The Curse of Kehama

Related poetry:

1. A Curse For A Nation I heard an angel speak last night, And he said ‘Write! Write a Nation’s curse for me, And send it over the Western Sea.’ I faltered, taking up the word: ‘Not so, my lord! If curses must be, choose another To send thy curse against my brother. ‘For I am bound by gratitude, By love […]...
2. Extinguish Thou My Eyes Extinguish Thou my eyes:I still can see Thee, Deprive my ears of sound:I still can hear Thee, And without feet I still can come to Thee, And without voice I still can call to Thee. Sever my arms from me, I still will hold Thee With all my heart as with a single hand, Arrest […]...
3. Isolation: To Marguerite We were apart; yet, day by day, I bade my heart more constant be. I bade it keep the world away, And grow a home for only thee; Nor fear’d but thy love likewise grew, Like mine, each day, more tried, more true. The fault was grave! I might have known, What far too soon, […]...
4. In snow thou comest In snow thou comest Thou shalt go with the resuming ground, The sweet derision of the crow, And Glee’s advancing sound. In fear thou comest Thou shalt go at such a gait of joy That man anew embark to live Upon the depth of thee....
5. THE REMORSE OF THE DEAD O SHADOWY Beauty mine, when thou shalt sleep In the deep heart of a black marble tomb; When thou for mansion and for bower shalt keep Only one rainy cave of hollow gloom; And when the stone upon thy trembling breast, And on thy straight sweet body’s supple grace, Crushes thy will and keeps thy […]...
6. 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 […]...
7. To My Inconstant Mistress When thou, poor excommunicate From all the joys of love, shalt see The full reward and glorious fate Which my strong faith shall purchase me, Then curse thine own inconstancy. A fairer hand than thine shall cure That heart which thy false oaths did wound; And to my soul a soul more pure Than thine […]...
8. Contentment (Phillipians, iv.11) Fierce passions discompose the mind, As tempests vex the sea, But calm, content and peace we find, When, Lord, we turn to Thee. In vain by reason and by rule We try to bend the will; For none but in the Saviour’s school Can learn the heavenly skill. Since at His feet my […]...
9. In San Lorenzo Is thine hour come to wake, O slumbering Night? Hath not the Dawn a message in thine ear? Though thou be stone and sleep, yet shalt thou hear When the word falls from heaven Let there be light. Thou knowest we would not do thee the despite To wake thee while the old sorrow and […]...
10. Sleep Come Sleep; O Sleep! the certain knot of peace, The baiting-place of wit, the balm of woe, The poor man’s wealth, the prisoner’s release, Th’ indifferent judge between the high and low; With shield of proof shield me from out the prease Of those fierce darts Despair at me doth throw: O make in me […]...
11. Patria I would not even ask my heart to say If I could love some other land as well As thee, my country, had I felt the spell Of Italy at birth, or learned to obey The charm of France, or England’s mighty sway. I would not be so much an infidel As once to dream, […]...
12. Sonnet XXXIX: Come, Sleep! Come Sleep! O Sleep, the certain knot of peace, The baiting-place of wit, the balm of woe, The poor man’s wealth, the prisoner’s release, Th’ indifferent judge between the high and low. With shield of proof shield me from out the prease Of those fierce darts despair at me doth throw: O make in me […]...
13. Come Sleep, O Sleep! The Certain Knot Of Peace Come, Sleep! O Sleep, the certain knot of peace, The baiting-place of wit, the balm of woe, The poor man’s wealth, the prisoner’s release, Th’ indifferent judge between the high and low; With shield of proof shield me from out the press Of those fierce darts Despair at me doth throw! O make in me […]...
14. Love's Usury For every hour that thou wilt spare me now I will allow, Usurious God of Love, twenty to thee, When with my brown my gray hairs equal be; Till then, Love, let my body reign, and let Me travel, sojourn, snatch, plot, have, forget, Resume my last year’s relic: think that yet We’had never met. […]...
15. TO PHILLIS, TO LOVE AND LIVE WITH HIM Live, live with me, and thou shalt see The pleasures I’ll prepare for thee: What sweets the country can afford Shall bless thy bed, and bless thy board. The soft sweet moss shall be thy bed, With crawling woodbine over-spread: By which the silver-shedding streams Shall gently melt thee into dreams. Thy clothing next, shall […]...
16. To Memory Strange Power, I know not what thou art, Murderer or mistress of my heart. I know I’d rather meet the blow Of my most unrelenting foe Than live – as now I live – to be Slain twenty times a day by thee. Yet, when I would command thee hence, Thou mockest at the vain […]...
17. Inspiration Not like a daring, bold, aggressive boy, Is inspiration, eager to pursue, But rather like a maiden, fond, yet coy, Who gives herself to him who best doth woo. Once she may smile, or thrice, thy soul to fire, In passing by, but when she turns her face, Thou must persist and seek her with […]...
18. Sonnet LXXXVIII When thou shalt be disposed to set me light, And place my merit in the eye of scorn, Upon thy side against myself I’ll fight, And prove thee virtuous, though thou art forsworn. With mine own weakness being best acquainted, Upon thy part I can set down a story Of faults conceal’d, wherein I am […]...
19. Sonnet 88: When thou shalt be disposed to set me light When thou shalt be disposed to set me light And place my merit in the eye of scorn, Upon thy side, against myself I’ll fight, And prove thee virtuous, though thou art forsworn. With mine own weakness being best acquainted, Upon thy part I can set down a story Of faults concealed, wherein I am […]...
20. Ardelia to Melancholy At last, my old inveterate foe, No opposition shalt thou know. Since I by struggling, can obtain Nothing, but encrease of pain, I will att last, no more do soe, Tho’ I confesse, I have apply’d Sweet mirth, and musick, and have try’d A thousand other arts beside, To drive thee from my darken’d breast, […]...
21. If I can stop one Heart from breaking If I can stop one Heart from breaking I shall not live in vain If I can ease one Life the Aching Or cool one Pain Or help one fainting Robin Unto his Nest again I shall not live in Vain....
22. A Calendar of Sonnets: January O Winter! frozen pulse and heart of fire, What loss is theirs who from thy kingdom turn Dismayed, and think thy snow a sculptured urn Of death! Far sooner in midsummer tire The streams than under ice. June could not hire Her roses to forego the strength they learn In sleeping on thy breast. No […]...
23. Curse of a Rich Polish Peasant on His Sister Who Ran Away With a Wild Man FELIKSOWA has gone again from our house and this time for good, I hope. She and her husband took with them the cow father gave them, and they sold it. She went like a swine, because she called neither on me, her brother, nor on her father, before leaving for those forests. That is where […]...
24. The Promise of the Morning Star Thou father of the children of my brain By thee engendered in my willing heart, How can I thank thee for this gift of art Poured out so lavishly, and not in vain. What thou created never more can die, Thy fructifying power lives in me And I conceive, knowing it is by thee, Dear […]...
25. Severed and Gone Severed and gone, so many years! And art thou still so dear to me, That throbbing heart and burning tears Can witness how I cling to thee? I know that in the narrow tomb The form I loved was buried deep, And left, in silence and in gloom, To slumber out its dreamless sleep. I […]...
26. Love (II) Immortal Heat, O let thy greater flame Attract the lesser to it: let those fires Which shall consume the world, first make it tame, And kindle in our hearts such true desires, As may consume our lusts, and make thee way. Then shall our hearts pant thee; then shall our brain All her invention on […]...
27. To Anthea, Who May Command Him Anything Bid me to live, and I will live Thy Protestant to be; Or bid me love, and I will give A loving heart to thee. A heart as soft, a heart as kind, A heart as sound and free, As in the whole world thou canst find, That heart I’ll give to thee. Bid that […]...
28. Ambition and Art Ambition I am the maid of the lustrous eyes Of great fruition, Whom the sons of men that are over-wise Have called Ambition. And the world’s success is the only goal I have within me; The meanest man with the smallest soul May woo and win me. For the lust of power and the pride […]...
29. Boldness in Love Mark how the bashful morn in vain Courts the amorous marigold, With sighing blasts and weeping rain, Yet she refuses to unfold. But when the planet of the day Approacheth with his powerful ray, The she spreads, then she receives His warmer beams into her virgin leaves. So shalt thou thrive in love, fond boy; […]...
30. Jealousy VAIN Love, why do’st thou boast of Wings, That cannot help thee to retire! When such quick Flames Suspicion brings, As do the Heart about thee fire. Still Swift to come, but when to go Thou shou’d’st be more-Alas! how Slow. Lord of the World must surely be But thy bare Title at the most; […]...
31. 555. Song-O wert thou in the cauld blast O WERT thou in the cauld blast, On yonder lea, on yonder lea, My plaidie to the angry airt, I’d shelter thee, I’d shelter thee; Or did Misfortune’s bitter storms Around thee blaw, around thee blaw, Thy bield should be my bosom, To share it a’, to share it a’. Or were I in the […]...
32. Oh Wert Thou In The Cauld Blast Oh wert thou in the cauld blast, On yonder lea, on yonder lea, My plaidie to the angry airt, I’d shelter thee, I’d shelter thee; Or did misfortune’s bitter storms Around thee blaw, around thee blaw, Thy bield should be my bosom, To share it a’, to share it a’. Or were I in the […]...
33. Psalm 123 Pleading with submission. O thou whose grace and justice reign Enthroned above the skies, To thee our hearts would tell their pain, To thee we lift our eyes. As servants watch their master’s hand, And fear the angry stroke; Or maids before their mistress stand, And wait a peaceful look; So for our sins we […]...
34. Specula When He appoints to meet thee, go thou forth – It matters not If south or north, Bleak waste or sunny plot. Nor think, if haply He thou seek’st be late, He does thee wrong. To stile or gate Lean thou thy head, and long! It may be that to spy thee He is mounting […]...
35. To An Unborn Pauper Child Breathe not, hid Heart: cease silently, And though thy birth-hour beckons thee, Sleep the long sleep: The Doomsters heap Travails and teens around us here, And Time-Wraiths turn our songsingings to fear. Hark, how the peoples surge and sigh, And laughters fail, and greetings die; Hopes dwindle; yea, Faiths waste away, Affections and enthusiasms numb: […]...
36. Sapphic Fragment “Thou shalt be Nothing.” Omar Khayyam. “Tombless, with no remembrance.” W. Shakespeare. Dead shalt thou lie; and nought Be told of thee or thought, For thou hast plucked not of the Muses’ tree: And even in Hades’ halls Amidst thy fellow-thralls No friendly shade thy shade shall company!...
37. Sonnet 34 – With the same heart, I said, I'll answer thee With the same heart, I said, I’ll answer thee As those, when thou shalt call me by my name- Lo, the vain promise! is the same, the same, Perplexed and ruffled by life’s strategy? When called before, I told how hastily I dropped my flowers or brake off from a game, To run and answer […]...
38. A prayer to the Wind Go thou gentle whispering wind, Bear this sigh; and if thou find Where my cruel fair doth rest, Cast it in her snowy breast, So, enflam’d by my desire, It may set her heart a-fire. Those sweet kisses thou shalt gain, Will reward thee for thy pain: Boldly light upon her lip, There suck odours, […]...
39. Sonnet IV: Virtue, Alas Virtue, alas, now let me take some rest. Thou set’st a bate between my soul and wit. If vain love have my simple soul oppress’d, Leave what thou likest not, deal not thou with it. The scepter use in some old Cato’s breast; Churches or schools are for thy seat more fit. I do confess, […]...
40. Sonnet 77: Thy glass will show thee how thy beauties wear Thy glass will show thee how thy beauties wear, Thy dial how thy precious minutes waste; These vacant leaves thy mind’s imprint will bear, And of this book, this learning mayst thou taste. The wrinkles which thy glass will truly show Of mouthèd graves will give thee memory, Thou by thy dial’s shady stealth mayst […]...