If I should cast off this tattered coat

Related poetry:

1. To mend each tattered Faith To mend each tattered Faith There is a needle fair Though no appearance indicate ‘Tis threaded in the Air And though it do not wear As if it never Tore ‘Tis very comfortable indeed And spacious as before...
2. A poor torn heart a tattered heart A poor torn heart a tattered heart That sat it down to rest Nor noticed that the Ebbing Day Flowed silver to the West Nor noticed Night did soft descend Nor Constellation burn Intent upon the vision Of latitudes unknown. The angels happening that way This dusty heart espied Tenderly took it up from toil […]...
3. POEM TO BE PLACED IN A BOTTLE AND CAST OUT TO SEA for Ken Kesey and his merry pranksters in a bus called ‘Further…’ Dear and here’s where the problem begins For who shall I address this letter to? Friends are few and very special, muses in the main I must confess, the first I lost just fifty years ago. Perhaps the best. I searched for years […]...
4. A Coat I made my song a coat Covered with embroideries Out of old mythologies From heel to throat; But he fools caught it, Wore it in the world’s eyes As though they’d wrought it. Song, let them take it, For there’s more enterprise In walking naked....
5. Joseph's Coat Wounded I sing, tormented I indite, Thrown down I fall into a bed, and rest: Sorrow hath chang’d its note: such is his will Who changeth all things, as him pleaseth best. For well he knows, if but one grief and smart Among my many had his full career, Sure it would carry with it […]...
6. Psalm LXXIV: Will God For Ever Cast Us Off? Will God for ever east us off? His wrath for ever smoke Against the people of’ his love, His little chosen flock? Think of the tribes so dearly bought With their Redeemer’s blood; Nor let thy Zion be forgot, Where once thy glory stood. Lift up thy feet and march in haste, Aloud our ruin […]...
7. How fits his Umber Coat How fits his Umber Coat The Tailor of the Nut? Combined without a seam Like Raiment of a Dream Who spun the Auburn Cloth? Computed how the girth? The Chestnut aged grows In those primeval Clothes We know that we are wise Accomplished in Surprise Yet by this Countryman This nature how undone!...
8. Adam Cast Forth Was there a Garden or was the Garden a dream? Amid the fleeting light, I have slowed myself and queried, Almost for consolation, if the bygone period Over which this Adam, wretched now, once reigned supreme, Might not have been just a magical illusion Of that God I dreamed. Already it’s imprecise In my memory, […]...
9. Since Years Ago For Evermore SINCE years ago for evermore My cedar ship I drew to shore; And to the road and riverbed And the green, nodding reeds, I said Mine ignorant and last farewell: Now with content at home I dwell, And now divide my sluggish life Betwixt my verses and my wife: In vain; for when the lamp […]...
10. The Dawn I would be ignorant as the dawn That has looked down On that old queen measuring a town With the pin of a brooch, Or on the withered men that saw From their pedantic Babylon The careless planets in their courses, The stars fade out where the moon comes. And took their tablets and did […]...
11. Facts by our side are never sudden Facts by our side are never sudden Until they look around And then they scare us like a spectre Protruding from the Ground The height of our portentous Neighbor We never know Till summoned to his recognition By an Adieu Adieu for whence The sage cannot conjecture The bravest die As ignorant of their resumption […]...
12. First Sight Lambs that learn to walk in snow When their bleating clouds the air Meet a vast unwelcome, know Nothing but a sunless glare. Newly stumbling to and fro All they find, outside the fold, Is a wretched width of cold. As they wait beside the ewe, Her fleeces wetly caked, there lies Hidden round them, […]...
13. The wanderer Upon a mountain height, far from the sea, I found a shell, And to my listening ear the lonely thing Ever a song of ocean seemed to sing, Ever a tale of ocean seemed to tell. How came the shell upon that mountain height? Ah, who can say Whether there dropped by some too careless […]...
14. Colors Passing Through Us Purple as tulips in May, mauve Into lush velvet, purple As the stain blackberries leave On the lips, on the hands, The purple of ripe grapes Sunlit and warm as flesh. Every day I will give you a color, Like a new flower in a bud vase On your desk. Every day I will paint […]...
15. Sestina I wandered o’er the vast green plains of youth, And searched for Pleasure. On a distant height Fame’s silhouette stood sharp against the skies. Beyond vast crowds that thronged a broad highway I caught the glimmer of a golden goal, While from a blooming bower smiled siren Love. Straight gazing in her eyes, I laughed […]...
16. Unlyric Love Song It is time to give that-of-myself which I could not at first: To offer you now at last my least and my worst: Minor, absurd preserves, The shell’s end-curves, A document kept at the back of a drawer, A tin hidden under the floor, Recalcitrant prides and hesitations: To pile them carefully in a desparate […]...
17. 16-bit Intel 8088 chip with an Apple Macintosh You can’t run Radio Shack programs In its disc drive. Nor can a Commodore 64 Drive read a file You have created on an IBM Personal Computer. Both Kaypro and Osborne computers use The CP/M operating system But can’t read each other’s Handwriting For they format (write On) discs in different […]...
18. Innocence The height of wisdom seems to me That of a child; So let my ageing vision be Serene and mild. The depth of folly, I aver, Is to fish deep In that dark pool of science where Truth-demons sleep. Let me not be a bearded sage Seeing too clear; In issues of the atom age […]...
19. The Place of Rest UNTO the deep the deep heart goes, It lays its sadness nigh the breast: Only the Mighty Mother knows The wounds that quiver unconfessed. It seeks a deeper silence still; It folds itself around with peace, Where thoughts alike of good or ill In quietness unfostered cease. It feels in the unwounding vast For comfort […]...
20. The Vesture of the Soul I PITIED one whose tattered dress Was patched, and stained with dust and rain; He smiled on me; I could not guess The viewless spirit’s wide domain. He said, “The royal robe I wear Trails all along the fields of light: Its silent blue and silver bear For gems the starry dust of night. “The […]...
21. The Land Of Beyond Have ever you heard of the Land of Beyond, That dreams at the gates of the day? Alluring it lies at the skirts of the skies, And ever so far away; Alluring it calls: O ye the yoke galls, And ye of the trail overfond, With saddle and pack, by paddle and track, Let’s go […]...
22. A FORMER LIFE LONG since, I lived beneath vast porticoes, By many ocean-sunsets tinged and fired, Where mighty pillars, in majestic rows, Seemed like basaltic caves when day expired. The rolling surge that mirrored all the skies Mingled its music, turbulent and rich, Solemn and mystic, with the colours which The setting sun reflected in my eyes. And […]...
23. I got so I could take his name I got so I could take his name Without Tremendous gain That Stop-sensation on my Soul And Thunder in the Room I got so I could walk across That Angle in the floor, Where he turned so, and I turned how And all our Sinew tore I got so I could stir the Box In […]...
24. The Deluge Though giant rains put out the sun, Here stand I for a sign. Though earth be filled with waters dark, My cup is filled with wine. Tell to the trembling priests that here Under the deluge rod, One nameless, tattered, broken man Stood up, and drank to God. Sun has been where the rain is […]...
25. The Desolate Field Vast and grey, the sky Is a simulacrum To all but him whose days Are vast and grey and- In the tall, dried grasses A goat stirs With nozzle searching the ground. My head is in the air But who am I. . . ? -and my heart stops amazed At the thought of love […]...
26. Fata Morgana O sweet illusions of song That tempt me everywhere, In the lonely fields, and the throng Of the crowded thoroughfare! I approach and ye vanish away, I grasp you, and ye are gone; But ever by night and by day, The melody soundeth on. As the weary traveller sees In desert or prairie vast, Blue […]...
27. Theoretikos This mighty empire hath but feet of clay: Of all its ancient chivalry and might Our little island is forsaken quite: Some enemy hath stolen its crown of bay, And from its hills that voice hath passed away Which spake of Freedom: O come out of it, Come out of it, my Soul, thou art […]...
28. The Red Blaze is the Morning The Red Blaze is the Morning The Violet is Noon The Yellow Day is falling And after that is none But Miles of Sparks at Evening Reveal the Width that burned The Territory Argent that Never yet consumed...
29. Parting AS from our dream we died away Far off I felt the outer things; Your wind-blown tresses round me play, Your bosom’s gentle murmurings. And far away our faces met As on the verge of the vast spheres; And in the night our cheeks were wet, I could not say with dew or tears. As […]...
30. At leisure is the Soul At leisure is the Soul That gets a Staggering Blow The Width of Life before it spreads Without a thing to do It begs you give it Work But just the placing Pins Or humblest Patchwork Children do To Help its Vacant Hands...
31. Sonnet: The Ghosts Of James And Peirce In Harvard Yard In memory of D. W. Prall The ghosts of James and Peirce in Harvard Yard At star-pierced midnight, after the chapel bell (Episcopalian! palian! the ringing soared!) Stare at me now as if they wish me well. In the waking dream amid the trees which fall, Bar and bough of shadow, by my shadow crossed, […]...
32. How many schemes may die How many schemes may die In one short Afternoon Entirely unknown To those they most concern The man that was not lost Because by accident He varied by a Ribbon’s width From his accustomed route The Love that would not try Because beside the Door It must be competitions Some unsuspecting Horse was tied Surveying […]...
33. TO HIS LOVELY MISTRESSES One night i’th’ year, my dearest Beauties, come, And bring those dew-drink-offerings to my tomb; When thence ye see my reverend ghost to rise, And there to lick th’ effused sacrifice, Though paleness be the livery that I wear, Look ye not wan or colourless for fear. Trust me, I will not hurt ye, or […]...
34. Tцrnfallet There is a meadow in Sweden Where I lie smitten, Eyes stained with clouds’ White ins and outs. And about that meadow Roams my widow Plaiting a clover Wreath for her lover. I took her in marriage In a granite parish. The snow lent her whiteness, A pine was a witness. She’d swim in the […]...
35. Somewhere upon the general Earth Somewhere upon the general Earth Itself exist Today The Magic passive but extant That consecrated me Indifferent Seasons doubtless play Where I for right to be Would pay each Atom that I am But Immortality Reserving that but just to prove Another Date of Thee Oh God of Width, do not for us Curtail Eternity!...
36. Old Ironsides Ay, tear her tattered ensign down! Long has it waved on high, And many an eye has danced to see That banner in the sky; Beneath it rung the battle shout, And burst the cannon’s roar; The meteor of the ocean air Shall sweep the clouds no more. Her deck, once red with heroes’ blood, […]...
37. May 24, 1980 I have braved, for want of wild beasts, steel cages, Carved my term and nickname on bunks and rafters, Lived by the sea, flashed aces in an oasis, Dined with the-devil-knows-whom, in tails, on truffles. From the height of a glacier I beheld half a world, the earthly width. Twice have drowned, thrice let knives […]...
38. No Man can compass a Despair No Man can compass a Despair As round a Goalless Road No faster than a Mile at once The Traveller proceed Unconscious of the Width Unconscious that the Sun Be setting on His progress So accurate the One At estimating Pain Whose own has just begun His ignorance the Angel That pilot Him along...
39. CALM AT SEA SILENCE deep rules o’er the waters, Calmly slumb’ring lies the main, While the sailor views with trouble Nought but one vast level plain. Not a zephyr is in motion! Silence fearful as the grave! In the mighty waste of ocean Sunk to rest is ev’ry wave. 1795....
40. Girl's Lament In the years when we were All children, this inclining To be alone so much was gentle; Others’ time passed fighting, And one had one’s faction, One’s near, one’s far-off place, A path, an animal, a picture. And I still imagined, that life Would always keep providing For one to dwell on things within, Am […]...