The Explosion

Related poetry:

1. The Great Explosion The universe expands and contracts like a great heart. It is expanding, the farthest nebulae Rush with the speed of light into empty space. It will contract, the immense navies of stars and galaxies, dust clouds and nebulae Are recalled home, they crush against each other in one harbor, they stick in one lump And […]...
2. The Wildy Ones The sheep are in the silver wood, The cows are in the broom; The goats are in the wild mountain And won’t be home by noon. My mother sang that olden tune Most every night, And to her newest she would croon By candle light; While cuddling in the velvet gloom I’d dream of cows […]...
3. Santa Decca The Gods are dead: no longer do we bring To grey-eyed Pallas crowns of olive-leaves! Demeter’s child no more hath tithe of sheaves, And in the noon the careless shepherds sing, For Pan is dead, and all the wantoning By secret glade and devious haunt is o’er: Young Hylas seeks the water-springs no more; Great […]...
4. The Red Blaze is the Morning The Red Blaze is the Morning The Violet is Noon The Yellow Day is falling And after that is none But Miles of Sparks at Evening Reveal the Width that burned The Territory Argent that Never yet consumed...
5. The Mountains stood in Haze The Mountains stood in Haze The Valleys stopped below And went or waited as they liked The River and the Sky. At leisure was the Sun His interests of Fire A little from remark withdrawn The Twilight spoke the Spire, So soft upon the Scene The Act of evening fell We felt how neighborly a […]...
6. My Favoured Fare Some poets sing of scenery; Some to fair maids make sonnets sweet. A fig for love and greenery, Be mine a song of things to eat. Let brother bards divinely dream, I’m just plain human, as you see; And choose to carol such a theme As ham and eggs and tea. Just two fried eggs […]...
7. Snow SNOW took us away from the smoke valleys into white mountains, we saw velvet blue cows eating a vermillion grass and they gave us a pink milk. Snow changes our bones into fog streamers caught by the wind and spelled into many dances. Six bits for a sniff of snow in the old days bought […]...
8. They Buy With an Eye to Looks THE FINE cloth of your love might be a fabric of Egypt, Something Sinbad, the sailor, took away from robbers, Something a traveler with plenty of money might pick up And bring home and stick on the walls and say: “There’s a little thing made a hit with me When I was in Cairo-I think […]...
9. The Sun kept setting setting still The Sun kept setting setting still No Hue of Afternoon Upon the Village I perceived From House to House ’twas Noon The Dusk kept dropping dropping still No Dew upon the Grass But only on my Forehead stopped And wandered in my Face My Feet kept drowsing drowsing still My fingers were awake Yet why […]...
10. The Little Black Boy My mother bore me in the southern wild, And I am black, but O! my soul is white. White as an angel is the English child: But I am black as if bereav’d of light. My mother taught me underneath a tree And sitting down before the heat of day. She took me on her […]...
11. The Whale The Whale is found in seas and oceans, Indulging there in fishlike motions, But Science shows that Whales are mammals, Like Jersey cows, and goats, and camels. When undisturbed, the Whale will browse Like camels, goats, and Jersey cows, On food that satisfies its tongue, Thus making milk to feed its young. Asking no costly […]...
12. Toledo Three widows of the Middle West We’re grimly chewing gum; The Lido chef a quail had dressed With garlic and with rum, And they were painfully oppressed For they had eaten some. Said One: “This famed El Greco guy Gives me the blessed pip; Them Saints look like they want to die – Let’s give […]...
13. Palladiums IN the newspaper office-who are the spooks? Who wears the mythic coat invisible? Who pussyfoots from desk to desk with a speaking forefinger? Who gumshoes amid the copy paper with a whispering thumb? Speak softly-the sacred cows may hear. Speak easy-the sacred cows must be fed....
14. Noon I bend to the ground To catch Something whispered, Urgent, drifting Across the ditches. The heaviness of Flies stuttering In orbit, dirt Ripening, the sweat Of eggs. There are Small streams The width ofa thumb Running in the villages Of sheaves, whole Eras of grain Wakening on The stalks, a roof That breathes over My […]...
15. What shall I do when the Summer troubles What shall I do when the Summer troubles What, when the Rose is ripe What when the Eggs fly off in Music From the Maple Keep? What shall I do when the Skies a’chirrup Drop a Tune on me When the Bee hangs all Noon in the Buttercup What will become of me? Oh, when […]...
16. The Hangman at Home WHAT does the hangman think about When he goes home at night from work? When he sits down with his wife and Children for a cup of coffee and a Plate of ham and eggs, do they ask Him if it was a good day’s work And everything went well or do they Stay off […]...
17. Heat O wind, rend open the heat, Cut apart the heat, Rend it to tatters. Fruit cannot drop Through this thick air Fruit cannot fall into heat That presses up and blunts The points of pears And rounds the grapes. Cut the heat Plough through it, Turning it on either side Of your path....
18. The "happy isles" of horace Oh, come with me to the Happy Isles In the golden haze off yonder, Where the song of the sun-kissed breeze beguiles, And the ocean loves to wander. Fragrant the vines that mantle those hills, Proudly the fig rejoices; Merrily dance the virgin rills, Blending their myriad voices. Our herds shall fear no evil there, […]...
19. It was not Death, for I stood up It was not Death, for I stood up, And all the Dead, lie down It was not Night, for all the Bells Put out their Tongues, for Noon. It was not Frost, for on my Flesh I felt Siroccos crawl Nor Fire for just my Marble feet Could keep a Chancel, cool And yet, it […]...
20. If I Could But Forget If I could but forget The fullness of those first sweet days, When you burst sun-like thro’ the haze Of unacquaintance, on my sight, And made the wet, gray day seem bright While clouds themselves grew fair to see. And since, no day is gray or wet But all the scene comes back to me, […]...
21. Unlyric Love Song It is time to give that-of-myself which I could not at first: To offer you now at last my least and my worst: Minor, absurd preserves, The shell’s end-curves, A document kept at the back of a drawer, A tin hidden under the floor, Recalcitrant prides and hesitations: To pile them carefully in a desparate […]...
22. The Drover's Sweetheart An hour before the sun goes down Behind the ragged boughs, I go across the little run And bring the dusty cows; And once I used to sit and rest Beneath the fading dome, For there was one that I loved best Who’d bring the cattle home. Our yard is fixed with double bails, Round […]...
23. The Warrior He wrought in poverty, the dull grey days, But with the night his little lamp-lit room Was bright with battle flame, or through a haze Of smoke that stung his eyes he heard the boom Of Bluecher’s guns; he shared Almeida’s scars, And from the close-packed deck, about to die, Looked up and saw the […]...
24. The Moon of Other Days Beneath the deep veranda’s shade, When bats begin to fly, I sit me down and watch alas! Another evening die. Blood-red behind the sere ferash She rises through the haze. Sainted Diana! can that be The Moon of Other Days? Ah! shade of little Kitty Smith, Sweet Saint of Kensington! Say, was it ever thus […]...
25. Stretcher Case He woke; the clank and racket of the train Kept time with angry throbbings in his brain. Then for a while he lapsed and drowsed again. At last he lifted his bewildered eyes And blinked, and rolled them sidelong; hills and skies, Heavily wooded, hot with August haze, And, slipping backward, golden for his gaze, […]...
26. What care the Dead, for Chanticleer What care the Dead, for Chanticleer What care the Dead for Day? ‘Tis late your Sunrise vex their face And Purple Ribaldry of Morning Pour as blank on them As on the Tier of Wall The Mason builded, yesterday, And equally as cool What care the Dead for Summer? The Solstice had no Sun Could […]...
27. Henry King The Chief Defect of Henry King Was chewing little bits of String. At last he swallowed some which tied Itself in ugly Knots inside. Physicians of the Utmost Fame Were called at once; but when they came They answered, as they took their Fees, “There is no Cure for this Disease. “Henry will very soon […]...
28. May 24, 1980 I have braved, for want of wild beasts, steel cages, Carved my term and nickname on bunks and rafters, Lived by the sea, flashed aces in an oasis, Dined with the-devil-knows-whom, in tails, on truffles. From the height of a glacier I beheld half a world, the earthly width. Twice have drowned, thrice let knives […]...
29. The Identification So you think its Stephen? Then I’d best make sure Be on the safe side as it were. Ah, theres been a mistake. The hair You see, its black, now Stephens fair… Whats that? The explosion? Of course, burnt black. Silly of me. I should have known. Then lets get on. The face, is that […]...
30. First Sight Lambs that learn to walk in snow When their bleating clouds the air Meet a vast unwelcome, know Nothing but a sunless glare. Newly stumbling to and fro All they find, outside the fold, Is a wretched width of cold. As they wait beside the ewe, Her fleeces wetly caked, there lies Hidden round them, […]...
31. A Clock stopped A Clock stopped Not the Mantel’s Geneva’s farthest skill Can’t put the puppet bowing That just now dangled still An awe came on the Trinket! The Figures hunched, with pain Then quivered out of Decimals Into Degreeless Noon It will not stir for Doctors This Pendulum of snow This Shopman importunes it While cool concernless […]...
32. A Noon Song There are songs for the morning and songs for the night, For sunrise and sunset, the stars and the moon; But who will give praise to the fulness of light, And sing us a song of the glory of noon? Oh, the high noon, the clear noon, The noon with golden crest; When the blue […]...
33. Flanders FLANDERS, the name of a place, a country of people, Spells itself with letters, is written in books. “Where is Flanders?” was asked one time, Flanders known only to those who lived there And milked cows and made cheese and spoke the home language. “Where is Flanders?” was asked. And the slang adepts shot the […]...
34. Friendship After Love After the fierce midsummer all ablaze Has burned itself to ashes, and expires In the intensity of its own fires, There come the mellow, mild, St. Martin days Crowned with the calm of peace, but sad with haze. So after Love has led us, till he tires Of his own throes, and torments, and desires, […]...
35. The Free-Selector's Daughter I met her on the Lachlan Side A darling girl I thought her, And ere I left I swore I’d win The free-selector’s daughter. I milked her father’s cows a month, I brought the wood and water, I mended all the broken fence, Before I won the daughter. I listened to her father’s yarns, I […]...
36. In a Disused Graveyard The living come with grassy tread To read the gravestones on the hill; The graveyard draws the living still, But never anymore the dead. The verses in it say and say: “The ones who living come today To read the stones and go away Tomorrow dead will come to stay.” So sure of death the […]...
37. Going Back to School The boat ploughed on. Now Alcatraz was past And all the grey waves flamed to red again At the dead sun’s last glimmer. Far and vast The Sausalito lights burned suddenly In little dots and clumps, as if a pen Had scrawled vague lines of gold across the hills; The sky was like a cup […]...
38. The Tortoise In Keystone Heights When I knew, it was raining. Winter in decline. I was tired. You in your soaked shirt diffused Into the western sky bulging with clouds, Speeding cars a few feet away- Why would they not slow down? Though afternoon, a slip of moon Busied itself with rising, And it had to mean something. If only […]...
39. At leisure is the Soul At leisure is the Soul That gets a Staggering Blow The Width of Life before it spreads Without a thing to do It begs you give it Work But just the placing Pins Or humblest Patchwork Children do To Help its Vacant Hands...
40. Hamlet Off-Stage: The Magnolia Closet “Let the words of my mouth and the meditations Of my heart be acceptable in Thy sight.” Whoever “Thy” is, that’s the prayer to breathe, Words that chimed in my head while I stood under The first magnolia blossom of the year, Gift of God? Elvis? Allah? or Liberace? Who provides the rococo razzledazzle? What’s […]...