The Prodigal Son

Related poetry:

1. A Performance At Hog Theater There was once a hog theater where hogs performed As men, had men been hogs. One hog said, I will be a hog in a field which has Found a mouse which is being eaten by the same hog Which is in the field and which has found the mouse, Which I am performing as […]...
2. The Junior God The Junior God looked from his place In the conning towers of heaven, And he saw the world through the span of space Like a giant golf-ball driven. And because he was bored, as some gods are, With high celestial mirth, He clutched the reins of a shooting star, And he steered it down to […]...
3. A Prodigal The brown enormous odor he lived by Was too close, with its breathing and thick hair, For him to judge. The floor was rotten; the sty Was plastered halfway up with glass-smooth dung. Light-lashed, self-righteous, above moving snouts, The pigs’ eyes followed him, a cheerful stare Even to the sow that always ate her young […]...
4. Alone With Everybody the flesh covers the bone And they put a mind In there and Sometimes a soul, And the women break Vases against the walls And the men drink too Much And nobody finds the One But keep Looking Crawling in and out Of beds. Flesh covers The bone and the Flesh searches For more than […]...
5. Lydia Puckett Knowlt Hoheimer ran away to the war The day before Curl Trenary Swore out a warrant through Justice Arnett For stealing hogs. But that’s not the reason he turned a soldier. He caught me running with Lucius Atherton. We quarreled and I told him never again To cross my path. Then he stole the hogs […]...
6. England's Answer Truly ye come of The Blood; slower to bless than to ban; Little used to lie down at the bidding of any man. Flesh of the flesh that I bred, bone of the bone that I bare; Stark as your sons shall be stern as your fathers were. Deeper than speech our love, stronger than […]...
7. Schroeder the Fisherman I sat on the bank above Bernadotte And dropped crumbs in the water, Just to see the minnows bump each other, Until the strongest got the prize. Or I went to my little pasture, Where the peaceful swine were asleep in the wallow, Or nosing each other lovingly, And emptied a basket of yellow corn, […]...
8. Before I Knocked Before I knocked and flesh let enter, With liquid hands tapped on the womb, I who was as shapeless as the water That shaped the Jordan near my home Was brother to Mnetha’s daughter And sister to the fathering worm. I who was deaf to spring and summer, Who knew not sun nor moon by […]...
9. The Vampire A fool there was and he mad his prayer (Even as you and I!) To a rag and a bone and a hank of hair (We called her the woman who did not care), But the fool he called her his lady fair (Even as you and I!) Oh the years we waste and the […]...
10. A Tenant of Mrs. Van Kleeck My very good landlady, Mistress Van Kleeck, (For the tears that o’erwhelm me I scarcely can speak) I know that I promis’d you hogs two or three (But who knows his destiny? Certain not me!) That I promis’d three hogs I don’t mean to deny (I can prove that I had five or six upon […]...
11. One Art The art of losing isn’t hard to master; So many things seem filled with the intent To be lost that their loss is no disaster. Lose something every day. Accept the fluster Of lost door keys, the hour badly spent. The art of losing isn’t hard to master. Then practice losing farther, losing faster: Places, […]...
12. The New Ezekiel What, can these dead bones live, whose sap is dried By twenty scorching centuries of wrong? Is this the House of Israel, whose pride Is as a tale that’s told, an ancient song? Are these ignoble relics all that live Of psalmist, priest, and prophet? Can the breath Of very heaven bid these bones revive, […]...
13. A Letter to Her Husband Absent upon Public Employment My head, my heart, mine eyes, my life, nay more, My joy, my magazine, of earthly store, If two be one, as surely thou and I, How stayest thou there, whilst I at Ipswich lie? So many steps, head from the heart to sever, If but a neck, soon should we […]...
14. Ah! Yet Consider it Again! “Old things need not be therefore true,” O brother men, nor yet the new; Ah! still awhile the old thought retain, And yet consider it again! The souls of now two thousand years Have laid up here their toils and tears, And all the earnings of their pain, Ah, yet consider it again! We! what […]...
15. 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 […]...
16. A BROTHER IN NEED NOW, rallying once if ne’er again, With flag at half-mast flown, A people in dire need and strain Mans Tyra’s bastion. Betrayed in danger’s hour, betrayed Before the stress of strife! Was this the meaning that it had That clasp of hands at Axelstad Which gave the North new life? The words that seemed as […]...
17. The Immortal Part When I meet the morning beam, Or lay me down at night to dream, I hear my bones within me say, “Another night, another day. “When shall this slough of sense be cast, This dust of thoughts be laid at last, The man of flesh and soul be slain And the man of bone remain? […]...
18. Style Flaubert wanted to write a novel About nothing. It was to have no subject And be sustained upon the style alone, Like the Holy Ghost cruising above The abyss, or like the little animals In Disney cartoons who stand upon a branch That breaks, but do not fall Till they look down. He never wrote […]...
19. H. Baptism II Since, Lord, to thee A narrow way and little gate Is all the passage, on my infancy Thou didst lay hold, and antedate My faith in me. O let me still Write thee great God, and me a child: Let me be soft and supple to thy will, Small to my self, to others mild, […]...
20. "I Love You Sweatheart&quot A man risked his life to write the words. A man hung upside down (an idiot friend Holding his legs?) with spray paint To write the words on a girder fifty feet above A highway. And his beloved, The next morning driving to work…? His words are not (meant to be) so unique. Does she […]...
21. Where's the Poker? The poker lost, poor Susan storm’d, And all the rites of rage perform’d; As scolding, crying, swearing, sweating, Abusing, fidgetting, and fretting. “Nothing but villany, and thieving; Good heavens! what a world we live in! If I don’t find it in the morning, I’ll surely give my master warning. He’d better far shut up his […]...
22. Psalm 49 The rich sinner’s death, and the saint’s resurrection. Why do the proud insult the poor, And boast the large estates they have? How vain are riches to secure Their haughty owners from the grave! They can’t redeem one hour from death, With all the wealth in which they trust; Nor give a dying brother breath, […]...
23. My Book Before I drink myself to death, God, let me finish up my Book! At night, I fear, I fight for breath, And wake up whiter than a spook; And crawl off to a bistro near, And drink until my brain is clear. Rare Absinthe! Oh, it gives me strength To write and write; and so […]...
24. Saddest Poem I can write the saddest poem of all tonight. Write, for instance: “The night is full of stars, And the stars, blue, shiver in the distance.” The night wind whirls in the sky and sings. I can write the saddest poem of all tonight. I loved her, and sometimes she loved me too. On nights […]...
25. Cacoethes Scribendi If all the trees in all the woods were men; And each and every blade of grass a pen; If every leaf on every shrub and tree Turned to a sheet of foolscap; every sea Were changed to ink, and all earth’s living tribes Had nothing else to do but act as scribes, And for […]...
26. Tonight I Can Write Tonight I can write the saddest lines. Write, for example, ‘The night is starry And the stars are blue and shiver in the distance.’ The night wind revolves in the sky and sings. Tonight I can write the saddest lines. I loved her, and sometimes she loved me too. Through nights like this one I […]...
27. Curse of a Rich Polish Peasant on His Sister Who Ran Away With a Wild Man FELIKSOWA has gone again from our house and this time for good, I hope. She and her husband took with them the cow father gave them, and they sold it. She went like a swine, because she called neither on me, her brother, nor on her father, before leaving for those forests. That is where […]...
28. Always the Mob JESUS emptied the devils of one man into forty hogs and the hogs took the edge of a high rock and dropped off and down into the sea: a mob. The sheep on the hills of Australia, blundering fourfooted in the sunset mist to the dark, they go one way, they hunt one sleep, they […]...
29. The Wicked Postman Why do you sit there on the floor so quiet and silent, tell me, Mother dear? The rain is coming in through the open window, making you all Wet, and you don’t mind it. Do you hear the gong striking four? It is time for my brother To come home from school. What has happened […]...
30. The Bridge In his travels he comes to a bridge made entirely of bones. Before crossing he writes a letter to his mother: Dear mother, Guess what? the ape accidentally bit off one of his hands while Eating a banana. Just now I am at the foot of a bone bridge. I Shall be crossing it shortly. […]...
31. Song of Myself I was a Poet! But I did not know it, Neither did my Mother, Nor my Sister nor my Brother. The Rich were not aware of it; The Poor took no care of it. The Reverend Mr. Drewitt Never knew it. The High did not suspect it; The Low could not detect it. Aunt Sue […]...
32. The Waradgery Tribe Harried we were, and spent, Broken and falling, Ere as the cranes we went, Crying and calling. Summer shall see the bird Backward returning; Never shall there be heard Those, who went yearning. Emptied of us the land; Ghostly our going; Fallen like spears the hand Dropped in the throwing. We are the lost who […]...
33. Kin BROTHER, I am fire Surging under the ocean floor. I shall never meet you, brother Not for years, anyhow; Maybe thousands of years, brother. Then I will warm you, Hold you close, wrap you in circles, Use you and change you Maybe thousands of years, brother. Where the moon slants and wavers....
34. Willard Fluke My wife lost her health, And dwindled until she weighed scarce ninety pounds. Then that woman, whom the men Styled Cleopatra, came along. And we we married ones All broke our vows, myself among the rest. Years passed and one by one Death claimed them all in some hideous form, And I was borne along […]...
35. PEACEFUL GROUND Cool Morning spit on bladed grass. A Thousand silky fingers tickling toes. The strong scent of natures freshly cut hair. Mans spiritual stamping groung toward inner Peace....
36. Lohengrin Back to the mystic shore beyond the main The mystic craft has sped, and left no trace. Ah, nevermore may she behold his face, Nor touch his hand, nor hear his voice again! With hidden front she crouches; all in vain The proffered balm. A vessel nears the place; They bring her young, lost brother; […]...
37. The Strangest Creature On Earth You’re like a scorpion, my brother, You live in cowardly darkness like a scorpion. You’re like a sparrow, my brother, Always in a sparrow’s flutter. You’re like a clam, my brother, Closed like a clam, content, And you’re frightening, my brother, like the mouth of an extinct volcano. Not one, not five Unfortunately, you number […]...
38. Road-Song of the Bandar-Log (From The Jungle Book) Here we go in a flung festoon, Half-way up to the jealous moon! Don’t you envy our pranceful bands? Don’t you wish you had extra hands? Would n’t you like if your tails were so Curved in the shape of a Cupid’s bow? Now you’re angry, but never mind, Brother, thy […]...
39. Benjamin Painter Together in this grave lie Benjamin Painter, attorney at law, And Nig, his dog, constant companion, solace and friend. Down the grey road, friends, children, men and women, Passing one by one out of life, left me till I was alone With Nig for partner, bed fellow, comrade in drink. In the morning of life […]...
40. Sixteen Dead Men O but we talked at large before The sixteen men were shot, But who can talk of give and take, What should be and what not While those dead men are loitering there To stir the boiling pot? You say that we should still the land Till Germany’s overcome; But who is there to argue […]...