Life

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1. Tools for life Has life ever dumped you in a heap? Perhaps you’ve found self belief so strongly Reinforcing that doubt never enters it, Nor divorces you from your own reality. While I admire conviction I see it an Affliction of the blessed, sign of the righteously Possessed and indeed, a decent place to serve A sentence for […]...
2. Love In A Life I Room after room, I hunt the house through We inhabit together. Heart, fear nothing, for, heart, thou shalt find her, Next time, herself!-not the trouble behind her Left in the curtain, the couch’s perfume! As she brushed it, the cornice-wreath blossomed anew,- Yon looking-glass gleamed at the wave of her feather. II Yet the […]...
3. Hanging Fire I am fourteen And my skin has betrayed me The boy I cannot live without Still sucks his tumb In secret How come my knees are Always so ashy What if I die Before the morning comes And momma’s in the bedroom With the door closed. I have to learn how to dance In time […]...
4. The room you know how it is with the room The door is frequently locked As i pass a white sigh Is pushed out from under As i bend to retrieve it The wood quivers with a woman’s breath There is a ruffle of crying Through the keyhole i am able To glimpse a red dress Clawing […]...
5. Lesson In Grammar THE SENTENCE Perhaps I can make it plain by analogy. Imagine a machine, not yet assembled, Each part being quite necessary To the functioning of the whole: if the job is fumbled And a vital piece mislaid The machine is quite valueless, The workers will not be paid. It is just the same when constructing […]...
6. No Lilies For Lisette Said the Door: “She came in With no shadow of sin; Turned the key in the lock, Slipped out of her frock, The robe she liked best When for supper she dressed. Then a letter she tore. . . What a wan look she wore!” Said the Door. Said the Chair: “She sat down With […]...
7. Madam Life's a Piece in Bloom Madam Life’s a piece in bloom Death goes dogging everywhere: She’s the tenant of the room, He’s the ruffian on the stair. You shall see her as a friend, You shall bilk him once or twice; But he’ll trap you in the end, And he’ll stick you for her price. With his kneebones at your […]...
8. My life closed twice before its close My life closed twice before its close It yet remains to see If Immortality unveil A third event to me So huge, so hopeless to conceive As these that twice befell. Parting is all we know of heaven, And all we need of hell....
9. Words Be careful of words, Even the miraculous ones. For the miraculous we do our best, Sometimes they swarm like insects And leave not a sting but a kiss. They can be as good as fingers. They can be as trusty as the rock You stick your bottom on. But they can be both daisies and […]...
10. Of Three Or Four In The Room Out of three or four in the room One is always standing at the window. Forced to see the injustice amongst the thorns, The fires on the hills. And people who left whole Are brought home in the evening, like small change. Out of three or four in the room One is always standing at […]...
11. This Life Which Seems So Fair This Life, which seems so fair, Is like a bubble blown up in the air By sporting children’s breath, Who chase it everywhere And strive who can most motion it bequeath. And though it sometimes seem of its own might Like to an eye of gold to be fixed there, And firm to hover in […]...
12. Going to Him! Happy letter! Going to Him! Happy letter! Tell Him Tell Him the page I didn’t write Tell Him I only said the Syntax And left the Verb and the pronoun out Tell Him just how the fingers hurried Then how they waded slow slow And then you wished you had eyes in your pages So you could […]...
13. The Guardian Angel Of The Private Life All this was written on the next day’s list. On which the busyness unfurled its cursive roots, Pale but effective, And the long stem of the necessary, the sum of events, Built-up its tiniest cathedral… (Or is it the sum of what takes place? ) If I lean down, to whisper, to them, Down into […]...
14. The Dark House Where a faint light shines alone, Dwells a Demon I have known. Most of you had better say “The Dark House,” and go your way. Do not wonder if I stay. For I know the Demon’s eyes And their lure that never dies. Banish all your fond alarms, For I know the foiling charms Of […]...
15. The Room Of My Life Here, In the room of my life The objects keep changing. Ashtrays to cry into, The suffering brother of the wood walls, The forty-eight keys of the typewriter Each an eyeball that is never shut, The books, each a contestant in a beauty contest, The black chair, a dog coffin made of Naugahyde, The sockets […]...
16. As You Go Through Life Don’t look for the flaws as you go through life; And even when you find them, It is wise and kind to be somewhat blind And look for the virtue behind them. For the cloudiest night has a hint of light Somewhere in its shadows hiding; It is better by far to hunt for a […]...
17. Confetti In The Wind He wrote a letter in his mind To answer one a maid had sent; He sought the fitting word to find, As on by hill and rill he went. By bluebell wood and hawthorn lane, The cadence sweet and silken phrase He incubated in his brain For days and days. He wrote his letter on […]...
18. The Overland Mail (Foot-Service to the Hills) In the name of the Empress of India, make way, O Lords of the Jungle, wherever you roam. The woods are astir at the close of the day We exiles are waiting for letters from Home. Let the robber retreat let the tiger turn tail In the Name of the Empress, […]...
19. Life Is A Privilege Life is a privilege. Its youthful days Shine with the radiance of continuous Mays. To live, to breathe, to wonder and desire, To feed with dreams the heart’s perpetual fire, To thrill with virtuous passions, and to glow With great ambitions – in one hour to know The depths and heights of feeling – God! […]...
20. Breton Wife A Wintertide we had been wed When Jan went off to sea; And now the laurel rose is red And I wait on the quay. His berthing boat I watch with dread, For where, oh where is he? “Weep not, brave lass,” the Skipper said; “Return to you he will; In hospital he lies abed […]...
21. An Invitation Holding with shaking hands a letter from some Official – high up he says in the Ministry, I note that I am invited to Birmingham, There pedagogues to address for a decent fee. ‘We like to meet,’ he goes on, ‘men eminent In the field of letters each year,’ and that’s well put, Though I […]...
22. The Life Beyond He wakes, who never thought to wake again, Who held the end was Death. He opens eyes Slowly, to one long livid oozing plain Closed down by the strange eyeless heavens. He lies; And waits; and once in timeless sick surmise Through the dead air heaves up an unknown hand, Like a dry branch. No […]...
23. Life All in the dark we grope along, And if we go amiss We learn at least which path is wrong, And there is gain in this. We do not always win the race, By only running right, We have to tread the mountain’s base Before we reach its height. The Christs alone no errors made; […]...
24. Coffee Sometimes life is merely a matter of coffee and whatever intimacy a cup of coffee Affords. I once read something about coffee. The thing said that coffee is good for you; It stimulates all the organs. I thought at first this was a strange way to put it, and not altogether pleasant, but As time […]...
25. To the Muse Resign the rhapsody, the dream, To men of larger reach; Be ours the quest of a plain theme, The piety of speech. As monkish scribes from morning break Toiled till the close of light, Nor thought a day too long to make One line or letter bright: We also with an ardent mind, Time, wealth, […]...
26. PULLED FROM A LIFE SOME LEAVES Pulled from a life some leaves in evergreen Or dressed like fragrant crinoline draped Over shadows by di Chirico, stolen From a station where trains never run And set up in a tableau in the parsonage at Haworth The three sisters with Chekovian overtones Stood round the table where their mirrored forms Await the blast […]...
27. MOUNTAIN LIFE IN summer dusk the valley lies With far-flung shadow veil; A cloud-sea laps the precipice Before the evening gale: The welter of the cloud-waves grey Cuts off from keenest sight The glacier, looking out by day O’er all the district, far away, And crowned with golden light. But o’er the smouldering cloud-wrack’s flow, Where gold […]...
28. The Way I read a Letter's this The Way I read a Letter’s this ‘Tis first I lock the Door And push it with my fingers next For transport it be sure And then I go the furthest off To counteract a knock Then draw my little Letter forth And slowly pick the lock Then glancing narrow, at the Wall And narrow […]...
29. I felt my life with both my hands I felt my life with both my hands To see if it was there I held my spirit to the Glass, To prove it possibler I turned my Being round and round And paused at every pound To ask the Owner’s name For doubt, that I should know the Sound I judged my features jarred […]...
30. The house where I was born (05) In the same dream I am lying in the hollow of a boat, My forehead and eyes against the curved planks Where I can hear the undercurrents Striking the bottom of the boat. All at once, the prow rises up, And I think that we’ve come to the estuary, But I keep my eyes against […]...
31. Wednesday Gray rainwater lay on the grass in the late afternoon. The carp lay on the bottom, resting, while dusk took shape In the form of the first stirrings of his hunger, And the trees, shorter and heavier, breathed heavily upward. Into this sodden, nourishing afternoon I emerged, Partway toward a paycheck, halfway toward the weekend, […]...
32. Sepulchre O blessed body! Whither are thou thrown? No lodging for thee, but a cold hard stone? So many hearts on earth, and yet not one Receive thee? Sure there is room within our hearts’ good store; For they can lodge transgressions by the score: Thousands of toys dwell there, yet out of door They leave […]...
33. The Silent Lover i PASSIONS are liken’d best to floods and streams: The shallow murmur, but the deep are dumb; So, when affection yields discourse, it seems The bottom is but shallow whence they come. They that are rich in words, in words discover That they are poor in that which makes a lover....
34. Death And Life ‘Twas in the grave-yard’s gruesome gloom That May and I were mated; We sneaked inside and on a tomb Our love was consummated. It’s quite all right, no doubt we’ll wed, Our sin will go unchidden. . . Ah! sweeter than the nuptial bed Are ecstasies forbidden. And as I held my sweetheart close, And […]...
35. Stars Ah! why, because the dazzling sun Restored our Earth to joy, Have you departed, every one, And left a desert sky? All through the night, your glorious eyes Were gazing down in mine, And, with a full heart’s thankful sighs, I blessed that watch divine. I was at peace, and drank your beams As they […]...
36. LIFE IS THE BODY'S LIGHT Life is the body’s light; which, once declining, Those crimson clouds i’ th’ cheeks and lips leave shining:- Those counter-changed tabbies in the air, The sun once set, all of one colour are: So, when death comes, fresh tinctures lose their place, And dismal darkness then doth smutch the face....
37. A Rhyme of Death’s Inn A rhyme of good Death’s inn! My love came to that door; And she had need of many things, The way had been so sore. My love she lifted up her head, “And is there room?” said she; “There was no room in Bethlehem’s inn For Christ who died for me.” But said the keeper […]...
38. The House Of Dust: Part 03: 06: Portrait Of One Dead This is the house. On one side there is darkness, On one side there is light. Into the darkness you may lift your lanterns- O, any number-it will still be night. And here are echoing stairs to lead you downward To long sonorous halls. And here is spring forever at these windows, With roses on […]...
39. The Buried Life Light flows our war of mocking words, and yet, Behold, with tears mine eyes are wet! I feel a nameless sadness o’er me roll. Yes, yes, we know that we can jest, We know, we know that we can smile! But there’s a something in this breast, To which thy light words bring no rest, […]...
40. A COUNTRY LIFE:TO HIS BROTHER, MR THOMAS HERRICK Thrice, and above, blest, my soul’s half, art thou, In thy both last and better vow; Could’st leave the city, for exchange, to see The country’s sweet simplicity; And it to know and practise, with intent To grow the sooner innocent; By studying to know virtue, and to aim More at her nature than her […]...