Leda

Related poetry:

1. Leda And The Swan A sudden blow: the great wings beating still Above the staggering girl, her thighs caressed By the dark webs, her nape caught in his bill, He holds her helpless breast upon his breast. How can those terrified vague fingers push The feathered glory from her loosening thighs? And how can body, laid in that white […]...
2. The Summer Day Who made the world? Who made the swan, and the black bear? Who made the grasshopper? This grasshopper, I mean The one who has flung herself out of the grass, The one who is eating sugar out of my hand, Who is moving her jaws back and forth instead of up and down Who is […]...
3. Madonna Mia A lily-girl, not made for this world’s pain, With brown, soft hair close braided by her ears, And longing eyes half veiled by slumberous tears Like bluest water seen through mists of rain: Pale cheeks whereon no love hath left its stain, Red underlip drawn in for fear of love, And white throat, whiter than […]...
4. Love The Wild Swan “I hate my verses, every line, every word. Oh pale and brittle pencils ever to try One grass-blade’s curve, or the throat of one bird That clings to twig, ruffled against white sky. Oh cracked and twilight mirrors ever to catch One color, one glinting Flash, of the splendor of things. Unlucky hunter, Oh bullets […]...
5. The Gulls I Soft is the sky in the mist-kirtled east, Light is abroad on the sea, All of the heaven with silver is fleeced, Holding the sunrise in fee. Lo! with a flash and uplifting of wings Down where the long ripples break, Cometh a bevy of glad-hearted things, ‘Tis morn, for the gulls are awake. […]...
6. Sonnet (1928) I am in need of music that would flow Over my fretful, feeling finger-tips, Over my bitter-tainted, trembling lips, With melody, deep, clear, and liquid-slow. Oh, for the healing swaying, old and low, Of some song sung to rest the tired dead, A song to fall like water on my head, And over quivering limbs, […]...
7. Have You Seen But A Bright Lily Grow Have you seen but a bright lily grow Before rude hands have touched it? Have you marked but the fall of snow Before the soil hath smutched it? Have you felt the wool of beaver, Or swan’s down ever? Or have smelt o’ the bud o’ the brier, Or the nard in the fire? Or […]...
8. Indian Dancer EYES ravished with rapture, celestially panting, what passionate bosoms aflaming with fire Drink deep of the hush of the hyacinth heavens that glimmer around them in fountains of light; O wild and entrancing the strain of keen music that cleaveth the stars like a wail of desire, And beautiful dancers with houri-like faces bewitch the […]...
9. Lines Written by the Side of a River FLOW soft RIVER, gently stray, Still a silent waving tide O’er thy glitt’ring carpet glide, While I chaunt my ROUNDELAY, As I gather from thy bank, Shelter’d by the poplar dank, King-cups, deck’d in golden pride, Harebells sweet, and daisies pied; While beneath the evening sky, Soft the western breezes fly. Gentle RIVER, should’st thou […]...
10. Endymion The rising moon has hid the stars; Her level rays, like golden bars, Lie on the landscape green, With shadows brown between. And silver white the river gleams, As if Diana, in her dreams, Had dropt her silver bow Upon the meadows low. On such a tranquil night as this, She woke Endymion with a […]...
11. The Black Swan When the swans turned my sister into a swan I would go to the lake, at night, from milking: The sun would look out through the reeds like a swan, A swan’s red beak; and the beak would open And inside there was darkness, the stars and the moon. Out on the lake, a girl […]...
12. An Opera House Within the gold square of the proscenium arch, A curtain of orange velvet hangs in stiff folds, Its tassels jarring slightly when someone crosses the stage behind. Gold carving edges the balconies, Rims the boxes, Runs up and down fluted pillars. Little knife-stabs of gold Shine out whenever a box door is opened. Gold clusters […]...
13. Lily-Bell and Thistledown Song II Thistledown in prison sings: Bright shines the summer sun, Soft is the summer air; Gayly the wood-birds sing, Flowers are blooming fair. But, deep in the dark, cold rock, Sadly I dwell, Longing for thee, dear friend, Lily-Bell! Lily-Bell! Lily-Bell replies: Through sunlight and summer air I have sought for thee long, Guided by birds […]...
14. Lilies I have been thinking About living Like the lilies That blow in the fields. They rise and fall In the edge of the wind, And have no shelter From the tongues of the cattle, And have no closets or cupboards, And have no legs. Still I would like to be As wonderful As the old […]...
15. The Winds of Angus THE GREY road whereupon we trod became as holy ground: The eve was all one voice that breathed its message with no sound: And burning multitudes pour through my heart, too bright, too blind, Too swift and hurried in their flight to leave their tale behind. Twin gates unto that living world, dark honey-coloured eyes, […]...
16. The Triumph SEE the Chariot at hand here of Love, Wherein my Lady rideth! Each that draws is a swan or a dove, And well the car Love guideth. As she goes, all hearts do duty Unto her beauty; And enamour’d do wish, so they might But enjoy such a sight, That they still were to run […]...
17. THE LILY IN A CRYSTAL You have beheld a smiling rose When virgins’ hands have drawn O’er it a cobweb-lawn: And here, you see, this lily shows, Tomb’d in a crystal stone, More fair in this transparent case Than when it grew alone, And had but single grace. You see how cream but naked is, Nor dances in the eye […]...
18. A Celebration of Charis: IV. Her Triumph See the chariot at hand here of Love, Wherein my lady rideth! Each that draws is a swan or a dove, And well the car Love guideth. As she goes, all hearts do duty Unto her beauty; And enamour’d, do wish, so they might But enjoy such a sight, That they still were to run […]...
19. A Journey Through The Moonlight In sleep when an old man’s body is no longer Aware of his boundaries, and lies flattened by Gravity like a mere of wax in its bed. . . It drips Down to the floor and moves there like a tear down a Cheek. . . Under the back door into the silver meadow, Like […]...
20. Magdalen Walks The little white clouds are racing over the sky, And the fields are strewn with the gold of the flower of March, The daffodil breaks under foot, and the tasselled larch Sways and swings as the thrush goes hurrying by. A delicate odour is borne on the wings of the morning Breeze, The odour of […]...
21. Sonnet 16 – And yet, because thou overcomest so And yet, because thou overcomest so, Because thou art more noble and like a king, Thou canst prevail against my fears and fling Thy purple round me, till my heart shall grow Too close against thine heart henceforth to know How it shook when alone. Why, conquering May prove as lordly and complete a thing […]...
22. Butterfly Butterfly, the wind blows sea-ward, strong beyond the garden-wall! Butterfly, why do you settle on my shoe, and sip the dirt on my shoe, Lifting your veined wings, lifting them? big white butterfly! Already it is October, and the wind blows strong to the sea From the hills where snow must have fallen, the wind […]...
23. Japanese lullaby Sleep, little pigeon, and fold your wings, Little blue pigeon with velvet eyes; Sleep to the singing of mother-bird swinging Swinging the nest where her little one lies. Away out yonder I see a star, Silvery star with a tinkling song; To the soft dew falling I hear it calling Calling and tinkling the night […]...
24. ENDYMION (For music) The apple trees are hung with gold, And birds are loud in Arcady, The sheep lie bleating in the fold, The wild goat runs across the wold, But yesterday his love he told, I know he will come back to me. O rising moon! O Lady moon! Be you my lover’s sentinel, You cannot choose […]...
25. Shiva There is a hawk that is picking the birds out of our sky, She killed the pigeons of peace and security, She has taken honesty and confidence from nations and men, She is hunting the lonely heron of liberty. She loads the arts with nonsense, she is very cunning Science with dreams and the state […]...
26. Dawlish Bird-watching colonels on the old sea wall, Down here at Dawlish where the slow trains crawl: Low tide lifting, on a shingle shore, Long-sunk islands from the sea once more: Red cliffs rising where the wet sands run, Gulls reflecting in the sharp spring sun; Pink-washed plaster by a sheltered patch, Ilex shadows upon velvet […]...
27. Letter S THE RIVER is gold under a sunset of Illinois. It is a molten gold someone pours and changes. A woman mixing a wedding cake of butter and eggs Knows what the sunset is pouring on the river here. The river twists in a letter S. A gold S now speaks to the Illinois sky....
28. Holidays The holiest of all holidays are those Kept by ourselves in silence and apart; The secret anniversaries of the heart, When the full river of feeling overflows; The happy days unclouded to their close; The sudden joys that out of darkness start As flames from ashes; swift desires that dart Like swallows singing down each […]...
29. Two Lovers Two lovers by a moss-grown spring: They leaned soft cheeks together there, Mingled the dark and sunny hair, And heard the wooing thrushes sing. O budding time! O love’s blest prime! Two wedded from the portal stept: The bells made happy carolings, The air was soft as fanning wings, White petals on the pathway slept. […]...
30. My Boy Jack 1914-18 Have you news of my boy Jack?” Not this tide. “When d’you think that he’ll come back?” Not with this wind blowing, and this tide. “Has any one else had word of him?: “ Not this tide. For what is sunk will hardly swim, Not with this wind blowing, and this tide. “Oh, dear, […]...
31. The Lute And The Lyre Deep desire, that pierces heart and spirit to the root, Finds reluctant voice in verse that yearns like soaring fire, Takes exultant voice when music holds in high pursuit Deep desire. Keen as burns the passion of the rose whose buds respire, Strong as grows the yearning of the blossom toward the fruit, Sounds the […]...
32. Goldwing Moth A GOLDWING moth is between the scissors and the ink bottle on the desk. Last night it flew hundreds of circles around a glass bulb and a flame wire. The wings are a soft gold; it is the gold of illuminated initials in manuscripts of the medieval monks....
33. Athanasia To that gaunt House of Art which lacks for naught Of all the great things men have saved from Time, The withered body of a girl was brought Dead ere the world’s glad youth had touched its prime, And seen by lonely Arabs lying hid In the dim womb of some black pyramid. But when […]...
34. On The Garden Wall Oh, once I walked a garden In dreams. ‘Twas yellow grass. And many orange-trees grew there In sand as white as glass. The curving, wide wall-border Was marble, like the snow. I walked that wall a fairy-prince And, pacing quaint and slow, Beside me were my pages, Two giant, friendly birds. Half swan they were, […]...
35. The Fairy Bridal-Hymn [This is the hymn to Eleanor, daughter of Mab and a golden drone, sung by the Locust choir when the fairy child marries her God, the yellow rose] This is a song to the white-armed one Cold in the breast as the frost-wrapped Spring, Whose feet are slow on the hills of life, Whose round […]...
36. The river at whitebrook the winding wye Curls into my senses Feliniously There’s no such word But no such river Merely exists Where this river slivers Between the dream And the time i camped by it Has left a furmark On my inward skin It takes only a wet thought For hunchbacked woods And a drift of mist Lifting […]...
37. Aeolian Harp O pale green sea, With long, pale, purple clouds above – What lies in me like weight of love? What dies in me With utter grief, because there comes no sign Through the sun-raying West, or the dim sea-line? O salted air, Blown round the rocky headland still, What calls me there from cove and […]...
38. The Lake Isle Of Innisfree I will arise and go now, and go to Innisfree, And a small cabin build there, of clay and wattles made: Nine bean-rows will I have there, a hive for the honey-bee, And live alone in the bee-loud glade. And I shall have some peace there, for peace comes dropping slow, Dropping from the veils […]...
39. The Awakening River The gulls are mad-in-love with the river, And the river unveils her face and smiles. In her sleep-brooding eyes they mirror their shining wings. She lies on silver pillows: the sun leans over her. He warms and warms her, he kisses and kisses her. There are sparks in her hair and she stirs in laughter. […]...
40. Transition Too long and quickly have I lived to vow The woe that stretches me shall never wane, Too often seen the end of endless pain To swear that peace no more shall cool my brow. I know, I know – again the shriveled bough Will burgeon sweetly in the gentle rain, And these hard lands […]...