Low Barometer

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1. The Masked Face I found me in a great surging space, At either end a door, And I said: “What is this giddying place, With no firm-fixéd floor, That I knew not of before?” “It is Life,” said a mask-clad face. I asked: “But how do I come here, Who never wished to come; Can the light and […]...
2. 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 […]...
3. Locked Out As told to a child When we locked up the house at night, We always locked the flowers outside And cut them off from window light. The time I dreamed the door was tried And brushed with buttons upon sleeves, The flowers were out there with the thieves. Yet nobody molested them! We did find […]...
4. In Port Last, to the chamber where I lie My fearful footsteps patter nigh, And come out from the cold and gloom Into my warm and cheerful room. There, safe arrived, we turn about To keep the coming shadows out, And close the happy door at last On all the perils that we past. Then, when mamma […]...
5. Pals Take a hold now On the silver handles here, Six silver handles, One for each of his old pals. Take hold And lift him down the stairs, Put him on the rollers Over the floor of the hearse. Take him on the last haul, To the cold straight house, The level even house, To the […]...
6. Forbidden Fruit all the forbidden fruit I ever Dreamt of or was taught to Resist and fear ripens and Blossoms under the palms of my Hands as they uncover and explore You and in the most secret Corners of my heart as it discovers And adores you the forbidden fruit Of forgiveness the forbidden fruit Of finally […]...
7. The Lockless Door It went many years, But at last came a knock, And I though of the door With no lock to lock. I blew out the light, I tip-toed the floor, And raised both hands In prayer to the door. But the knock came again. My window was wide; I climbed on the sill And descended […]...
8. Song Unsung The song that I came to sing remains unsung to this day. I have spent my days in stringing and in unstringing my instrument. The time has not come true, the words have not been rightly set; Only there is the agony of wishing in my heart. The blossom has not opened; only the wind […]...
9. The House This poem has a door, a locked door, And curtains drawn against the day, But at night the lights come on, one In each room, and the neighbors swear They hear music and the sound of dancing. These days the neighbors will swear To anything, but that is not why The house is locked up […]...
10. The Listeners “Is there anybody there?” said the Traveller, Knocking on the moonlit door; And his horse in the silence champed the grass Of the forest’s ferny floor; And a bird flew up out of the turret, Above the Traveller’s head: And he smote upon the door again a second time; “Is there anybody there?” he said. […]...
11. The Fair Maid of Perth's House All ye good people, afar and near, To my request pray lend an ear; I advise you all without delay to go And see the Fair Maid’s House – it is a rare show. Some of the chairs there are very grand, They have been cut and carved by a skilful hand; And kings, perchance, […]...
12. Lines Written In The Fannie Farmer Cookbook You won’t become a gourmet* cook By studying our Fannie’s book Her thoughts on Food & Keeping House Are scarcely those of Lévi-Strauss. Nevertheless, you’ll find, Frank dear, The basic elements** are here. And if a problem should arise: The Soufflé fall before your eyes, Or strange things happen to the Rice You know I […]...
13. Never Suddenly, desperately I thought, “No, never In millions of minutes Can I for one second Calm-leaving my own self Like clothes on a chair-back And quietly opening The door of one house (No, not one of all millions) Of blood, flesh and brain, Climb the nerve-stair and look From the tower, from the windows Of […]...
14. Visits To St. Elizabeths This is the house of Bedlam. This is the man That lies in the house of Bedlam. This is the time Of the tragic man That lies in the house of Bedlam. This is a wristwatch Telling the time Of the talkative man That lies in the house of Bedlam. This is a sailor Wearing […]...
15. Old Testament Gospel (Hebrews, iv.2) Israel in ancient days Not only had a view Of Sinai in a blaze, But learn’d the Gospel too; The types and figures were a glass, In which thy saw a Saviour’s face. The paschal sacrifice And blood-besprinkled door, Seen with enlighten’d eyes, And once applied with power, Would teach the need of […]...
16. Houses (For Aline) When you shall die and to the sky Serenely, delicately go, Saint Peter, when he sees you there, Will clash his keys and say: “Now talk to her, Sir Christopher! And hurry, Michelangelo! She wants to play at building, And you’ve got to help her play!” Every architect will help erect A palace […]...
17. Success is counted sweetest Success is counted sweetest By those who ne’er succeed. To comprehend a nectar Requires sorest need. Not one of all the purple Host Who took the Flag today Can tell the definition So clear of Victory As he defeated dying On whose forbidden ear The distant strains of triumph Burst agonized and clear!...
18. The Three Hermits Three old hermits took the air By a cold and desolate sea, First was muttering a prayer, Second rummaged for a flea; On a windy stone, the third, Giddy with his hundredth year, Sang unnoticed like a bird: ‘Though the Door of Death is near And what waits behind the door, Three times in a […]...
19. O Living Always-Always Dying O LIVING always-always dying! O the burials of me, past and present! O me, while I stride ahead, material, visible, imperious as ever! O me, what I was for years, now dead, (I lament not-I am content;) O to disengage myself from those corpses of me, which I turn and look at, where I cast […]...
20. Someone's Mother Someone’s Mother trails the street Wrapt in rotted rags; Broken slippers on her feet Drearily she drags; Drifting in the bitter night, Gnawing gutter bread, With a face of tallow white, Listless as the dead. Someone’s Mother in the dim Of the grey church wall Hears within a Christmas hymn, One she can recall From […]...
21. This Life My friend tells me A man in my house jumped off the roof The roof is the eighth floor of this building The roof door was locked how did he manage? His girlfriend had said goodbye I’m leaving He was 22 His mother and father were hurrying At that very moment From upstate to help […]...
22. I Years had been from Home I Years had been from Home And now before the Door I dared not enter, lest a Face I never saw before Stare solid into mine And ask my Business there “My Business but a Life I left Was such remaining there?” I leaned upon the Awe I lingered with Before The Second like an […]...
23. Lover's Gifts LII: Tired of Waiting Tired of waiting, you burst your bonds, impatient flowers, before The winter had gone. Glimpses of the unseen comer reached your Wayside watch, and you rushed out running and panting, impulsive Jasmines, troops of riotous roses. You were the first to march to the breach of death, your Clamour of colour and perfume troubled the […]...
24. An Improvisation For Angular Momentum Walking is like Imagination, a Single step Dissolves the circle Into motion; the eye here And there rests On a leaf, Gap, or ledge, Everything flowing Except where Sight touches seen: Stop, though, and Reality snaps back In, locked hard, Forms sharply Themselves, bushbank, Dentree, phoneline, Definite, fixed, The self, too, then Caught real, clouds […]...
25. Written On Sunday Morning Go thou and seek the House of Prayer! I to the Woodlands wend, and there In lovely Nature see the GOD OF LOVE. The swelling organ’s peal Wakes not my soul to zeal, Like the wild music of the wind-swept grove. The gorgeous altar and the mystic vest Rouse not such ardor in my breast, […]...
26. The School In August The cloakroom pegs are empty now, And locked the classroom door, The hollow desks are lined with dust, And slow across the floor A sunbeam creeps between the chairs Till the sun shines no more. Who did their hair before this glass? Who scratched ‘Elaine loves Jill’ One drowsy summer sewing-class With scissors on the […]...
27. Return This little house sows the degrees By which wood can return to trees. Weather has stained the shingles dark And indistinguishable from bark. Lichen that long ago adjourned Its lodging here has now returned. And if you look in through the door You see a sapling through the floor....
28. The Man And His Horse Within a Meadow, on the way, A sordid Churl resolv’d to stay, And give his Horse a Bite; Purloining so his Neighbours Hay, That at the Inn he might not pay For Forage all the Night. With Heart’s content th’ unloaded Steed Began to neigh, and frisk, and feed; For nothing more he car’d, Since […]...
29. Dream Song 123: Daples my floor the eastern sun, my house faces north Dapples my floor the eastern sun, my house faces north, I have nothing to say except that it dapples my floor And it would dapple me If I lay on that floor, as-well-forthwith I have done, trying well to mount a thought Not carelessly In times forgotten, except by the New York Times Which can’t […]...
30. Confessions What is he buzzing in my ears? “Now that I come to die, Do I view the world as a vale of tears?” Ah, reverend sir, not I! What I viewed there once, what I view again Where the physic bottles stand On the table’s edge,-is a suburb lane, With a wall to my bedside […]...
31. Let Us Have Madness Let us have madness openly. O men Of my generation. Let us follow The footsteps of this slaughtered age: See it trail across Time’s dim land Into the closed house of eternity With the noise that dying has, With the face that dead things wear Nor ever say We wanted more; we looked to find […]...
32. Heart of Copper The Candidate, answering a question About El Salvador, generalized By saying he thought We should support human rights Everywhere they were being abrogated South Korea, South Africa Or South Yemen. He didn’t have The moral perspicuity To mention South Dakota. Perhaps it’s too far north....
33. The Waiting Soul Breathe from the gentle south, O Lord, And cheer me from the north; Blow on the treasures of thy word, And call the spices forth! I wish, Thou knowest, to be resign’d, And wait with patient hope; But hope delay’d fatigues the mind, And drinks the spirits up. Help me to reach the distant goal; […]...
34. The room you know how it is with the room The door is frequently locked As i pass a white sigh Is pushed out from under As i bend to retrieve it The wood quivers with a woman’s breath There is a ruffle of crying Through the keyhole i am able To glimpse a red dress Clawing […]...
35. Before This Little Gift Was Come BEFORE this little gift was come The little owner had made haste for home; And from the door of where the eternal dwell, Looked back on human things and smiled farewell. O may this grief remain the only one! O may our house be still a garrison Of smiling children, and for evermore The tune […]...
36. Praise (I) To write a verse or two is all the praise That I can raise: Mend my estate in any ways, Thou shalt have more. I go to Church; help me to wings, and I Will thither fly; Or, if I mount unto the sky, I will do more. Man is all weakness; there is no […]...
37. Prophecy I shall die hidden in a hut In the middle of an alder wood, With the back door blind and bolted shut, And the front door locked for good. I shall lie folded like a saint, Lapped in a scented linen sheet, On a bedstead striped with bright-blue paint, Narrow and cold and neat. The […]...
38. To the Thawing Wind COME with rain. O loud Southwester! Bring the singer, bring the nester; Give the buried flower a dream; Make the settled snowbank steam; Find the brown beneath the white; But whate’er you do tonight, Bath my window, make it flow, Melt it as the ice will go; Melt the glass and leave the sticks Like […]...
39. The New Love If it shine or if it rain, Little will I care or know. Days, like drops upon a pane, Slip, and join, and go. At my door’s another lad; Here’s his flower in my hair. If he see me pale and sad, Will he see me fair? I sit looking at the floor. Little will […]...
40. A Case Of Murder They should not have left him there alone, Alone that is except for the cat. He was only nine, not old enough To be left alone in a basement flat, Alone, that is, except for the cat. A dog would have been a different thing, A big gruff dog with slashing jaws, But a cat […]...