The Damned

Related poetry:

1. AN ODE TO MY JAILED FRIEND Unmasked – The spirits’ face is a black hole Swallowing the celestial beauty Of the stars. Caged – The sentinel is crouched Subsumed in seething pain Not pain but anger of being guiltless Yet ‘guilty’ for being in jail. The cell – No crime equals its greasy grey walls Thickly dark with no grills for […]...
2. The Womb Up from the evil day Of wattle and of woad, Along man’s weary way Dark Pain has been the goad. Back from the age of stone, Within his brutish brain, What pleasure he has known Is ease from Pain. Behold in Pain the force That haled Man from the Pit, And set him such a […]...
3. To the maiden To the maiden The sea was blue meadow, Alive with little froth-people Singing. To the sailor, wrecked, The sea was dead grey walls Superlative in vacancy, Upon which nevertheless at fateful time Was written The grim hatred of nature....
4. Dream Song 265: I don't know one damned butterfly from another I don’t know one damned butterfly from another My ignorance of the stars is formidable, Also of dogs & ferns Except that around my house one destroys the other When I reckon up my real ignorance, pal, I mumble “many returns”— Next time it will be nature & Thoreau This time is Baudelaire if one […]...
5. The Place of the Damned All folks who pretend to religion and grace, Allow there’s a HELL, but dispute of the place: But, if HELL may by logical rules be defined The place of the damned – I’ll tell you my mind. Wherever the damned do chiefly abound, Most certainly there is HELL to be found: Damned poets, damned critics, […]...
6. A Toast to the Men Here’s to the men! Since Adam’s time They’ve always been the same; Whenever anything goes wrong, The woman is to blame. From early morn to late at night, The men fault-finders are; They blame us if they oversleep, Or if they miss a car. They blame us if, beneath the bed, Their collar buttons roll; […]...
7. A Word To The 'Elect&#039 You may rejoice to think yourselves secure; You may be grateful for the gift divine That grace unsought, which made your black hearts pure, And fits your earth-born souls in Heaven to shine. But, is it sweet to look around, and view Thousands excluded from that happiness, Which they deserved, at least, as much as […]...
8. A Word To The Calvinists You may rejoice to think yourselves secure, You may be grateful for the gift divine, That grace unsought which made your black hearts pure And fits your earthborn souls in Heaven to shine. But is it sweet to look around and view Thousands excluded from that happiness, Which they deserve at least as much as […]...
9. Hymn 1 A new song to the Lamb that was slain. Rev. 5:6-12 Behold the glories of the Lamb Amidst his Father’s throne; Prepare new honors for his name, And songs before unknown. Let elders worship at his feet, The church adore around, With vials full of odors sweet, And harps of sweeter sound. Those are the […]...
10. A Song Of Suicide Deeming that I were better dead, “How shall I kill myself?” I said. Thus mooning by the river Seine I sought extinction without pain, When on a bridge I saw a flash Of lingerie and heard a splash. . . So as I am a swimmer stout I plunged and pulled the poor wretch out. […]...
11. Just Think! Just think! some night the stars will gleam Upon a cold, grey stone, And trace a name with silver beam, And lo! ’twill be your own. That night is speeding on to greet Your epitaphic rhyme. Your life is but a little beat Within the heart of Time. A little gain, a little pain, A […]...
12. Million Man March Poem The night has been long, The wound has been deep, The pit has been dark, And the walls have been steep. Under a dead blue sky on a distant beach, I was dragged by my braids just beyond your reach. Your hands were tied, your mouth was bound, You couldn’t even call out my name. […]...
13. Psalm XXXIV: Lord, I Will Bless Thee Lord, I will bless thee all my days, Thy praise shall dwell upon my tongue; My soul shall glory in thy grace, While saints rejoice to hear the song. Come, magnify the Lord with me, Come, let us all exalt his name; I sought th’eternal God, and he Has not exposed my hope to shame. […]...
14. Guilty Of Dust up or down from the infinite C E N T E R B R I M M I N G at the winking rim of time The voice in my head said LOVE IS THE DISTANCE BETWEEN YOU AND WHAT YOU LOVE WHAT YOU LOVE IS YOUR FATE * Then I saw the parade of […]...
15. We say we say blame the teachers Don’t we send our young to school To be taught the simple rules For decent public-spirited behaviour Do we pay such crushing rates To have our children turned to louts We’re sick of all this fuss We say blame the teachers Or the preachers They’re all the same to us […]...
16. Finality When I am dead I will not care How future generations fare, For I will be so unaware. Though fields their slain has carpeted, And seas be salt with tears they shed, Not one I’ll waste, for I’ll be dead. Though atom bombs in ashes lay Their skyey cities of to-day, With carrion lips I […]...
17. A Wasted Illness Through vaults of pain, Enribbed and wrought with groins of ghastliness, I passed, and garish spectres moved my brain To dire distress. And hammerings, And quakes, and shoots, and stifling hotness, blent With webby waxing things and waning things As on I went. “Where lies the end To this foul way?” I asked with weakening […]...
18. I Stood With the Dead I Stood with the Dead, so forsaken and still: When dawn was grey I stood with the Dead. And my slow heart said, ‘You must kill, you must kill: ‘Soldier, soldier, morning is red’. On the shapes of the slain in their crumpled disgrace I stared for a while through the thin cold rain… ‘O […]...
19. Dead Love Dead love, by treason slain, lies stark, White as a dead stark-stricken dove: None that pass by him pause to mark Dead love. His heart, that strained and yearned and strove As toward the sundawn strives the lark, Is cold as all the old joy thereof. Dead men, re-risen from dust, may hark When rings […]...
20. The Passing Of The Year My glass is filled, my pipe is lit, My den is all a cosy glow; And snug before the fire I sit, And wait to feel the old year go. I dedicate to solemn thought Amid my too-unthinking days, This sober moment, sadly fraught With much of blame, with little praise. Old Year! upon the […]...
21. A shady friend for Torrid days A shady friend for Torrid days Is easier to find Than one of higher temperature For Frigid hour of Mind The Vane a little to the East Scares Muslin souls away If Broadcloth Hearts are firmer Than those of Organdy Who is to blame? The Weaver? Ah, the bewildering thread! The Tapestries of Paradise So […]...
22. Remorse For Any Death Free of memory and of hope, Limitless, abstract, almost future, The dead man is not a dead man: he is death. Like the God of the mystics, Of Whom anything that could be said must be denied, The dead one, alien everywhere, Is but the ruin and absence of the world. We rob him of […]...
23. Mirabeau Bridge Under Mirabeau Bridge runs the Seine And our loves Must I remember them Joy came always after pain Let arriving night explain Days fade I remain Arm in arm let us stay face to face While below The bridge at our hands passes With eternal regards the wave so slow Let arriving night explain Days […]...
24. The Earth Falls Down If I could blame it all on the weather, The snow like the cadaver’s table, The trees turned into knitting needles, The ground as hard as a frozen haddock, The pond wearing its mustache of frost. If I could blame conditions on that, If I could blame the hearts of strangers Striding muffled down the […]...
25. Wounded Is it not strange? A year ago to-day, With scarce a thought beyond the hum-drum round, I did my decent job and earned my pay; Was averagely happy, I’ll be bound. Ay, in my little groove I was content, Seeing my life run smoothly to the end, With prosy days in stolid labour spent, And […]...
26. The Other One “Gather around me, children dear; The wind is high and the night is cold; Closer, little ones, snuggle near; Let’s seek a story of ages old; A magic tale of a bygone day, Of lovely ladies and dragons dread; Come, for you’re all so tired of play, We’ll read till it’s time to go to […]...
27. A Mountain Revelry To wash and rinse our souls of their age-old sorrows, We drained a hundred jugs of wine. A splendid night it was. . . . In the clear moonlight we were loath to go to bed, But at last drunkenness overtook us; And we laid ourselves down on the empty mountain, The earth for pillow, […]...
28. A Year's Burden 1870 Fire and wild light of hope and doubt and fear, Wind of swift change, and clouds and hours that veer As the storm shifts of the tempestuous year; Cry wellaway, but well befall the right. Hope sits yet hiding her war-wearied eyes, Doubt sets her forehead earthward and denies, But fear brought hand to hand […]...
29. Don't Cheer Don’t cheer, damn you! Don’t cheer! Silence! Your bitterest tear Is fulsomely sweet to-day. . . . Down on your knees and pray. See, they sing as they go, Marching row upon row. Who will be spared to return, Sombre and starkly stern? Chaps whom we knew – s0 strange, Distant and dark with change; […]...
30. Cadmus and Harmonia Far, far from here, The Adriatic breaks in a warm bay Among the green Illyrian hills; and there The sunshine in the happy glens is fair, And by the sea, and in the brakes. The grass is cool, the sea-side air Buoyant and fresh, the mountain flowers More virginal and sweet than ours. And there, […]...
31. A Sight in Camp A SIGHT in camp in the day-break grey and dim, As from my tent I emerge so early, sleepless, As slow I walk in the cool fresh air, the path near by the hospital tent, Three forms I see on stretchers lying, brought out there, untended lying, Over each the blanket spread, ample brownish woollen […]...
32. Incantation A white well In a black cave; A bright shell In a dark wave. A white rose Black brambles hood; Smooth bright snows In a dark wood. A flung white glove In a dark fight; A white dove On a wild black night. A white door In a dark lane; A bright core To bitter […]...
33. Lament for Zenocrate Black is the beauty of the brightest day, The golden belle of heaven’s eternal fire, That danced with glory on the silver waves, Now wants the fuel that inflamed his beams: And all with faintness and for foul disgrace, He binds his temples with a frowning cloud, Ready to darken earth with endless night: Zenocrate […]...
34. Hymn 25 A vision of the Lamb. Rev. 5:6-9. All mortal vanities, begone, Nor tempt my eyes, nor tire my ears; Behold, amidst th’ eternal throne, A vision of the Lamb appears. [Glory his fleecy robe adorns, Marked with the bloody death he bore; Seven are his eyes, and seven his horns, To speak his wisdom and […]...
35. THE COLOSSUS (Goya, an old man in exile, looks at his self-portrait) A bull’s neck, still much needed, Deserving exile or the guillotine, ‘Because you are an artist we forgave you’, Thus his royal highness gave thanks, My fingers itching for brush and canvas, Floury cheeks and rouge, legs a donkey would be ashamed of, A wife […]...
36. To Frank Dodd Since four decades you’ve been to me Both Guide and Friend, I fondly hope you’ll always be, Right to the end; And though my rhymes you rarely scan (Oh, small the blame!) I joy that on this Page I can Inscribe your name....
37. To Leonide Massine in 'Cleopatra&#039 O beauty doomed and perfect for an hour, Leaping along the verge of death and night, You show me dauntless Youth that went to fight Four long years past, discovering pride and power. You die but in our dreams, who watch you fall Knowing that to-morrow you will dance again. But not to ebbing music […]...
38. The Raven Days Our hearths are gone out and our hearts are broken, And but the ghosts of homes to us remain, And ghastly eyes and hollow sighs give token From friend to friend of an unspoken pain. O Raven days, dark Raven days of sorrow, Bring to us in your whetted ivory beaks Some sign out of […]...
39. Song VI: Cherish Life that Abideth Love is enough: cherish life that abideth, Lest ye die ere ye know him, and curse and misname him; For who knows in what ruin of all hope he hideth, On what wings of the terror of darkness he rideth? And what is the joy of man’s life that ye blame him For his bliss […]...
40. Cinderella Cinderella in the street In a ragged gown, Sloven slippers on her feet, Shames our tidy town; Harsh her locks of ashen grey, Vapour vague her stare, By the curb this bitter day Selling papers there. Cinderella once was sweet, Fine and lily fair, Silver slippers on her feet, Ribands in her hair; Solid men […]...