388. Extempore on some commemorations of Thomson

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1. 343. Address to the shade of Thomson WHILE virgin Spring by Eden’s flood, Unfolds her tender mantle green, Or pranks the sod in frolic mood, Or tunes Eolian strains between. While Summer, with a matron grace, Retreats to Dryburgh’s cooling shade, Yet oft, delighted, stops to trace The progress of the spiky blade. While Autumn, benefactor kind, By Tweed erects his aged […]...
2. 152. Extempore in the Court of Session LORD ADVOCATEHE clenched his pamphlet in his fist, He quoted and he hinted, Till, in a declamation-mist, His argument he tint it: He gapèd for’t, he grapèd for’t, He fand it was awa, man; But what his common sense came short, He eked out wi’ law, man. MR. ERSKINECollected, Harry stood awee, Then open’d out […]...
3. To The Nile Son of the old Moon-mountains African! Chief of the Pyramid and Crocodile! We call thee fruitful, and that very while A desert fills our seeing’s inward span: Nurse of swart nations since the world began, Art thou so fruitful? or dost thou beguile Such men to honour thee, who, worn with toil, Rest for a […]...
4. After Auschwitz Anger, As black as a hook, Overtakes me. Each day, Each Nazi Took, at 8:00 A. M., a baby And sauteed him for breakfast In his frying pan. And death looks on with a casual eye And picks at the dirt under his fingernail. Man is evil, I say aloud. Man is a flower That […]...
5. On the Religious Memory of Mrs. Catherine Thomson, my Christian Friend, Deceased Dec. 16, 1646 When Faith and Love, which parted from thee never, Had ripened thy just soul to dwell with God, Meekly thou didst resign this earthly load Of death, called life, which us from life doth sever. Thy works, and alms, and all thy good endeavour, Stayed not behind, nor in the grave were trod; But, as […]...
6. Idea XXXVII: Dear, why should you command me to my rest Dear, why should you command me to my rest When now the night doth summon all to sleep? Methinks this time becometh lovers best; Night was ordain’d together friends to keep. How happy are all other living things Which, though the day disjoin by sev’ral flight, The quiet ev’ning yet together brings, And each returns […]...
7. Sonnet XXXVII: Dear, Why Should You Dear, why should you command me to my rest When now the night doth summon all to sleep? Methinks this time becometh lovers best; Night was ordain’d, together friends to keep; How happy are all other living things Which through the day disjoin by sev’ral flight, The quiet ev’ning yet together brings, And each returns […]...
8. Sonnet IV: Unthrifty Loveliness, Why Dost Thou Spend Unthrifty loveliness, why dost thou spend Upon thy self thy beauty’s legacy? Nature’s bequest gives nothing, but doth lend, And being frank she lends to those are free: Then, beauteous niggard, why dost thou abuse The bounteous largess given thee to give? Profitless usurer, why dost thou use So great a sum of sums, yet […]...
9. Call It a Good Marriage Call it a good marriage – For no one ever questioned Her warmth, his masculinity, Their interlocking views; Except one stray graphologist Who frowned in speculation At her h’s and her s’s, His p’s and w’s. Though few would still subscribe To the monogamic axiom That strife below the hip-bones Need not estrange the heart, […]...
10. ON THE MASSACRE OF THE CHRISTIANS IN BULGARIA Christ, dost Thou live indeed? or are Thy bones Still straitened in their rock-hewn sepulchre? And was Thy Rising only dreamed by her Whose love of Thee for all her sin atones? For here the air is horrid with men’s groans, The priests who call upon Thy name are slain, Dost Thou not hear the […]...
11. Sonnet 4: Unthrifty loveliness, why dost thou spend Unthrifty loveliness, why dost thou spend Upon thy self thy beauty’s legacy? Nature’s bequest gives nothing, but doth lend, And being frank she lends to those are free. Then, beauteous niggard why dost thou abuse, The bounteous largess given thee to give? Profitless usurer, why dost thou use So great a sum of sums yet […]...
12. Ribblesdale Earth, sweet Earth, sweet landscape, with leavés throng And louchéd low grass, heaven that dost appeal To, with no tongue to plead, no heart to feel; That canst but only be, but dost that long- Thou canst but be, but that thou well dost; strong Thy plea with him who dealt, nay does now deal, […]...
13. Sonnet 38: How can my Muse want subject to invent How can my Muse want subject to invent While thou dost breathe, that pour’st into my verse Thine own sweet argument, too excellent For every vulgar paper to rehearse? O, give thyself the thanks, if aught in me Worthy perusal stand against thy sight, For who’s so dumb that cannot write to thee, When thou […]...
14. Sonnet IV Unthrifty loveliness, why dost thou spend Upon thyself thy beauty’s legacy? Nature’s bequest gives nothing but doth lend, And being frank she lends to those are free. Then, beauteous niggard, why dost thou abuse The bounteous largess given thee to give? Profitless usurer, why dost thou use So great a sum of sums, yet canst […]...
15. Song What I took in my hand Grew in weight. You must Understand it Was not obscene. Night comes. We sleep. Then if you know what Say it. Don’t pretend. Guises are What enemies wear. You And I live In a prayer. Helpless. Helpless, Should I speak. Would you. What do you think of me. No […]...
16. Sonnet CXXXIV So, now I have confess’d that he is thine, And I myself am mortgaged to thy will, Myself I’ll forfeit, so that other mine Thou wilt restore, to be my comfort still: But thou wilt not, nor he will not be free, For thou art covetous and he is kind; He learn’d but surety-like to […]...
17. Where Thou art that is Home Where Thou art that is Home Cashmere or Calvary the same Degree or Shame I scarce esteem Location’s Name So I may Come What Thou dost is Delight Bondage as Play be sweet Imprisonment Content And Sentence Sacrament Just We two meet Where Thou art not is Woe Tho’ Bands of Spices row What Thou […]...
18. A Villanelle O singer of Persephone! In the dim meadows desolate Dost thou remember Sicily? Still through the ivy flits the bee Where Amaryllis lies in state; O Singer of Persephone! Simaetha calls on Hecate And hears the wild dogs at the gate; Dost thou remember Sicily? Still by the light and laughing sea Poor Polypheme bemoans […]...
19. October Ay, thou art welcome, heaven’s delicious breath! When woods begin to wear the crimson leaf, And suns grow meek, and the meek suns grow brief And the year smiles as it draws near its death. Wind of the sunny south! oh, still delay In the gay woods and in the golden air, Like to a […]...
20. The Bedridden Peasant to an Unknown God Much wonder I here long low-laid – That this dead wall should be Betwixt the Maker and the made, Between Thyself and me! For, say one puts a child to nurse, He eyes it now and then To know if better ’tis, or worse, And if it mourn, and when. But Thou, Lord, giv’st us […]...
21. Sonnet 21 – Say over again, and yet once over again Say over again, and yet once over again, That thou dost love me. Though the word repeated Should seem ‘a cuckoo-song,’ as thou dost treat it, Remember, never to the hill or plain, Valley and wood, without her cuckoo-strain Comes the fresh Spring in all her green completed. Beloved, I, amid the darkness greeted By […]...
22. With Whom is no Variableness, Neither Shadow of Turning It fortifies my soul to know That, though I perish, Truth is so: That, howsoe’er I stray and range, Whate’er I do, Thou dost not change. I steadier step when I recall That, if I slip, Thou dost not fall....
23. 521. Inscription for an Alter of Independence THOU of an independent mind, With soul resolv’d, with soul resign’d; Prepar’d Power’s proudest frown to brave, Who wilt not be, nor have a slave; Virtue alone who dost revere, Thy own reproach alone dost fear- Approach this shrine, and worship here....
24. HIS COVENANT OR PROTESTATION TO JULIA Why dost thou wound and break my heart, As if we should for ever part? Hast thou not heard an oath from me, After a day, or two, or three, I would come back and live with thee? Take, if thou dost distrust that vow, This second protestation now: Upon thy cheek that spangled tear, […]...
25. The Hawk Thou dost not fly, thou art not perched, The air is all around: What is it that can keep thee set, From falling to the ground? The concentration of thy mind Supports thee in the air; As thou dost watch the small young birgs, With such a deadly care. My mind has such a hawk […]...
26. Still own thee still thou art Still own thee still thou art What surgeons call alive Though slipping slipping I perceive To thy reportless Grave Which question shall I clutch What answer wrest from thee Before thou dost exude away In the recallless sea?...
27. Holy Sonnet X: Death Be Not Proud Death, be not proud, though some have callèd thee Mighty and dreadful, for thou art not so; For those whom thou think’st thou dost overthrow Die not, poor death, nor yet canst thou kill me. From rest and sleep, which yet thy pictures be, Much pleasure, then from thee much more, must low And soonest […]...
28. THE MAIDEN SPEAKS How grave thou loookest, loved one! wherefore so? Thy marble image seems a type of thee; Like it, no sign of life thou giv’st to me; Compared with thee, the stone appears to glow. Behind his shield in ambush lurks the foe, The friend’s brow all-unruffled we should see. I seek thee, but thou seek’st […]...
29. If I Should Learn, In Some Quite Casual Way IF I should learn, in some quite casual way, That you were gone, not to return again – Read from the back-page of a paper, say, Held by a neighbor in a subway train, How at the corner of this avenue And such a street (so are the papers filled) A hurrying man-who happened to […]...
30. Sonnet 38 – First time he kissed me, he but only kissed First time he kissed me, he but only kissed The fingers of this hand wherewith I write; And ever since, it grew more clean and white, Slow to world-greetings, quick with its ‘Oh, list,’ When the angels speak. A ring of amethyst I could not wear here, plainer to my sight, Than that first kiss. […]...
31. Tides O patient shore, thou canst not go to meet Thy love, the restless sea, how comfortest Thou all thy loneliness? Art thou at rest, When, loosing his strong arms from round thy feet, He turns away? Know’st thou, however sweet That other shore may be, that to thy breast He must return? And when in […]...
32. 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, […]...
33. Superior Mother, your baby is silly! She is so absurdly childish! She does not know the difference between the lights in the Streets and the stars. When we play at eating with pebbles, she thinks they are real Food, and tries to put them into her mouth. When I open a book before her and ask […]...
34. Theme For English B The instructor said, Go home and write a page tonight. And let that page come out of you Then, it will be true. I wonder if it’s that simple? I am twenty-two, colored, born in Winston-Salem. I went to school there, then Durham, then here To this college on the hill above Harlem. I am […]...
35. Sonnet 142: Love is my sin, and thy dear virtue hate Love is my sin, and thy dear virtue hate, Hate of my sin, grounded on sinful loving, O, but with mine, compare thou thine own state, And thou shalt find it merits not reproving, Or if it do, not from those lips of thine That have profaned their scarlet ornaments And sealed false bonds of […]...
36. Land, Ho! I know ’tis but a loom of land, Yet is it land, and so I will rejoice, I know I cannot hear His voice Upon the shore, nor see Him stand; Yet is it land, ho! land. The land! the land! the lovely land! ‘Far off,’ dost say? Far off-ah, blessиd home! Farewell! farewell! thou […]...
37. Sonnet CXLII Love is my sin and thy dear virtue hate, Hate of my sin, grounded on sinful loving: O, but with mine compare thou thine own state, And thou shalt find it merits not reproving; Or, if it do, not from those lips of thine, That have profaned their scarlet ornaments And seal’d false bonds of […]...
38. Unprofitableness How rich, O Lord! how fresh thy visits are! ‘Twas but just now my bleak leaves hopeless hung Sullied with dust and mud; Each snarling blast shot through me, and did share Their youth, and beauty, cold showers nipt, and wrung Their spiciness and blood; But since thou didst in one sweet glance survey Their […]...
39. The Temper (II) It cannot be. Where is that mighty joy, Which just now took up all my heart? Lord, if thou must needs use thy dart, Save that, and me; or sin for both destroy. The grosser world stand to thy word and art; But thy diviner world of grace Thou suddenly dost raise and race, And […]...
40. 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 […]...