Natural therapy
the great thing about the tall white daisy
Is that it knows how to laugh at itself
Some flowers for all their rich displays
Won’t preen themselves without a primness
In their sap – nor let their stalks abide
Bending this way that way in the thick wind
The large daisy is happy to be slapdash
Is not snooty about the company it keeps
It does have a flair for being noticed
It’s the way it lets its petals out (ragged
And not wanting everyone the same)
That appeals to nervous garden sufferers
(weary with pretending flowers per se are
God’s gift to the dull earth and somehow
The human race is privileged to be there)
The daisy knows everything there is to know
About not taking yourself too seriously – about
Relaxation and how to be naturally yogic
How to be part of the rough common stock
Yet have a whiff of the immortal about you
A patch of such daisies growing artlessly
Contains the dreams of all good health
Related poetry:
- Natural Theology Primitive I ate my fill of a whale that died And stranded after a month at sea. . . . There is a pain in my inside. Why have the Gods afflicted me? Ow! I am purged till I am a wraith! Wow! I am sick till I cannot see! What is the sense of […]...
- Now I sit here on the 2nd floor Hunched over in yellow Pajamas Still pretending to be A writer. Some damned gall, At 71, My brain cells eaten Away by Life. Rows of books Behind me, I scratch my thinning Hair And search for the Word. For decades now I have infuriated the Ladies, The critics, […]...
- Juvenilia, An Ode to Natural Beauty There is a power whose inspiration fills Nature’s fair fabric, sun – and star-inwrought, Like airy dew ere any drop distils, Like perfume in the laden flower, like aught Unseen which interfused throughout the whole Becomes its quickening pulse and principle and soul. Now when, the drift of old desire renewing, Warm tides flow northward […]...
- Were natural mortal lady Were natural mortal lady Who had so little time To pack her trunk and order The great exchange of clime How rapid, how momentous What exigencies were But nature will be ready And have an hour to spare. To make some trifle fairer That was too fair before Enchanting by remaining, And by departure more....
- Wreath the Bowl Wreath the bowl With flowers of soul, The brightest Wit can find us, We’ll take a flight Towards heaven to-night, And leave dull earth behind us. Should Love amid The wreaths be hid That Joy, the enchanter, brings us, No danger fear, While wine is near We’ll drown him if he stings us. Then, wreath […]...
- Cacoethes Scribendi If all the trees in all the woods were men; And each and every blade of grass a pen; If every leaf on every shrub and tree Turned to a sheet of foolscap; every sea Were changed to ink, and all earth’s living tribes Had nothing else to do but act as scribes, And for […]...
- Caliban upon Setebos or, Natural Theology in the Island “Thou thoughtest that I was altogether such a one as thyself.” (David, Psalms 50.21) [‘Will sprawl, now that the heat of day is best, Flat on his belly in the pit’s much mire, With elbows wide, fists clenched to prop his chin. And, while he kicks both feet in the cool slush, And feels about […]...
- If it had no pencil If it had no pencil Would it try mine Worn now and dull sweet, Writing much to thee. If it had no word, Would it make the Daisy, Most as big as I was, When it plucked me?...
- Women’s Rights You cannot rob us of the rights we cherish, Nor turn our thoughts away From the bright picture of a “Woman’s Mission” Our hearts portray. We claim to dwell, in quiet and seclusion, Beneath the household roof, From the great world’s harsh strife, and jarring voices, To stand aloof; Not in a dreamy and inane […]...
- Natural Music The old voice of the ocean, the bird-chatter of little rivers, (Winter has given them gold for silver To stain their water and bladed green for brown to line their banks) >From different throats intone one language. So I believe if we were strong enough to listen without Divisions of desire and terror To the […]...
- Something Childish, But Very Natural If I had but two little wings And were a little feathery bird, To you I’d fly, my dear! But thoughts like these are idle things, And I stay here. But in my sleep to you I fly: I’m always with you in my sleep! The world is all one’s own. But then one wakes, […]...
- Natural Magic WE air tired who follow after Phantasy and truth that flies: You with only look and laughter Stain our hearts with richest dyes. When you break upon our study Vanish all our frosty cares; As the diamond deep grows ruddy, Filled with morning unawares. With the stuff that dreams are made of But an empty […]...
- Of a Woman, Dead Young If she had been beautiful, even, Or wiser than women about her, Or had moved with a certain defiance; If she had had sons at her sides, And she with her hands on their shoulders, Sons, to make troubled the Gods- But where was there wonder in her? What had she, better or eviler, Whose […]...
- Sunset at Night is natural Sunset at Night is natural But Sunset on the Dawn Reverses Nature Master So Midnight’s due at Noon. Eclipses be predicted And Science bows them in But do one face us suddenly Jehovah’s Watch is wrong....
- 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 […]...
- 373. Song-The Slave's Lament IT was in sweet Senegal that my foes did me enthral, For the lands of Virginia,-ginia, O: Torn from that lovely shore, and must never see it more; And alas! I am weary, weary O: Torn from that lovely shore, and must never see it more; And alas! I am weary, weary O. All on […]...
- June Light Your voice, with clear location of June days, Called me outside the window. You were there, Light yet composed, as in the just soft stare Of uncontested summer all things raise Plainly their seeming into seamless air. Then your love looked as simple and entire As that picked pear you tossed me, and your face […]...
- Dithyramb Believe me, together The bright gods come ever, Still as of old; Scarce see I Bacchus, the giver of joy, Than comes up fair Eros, the laugh-loving boy, And Phoebus, the stately, behold! They come near and nearer, The heavenly ones all The gods with their presence Fill earth as their hall! Say, how shall […]...
- Conqueror I was a gulp of high air – A bird breathing in, A black dot on blue paper, A privileged recipient Of finite sacrament Of souls of flying saints. That all happened the moment You taught me splendid roundness As defined by the touch of your lips. The other mysteries fell, one by one, Cities […]...
- With All Thy Gifts WITH all thy gifts, America, (Standing secure, rapidly tending, overlooking the world,) Power, wealth, extent, vouchsafed to thee-With these, and like of these, vouchsafed to thee, What if one gift thou lackest? (the ultimate human problem never solving;) The gift of Perfect Women fit for thee-What of that gift of gifts thou lackest? The towering […]...
- Partnership Yes, you have it; I can see. Beautiful?… Dear, look at me! Look and let my shame confess Triumph after weariness. Beautiful? Ah, yes. Lift it where the beams are bright; Hold it where the western light, Shining in above my bed, Throws a glory on your head. Now it is all said. All there […]...
- Daybreak In Alabama When I get to be a composer I’m gonna write me some music about Daybreak in Alabama And I’m gonna put the purtiest songs in it Rising out of the ground like a swamp mist And falling out of heaven like soft dew. I’m gonna put some tall tall trees in it And the scent […]...
- A Child of the Snows There is heard a hymn when the panes are dim, And never before or again, When the nights are strong with a darkness long, And the dark is alive with rain. Never we know but in sleet and in snow, The place where the great fires are, That the midst of the earth is a […]...
- The Argument Of His Book I sing of brooks, of blossoms, birds, and bowers, Of April, May, of June, and July-flowers. I sing of May-poles, hock-carts, wassails, wakes, Of bridegrooms, brides, and of their bridal-cakes. I write of youth, of love, and have access By these to sing of cleanly wantonness. I sing of dews, of rains, and piece by […]...
- Enslaved Oh when I think of my long-suffering race, For weary centuries despised, oppressed, Enslaved and lynched, denied a human place In the great life line of the Christian West; And in the Black Land disinherited, Robbed in the ancient country of its birth, My heart grows sick with hate, becomes as lead, For this my […]...
- Lover's Gifts II: Come to My Garden Walk Come to my garden walk, my love. Pass by the fervid flowers that Press themselves on your sight. Pass them by, stopping at some Chance joy, which like a sudden wonder of sunset illumines, yet Elude. For lover’s gift is shy, it never tells its name, it flits Across the shade, spreading a shiver of […]...
- In Black Despair In grayish doubt and black despair, I drafted hymns to the earth and the air, Pretending to joy, although I lacked it. The age had made lament redundant. So here’s the question who can answer it Was he a brave man or a hypocrite?...
- Doctors They work with herbs And penicillin They work with gentleness And the scalpel. They dig out the cancer, Close an incision And say a prayer To the poverty of the skin. They are not Gods Though they would like to be; They are only a human Trying to fix up a human. Many humans die. […]...
- Relativity I looked down on a daisied lawn To where a host of tiny eyes Of snow and gold from velvet shone And made me think of starry skies. I looked up to the vasty night Where stars were very small indeed, And in their galaxy of light They made me think of daised mead. I […]...
- As We Are So Wonderfully Done With Each Other As we are so wonderfully done with each other We can walk into our separate sleep On floors of music where the milkwhite cloak of childhood Lies Oh my love, my golden lark, my soft long doll Your lips have splashed my dull house with print of flowers My hands are crooked where they spilled […]...
- Double Red Daisies Double red daisies, they’re my flowers, Which nobody else may grow. In a big quarrelsome house like ours They try it sometimes-but no, I root them up because they’re my flowers, Which nobody else may grow. Claire has a tea-rose, but she didn’t plant it; Ben has an iris, but I don’t want it. Daisies, […]...
- To James Whitcomb Riley On his “Book of Joyous Children” Yours is a garden of old-fashioned flowers; Joyous children delight to play there; Weary men find rest in its bowers, Watching the lingering light of day there. Old-time tunes and young love’s laughter Ripple and run among the roses; Memory’s echoes, murmuring after, Fill the dusk when the long […]...
- Psalm 82 God the supreme Governor; or, Magistrates warned. Among th’ assemblies of the great A greater Ruler takes his seat; The God of heav’n, as Judge, surveys Those gods on earth, and all their ways. Why will ye, then, frame wicked laws? Or why support th’ unrighteous cause? When will ye once defend the poor, That […]...
- If It Is True What the Prophets Write If it is true, what the Prophets write, That the heathen gods are all stocks and stones, Shall we, for the sake of being polite, Feed them with the juice of our marrow-bones? And if Bezaleel and Aholiab drew What the finger of God pointed to their view, Shall we suffer the Roman and Grecian […]...
- Hellas THE world’s great age begins anew, The golden years return, The earth doth like a snake renew Her winter weeds outworn; Heaven smiles, and faiths and empires gleam Like wrecks of a dissolving dream. A brighter Hellas rears its mountains From waves serener far; A new Peneus rolls his fountains Against the morning star; Where […]...
- An Hymn To Humanity (To S. P. G. Esp) O! for this dark terrestrial ball Forsakes his azure-paved hall A prince of heav’nly birth! Divine Humanity behold, What wonders rise, what charms unfold At his descent to earth! II. The bosoms of the great and good With wonder and delight he view’d, And fix’d his empire there: Him, close compressing to his breast, The […]...
- Amy Margaret's Five Year Old Amy Margaret’s five years old, Amy Margaret’s hair is gold, Dearer twenty-thousand-fold Than gold, is Amy Margaret. “Amy” is friend, is “Margaret” The pearl for crown or carkanet? Or peeping daisy, summer’s pet? Which are you, Amy Margaret? A friend, a daisy, and a pearl, A kindly, simple, precious girl, Such, howsoe’er the world may […]...
- The Castle of Mains Ancient Castle of the Mains, With your romantic scenery and surrounding plains, Which seem most beautiful to the eye, And the little rivulet running by, Which the weary traveller can drink of when he feels dry. And the heaven’s breath smells sweetly there, And scented perfumes fill the air, Emanating from the green trees and […]...
- A Poetry Reading At West Point I read to the entire plebe class, In two batches. Twice the hall filled With bodies dressed alike, each toting A copy of my book. What would my Shrink say, if I had one, about Such a dream, if it were a dream? Question and answer time. “Sir,” a cadet yelled from the balcony, And […]...
- Stylised tulips stylised tulips – this is what the card says And they have that nineteen-twenties’ feel Of those bright young things a decade before us Who had a way of walking with their legs Bent back and their pelvis forward as if Inviting a kind of sexual depravity With the no touch signs fervently displayed Stylised […]...