Fortitude

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1. Swing high and swing low Swing high and swing low While the breezes they blow – It’s off for a sailor thy father would go; And it’s here in the harbor, in sight of the sea, He hath left his wee babe with my song and with me: “Swing high and swing low While the breezes they blow!” Swing high […]...
2. Poor Poet ‘A man should write to please himself,’ He proudly said. Well, see his poems on the shelf, Dusty, unread. When he came to my shop each day, So peaked and cold, I’d sneak one of his books away And say ’twas sold. And then by chance he looked below, And saw a stack Of his […]...
3. The Deluge Though giant rains put out the sun, Here stand I for a sign. Though earth be filled with waters dark, My cup is filled with wine. Tell to the trembling priests that here Under the deluge rod, One nameless, tattered, broken man Stood up, and drank to God. Sun has been where the rain is […]...
4. 215. Song-Hey, the Dusty Miller HEY, the dusty Miller, And his dusty coat, He will win a shilling, Or he spend a groat: Dusty was the coat, Dusty was the colour, Dusty was the kiss That I gat frae the Miller. Hey, the dusty Miller, And his dusty sack; Leeze me on the calling Fills the dusty peck: Fills the […]...
5. What Shall I Do For the Land that Bred Me What shall I do for the land that bred me, Her homes and fields that folded and fed me?- Be under her banner and live for her honour: Under her banner I’ll live for her honour. CHORUS. Under her banner live for her honour. Not the pleasure, the pay, the plunder, But country and flag, […]...
6. Fortitude incarnate Fortitude incarnate Here is laid away In the swift Partitions Of the awful Sea Babble of the Happy Cavil of the Bold Hoary the Fruition But the Sea is old Edifice of Ocean Thy tumultuous Rooms Suit me at a venture Better than the Tombs...
7. A Good Knight In Prison Wearily, drearily, Half the day long, Flap the great banners High over the stone; Strangely and eerily Sounds the wind’s song, Bending the banner-poles. While, all alone, Watching the loophole’s spark, Lie I, with life all dark, Feet tether’d, hands fetter’d Fast to the stone, The grim walls, square-letter’d With prison’d men’s groan. Still strain […]...
8. Fore-Warning I’d rather be the Jester than the Minstrel of the King; I’d rather jangle cap and bells than twang the stately harp; I’d rather make his royal ribs with belly-laughter ring, Than see him sitting in the suds and sulky as a carp. I’d rather be the Court buffoon than its most high-browed sage: So […]...
9. Ballade to Our Lady of Czestochowa I Lady and Queen and Mystery manifold And very Regent of the untroubled sky, Whom in a dream St. Hilda did behold And heard a woodland music passing by: You shall receive me when the clouds are high With evening and the sheep attain the fold. This is the faith that I have held and […]...
10. Old Ironsides Ay, tear her tattered ensign down! Long has it waved on high, And many an eye has danced to see That banner in the sky; Beneath it rung the battle shout, And burst the cannon’s roar; The meteor of the ocean air Shall sweep the clouds no more. Her deck, once red with heroes’ blood, […]...
11. The First Extra A Waltz Song. O sway, and swing, and sway, And swing, and sway, and swing! Ah me, what bliss like unto this, Can days and daylight bring? A rose beneath your feet Has fallen from my head; Its odour rises sweet, All crushed it lies, and dead. O Love is like a rose, Fair-hued, of […]...
12. Unfortunate Heart, you are restless as a paper scrap That’s tossed down dusty pavements by the wind; Saying, “She is most wise, patient and kind. Between the small hands folded in her lap Surely a shamed head may bow down at length, And find forgiveness where the shadows stir About her lips, and wisdom in her […]...
13. Room 5: The Concert Singer I’m one of these haphazard chaps Who sit in cafes drinking; A most improper taste, perhaps, Yet pleasant, to my thinking. For, oh, I hate discord and strife; I’m sadly, weakly human; And I do think the best of life Is wine and song and woman. Now, there’s that youngster on my right Who thinks […]...
14. The Song Of The Pacifist What do they matter, our headlong hates, when we take the toll of our Dead? Think ye our glory and gain will pay for the torrent of blood we have shed? By the cheers of our Victory will the heart of the mother be comforted? If by the Victory all we mean is a broken […]...
15. Indifference When I am dead I will not care Forever more, If sky be radiantly fair Or tempest roar. If my life-hoard in sin be spent, My wife re-wed, I’ll be so damned indifferent When I am dead. When I meet up with dusty doom What if I rest In common ditch or marble tomb, If […]...
16. A poor torn heart a tattered heart A poor torn heart a tattered heart That sat it down to rest Nor noticed that the Ebbing Day Flowed silver to the West Nor noticed Night did soft descend Nor Constellation burn Intent upon the vision Of latitudes unknown. The angels happening that way This dusty heart espied Tenderly took it up from toil […]...
17. The Truth of Woman Woman’s faith, and woman’s trust – Write the characters in the dust; Stamp them on the running stream, Print them on the moon’s pale beam, And each evanescent letter Shall be clearer, firmer, better, And more permanent, I ween, Than the thing those letters mean. I have strain’d the spider’s thread ‘Gainst the promise of […]...
18. Day And Night Through my heart’s palace Thoughts unnumbered throng; And there, most quiet and, as a child, most wise, High-throned you sit, and gracious. All day long Great Hopes gold-armoured, jester Fantasies, And pilgrim Dreams, and little beggar Sighs, Bow to your benediction, go their way. And the grave jewelled courtier Memories Worship and love and tend […]...
19. The Lament of the Border Cattle Thief O woe is me for the merry life I led beyond the Bar, And a treble woe for my winsome wife That weeps at Shalimar. They have taken away my long jezail, My shield and sabre fine, And heaved me into the Central jail For lifting of the kine. The steer may low within the […]...
20. Union and Liberty FLAG of the heroes who left us their glory, Borne through their battle-fields’ thunder and flame, Blazoned in song and illumined in story, Wave o’er us all who inherit their fame! Up with our banner bright, Sprinkled with starry light, Spread its fair emblems from mountain to shore, While through the sounding sky Loud rings […]...
21. The Allies August 14th, 1914 Into the brazen, burnished sky, the cry hurls itself. The Zigzagging cry Of hoarse throats, it floats against the hard winds, and binds the Head Of the serpent to its tail, the long snail-slow serpent of marching Men. Men weighed down with rifles and knapsacks, and parching with war. The cry jars […]...
22. Leave This Leave this chanting and singing and telling of beads! Whom dost thou worship in this lonely dark corner of a temple with doors all shut? Open thine eyes and see thy God is not before thee! He is there where the tiller is tilling the hard ground And where the pathmaker is breaking stones. He […]...
23. The Owners Of The Little Box Line the inside of the little box With your precious skin And make yourself cozy Just as you would in your own home Make space voyages inside her Gather stars make time squirt its milk And sleep in the clouds Just don’t go around pretending You’re more important than her length And wiser than her […]...
24. O Lovely Lie I told a truth, a tragic truth That tore the sullen sky; A million shuddered at my sooth And anarchist was I. Red righteousness was in my word To winnow evil chaff; Yet while I swung crusading sword I heard the devil laugh. I framed a lie, a rainbow lie To glorify a thought; And […]...
25. Sardis (Revelations, iii. 1-6) “Write to Sardis,” saith the Lord, “And write what He declares, He whose Spirit, and whose word, Upholds the seven stars: All thy works and ways I search, Find thy zeal and love decay’d; Thou art call’d a living church, But thou art cold and dead. “Watch, remember, seek, and strive, Exert […]...
26. The Lonely God So Eden was deserted, and at eve Into the quiet place God came to grieve. His face was sad, His hands hung slackly down Along his robe; too sorrowful to frown He paced along the grassy paths and through The silent trees, and where the flowers grew Tended by Adam. All the birds had gone […]...
27. The Little Box The little box gets her first teeth And her little length Little width little emptiness And all the rest she has The little box continues growing The cupboard that she was inside Is now inside her And she grows bigger bigger bigger Now the room is inside her And the house and the city and […]...
28. The Wife of Flanders Low and brown barns, thatched and repatched and tattered, Where I had seven sons until to-day, A little hill of hay your spur has scattered. . . . This is not Paris. You have lost your way. You, staring at your sword to find it brittle, Surprised at the surprise that was your plan, Who, […]...
29. The Oldest Song “These were never your true love’s eyes. Why do you feign that you love them? You that broke from their constancies, And the wide calm brows above them! This was never your true love’s speech. Why do you thrill when you hear it? You that have ridden out of its reach The width of the […]...
30. Conqueror Though I defy the howling horde As bloody-browed I smite, Back to the wall with shattered sword When darkly dooms the night; Though hoarse they cheer as I go down Before their bitter odds, ‘Tis I who win the victor’s crown, The guerdon of the gods. For all who fall in fearless fight Alight a […]...
31. Hymn of the Moravian Nuns of Bethlehem at the Consecration of Pulaski's Banner When the dying flame of day Through the chancel shot its ray, Far the glimmering tapers shed Faint light on the cowled head; And the censer burning swung, Where, before the altar, hung The crimson banner, that with prayer Had been consecrated there. And the nuns’ sweet hymn was heard the while, Sung low, in […]...
32. Carbonara eyes Nicky said I couldn’t write, she’s got a charming Sense of social etiquette – given she’s a bitch (the canine sort, can’t spell for shit or even write A word) but then she has the most expressive eyes. So what she said was no surprise, she’d heard My lamentations, licked my hands, rested forepaws On […]...
33. The Wreck of the Golfer It was the Bondi golfing man Drove off from the golf house tee, And he had taken his little daughter To bear him company. “Oh, Father, why do you swing the club And flourish it such a lot?” “You watch it fly o’er the fences high!” And he tried with a brassey shot. “Oh, Father, […]...
34. On Behalf of Some Irishmen not Followers of Tradition THEY call us aliens, we are told, Because our wayward visions stray From that dim banner they unfold, The dreams of worn-out yesterday. The sum of all the past is theirs, The creeds, the deeds, the fame, the name, Whose death-created glory flares And dims the spark of living flame. They weave the necromancer’s spell, […]...
35. Unlyric Love Song It is time to give that-of-myself which I could not at first: To offer you now at last my least and my worst: Minor, absurd preserves, The shell’s end-curves, A document kept at the back of a drawer, A tin hidden under the floor, Recalcitrant prides and hesitations: To pile them carefully in a desparate […]...
36. Sonnet 76: Why is my verse so barren of new pride? Why is my verse so barren of new pride? So far from variation or quick change? Why with the time do I not glance aside To new-found methods, and to compounds strange? Why write I still all one, ever the same, And keep invention in a noted weed, That every word doth almost tell my […]...
37. The Witch's Life When I was a child There was an old woman in our neighborhood whom we called The Witch. All day she peered from her second story Window From behind the wrinkled curtains And sometimes she would open the window And yell: Get out of my life! She had hair like kelp And a voice like […]...
38. Dedication To Joseph Mazzini Take, since you bade it should bear, These, of the seed of your sowing, Blossom or berry or weed. Sweet though they be not, or fair, That the dew of your word kept growing, Sweet at least was the seed. Men bring you love-offerings of tears, And sorrow the kiss that assuages, And slaves the […]...
39. Poet's Path My garden hath a slender path With ivy overgrown, A secret place where once would pace A pot all alone; I see him now with fretted brow, Plunged deep in thought; And sometimes he would write maybe, And sometimes he would not. A verse a day he used to say Keeps worry from the door; […]...
40. The Defeated Think not because you raise A gleaming sword, That you will win to praise Before the Lord. And though men hail you great Unto the skies, Deem not ’twill ope’ the gate Of Paradise. Though you have gold and gear And fame and power, What odds when you draw near The Judgement Hour? But if […]...