Starling

Related poetry:

1. The Starling “‘I can’t get Out’, said the starling.” Sterne’s ‘Sentimental Journey’. Forever the impenetrable wall Of self confines my poor rebellious soul, I never see the towering white clouds roll Before a sturdy wind, save through the small Barred window of my jail. I live a thrall With all my outer life a clipped, square hole, […]...
2. Lying in me Lying in me, as though it were a white Stone in the depths of a well, is one Memory that I cannot, will not, fight: It is happiness, and it is pain. Anyone looking straight into my eyes Could not help seeing it, and could not fail To become thoughtful, more sad and quiet Than […]...
3. Mercian Hymns XVII He drove at evening through the hushed Vosges. The car radio, Glimmering, received broken utterance from the horizon of storms… ‘God’s honours – our bikes touched: he skidded and came off.’ ‘Liar.’ A Timid father’s protective bellow. Disfigurement of a village king. ‘Just Look at the bugger…’ His maroon GT chanted then overtook. He lavished […]...
4. Whats The Use Of A Title? They dont make it The beautiful die in flame – Sucide pills, rat poison, rope what – Ever… They rip their arms off, Throw themselves out of windows, They pull their eyes out of the sockets, Reject love Reject hate Reject, reject. They do’nt make it The beautiful can’t endure, They are butterflies They are […]...
5. Detachment As I go forth from fair to mart With racket ringing, Who would divine that in my heart Mad larks are singing. As I sweet sympathy express, Lest I should pain them, The money-mongers cannot guess How I disdain them. As I sit at some silly tea And flirt and flatter How I abhor society […]...
6. A Passing Bell Mournfully to and fro, to and fro the trees are waving; What did you say, my dear? The rain-bruised leaves are suddenly shaken, as a child Asleep still shakes in the clutch of a sob – Yes, my love, I hear. One lonely bell, one only, the storm-tossed afternoon is braving, Why not let it […]...
7. The Headliner And The Breadliner Moko, the Educated Ape is here, The pet of vaudeville, so the posters say, And every night the gaping people pay To see him in his panoply appear; To see him pad his paunch with dainty cheer, Puff his perfecto, swill champagne, and sway Just like a gentleman, yet all in play, Then bow himself […]...
8. "Truth," said a traveller “Truth,” said a traveller, “Is a rock, a mighty fortress; Often have I been to it, Even to its highest tower, From whence the world looks black.” “Truth,” said a traveller, “Is a breath, a wind, A shadow, a phantom; Long have I pursued it, But never have I touched The hem of its garment.” […]...
9. A reader's de profundis in my reading of the moment i have learned The figure next to christ in da vinci’s last supper (a painting i have actually seen in a milan church Fragilely restored) is a woman – an honour earned By mary magdalene who (according to research) Turns out to be christ’s wife – hang on what […]...
10. Little Birds Little Birds are dining Warily and well, Hid in mossy cell: Hid, I say, by waiters Gorgeous in their gaiters – I’ve a Tale to tell. Little Birds are feeding Justices with jam, Rich in frizzled ham: Rich, I say, in oysters Haunting shady cloisters – That is what I am. Little Birds are teaching […]...
11. The Mole Said he: “I’ll dive deep in the Past, And write a book of direful days When summer skies were overcast With smoke of humble hearths ablaze; When War was rampant in the land, And poor folk cowered in the night, While ruin gaped on every hand – Of ravishing and wrath I’ll write.” Ten years […]...
12. Le Gout du Néant Morne esprit, autrefois amoureux de la lutte, L’Espoir, dont l’éperon attisait ton ardeur, Ne veut plus t’enfourcher! Couche-toi sans pudeur, Vieux cheval dont le pied à chaque obstacle bute. Résigne-toi, mon coeur; dors ton sommeil de brute. Esprit vaincu, fourbu! Pour toi, vieux maraudeur, L’amour n’a plus de gout, non plus que la dispute; Adieu […]...
13. 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 […]...
14. 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 […]...
15. TO WILLIAM E. CHANNING The pages of thy book I read, And as I closed each one, My heart, responding, ever said, “Servant of God! well done!” Well done! Thy words are great and bold; At times they seem to me, Like Luther’s, in the days of old, Half-battles for the free. Go on, until this land revokes The […]...
16. Sonnet 17: Who will believe my verse in time to come Who will believe my verse in time to come If it were filled with your most high deserts? Though yet heaven knows it is but as a tomb Which hides your life, and shows not half your parts: If I could write the beauty of your eyes, And in fresh numbers number all your graces, […]...
17. Cotton Song Come, brother, come. Lets lift it; Come now, hewit! roll away! Shackles fall upon the Judgment Day But lets not wait for it. God’s body’s got a soul, Bodies like to roll the soul, Cant blame God if we dont roll, Come, brother, roll, roll! Cotton bales are the fleecy way, Weary sinner’s bare feet […]...
18. However grown up six…six…why only yesterday It seems that fist shot out That one eye winked…and yet Now that this day’s arrived It really is as if six years Have blinked – and you’ve sprung Through a thousand instant snaps Into this boy whose tongue Can’t help but say thought not thinked Who’s no longer to be fed […]...
19. Some Like Poetry Write it. Write. In ordinary ink On ordinary paper: they were given no food, They all died of hunger. “All. How many? It’s a big meadow. How much grass For each one?” Write: I don’t know. History counts its skeletons in round numbers. A thousand and one remains a thousand, As though the one had […]...
20. On the Way LITTLE one, you have been buzzing in the books, Flittering in the newspapers and drinking beer with Lawyers And amid the educated men of the clubs you have been Getting an earful of speech from trained tongues. Take an earful from me once, go with me on a hike Along sand stretches on the great […]...
21. Recompense Straight through my heart this fact to-day, By Truth’s own hand is driven: God never takes one thing away, But something else is given. I did not know in earlier years, This law of love and kindness; I only mourned through bitter tears My loss, in sorrow’s blindness. But, ever following each regret O’er some […]...
22. The Spring And The Fall In the spring of the year, in the spring of the year, I walked the road beside my dear. The trees were black where the bark was wet. I see them yet, in the spring of the year. He broke me a bough of the blossoming peach That was out of the way and hard […]...
23. Filling Station Oh, but it is dirty! this little filling station, Oil-soaked, oil-permeated To a disturbing, over-all Black translucency. Be careful with that match! Father wears a dirty, Oil-soaked monkey suit That cuts him under the arms, And several quick and saucy And greasy sons assist him (it’s a family filling station), All quite thoroughly dirty. Do […]...
24. It Is March It is March and black dust falls out of the books Soon I will be gone The tall spirit who lodged here has Left already On the avenues the colorless thread lies under Old prices When you look back there is always the past Even when it has vanished But when you look forward With […]...
25. Against the ladling of doom crisis has a fact to get straight It needn’t be the end of the world Beginnings too are coated with death Because we’ve had enough of the old’s Dirty jokes doesn’t mean there’s no More grass ready to push itself up Or dreams can’t go on being lived The dreamers’ necks having been twisted (visions […]...
26. Winter in Durnover Field Scene. A wide stretch of fallow ground recently sown with wheat, and Frozen to iron hardness. Three large birds walking about thereon, And wistfully eyeing the surface. Wind keen from north-east: sky a Dull grey. (Triolet) Rook. Throughout the field I find no grain; The cruel frost encrusts the cornland! Starling. Aye: patient pecking now […]...
27. The Spirit Medium Poetry, music, I have loved, and yet Because of those new dead That come into my soul and escape Confusion of the bed, Or those begotten or unbegotten Perning in a band, I bend my body to the spade Or grope with a dirty hand. Or those begotten or unbegotten, For I would not recall […]...
28. A Song of the English Fair is our lot O goodly is our heritage! (Humble ye, my people, and be fearful in your mirth!) For the Lord our God Most High He hath made the deep as dry, He hath smote for us a pathway to the ends of all the Earth! Yea, though we sinned and our rulers went […]...
29. Rowing A story, a story! (Let it go. Let it come.) I was stamped out like a Plymouth fender Into this world. First came the crib With its glacial bars. Then dolls And the devotion to their plactic mouths. Then there was school, The little straight rows of chairs, Blotting my name over and over, But […]...
30. You Felons on Trial in Courts YOU felons on trial in courts; You convicts in prison-cells-you sentenced assassins, chain’d and hand-cuff’d with iron; Who am I, too, that I am not on trial, or in prison? Me, ruthless and devilish as any, that my wrists are not chain’d with iron, or my ankles with iron? You prostitutes flaunting over the trottoirs, […]...
31. My Bear I never killed a bear because I always thought them critters was So kindo’ cute; Though round my shack they often came, I’d raise my rifle and take aim, But couldn’t shoot. Yet there was one full six-feet tall Who came each night and gobbled all The grub in sight; On my pet garden truck […]...
32. Lollingdon Downs VIII THE Kings go by with jewled crowns; Their horses gleam, their banners shake, their spears are many. The sack of many-peopled towns Is all their dream: The way they take Leaves but a ruin in the brake, And, in the furrow that the plowmen make, A stampless penny, a tale, a dream. The Merchants reckon […]...
33. Infirmities Because my teeth are feebly few I cannot bolt my grub like you, But have to chew and chew and chew As you can see; Yet every mouthful seems so good I would not haste it if I could, And so I salivate my food With ecstasy. Because my purse is poor in pence I […]...
34. The time has come for us to become madmen in your chain The time has come for us to become madmen in your chain, to Burst our bonds and become estranged from all; To yield up our souls, no more to bear the disgrace of such a Soul, to set fire to our house, and run like fire to the tavern. Until we ferment, we shall not […]...
35. Boon Soul Behold! I’m old; my hair is white; My eighty years are in the offing, And sitting by the fire to-night I sip a grog to ease my coughing. It’s true I’m raucous as a rook, But feeling bibulously “bardy,” These lines I’m scribbling in a book: The verse complete of Thomas Hardy. Although to-day he’s […]...
36. To May I have no heart to write verses to May; I have no heart-yet I’m cheerful today; I have no heart-she has won mine away So-I have no heart to write verses to May....
37. Why Do Birds Sing? Let poets piece prismatic words, Give me the jewelled joy of birds! What ecstasy moves them to sing? Is it the lyric glee of Spring, The dewy rapture of the rose? Is it the worship born in those Who are of Nature’s self a part, The adoration of the heart? Is it the mating mood […]...
38. This dirty little Heart This dirty little Heart Is freely mine. I won it with a Bun A Freckled shrine But eligibly fair To him who sees The Visage of the Soul And not the knees....
39. A Week Later A week later, I said to a friend: I don’t Think I could ever write about it. Maybe in a year I could write something. There is something in me maybe someday To be written; now it is folded, and folded, And folded, like a note in school. And in my dream Someone was playing […]...
40. Jealousy When I see you, who were so wise and cool, Gazing with silly sickness on that fool You’ve given your love to, your adoring hands Touch his so intimately that each understands, I know, most hidden things; and when I know Your holiest dreams yield to the stupid bow Of his red lips, and that […]...