Book Ends

Related poetry:

1. Book Borrower I am a mild man, you’ll agree, But red my rage is, When folks who borrow books from me Turn down their pages. Or when a chap a book I lend, And find he’s loaned it Without permission to a friend – As if he owned it. But worst of all I hate those crooks […]...
2. OPEN TABLE MANY a guest I’d see to-day, Met to taste my dishes! Food in plenty is prepar’d, Birds, and game, and fishes. Invitations all have had, All proposed attending. Johnny, go and look around! Are they hither wending? Pretty girls I hope to see, Dear and guileless misses, Ignorant how sweet it is Giving tender kisses. […]...
3. Book Lover I keep collecting books I know I’ll never, never read; My wife and daughter tell me so, And yet I never head. “Please make me,” says some wistful tome, “A wee bit of yourself.” And so I take my treasure home, And tuck it in a shelf. And now my very shelves complain; They jam […]...
4. 248. Pegasus at Wanlockhead WITH Pegasus upon a day, Apollo, weary flying, Through frosty hills the journey lay, On foot the way was plying. Poor slipshod giddy Pegasus Was but a sorry walker; To Vulcan then Apollo goes, To get a frosty caulker. Obliging Vulcan fell to work, Threw by his coat and bonnet, And did Sol’s business in […]...
5. Where the Sidewalk Ends There is a place where the sidewalk ends And before the street begins, And there the grass grows soft and white, And there the sun burns crimson bright, And there the moon-bird rests from his flight To cool in the peppermint wind. Let us leave this place where the smoke blows black And the dark […]...
6. Stout Marches Lead To Certain Ends STOUT marches lead to certain ends, We seek no Holy Grail, my friends – That dawn should find us every day Some fraction farther on our way. The dumb lands sleep from east to west, They stretch and turn and take their rest. The cock has crown in the steading-yard, But priest and people slumber […]...
7. The Months have ends the Years a knot The Months have ends the Years a knot No Power can untie To stretch a little further A Skein of Misery The Earth lays back these tired lives In her mysterious Drawers Too tenderly, that any doubt An ultimate Repose The manner of the Children Who weary of the Day Themself the noisy Plaything They […]...
8. Stupidity Dearest, forgive that with my clumsy touch I broke and bruised your rose. I hardly could suppose It were a thing so fragile that my clutch Could kill it, thus. It stood so proudly up upon its stem, I knew no thought of fear, And coming very near Fell, overbalanced, to your garment’s hem, Tearing […]...
9. Buffalo Bill BOY heart of Johnny Jones-aching to-day? Aching, and Buffalo Bill in town? Buffalo Bill and ponies, cowboys, Indians? Some of us know All about it, Johnny Jones. Buffalo Bill is a slanting look of the eyes, A slanting look under a hat on a horse. He sits on a horse and a passing look is […]...
10. Discrimination The meter I had sought to find, perplexed, Was ripped from books of “verse” that read like prose. I found it in sheet music, in long rows Of hologramic CDs, in sad wrecks Of long-forgotten volumes undisturbed Half-centuries by archivists, unscanned. I read their fading numbers, frowned, perturbed- Why should their tattered artistry be banned? […]...
11. Here I Am drunk again at 3 a. m. at the end of my 2nd bottle Of wine, I have typed from a dozen to 15 pages of Poesy An old man Maddened for the flesh of young girls in this Dwindling twilight Liver gone Kidneys going Pancrea pooped Top-floor blood pressure While all the fear of the […]...
12. Iambicum Trimetrum Unhappy verse, the witness of my unhappy state, Make thy self flutt’ring wings of thy fast flying Thought, and fly forth unto my love, wheresoever she be: Whether lying restless in heavy bed, or else Sitting so cheerless at the cheerful board, or else Playing alone careless on her heavenly virginals. If in bed, tell […]...
13. Pullman Porter The porter in the Pullman car Was charming, as they sometimes are. He scanned my baggage tags: “Are you The man who wrote of Lady Lou?” When I said “yes” he made a fuss – Oh, he was most assiduous; And I was pleased to think that he Enjoyed my brand of poetry. He was […]...
14. The Book of Urizen: Chapter II 1. Earth was not: nor globes of attraction The will of the Immortal expanded Or contracted his all flexible senses. Death was not, but eternal life sprung 2. The sound of a trumpet the heavens Awoke & vast clouds of blood roll’d Round the dim rocks of Urizen, so nam’d That solitary one in Immensity […]...
15. Purple Martins IF we were such and so, the same as these, Maybe we too would be slingers and sliders, Tumbling half over in the water mirrors, Tumbling half over at the horse heads of the sun, Tumbling our purple numbers. Twirl on, you and your satin blue. Be water birds, be air birds. Be these purple […]...
16. For Johnny Pole On The Forgotten Beach In his tenth July some instinct Taught him to arm the waiting wave, A giant where its mouth hung open. He rode on the lip that buoyed him there And buckled him under. The beach was strung With children paddling their ages in, Under the glare od noon chipping Its light out. He stood up, […]...
17. 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 […]...
18. The Task: Book V, The Winter Morning Walk (excerpts) ‘Tis morning; and the sun, with ruddy orb Ascending, fires th’ horizon: while the clouds, That crowd away before the driving wind, More ardent as the disk emerges more, Resemble most some city in a blaze, Seen through the leafless wood. His slanting ray Slides ineffectual down the snowy vale, And, tinging all with his […]...
19. Bridge Over The Aire Book 2 STANDING IN EDEN 1 Poetry claimed me young on Skegness beach Before I was born I answered her cry For a lost child still in the womb still As the seawave journeying green upon green Swollen in my mother’s side lashed and Tongue-tied on a raft of premonition Trying to survive my birth as the […]...
20. Double Red Daisies Double red daisies, they’re my flowers, Which nobody else may grow. In a big quarrelsome house like ours They try it sometimes-but no, I root them up because they’re my flowers, Which nobody else may grow. Claire has a tea-rose, but she didn’t plant it; Ben has an iris, but I don’t want it. Daisies, […]...
21. My Hundred Books A thousand books my library Contains; And all are primed, it seems to me With brains. Mine are so few I scratch in thought My head; For just a hundred of the lot I’ve read. A hundred books, but of the best, I can With wisdom savour and digest And scan. Yet when afar from […]...
22. The Task: Book VI, The Winter Walk at Noon (excerpts) Thus heav’nward all things tend. For all were once Perfect, and all must be at length restor’d. So God has greatly purpos’d; who would else In his dishonour’d works himself endure Dishonour, and be wrong’d without redress. Haste then, and wheel away a shatter’d world, Ye slow-revolving seasons! We would see (A sight to which […]...
23. Against Idleness and Mischief How doth the little busy Bee Improve each shining Hour, And gather Honey all the day From every opening Flower! How skilfully she builds her Cell! How neat she spreads the Wax! And labours hard to store it well With the sweet Food she makes. In Works of Labour or of Skill I would be […]...
24. The Last Unicorn The last unicorn was never free To chose another ending, The plaintive melody entrained With sweet orchestral strains Describing it was sundered in A soured rendition of Our heaven’s harsh dominion. We were never set to let her free From facile bonds, we fondly loved Mythology too much to let her go And kept her […]...
25. Imitations of Horace: The First Epistle of the Second Book Ne Rubeam, Pingui donatus Munere (Horace, Epistles II. i.267) While you, great patron of mankind, sustain The balanc’d world, and open all the main; Your country, chief, in arms abroad defend, At home, with morals, arts, and laws amend; How shall the Muse, from such a monarch steal An hour, and not defraud the public […]...
26. Bridge Over The Aire Book 4 THE LANDS OF MY CHILDHOOD 1 I am leaving the holy city of Leeds For the last time for the first time Leaded domes of minarets in Kirkgate Market, the onion-dome of Ellerby Lane School, the lands of my childhood empty Or gone. Market stalls under wrought Iron balconies strewn with roses and Green imitation […]...
27. Troilus And Criseyde: Book 03 Incipit prohemium tercii libri. O blisful light of whiche the bemes clere Adorneth al the thridde hevene faire! O sonnes lief, O Ioves doughter dere, Plesaunce of love, O goodly debonaire, In gentil hertes ay redy to repaire! O verray cause of hele and of gladnesse, Y-heried be thy might and thy goodnesse! In hevene […]...
28. The Men That Fought at Minden The men that fought at Minden, they was rookies in their time So was them that fought at Waterloo! All the ‘ole command, yuss, from Minden to Maiwand, They was once dam’ sweeps like you! Then do not be discouraged, ‘Eaven is your ‘elper, We’ll learn you not to forget; An’ you mustn’t swear an’ […]...
29. Troilus And Criseyde: Book 02 Incipit Prohemium Secundi Libri. Out of these blake wawes for to sayle, O wind, O wind, the weder ginneth clere; For in this see the boot hath swich travayle, Of my conning, that unnethe I it stere: This see clepe I the tempestous matere Of desespeyr that Troilus was inne: But now of hope the […]...
30. Bridge Over The Aire Book 3 THE KINGDOM OF MY HEART 1 The halcyon settled on the Aire of our days Kingfisher-blue it broke my heart in two Shall I forget you? Shall I forget you? I am the mad poet first love You never got over You are my blue-eyed Madonna virgin bride I shall carve ‘MG loves BT’ On […]...
31. Picture-Books in Winter Summer fading, winter comes Frosty mornings, tingling thumbs, Window robins, winter rooks, And the picture story-books. Water now is turned to stone Nurse and I can walk upon; Still we find the flowing brooks In the picture story-books. All the pretty things put by, Wait upon the children’s eye, Sheep and shepherds, trees and crooks, […]...
32. The Bibliomaniac's Bride The women-folk are like to books, Most pleasing to the eye, Whereon if anybody looks He feels disposed to buy. I hear that many are for sale, Those that record no dates, And such editions as regale The view with colored plates. Of every quality and grade And size they may be found, Quite often […]...
33. The Book of Annandale I Partly to think, more to be left alone, George Annandale said something to his friends – A word or two, brusque, but yet smoothed enough To suit their funeral gaze-and went upstairs; And there, in the one room that he could call His own, he found a sort of meaningless Annoyance in the mute […]...
34. Paradise Lost: Book 05 Now Morn, her rosy steps in the eastern clime Advancing, sowed the earth with orient pearl, When Adam waked, so customed; for his sleep Was aery-light, from pure digestion bred, And temperate vapours bland, which the only sound Of leaves and fuming rills, Aurora’s fan, Lightly dispersed, and the shrill matin song Of birds on […]...
35. Paradise Regained: The Fourth Book Perplexed and troubled at his bad success The Tempter stood, nor had what to reply, Discovered in his fraud, thrown from his hope So oft, and the persuasive rhetoric That sleeked his tongue, and won so much on Eve, So little here, nay lost. But Eve was Eve; This far his over-match, who, self-deceived And […]...
36. Sonnet 19: Devouring Time blunt thou the lion's paws Devouring Time blunt thou the lion’s paws, And make the earth devour her own sweet brood, Pluck the keen teeth from the fierce tiger’s jaws, And burn the long-lived phoenix, in her blood, Make glad and sorry seasons as thou fleet’st, And do whate’er thou wilt swift-footed Time To the wide world and all her […]...
37. Sonnet XIX Devouring Time, blunt thou the lion’s paws, And make the earth devour her own sweet brood; Pluck the keen teeth from the fierce tiger’s jaws, And burn the long-lived phoenix in her blood; Make glad and sorry seasons as thou fleets, And do whate’er thou wilt, swift-footed Time, To the wide world and all her […]...
38. Sonnet XIX: Devouring Time, Blunt Thou the Lion's Paws Devouring Time, blunt thou the lion’s paws, And make the earth devour her own sweet brood; Pluck the keen teeth from the fierce tiger’s jaws, And burn the long-liv’d Phoenix in her blood; Make glad and sorry seasons as thou fleets, And do whate’er thou wilt, swift-footed Time, To the wide world and all her […]...
39. Troilus And Criseyde: Book 01 The double 12 sorwe of Troilus to tellen, That was the king Priamus sone of Troye, In lovinge, how his aventures fellen Fro wo to wele, and after out of Ioye, My purpos is, er that I parte fro ye. Thesiphone, thou help me for tendyte Thise woful vers, that wepen as I wryte! To […]...
40. Shoes when you’re young A pair of Female High-heeled shoes Just sitting Alone In the closet Can fire your Bones; When you’re old It’s just A pair of shoes Without Anybody In them And Just as Well....