear, my Philly? What says she my dear, my Philly? She lets thee to wit she has thee forgot, And […]...
6. 492. Dialogue Song-Philly and Willy He. O PHILLY, happy be that day, When roving thro’ the gather’d hay, My youthfu’ heart was stown away, And by thy charms, my Philly. She. O Willy, aye I bless the grove Where first I own’d my maiden love, Whilst thou did pledge the Powers above, To be my ain dear Willy. Both. For […]...
7. Once, I knew a fine song Once, I knew a fine song, It is true, believe me It was all of birds, And I held them in a basket; When I opened the wicket, Heavens! They all flew away. I cried, “Come back, little thoughts!” But they only laughed. They flew on Until they were as sand Thrown between me and […]...
8. A Pastoral Just as the sun was setting Back of the Western hills Grandfather stood by the window Eating the last of his pills. And Grandmother, by the cupboard, Knitting, heard him say: “I ought to have went to the village To fetch some more pills today.” Then Grandmother snuffled a teardrop And said. “It is jest […]...
9. The Need of Being Versed in Country Things The house had gone to bring again To the midnight sky a sunset glow. Now the chimney was all of the house that stood, Like a pistil after the petals go. The barn opposed across the way, That would have joined the house in flame Had it been the will of the wind, was left […]...
10. 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 […]...
11. Two Songs Rewritten For The Tune's Sake I My Paistin Finn is my sole desire, And I am shrunken to skin and bone, For all my heart has had for its hire Is what I can whistle alone and alone. Oro, oro! Tomorrow night I will break down the door. What is the good of a man and he Alone and alone, […]...
12. COPTIC SONG LEAVE we the pedants to quarrel and strive, Rigid and cautious the teachers to be! All of the wisest men e’er seen alive Smile, nod, and join in the chorus with me: “Vain ’tis to wait till the dolt grows less silly! Play then the fool with the fool, willy-nilly, Children of wisdom, remember the […]...
13. TO SIR CLIPSBY CREW Since to the country first I came, I have lost my former flame; And, methinks, I not inherit, As I did, my ravish’d spirit. If I write a verse or two, ‘Tis with very much ado; In regard I want that wine Which should conjure up a line. Yet, though now of Muse bereft, I […]...
14. The Protest I say ‘e isn’t Remorse! ‘Ow do I know? Saw ‘im on Riccarton course Two year ago! Think I’d forget any ‘orse? Course ‘e’s The Crow! Bumper Maginnis and I After a “go”, Walkin’ our ‘orses to dry, I says “Hello! What’s that old black goin’ by?” Bumper says “Oh! That’s an old cuddy of […]...
15. CROW AND AUDEN A misprint in a newspaper reported: ‘Auden stepped from the train and was greeted by a small but enthusiastic crow.’ ‘Hmm,’ Auden thought when first he saw The bird, as train came to a stop, ‘I’ll make this image mine before Some Yorkshire upstart snaps it up.’ He drew a notebook from his mac’, Unclipped […]...
16. The Wreck of the Golfer It was the Bondi golfing man Drove off from the golf house tee, And he had taken his little daughter To bear him company. “Oh, Father, why do you swing the club And flourish it such a lot?” “You watch it fly o’er the fences high!” And he tried with a brassey shot. “Oh, Father, […]...
17. The Grandmother I. And Willy, my eldest-born, is gone, you say, little Anne? Ruddy and white, and strong on his legs, he looks like a man. And Willy’s wife has written: she never was over-wise, Never the wife for Willy: he would n’t take my advice. II. For, Annie, you see, her father was not the man […]...
18. Wherein Obscurely On the road with billowing poplars, In a country flat and desolate To the far-off gray horizon, wherein obscurely, A man and a woman went on foot, Each carrying a small suitcase. They were tired and had taken off Their shoes and were walking on Their toes, staring straight ahead. Every time a car passed […]...
19. The Centenarian Great Grandfather was ninety-nine And so it was our one dread, That though his health was superfine He’d fail to make the hundred. Though he was not a rolling stone No moss he seemed to gather: A patriarch of brawn and bone Was Great Grandfather. He should have been senile and frail Instead of hale […]...
20. Over the fence Over the fence Strawberries grow Over the fence I could climb if I tried, I know Berries are nice! But if I stained my Apron God would certainly scold! Oh, dear, I guess if He were a Boy He’d climb if He could!...
21. Depressed By A Book Of Bad Poetry, I Walk Toward An Unused Pasture And Invite The Insects To Join Me Relieved, I let the book fall behind a stone. I climb a slight rise of grass. I do not want to disturb the ants Who are walking single file up the fence post, Carrying small white petals, Casting shadows so frail that I can see through them. I close my eyes for a moment and […]...
22. The Vulgar Little Lady “But, mamma, now, ” said Charlotte, “pray, don’t you believe That I’m better than Jenny, my nurse? Only see my red shoes, and the lace on my sleeve; Her clothes are a thousand times worse. “I ride in my coach, and have nothing to do, And the country folks stare at me so; And nobody […]...
23. Grand-Pa's Whim While for me gapes the greedy grave It don’t make sense That I should have a crazy crave To paint our fence. Yet that is what I aim to do, Though dim my sight: Jest paint them aged pickets blue, Or green or white. Jest squat serenely in the sun Wi’ brush an’ paint, An’ […]...
24. Good neighbours To my shame I’ve been mending fences again… A quaint habit I inherited from my father; He would rather fix a fence than parley Repair, and that it is where our views diverged. He said fences were meant to make good Neighbours. In the intervening years I had it Wrong, believing a fence was a […]...
25. An Almost Made Up Poem I see you drinking at a fountain with tiny Blue hands, no, your hands are not tiny They are small, and the fountain is in France Where you wrote me that last letter and I answered and never heard from you again. You used to write insane poems about ANGELS AND GOD, all in upper […]...
26. The Flying Gang And I worked my way to the end, and I Was the head of the “Flying Gang”. ‘Twas a chosen band that was kept at hand In case of an urgent need; Was it south or north, we were started forth And away at our utmost speed. If word reached town that a bridge was […]...
27. A True Story, for Jeremy Jeremy hit the ball today, Over the fence and far away. So very, very far away A neighbor had to toss it back. (She thought it was an air attack!) Jeremy hit the ball so hard It flew across his neighbor’s yard. So very hard across her yard The bat that boomed a mighty “THWACK!” […]...
28. In Sark Abreast and ahead of the sea is a crag’s front cloven asunder With strong sea-breach and with wasting of winds whence terror is Shed As a shadow of death from the wings of the darkness on waters that Thunder Abreast and ahead. At its edge is a sepulchre hollowed and hewn for a lone man’s […]...
29. Lines Draw a line. Write a line. There. Stay in line, hold the line, a glance Between the lines is fine but don’t Turn corners, cross, cut in, go over Or out, between two points of no Return’s a line of flight, between Two points of view’s a line of vision. But a line of thought […]...
30. 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 […]...
31. The Return All afternoon my father drove the country roads Between Detroit and Lansing. What he was looking for I never learned, no doubt because he never knew himself, Though he would grab any unfamiliar side road And follow where it led past fields of tall sweet corn In August or in winter those of frozen sheaves. […]...
32. Remorse For Intemperate Speech I ranted to the knave and fool, But outgrew that school, Would transform the part, Fit audience found, but cannot rule My fanatic heart. I sought my betters: though in each Fine manners, liberal speech, Turn hatred into sport, Nothing said or done can reach My fanatic heart. Out of Ireland have we come. Great […]...
33. Christmas Holidays Along the Woodford road there comes a noise Of wheels, and Mr. Rounding’s neat post-chaise Struggles along, drawn by a pair of bays, With Reverend Mr. Crow and six small boys, Who ever and anon declare their joys With trumping horns and juvenile huzzas, At going home to spend their Christmas days, And changing learning’s […]...
34. Albert Schirding Jonas Keene thought his lot a hard one Because his children were all failures. But I know of a fate more trying than that: It is to be a failure while your children are successes. For I raised a brood of eagles Who flew away at last, leaving me A crow on the abandoned bough. […]...
35. Panels THE WEST window is a panel of marching onions. Five new lilacs nod to the wind and fence boards. The rain dry fence boards, the stained knot holes, heliograph a peace. (How long ago the knee drifts here and a blizzard howling at the knot holes, whistling winter war drums?)...
36. Murmurings in a field hospital [They picked him up in the grass where he had lain two Days in the rain with a piece of shrapnel in his lungs.] COME to me only with playthings now. . . A picture of a singing woman with blue eyes Standing at a fence of hollyhocks, poppies and sunflowers. . . Or an […]...
37. The Family Monkey We bought an electric monkey, experimenting rather Recklessly with funds carefully gathered since Grandfather’s time for the purchase of a steam monkey. We had either, by this time, the choice of an electric Or gas monkey. The steam monkey is no longer being made, said the monkey Merchant. But the family always planned on a […]...
38. The Tint I cannot take is best The Tint I cannot take is best The Color too remote That I could show it in Bazaar A Guinea at a sight The fine impalpable Array That swaggers on the eye Like Cleopatra’s Company Repeated in the sky The Moments of Dominion That happen on the Soul And leave it with a Discontent Too […]...
39. Boxer's Wife She phoned them when the Round was Eight: ‘How is my Joe?’ they heard her say. They answered: ‘Gee! He’s going great, Your guy’s Okay.’ She phoned them when the Round was Nine: ‘How is my hero in the fray?’ They yelled: ‘He leads; he’s doing fine, Joe’s sure Okay.’ She phoned them when the […]...
40. Against Winter The truth is dark under your eyelids. What are you going to do about it? The birds are silent; there’s no one to ask. All day long you’ll squint at the gray sky. When the wind blows you’ll shiver like straw. A meek little lamb you grew your wool Till they came after you with […]...