My Son

Related poetry:

1. Portent Courage mes gars: La guerre est proche. I plant my little plot of beans, I sit beneath my cyprus tree; I do not know what trouble means, I cultivate tranquillity. . . But as to-day my walk I made In all serenity and cheer, I saw cut in an agave blade: “Courage, my comrades, war […]...
2. Suzanne Suzanne takes you down to her place near the river You can hear the boats go by You can spend the night beside her And you know that she’s half crazy But that’s why you want to be there And she feeds you tea and oranges That come all the way from China And just […]...
3. MacGregor's Gathering The moon’s on the lake, and the mist’s on the brae, And the Clan has a name that is nameless by day; Then gather, gather, gather, Grigalach! Gather, gather, gather, &c. Our signal for fight, that from monarchs we drew, Must be heard but by night in our vengeful haloo! Then haloo, Grigalach! haloo, Grigalach! […]...
4. The Titanic Forth flashed the serpent streak of steel, Consummate crown of man’s device; Down crashed upon an immobile And brainless barrier of ice. Courage! The grey gods shoot a laughing lip: – Let not faith founder with the ship! We reel before the blows of fate; Our stout souls stagger at the shock. Oh! there is […]...
5. Parting THERE’S no use in weeping, Though we are condemned to part: There’s such a thing as keeping A remembrance in one’s heart: There’s such a thing as dwelling On the thought ourselves have nurs’d, And with scorn and courage telling The world to do its worst. We’ll not let its follies grieve us, We’ll just […]...
6. Work When twenty-one I loved to dream, And was to loafing well inclined; Somehow I couldn’t get up steam To welcome work of any kind. While students burned the midnight lamp, With dour ambition as their goad, I longed to be a gayful tramp And greet adventure on the road. But now that sixty years have […]...
7. The Fledgling So, art thou feahered, art thou flown, Thou naked thing?-and canst alone Upon the unsolid summer air Sustain thyself, and prosper there? Shall no more with anxious note Advise thee through the happy day, Thrusting the worm into thy throat, Bearing thine excrement away? Alas, I think I see thee yet, Perched on the windy […]...
8. To One denied the drink To One denied the drink To tell what Water is Would be acuter, would it not Than letting Him surmise? To lead Him to the Well And let Him hear it drip Remind Him, would it not, somewhat Of His condemned lip?...
9. Hiawathas' photographing ( Part II ) First the Governor, the Father: He suggested velvet curtains Looped about a massy pillar; And the corner of a table, Of a rosewood dining-table. He would hold a scroll of something, Hold it firmly in his left-hand; He would keep his right-hand buried (Like Napoleon) in his waistcoat; He would contemplate the distance With a […]...
10. The Old Stoic Riches I hold in light esteem, And love I laugh to scorn; And lust of fame was but a dream That vanish’d with the morn: And if I pray, the only prayer That moves my lips for me Is, “Leave the heart that now I bear, And give me liberty!” Yes, as my swift days […]...
11. A Dream Within A Dream Take this kiss upon the brow! And, in parting from you now, Thus much let me avow You are not wrong, who deem That my days have been a dream; Yet if hope has flown away In a night, or in a day, In a vision, or in none, Is it therefore the less gone? […]...
12. In Ebon Box, when years have flown In Ebon Box, when years have flown To reverently peer, Wiping away the velvet dust Summers have sprinkled there! To hold a letter to the light Grown Tawny now, with time To con the faded syllables That quickened us like Wine! Perhaps a Flower’s shrivelled check Among its stores to find Plucked far away, some […]...
13. Love's Vicissitudes AS Love and Hope together Walk by me for a while, Link-armed the ways they travel For many a pleasant mile – Link-armed and dumb they travel, They sing not, but they smile. Hope leaving, Love commences To practise on the lute; And as he sings and travels With lingering, laggard foot, Despair plays obligato […]...
14. Psalm 71 part 2 v.14-16,22-24 C. M. Christ our strength and righteousness. My Savior, my almighty Friend, When I begin thy praise, Where will the growing numbers end, The numbers of thy grace? Thou art my everlasting trust, Thy goodness I adore; And since I knew thy graces first, I speak thy glories more. My feet shall travel all […]...
15. I have a Bird in spring I have a Bird in spring Which for myself doth sing The spring decoys. And as the summer nears And as the Rose appears, Robin is gone. Yet do I not repine Knowing that Bird of mine Though flown Learneth beyond the sea Melody new for me And will return. Fast is a safer hand […]...
16. Courage It is in the small things we see it. The child’s first step, As awesome as an earthquake. The first time you rode a bike, Wallowing up the sidewalk. The first spanking when your heart Went on a journey all alone. When they called you crybaby Or poor or fatty or crazy And made you […]...
17. Nature Full of rebellion, I would die, Or fight, or travel, or deny That thou has aught to do with me. O tame my heart; It is thy highest art To captivate strong holds to thee. If thou shalt let this venom lurk, And in suggestions fume and work, My soul will turn to bubbles straight, […]...
18. The Ballad of the Carpet Bag Ho! Darkies, don’t you hear dose voters cryin’ Pack dat carpet bag! You must get to de Poll, you must get there flyin’; Pack dat carpet bag! You must travel by de road, you must travel by de train, And the things what you’ve done you will have to explain, And the things what you’ve […]...
19. Answers Why did you travel? Because the house was cold. Why did you travel? Because it is what I have always done between sunset and sunrise. What did you wear? I wore a blue suit, a white shirt, yellow tie, and yellow socks. What did you wear? I wore nothing. A scarf of pain kept me […]...
20. The Prisoner Upspoke the culprit at the bar, Conducting his own case: ‘Your Lordship, I have gone to far, But grant me of your grace. As I was passing by a shop I saw my arm go out, And though I begged of it to stop, It stole beyond a doubt. ‘But why should my whole body […]...
21. Back From Australia Cocooned in Time, at this inhuman height, The packaged food tastes neutrally of clay, We never seem to catch the running day But travel on in everlasting night With all the chic accoutrements of flight: Lotions and essences in neat array And yet another plastic cup and tray. “Thank you so much. Oh no, I’m […]...
22. Reading Moby-Dick at 30,000 Feet At this height, Kansas Is just a concept, A checkerboard design of wheat and corn No larger than the foldout section Of my neighbor’s travel magazine. At this stage of the journey I would estimate the distance Between myself and my own feelings Is roughly the same as the mileage From Seattle to New York, […]...
23. This Consciousness that is aware This Consciousness that is aware Of Neighbors and the Sun Will be the one aware of Death And that itself alone Is traversing the interval Experience between And most profound experiment Appointed unto Men How adequate unto itself Its properties shall be Itself unto itself and none Shall make discovery. Adventure most unto itself The […]...
24. The Damned My days are haunted by the thought Of men in coils of Justice caught With stone and steel, in chain and cell, Of men condemned to living hell, Yet blame them not. In my sun-joy their dark I see: For what they are and had to be Blame Nature, red in tooth and claw, Blame […]...
25. Lines from I’d rather have my verses win A place in common people’s hearts, Who, toiling through the strife and din Of life’s great thoroughfares, and marts, May read some line my hand has penned; Some simple verse, not fine, or grand, But what their hearts can understand And hold me henceforth as a friend, I’d rather […]...
26. Halloween The butcher knife goes in, first, at the top And carves out the round stemmed lid, The hole of which allows the hand to go In to pull the gooey mess inside, out – The walls scooped clean with a spoon. A grim design decided on, that afternoon, The eyes are the first to go, […]...
27. The Abnormal Is Not Courage The Poles rode out from Warsaw against the German Tanks on horses. Rode knowing, in sunlight, with sabers, A magnitude of beauty that allows me no peace. And yet this poem would lessen that day. Question The bravery. Say it’s not courage. Call it a passion. Would say courage isn’t that. Not at its best. […]...
28. The Forest Path Oh, the charm of idle dreaming Where the dappled shadows dance, All the leafy aisles are teeming With the lure of old romance! Down into the forest dipping, Deep and deeper as we go, One might fancy dryads slipping Where the white-stemmed birches grow. Lurking gnome and freakish fairy In the fern may peep and […]...
29. Dream Song 100: How this woman came by the courage How this woman came by the courage, how she got The courage, Henry bemused himself in a frantic hot Night of the eight of July, Where it came from, did once the Lord frown down Upon her ancient cradle thinking ‘This one Will do before she die For two and seventy years of chipped indignities […]...
30. I Am Poem by Anne-Marie Derése, translated by Judith Skillman. I am the red brand On the shoulder of the condemned, The gallows and the rope, The ax and the block, The whip and the cross. I am the lion’s tooth In the flesh of the gazelle. In my veins I have The blood of the slave […]...
31. Cockspur Bush I am lived. I am died. I was two-leafed three times, and grazed, But then I was stemmed and multiplied, Sharp-thorned and caned, nested and raised, Earth-salt by sun-sugar. I was innerly sung By thrushes who need fear no eyed skin thing. Finched, ant-run, flowered, I am given the years In now fewer berries, now […]...
32. Aubade I work all day, and get half-drunk at night. Waking at four to soundless dark, I stare. In time the curtain-edges will grow light. Till then I see what’s really always there: Unresting death, a whole day nearer now, Making all thought impossible but how And where and when I shall myself die. Arid interrogation: […]...
33. The White House Your door is shut against my tightened face, And I am sharp as steel with discontent; But I possess the courage and the grace To bear my anger proudly and unbent. The pavement slabs burn loose beneath my feet, A chafing savage, down the decent street; And passion rends my vitals as I pass, Where […]...
34. Just Thinking Got up on a cool morning. Leaned out a window. No cloud, no wind. Air that flowers held For awhile. Some dove somewhere. Been on probation most of my life. And The rest of my life been condemned. So these moments Count for a lot peace, you know. Let the bucket of memory down into […]...
35. Don't fear death Don’t fear death in earthly travels. Don’t fear enemies or friends. Just listen to the words of prayers, To pass the facets of the dreads. Your death will come to you, and never You shall be, else, a slave of life, Just waiting for a dawn’s favor, From nights of poverty and strife. She’ll build […]...
36. To Lucasta on Going to the War – For the Fourth Time It doesn’t matter what’s the cause, What wrong they say we’re righting, A curse for treaties, bonds and laws, When we’re to do the fighting! And since we lads are proud and true, What else remains to do? Lucasta, when to France your man Returns his fourth time, hating war, Yet laughs as calmly as […]...
37. The Seekers FRIENDS and loves we have none, nor wealth nor blessed abode, But the hope of the City of God at the other end of the road. Not for us are content, and quiet, and peace of mind, For we go seeking a city that we shall never find. There is no solace on earth for […]...
38. The God Abandons Antony When suddenly, at midnight, you hear An invisible procession going by With exquisite music, voices, Don’t mourn your luck that’s failing now, Work gone wrong, your plans All proving deceptive don’t mourn them uselessly. As one long prepared, and graced with courage, Say goodbye to her, the Alexandria that is leaving. Above all, don’t fool […]...
39. On Quitting How much grit do you think you’ve got? Can you quit a thing that you like a lot? You may talk of pluck; it’s an easy word, And where’er you go it is often heard; But can you tell to a jot or guess Just how much courage you now possess? You may stand to […]...
40. Suicide's Stone Peace is the heir of dead desire, Whether abundance killed the cormorant In a happy hour, or sleep or death Drowned him deep in dreamy waters, Peace is the ashes of that fire, The heir of that king, the inn of that journey. This last and best and goal: we dead Hold it so tight […]...