From The Frontier Of Writing

Related poetry:

1. Calls BECAUSE I have called to you As the flame flamingo calls, Or the want of a spotted hawk Is called- because in the dusk The warblers shoot the running Waters of short songs to the Homecoming warblers- because The cry here is wing to wing And song to song- I am waiting, Waiting with the […]...
2. Crossing the Frontier Crossing the frontier they were stopped in time, Told, quite politely, they would have to wait: Passports in order, nothing to declare And surely holding hands was not a crime Until they saw how, ranged across the gate, All their most formidable friends were there. Wearing his conscience like a crucifix, Her father, rampant, nursed […]...
3. Mike My lead dog Mike was like a bear; I reckon he was grizzly bred, For when he reared up in the air Ho over-topped me by a head. He’d cuff me with his hefty paws, Jest like a puppy actin’ cute, And I would swear: by Gosh! he was The world’s most mighty malemute. But […]...
4. Picture-Writing In those days said Hiawatha, “Lo! how all things fade and perish! From the memory of the old men Pass away the great traditions, The achievements of the warriors, The adventures of the hunters, All the wisdom of the Medas, All the craft of the Wabenos, All the marvellous dreams and visions Of the Jossakeeds, […]...
5. TO BRENDA WILLIAMS 'WRITING AGAINST THE GRAIN&#039 It was Karl Shapiro who wrote in his ‘Defence of Ignorance’ how many poets Go mad or seem to be so and the majority think we should all be in jail Or mental hospital and you have ended up in both places – fragile as bone china, Your pale skin taut, your fingers clasped tight […]...
6. Dream Song 118: He wondered: Do I love? all this applause He wondered: Do I love? all this applause, Young beauties sitting at my feet & all, And all. It tires me out, he pondered: I’m tempted to break laws And love myself, or the stupid questions asked me Move me to homicide— So many beauties, one on either side, The wall’s behind me, into which […]...
7. The Enigma The Sergeant of a Highland Reg- -Iment was drilling of his men; With temper notably on edge He blest them every now and then. A sweet old lady standing by, Was looking on with fascination, And then she dared this question shy, That pertubates the Celtic nation. “Oh gentle Sergeant do not scold; Please tell […]...
8. Arithmetic on the Frontier A great and glorious thing it is To learn, for seven years or so, The Lord knows what of that and this, Ere reckoned fit to face the foe The flying bullet down the Pass, That whistles clear: “All flesh is grass.” Three hundred pounds per annum spent On making brain and body meeter For […]...
9. Lament of the Frontier Guard By the North Gate, the wind blows full of sand, Lonely from the beginning of time until now! Trees fall, the grass goes yellow with autumn. I climb the towers and towers To watch out the barbarous land: Desolate castle, the sky, the wide desert. There is no wall left to this village. Bones white […]...
10. Plymouth Rock Joe Why are you running so fast hither and thither Chasing midges or butterflies? Some of you are standing solemnly scratching for grubs; Some of you are waiting for corn to be scattered. This is life, is it? Cock-a-doodle-do! Very well, Thomas Rhodes, You are cock of the walk, no doubt. But here comes Elliott Hawkins, […]...
11. Long Guns THEN came, Oscar, the time of the guns. And there was no land for a man, no land for a country, Unless guns sprang up And spoke their language. The how of running the world was all in guns. The law of a God keeping sea and land apart, The law of a child sucking […]...
12. Battalion-Relief ‘FALL in! Now get a move on.’ (Curse the rain.) We splash away along the straggling village, Out to the flat rich country, green with June… And sunset flares across wet crops and tillage, Blazing with splendour-patches. (Harvest soon, Up in the Line.) ‘Perhaps the War’ll be done ‘By Christmas-Day. Keep smiling then, old son.’ […]...
13. Danny Deever “What are the bugles blowin’ for?” said Files-on-Parade. “To turn you out, to turn you out”, the Colour-Sergeant said. “What makes you look so white, so white?” said Files-on-Parade. “I’m dreadin’ what I’ve got to watch”, the Colour-Sergeant said. For they’re hangin’ Danny Deever, you can hear the Dead March play, The regiment’s in ‘ollow […]...
14. Writing A man who keeps a diary, pays Due toll to many tedious days; But life becomes eventful then His busy hand forgets the pen. Most books, indeed, are records less Of fulness than of emptiness....
15. Against Writing about Children When I think of the many people Who privately despise children, I can’t say I’m completely shocked, Having been one. I was not Exceptional, uncomfortable as that is To admit, and most children are not Exceptional. The particulars of Cruelty, sizes Large and X-Large, Memory gnawing it like A fat dog, are ordinary: Mean Miss […]...
16. Baseball and Writing Fanaticism? No. Writing is exciting And baseball is like writing. You can never tell with either How it will go Or what you will do; Generating excitement A fever in the victim Pitcher, catcher, fielder, batter. Victim in what category? Owlman watching from the press box? To whom does it apply? Who is excited? Might […]...
17. What Do You Do About Dry Periods In Your Writing? When the writing is going well, I am a prince in a desert palace, Fountains flowing in the garden. I lean an elbow on a velvet pillow And drink from a silver goblet, Poems like a banquet Spread before me on rugs With rosettes the damask of blood. But exiled From the palace, I wander […]...
18. Writing often it is the only Thing Between you and Impossibility. No drink, No woman’s love, No wealth Can Match it. Nothing can save You Except Writing. It keeps the walls From Failing. The hordes from Closing in. It blasts the Darkness. Writing is the Ultimate Psychiatrist, The kindliest God of all the Gods. Writing stalks […]...
19. In Praise Of Writing Letters Blest be the Man! his Memory at least, Who found the Art, thus to unfold his Breast, And taught succeeding Times an easy way Their secret Thoughts by Letters to convey; To baffle Absence, and secure Delight, Which, till that Time, was limited to Sight. The parting Farewel spoke, the last Adieu, The less’ning Distance […]...
20. The Danger Of Writing Defiant Verse And now I have another lad! No longer need you tell How all my nights are slow and sad For loving you too well. His ways are not your wicked ways, He’s not the like of you. He treads his path of reckoned days, A sober man, and true. They’ll never see him in the […]...
21. 1954 Then dirt scared me, because of the dirt He had put on her face. And her training bra Scared me-the newspapers, morning and evening, Kept saying it, training bra, As if the cups of it had been calling The breasts up-he buried her in it, Perhaps he had never bothered to take it Off. They […]...
22. Twice Shy Her scarf a la Bardot, In suede flats for the walk, She came with me one evening For air and friendly talk. We crossed the quiet river, Took the embankment walk. Traffic holding its breath, Sky a tense diaphragm: Dusk hung like a backcloth That shook where a swan swam, Tremulous as a hawk Hanging […]...
23. Fourth Floor, Dawn, Up All Night Writing Letters Pigeons shake their wings on the copper church roof Out my window across the street, a bird perched on the cross Surveys the city’s blue-grey clouds. Larry Rivers ‘ll come at 10 AM and take my picture. I’m taking Your picture, pigeons. I’m writing you down, Dawn. I’m immortalizing your exhaust, Avenue A bus. O […]...
24. Iron GUNS, Long, steel guns, Pointed from the war ships In the name of the war god. Straight, shining, polished guns, Clambered over with jackies in white blouses, Glory of tan faces, tousled hair, white teeth, Laughing lithe jackies in white blouses, Sitting on the guns singing war songs, war chanties. Shovels, Broad, iron shovels, Scooping […]...
25. To G. M. W. And G. F. W Whenas-(I love that “whenas” word- It shows I am a poet, too,) Q. Horace Flaccus gaily stirred The welkin with his tra-la-loo, He little thought one donkey’s back Would carry thus a double load- Father and son upon one jack, Galumphing down the Tibur Road. II Old is the tale-Aesop’s, I think- Of that famed […]...
26. Many Inventions ‘Less you want your toes trod of you’d better get back at once, For the bullocks are walking two by two, The byles are walking two by two, And the elephants bring the guns. Ho! Yuss! Great-big-long-black-forty-pounder guns. Jiggery-jolty to and fro, Each as big as a launch in tow Blind-dumb-broad-breeched beggars o’ battering-guns! My […]...
27. Screw-Guns Smokin’ my pipe on the mountings, sniffin’ the mornin’ cool, I walks in my old brown gaiters along o’ my old brown mule, With seventy gunners be’ind me, an’ never a beggar forgets It’s only the pick of the Army that handles the dear little pets ‘Tss! ‘Tss! For you all love the screw-guns the […]...
28. The Songs of the Lathes 1918Being the Words of the Tune Hummed at Her Lathe by Mrs. L. Embsay, Widow The fans and the beltings they roar round me. The power is shaking the floor round me Till the lathes pick up their duty and the midnight-shift takes over. It is good for me to be here! Guns in Flanders […]...
29. Fragment At last I entered a long dark gallery, Catacomb-lined; and ranged at the side Were the bodies of men from far and wide Who, motion past, were nevertheless not dead. “The sense of waiting here strikes strong; Everyone’s waiting, waiting, it seems to me; What are you waiting for so long? What is to happen?” […]...
30. Marksman Sam When Sam Small joined the regiment, ‘E were no’ but a raw recruit, And they marched ‘im away one wint’ry day, ‘Is musket course to shoot. They woke ‘im up at the crack o’ dawn, Wi’ many a nudge and shake, ‘E were dreaming that t’ Sergeant ‘ad broke ‘is neck, And ‘e didn’t want […]...
31. The Cold Night It is cold. The white moon Is up among her scattered stars— Like the bare thighs of The Police Sergeant’s wife—among Her five children. . . No answer. Pale shadows lie upon The frosted grass. One answer: It is midnight, it is still And it is cold. . . ! White thighs of the sky! […]...
32. Swinging the Lead Said the soldier to the Surgeon, “I’ve got noises in me head And a kind o’ filled up feeling after every time I’m fed; I can sleep all night on picket, but I can’t sleep in my bed”. And the Surgeon said, “That’s Lead!” Said the soldier to the Surgeon, “Do you think they’ll send […]...
33. Waiting For The Miracle (co-written by Sharon Robinson) Baby, I’ve been waiting, I’ve been waiting night and day. I didn’t see the time, I waited half my life away. There were lots of invitations And I know you sent me some, But I was waiting For the miracle, for the miracle to come. I know you really loved me. […]...
34. Testimony ‘We were killing pigs when the Yanks arrived. A Tuesday morning, sunlight And gutter-blood Outside the slaughter house. >From the main road They would have heard the screaming, Then heard it stop and had a view of us In our gloves and aprons coming Down the hill. Two lines of them, guns on their Shoulders, […]...
35. Roadways ONE road leads to London, One road leads to Wales, My road leads me seawards To the white dipping sails. One road leads to the river, And it goes singing slow; My road leads to shipping, Where the bronzed sailors go. Leads me, lures me, calls me To salt green tossing sea; A road without […]...
36. Her Letter “I’m taking pen in hand this night, and hard it is for me; My poor old fingers tremble so, my hand is stiff and slow, And even with my glasses on I’m troubled sore to see. . . . You’d little know your mother, boy; you’d little, little know. You mind how brisk and bright […]...
37. The Hawk ‘Call down the hawk from the air; Let him be hooded or caged Till the yellow eye has grown mild, For larder and spit are bare, The old cook enraged, The scullion gone wild.’ ‘I will not be clapped in a hood, Nor a cage, nor alight upon wrist, Now I have learnt to be […]...
38. The Unknown Ye aspiring ones, listen to the story of the unknown Who lies here with no stone to mark the place. As a boy reckless and wanton, Wandering with gun in hand through the forest Near the mansion of Aaron Hatfield, I shot a hawk perched on the top Of a dead tree. He fell with […]...
39. A Bush Christening On the outer Barcoo where the churches are few, And men of religion are scanty, On a road never cross’d ‘cept by folk that are lost, One Michael Magee had a shanty. Now this Mike was the dad of a ten year old lad, Plump, healthy, and stoutly conditioned; He was strong as the best, […]...
40. There is a word There is a word Which bears a sword Can pierce an armed man It hurls its barbed syllables And is mute again But where it fell The saved will tell On patriotic day, Some epauletted Brother Gave his breath away. Wherever runs the breathless sun Wherever roams the day There is its noiseless onset There […]...