Then And Now

Related poetry:

1. The Mocking-Bird In mirth he mocks the other birds at noon, Catching the lilt of every easy tune; But when the day departs he sings of love, His own wild song beneath the listening moon....
2. There Is a Solemn Wind Tonight There is a solemn wind to-night That sings of solemn rain; The trees that have been quiet so long Flutter and start again. The slender trees, the heavy trees, The fruit trees laden and proud, Lift up their branches to the wind That cries to them so loud. The little bushes and the plants Bow […]...
3. A Golden Day The subtle beauty of this day Hangs o’er me like a fairy spell, And care and grief have flown away, And every breeze sings, “all is well.” I ask, “Holds earth or sin, or woe?” My heart replies, “I do not know.” Nay! all we know, or feel, my heart, Today is joy undimmed, complete; […]...
4. The Apple Orchard Come let us watch the sun go down And walk in twilight through the orchard’s green. Does it not seem as if we had for long Collected, saved and harbored within us Old memories? To find releases and seek New hopes, remembering half-forgotten joys, Mingled with darkness coming from within, As we randomly voice our […]...
5. The Sound of the Trees I wonder about the trees. Why do we wish to bear Forever the noise of these More than another noise So close to our dwelling place? We suffer them by the day Till we lose all measure of pace, And fixity in our joys, And acquire a listening air. They are that that talks of […]...
6. The Harvest Of The Sea The earth grows white with harvest; all day long The sickles gleam, until the darkness weaves Her web of silence o’er the thankful song Of reapers bringing home the golden sheaves. The wave tops whiten on the sea fields drear, And men go forth at haggard dawn to reap; But ever ‘mid the gleaners’ song […]...
7. Democracy It’s coming through a hole in the air, from those nights in Tiananmen Square. It’s coming from the feel that it ain’t exactly real, or it’s real, but it ain’t exactly there. From the wars against disorder, from the sirens night and day, from the fires of the homeless, from the ashes of the gay: […]...
8. Piano Softly, in the dusk, a woman is singing to me; Taking me back down the vista of years, till I see A child sitting under the piano, in the boom of the tingling strings And pressing the small, poised feet of a mother who smiles as she sings. In spite of myself, the insidious mastery […]...
9. Sonnet VI: How Many Paltry Things How many paltry, foolish, painted things, That now is coaches trouble every street, Shall be forgotten, whom no Poet sings, Ere they be well wrapt in their winding-sheet. Where I to thee eternity shall give, When nothing else remaineth of these days, And Queens hereafter shall be glad to live Upon the alms of thy […]...
10. I know why the caged bird sings A free bird leaps on the back Of the wind and floats downstream Till the current ends and dips his wing In the orange suns rays And dares to claim the sky. But a BIRD that stalks down his narrow cage Can seldom see through his bars of rage His wings are clipped and his […]...
11. How Many Paltry Foolish Painted Things How many paltry foolish painted things, That now in coaches trouble every street, Shall be forgotten, whom no poet sings, Ere they be well wrapped in their winding-sheet! Where I to thee eternity shall give, When nothing else remaineth of these days, And queens hereafter shall be glad to live Upon the alms of thy […]...
12. Stanley Kunitz I used to imagine him Coming from his house, like Merlin Strolling with important gestures Through the garden Where everything grows so thickly, Where birds sing, little snakes lie On the boughs, thinking of nothing But their own good lives, Where petals float upward, Their colors exploding, And trees open their moist Pages of thunder […]...
13. Harlem Shadows I hear the halting footsteps of a lass In Negro Harlem when the night lets fall Its veil. I see the shapes of girls who pass To bend and barter at desire’s call. Ah, little dark girls who in slippered feet Go prowling through the night from street to street! Through the long night until […]...
14. The Broken Tryst That day a fire was in my blood; I could have sung: joy wrapt me round; The men I met seemed all so good, I scarcely knew I trod the ground. How easy seemed all toil! I laughed To think that once I hated it. The sunlight thrilled like wine, I quaffed Delight, divine and […]...
15. Spring Carol WHEN loud by landside streamlets gush, And clear in the greenwood quires the thrush, With sun on the meadows And songs in the shadows Comes again to me The gift of the tongues of the lea, The gift of the tongues of meadows. Straightway my olden heart returns And dances with the dancing burns; It […]...
16. Come, Rest Awhile Come, rest awhile, and let us idly stray In glimmering valleys, cool and far away. Come from the greedy mart, the troubled street, And listen to the music, faint and sweet, That echoes ever to a listening ear, Unheard by those who will not pause to hear­ The wayward chimes of memory’s pensive bells, Wind-blown […]...
17. Idler's Song I sit in the twilight dim At the close of an idle day, And I list to the soft sweet hymn, That rises far away, And dies on the evening air. Oh, all day long, They sing their song, Who toil in the valley there. But never a song sing I, Sitting with folded hands, […]...
18. Song Of The Spirit Too sweet and too subtle for pen or for tongue In phrases unwritten and measures unsung, As deep and as strange as the sounds of the sea, Is the song that my spirit is singing to me. In the midnight and tempest when forest trees shiver, In the roar of the surf, and the rush […]...
19. Winter in the Country Sweet life! how lovely to be here And feel the soft sea-laden breeze Strike my flushed face, the spruce’s fair Free limbs to see, the lesser trees’ Bare hands to touch, the sparrow’s cheep To heed, and watch his nimble flight Above the short brown grass asleep. Love glorious in his friendly might, Music that […]...
20. Where edges are She is effulgent in the dark halls of town. She is listening but they are hearing. Her skin is blistering and sharp with sparks. She is listening for the crick of grass underfoot. They are hearing her heavy paces. She is straining to feel the hum of the air. They are hearing her voice wailing […]...
21. The Prince's Progress (excerpt) “Too late for love, too late for joy, Too late, too late! You loitered on the road too long, You trifled at the gate: The enchanted dove upon her branch Died without a mate. The enchanted princess in her tower Slept, died, behind the grate; Her heart was starving all this while You made it […]...
22. Main Street (For S. M. L.) I like to look at the blossomy track of the moon upon the sea, But it isn’t half so fine a sight as Main Street used to be When it all was covered over with a couple of feet of snow, And over the crisp and radiant road the ringing sleighs […]...
23. Perished I called to the summer sun, “Come over the hills to-day! Unlock the rivers, and tell them to run, And kiss the snow-drifts and melt them away.” And the sun came over – a tardy lover – And unlocked the river, and told it to glide, And kissed the snow-drift till it fainted and died. […]...
24. A Song before Sailing Wind of the dead men’s feet, Blow down the empty street Of this old city by the sea With news for me! Blow me beyond the grime And pestilence of time! I am too sick at heart to war With failure any more. Thy chill is in my bones; The moonlight on the stones Is […]...
25. My Heart, When First The Black-Bird Sings MY heart, when first the blackbird sings, My heart drinks in the song: Cool pleasure fills my bosom through And spreads each nerve along. My bosom eddies quietly, My heart is stirred and cool As when a wind-moved briar sweeps A stone into a pool But unto thee, when thee I meet, My pulses thicken […]...
26. Slumber Songs I Sleep, little eyes That brim with childish tears amid thy play, Be comforted! No grief of night can weigh Against the joys that throng thy coming day. Sleep, little heart! There is no place in Slumberland for tears: Life soon enough will bring its chilling fears And sorrows that will dim the after years. […]...
27. Bride Song From ‘The Prince’s Progress’ TOO late for love, too late for joy, Too late, too late! You loiter’d on the road too long, You trifled at the gate: The enchanted dove upon her branch Died without a mate; The enchanted princess in her tower Slept, died, behind the grate; Her heart was starving all this […]...
28. Companions Leave not your bough, my slender song-bird sweet, But pipe me now your roundelay complete. Come, gentle breeze, and tarrying on your way, Whisper my trees what you have seen to-day. Stand, golden cloud, until my song be done, (For he’s too proud) before the face of the sun. So one did sing, and the […]...
29. If Dear love, if you and I could sail away, With snowy pennons to the wind unfurled, Across the waters of some unknown bay, And find some island far from all the world; If we could dwell there, ever more alone, While unrecorded years slip by apace, Forgetting and forgotten and unknown By aught save native […]...
30. The South Wind Say So IF the oriole calls like last year When the south wind sings in the oats, If the leaves climb and climb on a bean pole Saying over a song learnt from the south wind, If the crickets send up the same old lessons Found when the south wind keeps on coming, We will get by, […]...
31. In the Street Where the needle-woman toils Through the night with hand and brain, Till the sickly daylight shudders like a spectre at the pain – Till her eyes seem to crawl, And her brain seems to creep – And her limbs are all a-tremble for the want of rest and sleep! It is there the fire-brand blazes […]...
32. A Song I had wanted a quiet testament And I had wanted, among other things, A song. That was to be Of a like monotony. (A grace Simply. Very very quiet. A murmur of some lost Thrush, though I have never seen one. Which was you then. Sitting And so, at peace, so very much now this […]...
33. London in July What ails my senses thus to cheat? What is it ails the place, That all the people in the street Should wear one woman’s face? The London trees are dusty-brown Beneath the summer sky; My love, she dwells in London town, Nor leaves it in July. O various and intricate maze, Wide waste of square […]...
34. In Hardwood Groves The same leaves over and over again! They fall from giving shade above To make one texture of faded brown And fit the earth like a leather glove. Before the leaves can mount again To fill the trees with another shade, They must go down past things coming up. They must go down into the […]...
35. Our Mother Pocahontas (Note: – Pocahontas is buried at Gravesend, England.) “Pocahontas’ body, lovely as a poplar, sweet as a red haw in November or a pawpaw in May – did she wonder? does she remember – in the dust – in the cool tombs?” CARL SANDBURG. I Powhatan was conqueror, Powhatan was emperor. He was akin to […]...
36. Broken-face Gargoyles ALL I can give you is broken-face gargoyles. It is too early to sing and dance at funerals, Though I can whisper to you I am looking for an undertaker humming a lullaby and throwing his feet in a swift and mystic buck-and-wing, now you see it and now you don’t. Fish to swim a […]...
37. Teatro Bambino. Dublin, N. H How still it is! Sunshine itself here Falls In quiet shafts of light through the high trees Which, arching, make a roof above the walls Changing from sun to shadow as each breeze Lingers a moment, charmed by the strange sight Of an Italian theatre, storied, seer Of vague romance, and time’s long history; Where […]...
38. Lost Shepherd Ah me! How hard is destiny! If we could only know. . . . I bought my son from Sicily A score of years ago; I haled him from our sunny vale To streets of din and squalor, And left it to professors pale To make of him a scholar. Had he remained a peasant […]...
39. Introductory Verses Oh, you who read some song that I have sung – What know you of the soul from whence it sprung? Dost dream the poet ever speaks aloud His secret thought unto the listening crowd? Go take the murmuring sea-shell from the shore- You have its shape, its colour – and no more. It tells […]...
40. The Light By The Barn The light by the barn that shines all night Pales at dawn when a little breeze comes. A little breeze comes breathing the fields From their sleep and waking the slow windmill. The slow windmill sings the long day About anguish and loss to the chickens at work. The little breeze follows the slow windmill […]...