When Coldness Wraps This Suffering Clay

Related poetry:

1. I would to heaven that I were so much clay I would to heaven that I were so much clay, As I am blood, bone, marrow, passion, feeling – Because at least the past were passed away – And for the future – (but I write this reeling, Having got drunk exceedingly today, So that I seem to stand upon the ceiling) I say – […]...
2. Henry Clay's Mouth Senator, statesman, speaker of the House, Exceptional dancer, slim, Graceful, ugly. Proclaimed, before most, slavery An evil, broker Of elections (burned Jackson For Adams), took a pistol ball in the thigh In a duel, delayed, by forty years, With his compromises, the Civil War, Gambler (“I have always Paid peculiar homage to the fickle goddess”), […]...
3. To John Hamilton Reynolds O that a week could be an age, and we Felt parting and warm meeting every week, Then one poor year a thousand years would be, The flush of welcome ever on the cheek: So could we live long life in little space, So time itself would be annihilate, So a day’s journey in oblivious […]...
4. The Light Wraps You The light wraps you in its mortal flame. Abstracted pale mourner, standing that way Against the old propellers of the twighlight That revolves around you. Speechless, my friend, Alone in the loneliness of this hour of the dead And filled with the lives of fire, Pure heir of the ruined day. A bough of fruit […]...
5. Through the strait pass of suffering Through the strait pass of suffering The Martyrs even trod. Their feet upon Temptations Their faces upon God A stately shriven Company Convulsion playing round Harmless as streaks of Meteor Upon a Planet’s Bond Their faith the everlasting troth Their Expectation fair The Needle to the North Degree Wades so thro’ polar Air!...
6. Clock-O'-Clay In the cowslip pips I lie, Hidden from the buzzing fly, While green grass beneath me lies, Pearled with dew like fishes’ eyes, Here I lie, a clock-o’-clay, Waiting for the time o’ day. While the forest quakes surprise, And the wild wind sobs and sighs, My home rocks as like to fall, On its […]...
7. Psalm 139 part 2 The wonderful formation of man. ‘Twas from thy hand, my God, I came, A work of such a curious frame In me thy fearful wonders shine, And each proclaims thy skill divine. Thine eyes did all my limbs survey, Which yet in dark confusion lay; Thou saw’st the daily growth they took, Formed by the […]...
8. Sonnet XIII: Phoebus Was Judge Phoebus was judge between Jove, Mars, and Love, Of those three gods, whose arms the fairest were: Jove’s golden shield did eagle sables bear, Whose talons held young Ganymede above: But in vert field Mars bare a golden spear, Which through a bleeding heart his point did shove: Each had his crest; Mars carried Venus’ […]...
9. Phantom All look and likeness caught from earth All accident of kin and birth, Had pass’d away. There was no trace Of aught on that illumined face, Uprais’d beneath the rifted stone But of one spirit all her own ; She, she herself, and only she, Shone through her body visibly....
10. A Grey Mood As we hurry away to the end, my friend, Of this sad little farce called existence, We are sure that the future will bring one thing, And that is the grave in the distance. And so when our lives run along all wrong, And nothing seems real or certain, We can comfort ourselves with the […]...
11. Psalm 90 part 1 v.1-5 C. M. Man frail, and God eternal. Our God, our help in ages past, Our hope for years to come, Our shelter from the stormy blast, And our eternal home. Under the shadow of thy throne Thy saints have dwelt secure; Sufficient is thine arm alone, And our defence is sure. Before the hills […]...
12. Loitering with a Vacant Eye Loitering with a vacant eye Along the Grecian gallery, And brooding on my heavy ill, I met a statue standing still. Still in marble stone stood he, And stedfastly he looked at me. “Well met,” I thought the look would say, “We both were fashioned far away; We neither knew, when we were young, These […]...
13. Lover's Gifts XLIII: Dying, You Have Left Behind Dying, you have left behind you the great sadness of the Eternal In my life. You have painted my thought’s horizon with the sunset Colours of your departure, leaving a track of tears across the Earth to love’s heaven. Clasped in your dear arms, life and death United in me in a marriage bond. I […]...
14. Heredity I am the family face; Flesh perishes, I live on, Projecting trait and trace Through time to times anon, And leaping from place to place Over oblivion. The years-heired feature that can In curve and voice and eye Despise the human span Of durance that is I; The eternal thing in man, That heeds no […]...
15. Dram-Shop Ditty I drink my fill of foamy ale I sing a song, I tell a tale, I play the fiddle; My throat is chronically dry, Yet savant of a sort am I, And Life’s my riddle. For look! I raise my arm to drink- A voluntary act, you think (Nay, Sir, you’re grinning)> You’re wrong: this […]...
16. Five A. M Elan that lifts me above the clouds Into pure space, timeless, yea eternal Breath transmuted into words Transmuted back to breath in one hundred two hundred years Nearly Immortal, Sappho’s 26 centuries Of cadenced breathing beyond time, clocks, empires, bodies, cars, Chariots, rocket ships skyscrapers, Nation empires Brass walls, polished marble, Inca Artwork Of the […]...
17. Bond and Free Love has earth to which she clings With hills and circling arms about Wall within wall to shut fear out. But Though has need of no such things, For Thought has a pair of dauntless wings. On snow and sand and turn, I see Where Love has left a printed trace With straining in the […]...
18. Sonnet XXXII If thou survive my well-contented day, When that churl Death my bones with dust shall cover, And shalt by fortune once more re-survey These poor rude lines of thy deceased lover, Compare them with the bettering of the time, And though they be outstripp’d by every pen, Reserve them for my love, not for their […]...
19. Sonnet 32: If thou survive my well-contented day If thou survive my well-contented day When that churl Death my bones with dust shall cover, And shalt by fortune once more re-survey These poor rude lines of thy deceasèd lover, Compare them with the bett’ring of the time, And though they be outstripped by every pen, Reserve them for my love, not for their […]...
20. Heritage Now the dead past seems vividly alive, And in this shining moment I can trace, Down through the vista of the vanished years, Your faun-like form, your fond elusive face. And suddenly some secret spring’s released, And unawares a riddle is revealed, And I can read like large, black-lettered print, What seemed before a thing […]...
21. The Christian Honor and happiness unite To make the Christian’s name a praise; How fair the scene, how clear the light, That fills the remnant of His days! A kingly character He bears, No change His priestly office knows; Unfading is the crown He wears, His joys can never reach a close. Adorn’d with glory from on […]...
22. Lost You left me with the autumn time; When the winter stripped the forest bare, Then dressed it in his spotless rime; When frosts were lurking in the air You left me here and went away. The winds were cold; you could not stay. You sought a warmer clime, until The south wind, artful maid, should […]...
23. Bindle Stiff When I was brash and gallant-gay Just fifty years ago, I hit the ties and beat my way From Maine to Mexico; For though to Glasgow gutter bred A hobo heart had I, And followed where adventure led, Beneath a brazen sky. And as I tramped the railway track I owned a single shirt; Like […]...
24. The Sower Sure of the spring that warms them into birth, The golden seeds thou trustest to the earth; And dost thou doubt the eternal spring sublime, For deeds the seeds which wisdom sows in time....
25. Wealth (For Aline) From what old ballad, or from what rich frame Did you descend to glorify the earth? Was it from Chaucer’s singing book you came? Or did Watteau’s small brushes give you birth? Nothing so exquisite as that slight hand Could Raphael or Leonardo trace. Nor could the poets know in Fairyland The changing […]...
26. For Him I Sing FOR him I sing, (As some perennial tree, out of its roots, the present on the past:) With time and space I him dilate-and fuse the immortal laws, To make himself, by them, the law unto himself....
27. 240. Verses on a Parting Kiss HUMID seal of soft affections, Tenderest pledge of future bliss, Dearest tie of young connections, Love’s first snowdrop, virgin kiss! Speaking silence, dumb confession, Passion’s birth, and infant’s play, Dove-like fondness, chaste concession, Glowing dawn of future day! Sorrowing joy, Adieu’s last action, (Lingering lips must now disjoin), What words can ever speak affection So […]...
28. A Calendar of Sonnets: June O month whose promise and fulfilment blend, And burst in one! it seems the earth can store In all her roomy house no treasure more; Of all her wealth no farthing have to spend On fruit, when once this stintless flowering end. And yet no tiniest flower shall fall before It hath made ready at […]...
29. Archibald Higbie I loathed you, Spoon River. I tried to rise above you, I was ashamed of you. I despised you As the place of my nativity. And there in Rome, among the artists, Speaking Italian, speaking French, I seemed to myself at times to be free Of every trace of my origin. I seemed to be […]...
30. Death And Birth Death and birth should dwell not near together: Wealth keeps house not, even for shame, with dearth: Fate doth ill to link in one brief tether Death and birth. Harsh the yoke that binds them, strange the girth Seems that girds them each with each: yet whether Death be best, who knows, or life on […]...
31. "To Speak of Woe That Is in Marriage&quot “It is the future generation that presses into being by means of these exuberant feelings and supersensible soap bubbles of ours.” Schopenhauer “The hot night makes us keep our bedroom windows open. Our magnolia blossoms. Life begins to happen. My hopped up husband drops his home disputes, And hits the streets to cruise for prostitutes, […]...
32. Divine Detachment One day the Great Designer sought His Clerk of Birth and Death. Said he: “Two souls are in my thought, To whom I gave life-breath. I deemed my work was fitly done, But yester-eve I saw That in the finished brain of one There was a tiny flaw. “It worried me, and I would know, […]...
33. On the Funeral of Charles the First The castle clock had tolled midnight: With mattock and with spade, And silent, by the torches’ light, His corse in earth we laid. The coffin bore his name, that those Of other years might know, When earth its secrets should disclose, Whose bones were laid below. “Peace to the dead” no children sung, Slow pacing […]...
34. It ceased to hurt me, though so slow It ceased to hurt me, though so slow I could not feel the Anguish go But only knew by looking back That something had benumbed the Track Nor when it altered, I could say, For I had worn it, every day, As constant as the Childish frock I hung upon the Peg, at night. But […]...
35. Immortality So I have sunk my roots in earth Since that my pretty boys had birth; And fear no more the grave and gloom, I, with the centuries to come. As the tree blossoms so bloom I, Flinging wild branches to the sky; Renew each year my leafy suit, Strike with the years a deeper root. […]...
36. To Time Time! on whose arbitrary wing The varying hours must flag or fly, Whose tardy winter, fleeting spring, But drag or drive us on to die – Hail thou! who on my birth bestowed Those boons to all that know thee known; Yet better I sustain thy load, For now I bear the weight alone. I […]...
37. Praise for Creation and Providence I sing the mighty power of God, That made the mountains rise, That spread the flowing seas abroad, And built the lofty skies. I sing the wisdom that ordained The sun to rule the day; The moon shines full at God’s command, And all the stars obey. I sing the goodness of the Lord, Who […]...
38. Psalm 90 Man mortal, and God eternal A mournful song at a funeral. Through every age, eternal God, Thou art our rest, our safe abode; High was thy throne ere heav’n was made, Or earth thy humble footstool laid. Long hadst thou reigned ere time began, Or dust was fashioned to a man; And long thy kingdom […]...
39. Momus, God Of Laughter Though with gods the world is cumbered, Gods unnamed, and gods unnumbered, Never god was known to be Who had not his devotee. So I dedicate to mine, Here in verse, my temple-shrine. ‘Tis not Ares, – mighty Mars, Who can give success in wars. ‘Tis not Morpheus, who doth keep Guard above us while […]...
40. Only Dreams A maiden sat in teh sunset glow Of the shadowy, beautiful Long Ago, That we see through a mist of tears. She sat and dreamed, with lips apart, With thoughtful eyes and a beating heart, Of the mystical future years; And brighter far than the sunset skies Was the vision seen by the maiden’s eyes. […]...