My Tails

Related poetry:

1. A Shropshire Lad The gas was on in the Institute, The flare was up in the gym, A man was running a mineral line, A lass was singing a hymn, When Captain Webb the Dawley man, Captain Webb from Dawley, Came swimming along the old canal That carried the bricks to Lawley. Swimming along – Swimming along – […]...
2. The Portrait My mother never forgave my father For killing himself, Especially at such an awkward time And in a public park, That spring When I was waiting to be born. She locked his name In her deepest cabinet And would not let him out, Though I could hear him thumping. When I came down from the […]...
3. Washerwife The aged Queen who passed away Had sixty servants, so they say; Twice sixty hands her shoes to tie: Two soapy ones have I. The old Queen had of beds a score; A cot have I and ask no more. For when the last is said and done One can but die in one. The […]...
4. Beast, Book, Body I was sick of being a woman, Sick of the pain, The irrelevant detail of sex, My own concavity Uselessly hungering And emptier whenever it was filled, And filled finally By its own emptiness, Seeking the garden of solitude Instead of men. The white bed In the green garden I looked forward To sleeping alone […]...
5. Swan Song A bunch of old snakeheads down by the pond Carrying on the swan tradition hissing Inside their white bodies, raising and lowering their heads Like ostriches, regretting only the sad ritual That forced them to waddle back into the water After their life under the rocks, wishing they could lie again in the sun And […]...
6. Blue dress i can see through the blue Dress when you stand In the doorway – the light Come indoors softly like A cat between your legs When you walk and The dress flows Over the curved pebble Of your belly into The blue pool my eye Is already there Waiting for the ripple I have the […]...
7. October The forest holds high carnival to-day, And every hill-side glows with gold and fire; Ivy and sumac dress in colors gay, And oak and maple mask in bright attire. The hoarded wealth of sober autumn days In lavish mood for motley garb is spent, And nature for the while at folly plays, Knowing the morrow […]...
8. 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 […]...
9. The Press “The Village That Voted the Earth Was Flat” A Diversity of Creatures The Soldier may forget his Sword, The Sailorman the Sea, The Mason may forget the Word And the Priest his Litany: The Maid may forget both jewel and gem, And the Bride her wedding-dress But the Jew shall forget Jerusalem Ere we forget […]...
10. How Yesterday Looked THE HIGH horses of the sea broke their white riders On the walls that held and counted the hours The wind lasted. Two landbirds looked on and the north and the east Looked on and the wind poured cups of foam And the evening began. The old men in the shanties looked on and lit […]...
11. All My Pretty Ones Father, this year’s jinx rides us apart Where you followed our mother to her cold slumber; A second shock boiling its stone to your heart, Leaving me here to shuffle and disencumber You from the residence you could not afford: A gold key, your half of a woolen mill, Twenty suits from Dunne’s, an English […]...
12. 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 […]...
13. Reverence I saw the Greatest Man on Earth, Aye, saw him with my proper eyes. A loin-cloth spanned his proper girth, But he was naked otherwise, Excepting for his grey sombrero; And when his domelike head he bared, With reverence I stared and stared, As mummified as any Pharaoh. He leaned upon a little cane, A […]...
14. Portia (To Ellen Terry) I marvel not Bassanio was so bold To peril all he had upon the lead, Or that proud Aragon bent low his head Or that Morocco’s fiery heart grew cold: For in that gorgeous dress of beaten gold Which is more golden than the golden sun No woman Veronese looked upon Was […]...
15. The Moon is a Painter He coveted her portrait. He toiled as she grew gay. She loved to see him labor In that devoted way. And in the end it pleased her, But bowed him more with care. Her rose-smile showed so plainly, Her soul-smile was not there. That night he groped without a lamp To find a cloak, a […]...
16. The Bullfinches Bother Bulleys, let us sing From the dawn till evening! – For we know not that we go not When the day’s pale pinions fold Unto those who sang of old. When I flew to Blackmoor Vale, Whence the green-gowned faeries hail, Roosting near them I could hear them Speak of queenly Nature’s ways, Means, […]...
17. Finery In an elegant frock, trimm’d with beautiful lace, And hair nicely curl’d, hanging over her face, Young Fanny went out to the house of a friend, With a large little party the evening to spend. “Ah! how they will all be delighted, I guess, And stare with surprise at my handsome new dress!” Thus said […]...
18. Lullaby It is a summer evening. The yellow moths sag Against the locked screens And the faded curtains Suck over the window sills And from another building A goat calls in his dreams. This is the TV parlor In the best ward at Bedlam. The night nurse is passing Out the evening pills. She walks on […]...
19. Kail Yard Bard A very humble pen I ply Beneath a cottage thatch; And in the sunny hours I try To till my cabbage patch; And in the gloaming glad am I To lift the latch. I do not plot to pile up pelf, With jowl and belly fat; To simple song I give myself, And seek no […]...
20. Annus Mirabilis Sexual intercourse began In nineteen sixty-three (which was rather late for me) – Between the end of the Chatterley ban And the Beatles’ first LP. Up to then there’d only been A sort of bargaining, A wrangle for the ring, A shame that started at sixteen And spread to everything. Then all at once the […]...
21. Sonnet XCVIII From you have I been absent in the spring, When proud-pied April dress’d in all his trim Hath put a spirit of youth in every thing, That heavy Saturn laugh’d and leap’d with him. Yet nor the lays of birds nor the sweet smell Of different flowers in odour and in hue Could make me […]...
22. The Hat In city shop a hat I saw That to my fancy seemed to strike, I gave my wage to buy the straw, And make myself a one the like. I wore it to the village fair; Oh proud I was, though poor was I. The maids looked at me with a stare, The lads looked […]...
23. Hands There was a road that leads him to go to find A certain time where he sits. Smokes quietly in the evening by the four legged Table wagging its (well why not) tail, friendly Chap. Hears footsteps, looks to find his own feet gone. The road absorbs everything with rumors of sleep. And then he […]...
24. The Gardener LXXXI: Why Do You Whisper So Faintly Why do you whisper so faintly in My ears, O Death, my Death? When the flowers droop in the Evening and cattle come back to their Stalls, you stealthily come to my side And speak words that I do not Understand. Is this how you must woo and win Me with the opiate of drowsy […]...
25. May 26 In Rotterdam I’m Going to speak about The state of poetry On a panel with a Pole And a Turk. It’s worth Being alive to utter That sentence. A German from Furth, My father’s home town And Henry Kissinger’s, Will preside. His name Is Joachim Sartorius, Which sounds like a Pseudonym Kierkegaard Might use to […]...
26. On A Portrait Of Wordsworth WORDSWORTH upon Helvellyn! Let the cloud Ebb audibly along the mountain-wind, Then break against the rock, and show behind The lowland valleys floating up to crowd The sense with beauty. He with forehead bowed And humble-lidded eyes, as one inclined Before the sovran thought of his own mind, And very meek with inspirations proud, Takes […]...
27. The Ragged Wood O hurry where by water among the trees The delicate-stepping stag and his lady sigh, When they have but looked upon their images – Would none had ever loved but you and I! Or have you heard that sliding silver-shoed Pale silver-proud queen-woman of the sky, When the sun looked out of his golden hood? […]...
28. FLOWER-SALUTE THIS nosegay, ’twas I dress’d it, Greets thee a thousand times! Oft stoop’d I, and caress’d it, Ah! full a thousand times, And ‘gainst my bosom press’d it A hundred thousand times! 1815.*...
29. The Municipal Gallery Revisited I Around me the images of thirty years: An ambush; pilgrims at the water-side; Casement upon trial, half hidden by the bars, Guarded; Griffith staring in hysterical pride; Kevin O’Higgins’ countenance that wears A gentle questioning look that cannot hide A soul incapable of remorse or rest; A revolutionary soldier kneeling to be blessed; II […]...
30. Morning O’ER fallow plains and fertile meads, AURORA lifts the torch of day; The shad’wy brow of Night recedes, Cold dew-drops fall from every spray; Now o’er the thistle’s rugged head, Thin veils of filmy vapour fly, On ev’ry violet’s perfum’d bed The sparkling gems of Nature lie. The hill’s tall brow is crown’d with gold, […]...
31. Fulfilment I sing of starry dreams come true, Of hopes fulfilled; Of rich reward beyond my due, Of harvest milled. The full fruition of the years Is mine to hold, And in despite of toil and tears The sun is gold. I have no hate for any one On this good earth; My days of hardihood […]...
32. A Song Of Sixty-Five Brave Thackeray has trolled of days when he was twenty-one, And bounded up five flights of stairs, a gallant garreteer; And yet again in mellow vein when youth was gaily run, Has dipped his nose in Gascon wine, and told of Forty Year. But if I worthy were to sing a richer, rarer time, I’d […]...
33. Burial of the Minnisink On sunny slope and beechen swell, The shadowed light of evening fell; And, where the maple’s leaf was brown, With soft and silent lapse came down, The glory, that the wood receives, At sunset, in its golden leaves. Far upward in the mellow light Rose the blue hills. One cloud of white, Around a far […]...
34. AN EPITAPH UPON A CHILD Virgins promised when I died, That they would each primrose-tide Duly, morn and evening, come, And with flowers dress my tomb. Having promised, pay your debts Maids, and here strew violets....
35. Recorders Ages Hence RECORDERS ages hence! Come, I will take you down underneath this impassive exterior-I will tell you what to say of me; Publish my name and hang up my picture as that of the tenderest lover, The friend, the lover’s portrait, of whom his friend, his lover, was fondest, Who was not proud of his songs, […]...
36. Success You ask me what I call Success – It is, I wonder, Happiness? It is not wealth, it is not fame, Nor rank, nor power nor honoured name. It is not triumph in the Arts – Best-selling books or leading parts. It is not plaudits of the crowd, The flame of flags, processions proud. The […]...
37. Finnigan's Finish They thought I’d be a champion; They boasted loud of me. A dozen victories I’d won, The Press was proud of me. I saw myself with glory crowned, And would, beyond a doubt, Till last night in the second round A Dago knocked me out. It must have been an accident; I cannot understand. For […]...
38. The Glass On The Bar Three bushmen one morning rode up to an inn, And one of them called for the drinks with a grin; They’d only returned from a trip to the North, And, eager to greet them, the landlord came forth. He absently poured out a glass of Three Star. And set down that drink with the rest […]...
39. Like eyes that looked on Wastes Like eyes that looked on Wastes Incredulous of Ought But Blank and steady Wilderness Diversified by Night Just Infinites of Nought As far as it could see So looked the face I looked upon So looked itself on Me I offered it no Help Because the Cause was Mine The Misery a Compact As hopeless […]...
40. Freethinker Although the Preacher be a bore, The Atheist is even more. I ain’t religious worth a damn; My views are reckoned to be broad; And yet I shut up like a clam When folks get figgerin’ on God; I’d hate my kids to think like me, And though they leave me in the lurch, I’m […]...