The Prisoner

Related poetry:

1. Prisoner, The – (A Fragment) In the dungeon-crypts, idly did I stray, Reckless of the lives wasting there away; “Draw the ponderous bars! open, Warder stern!” He dared not say me nay – the hinges harshly turn. “Our guests are darkly lodged,” I whisper’d, gazing through The vault, whose grated eye showed heaven more grey than blue; (This was when […]...
2. 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; […]...
3. Nocturne Night comes, an angel stands Measuring out the time of stars, Still are the winds, and still the hours. It would be peace to lie Still in the still hours at the angel’s feet, Upon a star hung in a starry sky, But hearts another measure beat. Each body, wingless as it lies, Sends out […]...
4. The Prisoner of Chillon I My hair is gray, but not with years, Nor grew it white In a single night, As men’s have grown from sudden fears: My limbs are bow’d, though not with toil, But rusted with a vile repose, For they have been a dungeon’s spoil, And mine has been the fate of those To whom […]...
5. The Prisoner I count the dismal time by months and years Since last I felt the green sward under foot, And the great breath of all things summer- Met mine upon my lips. Now earth appears As strange to me as dreams of distant spheres Or thoughts of Heaven we weep at. Nature’s lute Sounds on, behind […]...
6. Rest ON me to rest, my bird, my bird: The swaying branches of my heart Are blown by every wind toward The home whereto their wings depart. Build not your nest, my bird, on me; I know no peace but ever sway: O lovely bird, be free, be free, On the wild music of the day. […]...
7. My Prisoner We was in a crump-‘ole, ‘im and me; Fightin’ wiv our bayonets was we; Fightin’ ‘ard as ‘ell we was, Fightin’ fierce as fire because It was ‘im or me as must be downed; ‘E was twice as big as me; I was ‘arf the weight of ‘e; We was like a terryer and a […]...
8. Unconscious THE WINDS, the stars, and the skies though wrought By the heavenly King yet know it not; And man who moves in the twilight dim Feels not the love that encircles him, Though in heart, on bosom, and eyelids press Lips of an infinite tenderness, He turns away through the dark to roam Nor heeds […]...
9. The Gulf A Gulf of silence separates us from each other. I stand at one side of the gulf, you at the other. I cannot see you or hear you, yet know that you are there. Often I call you by your childish name And pretend that the echo to my crying is your voice. How can […]...
10. The Prisoner I lash and writhe against my prison bars, And watch with sullen eyes the gaping crowd. . Give me my freedom and the burning stars, The hollow sky, and crags of moonlit cloud! Once I might range across the trackless plain, And roar with joy, until the desert air And wide horizons echoed it amain: […]...
11. A Prisoner in a Dungeon Deep A prisoner in a dungeon deep Sat musing silently; His head was rested on his hand, His elbow on his knee. Turned he his thoughts to future times Or are they backward cast? For freedom is he pining now Or mourning for the past? No, he has lived so long enthralled Alone in dungeon gloom […]...
12. Morning You know how it is waking From a dream certain you can fly And that someone, long gone, returned And you are filled with longing, For a brief moment, to drive off The road and feel nothing Or to see the loved one and feel Everything. Perhaps one morning, Taking brush to hair you’ll wonder […]...
13. I cannot meet the Spring unmoved I cannot meet the Spring unmoved I feel the old desire A Hurry with a lingering, mixed, A Warrant to be fair A Competition in my sense With something hid in Her And as she vanishes, Remorse I saw no more of Her....
14. For the Fallen With proud thanksgiving, a mother for her children, England mourns for her dead across the sea. Flesh of her flesh they were, spirit of her spirit, Fallen in the cause of the free. Solemn the drums thrill; Death august and royal Sings sorrow up into immortal spheres, There is music in the midst of desolation […]...
15. To A Friend Going Blind Today, because I couldn’t find the shortcut through, I had to walk this town’s entire inner Perimeter to find Where the medieval walls break open In an eighteenth century Arch. The yellow valley flickered on and off Through cracks and the gaps For guns. Bruna is teaching me To cut a pattern. Saturdays we buy […]...
16. TO LEEDS BIG ISSUE SELLERS When I come from the Smoke to visit my son on the ward I see you everywhere: by the station, by the neon sign of ‘Squares’ By every shopping mall. Leeds seems to have more of you than anywhere: How do you stand there for so many hours in freezing winds When most you solicit […]...
17. The Prisoner Upspoke the culprit at the bar, Conducting his own case: ‘Your Lordship, I have gone to far, But grant me of your grace. As I was passing by a shop I saw my arm go out, And though I begged of it to stop, It stole beyond a doubt. ‘But why should my whole body […]...
18. Prisoner ‘Prisoner, tell me, who was it that bound you?’ ‘It was my master,’ said the prisoner. ‘I thought I could outdo everybody in the world in wealth and power, And I amassed in my own treasure-house the money due to my king. When sleep overcame me I lay upon the bed that was for my […]...
19. The Prisoner of Zenda At the end a “The Prisoner of Zenda,” The King being out of danger, Stewart Granger (As Rudolph Rassendyll) Must swallow a bitter pill By renouncing his co-star, Deborah Kerr. It would be poor behavia In him and in Princess Flavia Were they to put their own Concerns before those of the Throne. Deborah Kerr […]...
20. On A Political Prisoner She that but little patience knew, From childhood on, had now so much A grey gull lost its fear and flew Down to her cell and there alit, And there endured her fingers’ touch And from her fingers ate its bit. Did she in touching that lone wing Recall the years before her mind Became […]...
21. Arabian Nights When the call of the hudud, Echoes through the palm fronds Carrying in their mists, Visions, memories: Caravans of high spirited steads, Crisscrossing the endless seas of sand, Rushing through the oasis, Free, yet under control. Of women washing in the hot springs, Sheltered in the evergreen palms, Weaving baskets, Cooking, sewing, scampering after the […]...
22. We May Roam Through This World We may roam through this world, like a child at a feast, Who but sips of a sweet, and then flies to the rest; And, when pleasure begins to grow dull in the east, We may order our wings and be off to the west: But if hearts that feel, and eyes that smile, Are […]...
23. Cosmopolitan Greetings To Struga Festival Golden Wreath Laureates & International Bards 1986 Stand up against governments, against God. Stay irresponsible. Say only what we know & imagine. Absolutes are coercion. Change is absolute. Ordinary mind includes eternal perceptions. Observe what’s vivid. Notice what you notice. Catch yourself thinking. Vividness is self-selecting. If we don’t show anyone, we’re […]...
24. Dream Song 7: 'The Prisoner of Shark Island' with Paul Muni Henry is old, old; for Henry remembers Mr Deeds’ tuba, & the Cameo, & the race in Ben Hur, —The Lost World, with sound, & The Man from Blankey’s, which he did not dig, Nor did he understand one caption of, Bewildered Henry, while the Big Ones laughed. Now Henry is unmistakably a Big One. […]...
25. A Marine Etching A yacht from its harbour ropes pulled free, And leaped like a steed o’er the race track blue, Then up behind her, the dust of the sea, A gray fog, drifted, and hid her from view....
26. The Little Park Planted The little park planted in memory of a boy Who fell in the war begins To resemble him As he was twenty eight years ago. Year by year they look more alike. His old parents come almost daily To sit on a bench And look at him. And every night the memory in the garden […]...
27. That Day you came Such special sweetness was about That day God sent you here, I knew the lavender was out, And it was mid of year. Their common way the great winds blew, The ships sailed out to sea; Yet ere that day was spent I knew Mine own had come to me. As after song some snatch […]...
28. 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 […]...
29. Epilogue UNDER THE BLESSING OF YOUR PSYCHE WINGS Though I have found you llke a snow-drop pale, On sunny days have found you weak and still, Though I have often held your girlish head Drooped on my shoulder, faint from little ill:- Under the blessing of your Psyche-wings I hide to-night like one small broken bird, […]...
30. Ignorance Strange to know nothing, never to be sure Of what is true or right or real, But forced to qualify or so I feel, Or Well, it does seem so: Someone must know. Strange to be ignorant of the way things work: Their skill at finding what they need, Their sense of shape, and punctual […]...
31. The Epic Stars The heroic stars spending themselves, Coining their very flesh into bullets for the lost battle, They must burn out at length like used candles; And Mother Night will weep in her triumph, taking home her heroes. There is the stuff for an epic poem This magnificent raid at the heart of darkness, this lost battle […]...
32. A Memory YOU remember, dear, together Two children, you and I, Sat once in the autumn weather, Watching the autumn sky. There was some one round us straying The whole of the long day through, Who seemed to say, “I am playing At hide and seek with you.” And one thing after another Was whispered out of […]...
33. Spires of the fireweed Spires of the fireweed on the fretted sky – Tints of magenta on tranquility, Do you feel nurture for the life within, The burst of bloom that yields your progeny. Do you have sense of flowering’s fleeting glow, Bearing its part in continuity To charge the seed and rip its casing wall And float its […]...
34. To Death O King of Terrors, whose unbounded Sway All that have Life, must certainly Obey; The King, the Priest, the Prophet, all are Thine, Nor wou’d ev’n God (in Flesh) thy Stroke decline. My Name is on thy Roll, and sure I must Encrease thy gloomy Kingdom in the Dust. My soul at this no Apprehension […]...
35. Acceptance When the spent sun throws up its rays on cloud And goes down burning into the gulf below, No voice in nature is heard to cry aloud At what has happened. Birds, at least must know It is the change to darkness in the sky. Murmuring something quiet in her breast, One bird begins to […]...
36. On your birthday, today On your birthday, today, there is time to reflect On the essence of our intimacy, From a beginning in the spring-tide of youth To an afterward secured in the distant mist, And for what reason and to what end it endures. Each year I feel the consequence, keen With up-welling of sentiment, Where new love […]...
37. My first well Day since many ill My first well Day since many ill I asked to go abroad, And take the Sunshine in my hands, And see the things in Pod A ‘blossom just when I went in To take my Chance with pain Uncertain if myself, or He, Should prove the strongest One. The Summer deepened, while we strove She […]...
38. The Three Fishers 1 Three fishers went sailing away to the west, 2 Away to the west as the sun went down; 3 Each thought on the woman who loved him the best, 4 And the children stood watching them out of the town; 5 For men must work, and women must weep, 6 And there’s little to […]...
39. That odd old man is dead a year That odd old man is dead a year We miss his stated Hat. ‘Twas such an evening bright and stiff His faded lamp went out. Who miss his antiquated Wick Are any hoar for him? Waits any indurated mate His wrinkled coming Home? Oh Life, begun in fluent Blood And consummated dull! Achievement contemplating thee […]...
40. Death of the Bird For every bird there is this last migration; Once more the cooling year kindles her heart; With a warm passage to the summer station Love pricks the course in lights across the chart. Year after year a speck on the map, divided By a whole hemisphere, summons her to come; Season after season, sure and […]...