Corporal Stare

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1. On The Wire O God, take the sun from the sky! It’s burning me, scorching me up. God, can’t You hear my cry? Water! A poor, little cup! It’s laughing, the cursed sun! See how it swells and swells Fierce as a hundred hells! God, will it never have done? It’s searing the flesh on my bones; It’s […]...
2. Two Fusiliers And have we done with War at last? Well, we’ve been lucky devils both, And there’s no need of pledge or oath To bind our lovely friendship fast, By firmer stuff Close bound enough. By wire and wood and stake we’re bound, By Fricourt and by Festubert, By whipping rain, by the sun’s glare, By […]...
3. Abel Melveny I bought every kind of machine that’s known Grinders, shellers, planters, mowers, Mills and rakes and ploughs and threshers And all of them stood in the rain and sun, Getting rusted, warped and battered, For I had no sheds to store them in, And no use for most of them. And toward the last, when […]...
4. Trench Duty Shaken from sleep, and numbed and scarce awake, Out in the trench with three hours’ watch to take, I blunder through the splashing mirk; and then Hear the gruff muttering voices of the men Crouching in cabins candle-chinked with light. Hark! There’s the big bombardment on our right Rumbling and bumping; and the dark’s a […]...
5. 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 […]...
6. A City's Death By Fire After that hot gospeller has levelled all but the churched sky, I wrote the tale by tallow of a city’s death by fire; Under a candle’s eye, that smoked in tears, I Wanted to tell, in more than wax, of faiths that were snapped like wire. All day I walked abroad among the rubbled tales, […]...
7. San Francisco This poem was found written on a paper bag by Richard Brautigan in a laundromat in San Francisco. The author is unknown. By accident, you put Your money in my Machine (#4) By accident, I put My money in another Machine (#6) On purpose, I put Your clothes in the Empty machine full Of water […]...
8. The Sentry We’d found an old Boche dug-out, and he knew, And gave us hell, for shell on frantic shell Hammered on top, but never quite burst through. Rain, guttering down in waterfalls of slime Kept slush waist high, that rising hour by hour, Choked up the steps too thick with clay to climb. What murk of […]...
9. The Last Laugh ‘O Jesus Christ! I’m hit,’ he said; and died. Whether he vainly cursed, or prayed indeed, The Bullets chirped – ‘In vain! vain! vain!’ Machine-guns chuckled, ‘Tut-tut! Tut-tut!’ And the Big Gun guffawed. Another sighed, – ‘O Mother, Mother! Dad!’ Then smiled, at nothing, childlike, being dead. And the lofty Shrapnel-cloud Leisurely gestured, – ‘Fool!’ […]...
10. Bird On The Wire Like a bird on the wire, Like a drunk in a midnight choir I have tried in my way to be free. Like a worm on a hook, Like a knight from some old fashioned book I have saved all my ribbons for thee. If I, if I have been unkind, I hope that you […]...
11. An Abandoned Factory, Detroit The gates are chained, the barbed-wire fencing stands, An iron authority against the snow, And this grey monument to common sense Resists the weather. Fears of idle hands, Of protest, men in league, and of the slow Corrosion of their minds, still charge this fence. Beyond, through broken windows one can see Where the great […]...
12. In Fountain Court The fountain murmuring of sleep, A drowsy tune; The flickering green of leaves that keep The light of June; Peace, through a slumbering afternoon, The peace of June. A waiting ghost, in the blue sky, The white curved moon; June, hushed and breathless, waits, and I Wait too, with June; Come, through the lingering afternoon, […]...
13. Wirers ‘Pass it along, the wiring party’s going out’- And yawning sentries mumble, ‘Wirers going out.’ Unravelling; twisting; hammering stakes with muffled thud, They toil with stealthy haste and anger in their blood. The Boche sends up a flare. Black forms stand rigid there, Stock-still like posts; then darkness, and the clumsy ghosts Stride hither and […]...
14. Another Way Of Love I. June was not over Though past the fall, And the best of her roses Had yet to blow, When a man I know (But shall not discover, Since ears are dull, And time discloses) Turned him and said with a man’s true air, Half sighing a smile in a yawn, as ’twere, – ”If […]...
15. Heart, not so heavy as mine Heart, not so heavy as mine Wending late home As it passed my window Whistled itself a tune A careless snatch a ballad A ditty of the street Yet to my irritated Ear An Anodyne so sweet It was as if a Bobolink Sauntering this way Carolled, and paused, and carolled Then bubbled slow away! […]...
16. Only A Boche We brought him in from between the lines: we’d better have let him lie; For what’s the use of risking one’s skin for a tyke that’s going to die? What’s the use of tearing him loose under a gruelling fire, When he’s shot in the head, and worse than dead, and all messed up on […]...
17. Tired And Unhappy, You Think Of Houses Tired and unhappy, you think of houses Soft-carpeted and warm in the December evening, While snow’s white pieces fall past the window, And the orange firelight leaps. A young girl sings That song of Gluck where Orpheus pleads with Death; Her elders watch, nodding their happiness To see time fresh again in her self-conscious eyes: […]...
18. A Fish Answers Amazing monster! that, for aught I know, With the first sight of thee didst make our race For ever stare! O flat and shocking face, Grimly divided from the breast below! Thou that on dry land horribly dost go With a split body and most ridiculous pace, Prong after prong, disgracer of all grace, Long-useless-finned, […]...
19. S. I. W “I will to the King, And offer him consolation in his trouble, For that man there has set his teeth to die, And being one that hates obedience, Discipline, and orderliness of life, I cannot mourn him.” W. B. Yeats. Patting goodbye, doubtless they told the lad He’d always show the Hun a brave man’s […]...
20. Small Wire My faith Is a great weight Hung on a small wire, As doth the spider Hang her baby on a thin web, As doth the vine, Twiggy and wooden, Hold up grapes Like eyeballs, As many angels Dance on the head of a pin. God does not need Too much wire to keep Him there, […]...
21. Poor Devil! Well, I was tired of life; the silly folk, The tiresome noises, all the common things I loved once, crushed me with an iron yoke. I longed for the cool quiet and the dark, Under the common sod where louts and kings Lie down, serene, unheeding, careless, stark, Never to rise or move or feel […]...
22. There Was an Old Man in a Tree There was an Old Man in a tree, Who was horribly bored by a bee. When they said “Does it buzz?” He replied “Yes, it does! It’s a regular brute of a bee!”...
23. Love & Fame & Death it sits outside my window now Like and old woman going to market; It sits and watches me, It sweats nevously Through wire and fog and dog-bark Until suddenly I slam the screen with a newspaper Like slapping at a fly And you could hear the scream Over this plain city, And then it left. […]...
24. History History has to live with what was here, Clutching and close to fumbling all we had It is so dull and gruesome how we die, Unlike writing, life never finishes. Abel was finished; death is not remote, A flash-in-the-pan electrifies the skeptic, His cows crowding like skulls against high-voltage wire, His baby crying all night […]...
25. Editorial Impressions He seemed so certain ‘all was going well’, As he discussed the glorious time he’d had While visiting the trenches. ‘One can tell You’ve gathered big impressions!’ grinned the lad Who’d been severely wounded in the back In some wiped-out impossible Attack. ‘Impressions? Yes, most vivid! I am writing A little book called Europe on […]...
26. Battalion-Relief ‘FALL in! Now get a move on.’ (Curse the rain.) We splash away along the straggling village, Out to the flat rich country, green with June… And sunset flares across wet crops and tillage, Blazing with splendour-patches. (Harvest soon, Up in the Line.) ‘Perhaps the War’ll be done ‘By Christmas-Day. Keep smiling then, old son.’ […]...
27. Under A Telephone Pole I AM a copper wire slung in the air, Slim against the sun I make not even a clear line of shadow. Night and day I keep singing humming and thrumming: It is love and war and money; it is the fighting and the Tears, the work and want, Death and laughter of men and […]...
28. Who In The Hell Is Tom Jones? I was shacked with a 24 year old girl from New York City for Two weeks – about The time of the garbage Strike out there, and One night my 34 year Old woman arrived and She said, “I want to see My rival.” she did And then she said, “o, You’re a cute little […]...
29. Name of a Tree Some days I am Ana’s teacher, some days she is mine. This morning, we look through her kitchen window, The one she can’t get clean, cobwebs massed Between sash and pane. The sky is blue-gold, almost The color of home. Ana, I say, each winter I get more lonely. Both of us would like the […]...
30. The Noble Balm HIGH-SPIRITED friend, I send nor balms nor cor’sives to your wound: Your fate hath found A gentler and more agile hand to tend The cure of that which is but corporal; And doubtful days, which were named critical, Have made their fairest flight And now are out of sight. Yet doth some wholesome physic for […]...
31. A Dead Boche To you who’d read my songs of War And only hear of blood and fame, I’ll say (you’ve heard it said before) ВЂќWar’s Hell! ” and if you doubt the same, Today I found in Mametz Wood A certain cure for lust of blood: Where, propped against a shattered trunk, In a great mess of […]...
32. The long sigh of the Frog The long sigh of the Frog Upon a Summer’s Day Enacts intoxication Upon the Revery But his receding Swell Substantiates a Peace That makes the Ear inordinate For corporal release...
33. An Encounter ONCE on the kind of day called “weather breeder,” When the heat slowly hazes and the sun By its own power seems to be undone, I was half boring through, half climbing through A swamp of cedar. Choked with oil of cedar And scurf of plants, and weary and over-heated, And sorry I ever left […]...
34. The Rain and the Wind The rain and the wind, the wind and the rain They are with us like a disease: They worry the heart, they work the brain, As they shoulder and clutch at the shrieking pane, And savage the helpless trees. What does it profit a man to know These tattered and tumbling skies A million stately […]...
35. Chicago Poet I SALUTED a nobody. I saw him in a looking-glass. He smiled-so did I. He crumpled the skin on his forehead, frowning-so did I. Everything I did he did. I said, “Hello, I know you.” And I was a liar to say so. Ah, this looking-glass man! Liar, fool, dreamer, play-actor, Soldier, dusty drinker of […]...
36. This Window is This window is confidence, Documenting proceedings, Capturing moments, Cleansing views Challenging sentiment. This window is nourishment Filling the eyes With strong drink, And acidly piercing Over-elaborate structures. This window is furniture Re-hung like a picture, Recording new outlooks When the old pleases No more. This window is doorway To feelings, Good feelings and bad, All […]...
37. Fear The host, he says that all is well And the fire-wood glow is bright; The food has a warm and tempting smell,- But on the window licks the night. Pile on the logs… Give me your hands, Friends! No,- it is not fright… But hold me… somewhere I heard demands… And on the window licks […]...
38. BURIAL To the grave one day from a house they bore A maiden; To the window the citizens went to explore; In splendour they lived, and with wealth as of yore Their banquets were laden. Then thought they: “The maid to the tomb is now borne; We too from our dwellings ere long must be torn, […]...
39. Under Cover of Night To slip into your shadow under cover of night. To follow your footsteps, your shadow at the window. That shadow at the window is you and no one else; It’s you. Do not open that window behind whose curtains you’re moving. Shut your eyes. I’d like to shut them with my lips. But the window […]...
40. Four Days In Vermont Window’s tree trunk’s predominant face A single eye-leveled hole where limb’s torn off Another larger contorts to swell growing in around Imploding wound beside a clutch of thin twigs Hold to one two three four five six dry twisted Yellowish brown leaves flat against the other Gray trees in back stick upright then the glimpse […]...