A Plea

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1. Cosmopolities without a plea Cosmopolities without a plea Alight in every Land The compliments of Paradise From those within my Hand Their dappled Journey to themselves A compensation fair Knock and it shall be opened Is their Theology...
2. The Plea of the Simla Dancers Too late, alas! the song To remedy the wrong; The rooms are taken from us, swept and garnished for their fate. But these tear-besprinkled pages Shall attest to future ages That we cried against the crime of it too late, alas! too late! “What have we ever done to bear this grudge?” Was there no […]...
3. Make Bright The Arrows Make bright the arrows Gather the shields: Conquest narrows The peaceful fields. Stock well the quiver With arrows bright: The bowman feared Need never fight. Make bright the arrows, O peaceful and wise! Gather the shields Against surprise....
4. The Anniversary “This bunch of violets,” he said, “Is for my daughter dear. Since that glad morn when she was wed It is today a year. She lives atop this flight of stairs Please give an arm to me: If we can take her unawares How glad she’ll be!” We climbed the stairs; the flight was four, […]...
5. Plea Secrets, you said, would hold us two apart; You’d have me know of you your least transgression, And so the intimate places of your heart, Kneeling, you bared to me, as in confession. Softly you told of loves that went before- Of clinging arms, of kisses gladly given; Luxuriously clean of heart once more, You […]...
6. UNCLE BOB Shell-shocked from Korea A grenade that left him The platoon’s only survivor, Put him in Stanley Royd For thirty years. He tailored there And out on weekend leaves He made and mended Everybody’s clothes, Crying copiously While he sewed. When they cleared out The chronic cases Uncle Bob came home, Shopping for Edna, Doing the […]...
7. PLEA FOR A HISTORY OF WORKING-CLASS LEEDS I want a true history of my city FUCK THE DE LACY FAMILY AND DOUBLE FUCK JOHN OF GAUNT ESPECIALLY And all his descendants With their particular vilenesses – I met one in the sixties Who had all the coldness of Himmler So svelte and adored by the cognoscenti. I want a history responsive To […]...
8. Butch Weldy After I got religion and steadied down They gave me a job in the canning works, And every morning I had to fill The tank in the yard with gasoline, That fed the blow-fires in the sheds To heat the soldering irons. And I mounted a rickety ladder to do it, Carrying buckets full of […]...
9. Poor Honest Men Your jar of Virginny Will cost you a guinea, Which you reckon too much by five shillings or ten; But light your churchwarden And judge it according, When I’ve told you the troubles of poor honest men. From the Capes of the Delaware, As you are well aware, We sail which tobacco for England-but then, […]...
10. Pineapples And Pomegranates To think that, as a boy of thirteen, I would grapple With my first pineapple, Its exposed breast Setting itself as another test Of my will-power, knowing in my bones That it stood for something other than itself alone While having absolutely no sense Of its being a world-wide symbol of munificence. Munificence-right? Not munitions, […]...
11. The World Some are the brothers of all humankind, And own them, whatsoever their estate; And some, for sorrow and self-scorn, are blind With enmity for man’s unguarded fate. For some there is a music all day long Like flutes in Paradise, they are so glad; And there is hell’s eternal under-song Of curses and the cries […]...
12. The Coney Although I have never learned to mow I suddenly found myself half-way through Last year’s pea-sticks And cauliflower stalks In our half-acre of garden. My father had always left the whetstone Safely wrapped In his old, tweed cap And balanced on one particular plank Beside the septic tank. This past winter he had been too […]...
13. Hot Digitty Dog Hot digitty dog! Now, ain’t it queer, I’ve been abroad for over a year; Seen a helluva lot since then, Killed, I reckon, a dozen men; Six was doubtful, but six was sure, Three in Normandy, three in the Ruhr. Four I got with a hand grenade, Two I shot in a midnight raid: Oh, […]...
14. Michael “There’s something in your face, Michael, I’ve seen it all the day; There’s something quare that wasn’t there when first ye wint away. . . .” “It’s just the Army life, mother, the drill, the left and right, That puts the stiffinin’ in yer spine and locks yer jaw up tight. . . .” “There’s […]...
15. Babylon THE BLUE dusk ran between the streets: my love was winged within my mind, It left to-day and yesterday and thrice a thousand years behind. To-day was past and dead for me, for from to-day my feet had run Through thrice a thousand years to walk the ways of ancient Babylon. On temple top and […]...
16. The Has-Been A STONE face higher than six horses stood five thousand Years gazing at the world seeming to clutch a secret. A boy passes and throws a niggerhead that chips off the End of the nose from the stone face; he lets fly a Mud ball that spatters the right eye and cheek of the Old […]...
17. Long Years apart can make no Long Years apart can make no Breach a second cannot fill The absence of the Witch does not Invalidate the spell The embers of a Thousand Years Uncovered by the Hand That fondled them when they were Fire Will stir and understand...
18. The Heart Healed and Changed by Mercy Sin enslaved me many years, And led me bound and blind; Till at length a thousand fears Came swarming o’er my mind. “Where,” said I, in deep distress, “Will these sinful pleasures end? How shall I secure my peace And make the Lord my friend?” Friends and ministers said much The gospel to enforce; But […]...
19. Languages THERE are no handles upon a language Whereby men take hold of it And mark it with signs for its remembrance. It is a river, this language, Once in a thousand years Breaking a new course Changing its way to the ocean. It is mountain effluvia Moving to valleys And from nation to nation Crossing […]...
20. Justice Arnett It is true, fellow citizens, That my old docket lying there for years On a shelf above my head and over The seat of justice, I say it is true That docket had an iron rim Which gashed my baldness when it fell (Somehow I think it was shaken loose By the heave of the […]...
21. If Still Your Orchards Bear Brother, that breathe the August air Ten thousand years from now, And smell-if still your orchards bear Tart apples on the bough- The early windfall under the tree, And see the red fruit shine, I cannot think your thoughts will be Much different from mine. Should at that moment the full moon Step forth upon […]...
22. It All Will Come Out Right Whatever is a cruel wrong, Whatever is unjust, The honest years that speed along Will trample in the dust. In restless youth I railed at fate With all my puny might, But now I know if I but wait It all will come out right. Though Vice may don the judge’s gown And play the […]...
23. Twenty Years Hence Twenty years hence my eyes may grow If not quite dim, yet rather so, Still yours from others they shall know Twenty years hence. Twenty years hence though it may hap That I be called to take a nap In a cool cell where thunderclap Was never heard, There breathe but o’er my arch of […]...
24. The Woodlark Teevo cheevo cheevio chee: O where, what can thбat be? Weedio-weedio: there again! So tiny a trickle of sуng-strain; And all round not to be found For brier, bough, furrow, or grйen ground Before or behind or far or at hand Either left either right Anywhere in the sъnlight. Well, after all! Ah but hark- […]...
25. The Battle of Bannockburn Sir Robert the Bruce at Bannockburn Beat the English in every wheel and turn, And made them fly in great dismay From off the field without delay. The English were a hundred thousand strong, And King Edward passed through the Lowlands all along. Determined to conquer Scotland, it was his desire, And then to restore […]...
26. False Notions, Fears, And Other Things Of Wood Repeatedly, that sturdy stump in me Bears up like stone, Beneath some ritual I see: The blinding axe Swings up, holds, That moment of its weightlessness Inscrutable Till I confirm the arm is mine; I will it, grip, Feel moist the swelling handle, The shudder rude, The difference fallen. Toward that chopping block I carry […]...
27. The New Jerusalem And did those feet in ancient time Walk upon England’s mountains green? And was the holy Lamb of God On England’s pleasant pastures seen? And did the Countenance Divine Shine forth upon our clouded hills? And was Jerusalem builded here Among these dark Satanic Mills? Bring me my bow of burning gold! Bring me my […]...
28. And Did Those Feet In Ancient Time And did those feet in ancient time Walk upon England’s mountains green? And was the holy Lamb of God On England’s pleasant pastures seen? And did the Countenance Divine Shine forth upon our clouded hills? And was Jerusalem builded here Among these dark satanic mills? Bring me my bow of burning gold! Bring me my […]...
29. From Milton: And did those feet And did those feet in ancient time Walk upon England’s mountains green? And was the holy Lamb of God On England’s pleasant pastures seen? And did the Countenance Divine Shine forth upon our clouded hills? And was Jerusalem builded here, Among these dark Satanic Mills? Bring me my Bow of burning gold: Bring me my […]...
30. Carry On It’s easy to fight when everything’s right, And you’re mad with the thrill and the glory; It’s easy to cheer when victory’s near, And wallow in fields that are gory. It’s a different song when everything’s wrong, When you’re feeling infernally mortal; When it’s ten against one, and hope there is none, Buck up, little […]...
31. Introspection If you go deep Into the heart What do you find there? Fear, fear, Fear of the jaws of the rock, Fear of the teeth and splinters of iron that tear Flesh from the bone, and the moist Blood, running unfelt From the wound, and the hand Suddenly moist and red. If you go deep […]...
32. Death warrants are supposed to be Death warrants are supposed to be An enginery of equity A merciful mistake A pencil in an Idol’s Hand A Devotee has oft consigned To Crucifix or Block...
33. The Monster When we might make with happy heart This world a paradise, With bombs we blast brave men apart, With napalm carbonize. Where we might till the sunny soil, And sing for joy of life, We spend our treasure and our toil In bloody strife. The fields of wheat are sheening gold, The flocks have silver […]...
34. The Undying She was so wonderful I wondered If wedding me she had not blundered; She was so pure, so high above me, I marvelled how she came to love me: Or did she? Well, in her own fashion – Affection, pity, never passion. I knew I was not worth her love; Yet oh, how wistfully I […]...
35. Joliet ON the one hand the steel works. On the other hand the penitentiary. Sante Fé trains and Alton trains Between smokestacks on the west And gray walls on the east. And Lockport down the river. Part of the valley is God’s. And part is man’s. The river course laid out A thousand years ago. The […]...
36. Soldier Boy My soldier boy has crossed the sea To fight the foeman; But he’ll come back to make of me And honest woman. So I am singing all day long, Despite blood-shedding; For though I know he’s done me wrong, We’ll end by wedding. My soldier boy is home again, So bold and scathless; But oh, […]...
37. A Rusty Nail I ran a nail into my hand, The wound was hard to heal; So bitter was the pain to stand I thought how it would feel, To have spikes thrust through hands and feet, Impaled by hammer beat. Then hoisted on a cross of oak Against the sullen sky, With all about the jeering follk […]...
38. Question And Answer he sat naked and drunk in a room of summer night, running the blade of the knife under his fingernails, smiling, thinking of all the letters he had received telling him that the way he lived and wrote about that it had kept them going when all seemed truly hopeless. putting the blade on the […]...
39. Alone Over the fence, the dead settle in For a journey. Nine o’clock. You are alone for the first time Today. Boys asleep. Husband out. A beer bottle sweats in your hand, And sea lavender clogs the air With perfume. Think of yourself. Your arms rest with nothing to do After weeks spent attending to others. […]...
40. The Toy Band A Song of the Great Retreat Dreary lay the long road, dreary lay the town, Lights out and never a glint o’ moon: Weary lay the stragglers, half a thousand down, Sad sighed the weary big Dragoon. “Oh! if I’d a drum here to make them take the road again, Oh! if I’d a fife […]...