Kings Must Die

Related poetry:

1. The Missal Makers To visit the Escurial We took a motor bus, And there a guide mercurial Took charge of us. He showed us through room after room, And talked hour after hour, Of place, crypt and royal tomb, Of pomp and power. But in bewilderment of grace What pleased me most of all Were ancient missals proud […]...
2. 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 […]...
3. Kings (For the Rev. James B. Dollard) The Kings of the earth are men of might, And cities are burned for their delight, And the skies rain death in the silent night, And the hills belch death all day! But the King of Heaven, Who made them all, Is fair and gentle, and very small; He […]...
4. The Three Kings Three Kings came riding from far away, Melchior and Gaspar and Baltasar; Three Wise Men out of the East were they, And they travelled by night and they slept by day, For their guide was a beautiful, wonderful star. The star was so beautiful, large, and clear, That all the other stars of the sky […]...
5. The Two Kings King Eochaid came at sundown to a wood Westward of Tara. Hurrying to his queen He had outridden his war-wasted men That with empounded cattle trod the mire, And where beech-trees had mixed a pale green light With the ground-ivy’s blue, he saw a stag Whiter than curds, its eyes the tint of the sea. […]...
6. From: A King Of Kings, A King Among The Kings Come, let us rejoice in James Joyce, in the greatness of this poet, king, and king of poets For he is our poor dead king, he is the monarch and Caesar of English, he is the veritable King of the King’s English The English of the life of the city, and the English of music; […]...
7. Requiem for the Plantagenet Kings For whom the possessed sea littered, on both shores, Ruinous arms; being fired, and for good, To sound the constitution of just wards, Men, in their eloquent fashion, understood. Relieved of soul, the dropping-back of dust, Their usage, pride, admitted within doors; At home, under caved chantries, set in trust, With well-dressed alabaster and proved […]...
8. A Curse for Kings A curse upon each king who leads his state, No matter what his plea, to this foul game, And may it end his wicked dynasty, And may he die in exile and black shame. If there is vengeance in the Heaven of Heavens, What punishment could Heaven devise for these Who fill the rivers of […]...
9. Beggars And Kings In the evening All the hours that weren’t used Are emptied out And the beggars are waiting to gather them up To open them To find the sun in each one And teach it its beggar’s name And sing to it It is well Through the night But each of us Has his own kingdom […]...
10. Remarks About Kings “God said I am tired of kings.” EMERSON God said, “I am tired of kings,” But that was a long while ago! And meantime man said, “No, I like their looks in their robes and rings.” So he crowned a few more, And they went on playing the game as before, Fighting and spoiling things. […]...
11. Alexandrian Kings The Alexandrians were gathered To see Cleopatra’s children, Caesarion, and his little brothers, Alexander and Ptolemy, whom for the first Time they lead out to the Gymnasium, There to proclaim kings, In front of the grand assembly of the soldiers. Alexander they named him king Of Armenia, Media, and the Parthians. Ptolemy they named him […]...
12. The City of Perth Beautiful Ancient City of Perth, One of the fairest on the earth, With your stately mansions and scenery most fine, Which seems very beautiful in the summer time; And the beautiful silvery Tay, Rolling smoothly on its way, And glittering like silver in the sunshine – And the Railway Bridge across it is really sublime. […]...
13. My Cross I wrote a poem to the moon But no one noticed it; Although I hoped that late or soon Someone would praise a bit Its purity and grace forlone, Its beauty tulip-cool… But as my poem died still-born, I felt a fool. I wrote a verse of vulgar trend Spiced with an oath or two; […]...
14. I noticed People disappeared I noticed People disappeared When but a little child Supposed they visited remote Or settled Regions wild But did because they died A Fact withheld the little child...
15. The End of the World Here, at the end of the world, The flowers bleed As if they were hearts, The hearts ooze a darkness Like india ink, & poets dip their pens in & they write. “Here, at the end of the world,” They write, Not knowing what it means. “Here, where the sky nurses on black milk, Where […]...
16. Moonlight As a pale phantom with a lamp Ascends some ruin’s haunted stair, So glides the moon along the damp Mysterious chambers of the air. Now hidden in cloud, and now revealed, As if this phantom, full of pain, Were by the crumbling walls concealed, And at the windows seen again. Until at last, serene and […]...
17. A Western Ballad When I died, love, when I died My heart was broken in your care; I never suffered love so fair As now I suffer and abide When I died, love, when I died. When I died, love, when I died I wearied in an endless maze That men have walked for centuries, As endless as […]...
18. The Ghost Of The Past We two kept house, the Past and I, The Past and I; I tended while it hovered nigh, Leaving me never alone. It was a spectral housekeeping Where fell no jarring tone, As strange, as still a housekeeping As ever has been known. As daily I went up the stair, And down the stair, I […]...
19. The Dove of Dacca 1892 The freed dove flew to the Rajah’s tower Fled from the slaughter of Moslem kings And the thorns have covered the city of Guar. Dove dove oh, homing dove! Little white traitor, with woe on thy wings! The Rajah of Dacca rode under the wall; He set in his bosom a dove of flight […]...
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. Ode To Pornography If you could write down the words Moving through a man’s mind as He masturbates you’d have a quick Bonus bonk read, I used to think. But words were never adequate Or the point in the bar where the girl Is a boy the boy is a girl the two girls Exchange underpants the one […]...
22. 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; […]...
23. A Martian Sends A Postcard Home Caxtons are mechanical birds with many wings And some are treasured for their markings They cause the eyes to melt Or the body to shriek without pain. I have never seen one fly, but Sometimes they perch on the hand. Mist is when the sky is tired of flight And rests its soft machine on […]...
24. The Search Happiness, a-roving round For a sweet abiding place, In a stately palace found Symmetry and gilded grace; Courtliness and table cheer, All that chimes with evening dress. . . “I could never stick it here,” Swift decided Happiness. Happiness a-seeking still, In a mansion of the town, Comfort-crammed to overspill, Sought in vain to settle […]...
25. Thrushes Tossed on the glittering air they soar and skim, Whose voices make the emptiness of light A windy palace. Quavering from the brim Of dawn, and bold with song at edge of night, They clutch their leafy pinnacles and sing Scornful of man, and from his toils aloof Whose heart’s a haunted woodland whispering; Whose […]...
26. To My Wife – With A Copy Of My Poems I can write no stately proem As a prelude to my lay; From a poet to a poem I would dare to say. For if of these fallen petals One to you seem fair, Love will waft it till it settles On your hair. And when wind and winter harden All the loveless land, It […]...
27. To Eva O Fair and stately maid, whose eye Was kindled in the upper sky At the same torch that lighted mine; For so I must interpret still Thy sweet dominion o’er my will, A sympathy divine. Ah! let me blameless gaze upon Features that seem in heart my own, Nor fear those watchful sentinels Which charm […]...
28. 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 […]...
29. Buckingham Palace They’re changing guard at Buckingham Palace – Christopher Robin went down with Alice. Alice is marrying one of the guard. “A soldier’s life is terrible hard,” Says Alice. They’re changing guard at Buckingham Palace – Christopher Robin went down with Alice. We saw a guard in a sentry-box. “One of the sergeants looks after their […]...
30. Worldly Place Even in a palace, life may be led well! So spake the imperial sage, purest of men, Marcus Aurelius. But the stifling den Of common life, where, crowded up pell-mell, Our freedom for a little bread we sell, And drudge under some foolish master’s ken Who rates us if we peer outside our pen Match’d […]...
31. Authorship You say that father write a lot of books, but what he write I don’t Understand. He was reading to you all the evening, but could you really Make out what he meant? What nice stores, mother, you can tell us! Why can’t father Write like that, I wonder? Did he never hear from his […]...
32. The Wife “Tell Annie I’ll be home in time To help her with her Christmas-tree.” That’s what he wrote, and hark! the chime Of Christmas bells, and where is he? And how the house is dark and sad, And Annie’s sobbing on my knee! The page beside the candle-flame With cruel type was overfilled; I read and […]...
33. Madam Life's a Piece in Bloom Madam Life’s a piece in bloom Death goes dogging everywhere: She’s the tenant of the room, He’s the ruffian on the stair. You shall see her as a friend, You shall bilk him once or twice; But he’ll trap you in the end, And he’ll stick you for her price. With his kneebones at your […]...
34. Rome at the Pyramid of Cestius Near the Graves of Shelley and Keats Who, then, was Cestius, And what is he to me? – Amid thick thoughts and memories multitudinous One thought alone brings he. I can recall no word Of anything he did; For me he is a man who died and was interred To leave a pyramid Whose purpose was exprest Not with its first design, […]...
35. I died for Beauty but was scarce I died for Beauty but was scarce Adjusted in the Tomb When One who died for Truth, was lain In an adjoining room He questioned softly “Why I failed”? “For Beauty”, I replied “And I for Truth Themself are One We Brethren, are”, He said And so, as Kinsmen, met a Night We talked between […]...
36. Block City What are you able to build with your blocks? Castles and palaces, temples and docks. Rain may keep raining, and others go roam, But I can be happy and building at home. Let the sofa be mountains, the carpet be sea, There I’ll establish a city for me: A kirk and a mill and a […]...
37. Kathleen It was the steamer Alice May that sailed the Yukon foam. And touched in every river camp from Dawson down to Nome. It was her builder, owner, pilot, Captain Silas Geer, Who took her through the angry ice, the last boat of the year; Who patched her cracks with gunny sacks and wound her pipes […]...
38. A Rhyme of Death’s Inn A rhyme of good Death’s inn! My love came to that door; And she had need of many things, The way had been so sore. My love she lifted up her head, “And is there room?” said she; “There was no room in Bethlehem’s inn For Christ who died for me.” But said the keeper […]...
39. The Mountain Sprite In yonder valley there dwelt, alone, A youth, whose moments had calmly flown, ‘Till spells came o’er him, and, day and night, He was haunted and watch’d by a Mountain Sprite. As once, by moonlight, he wander’d o’er The golden sands of that Island shore, A foot-print sparkled before his sight ‘Twas the fairy foot […]...
40. The Man Who Was Away The widow sought the lawyer’s room with children three in tow, She told the lawyer man her tale in tones of deepest woe. She said, “My husband took to drink for pains in his inside, And never drew a sober breath from then until he died. “He never drew a sober breath, he died without […]...