This Dust was Once the Man

Related poetry:

1. Dust of Snow The way a crow Shook down on me The dust of snow From a hemlock tree Has given my heart A change of mood And saved some part Of a day I had rued....
2. Dust is the only Secret Dust is the only Secret Death, the only One You cannot find out all about In his “native town.” Nobody know “his Father” Never was a Boy Hadn’t any playmates, Or “Early history” Industrious! Laconic! Punctual! Sedate! Bold as a Brigand! Stiller than a Fleet! Builds, like a Bird, too! Christ robs the Nest Robin […]...
3. Dust When the white flame in us is gone, And we that lost the world’s delight Stiffen in darkness, left alone To crumble in our separate night; When your swift hair is quiet in death, And through the lips corruption thrust Has stilled the labour of my breath When we are dust, when we are dust! […]...
4. Dust in the Eyes If, as they say, some dust thrown in my eyes Will keep my talk from getting overwise, I’m not the one for putting off the proof. Let it be overwhelming, off a roof And round a corner, blizzard snow for dust, And blind me to a standstill if it must....
5. Dust When I went to look at what had long been hidden, A jewel laid long ago in a secret place, I trembled, for I thought to see its dark deep fire- But only a pinch of dust blew up in my face. I almost gave my life long ago for a thing That has gone […]...
6. On Journeys Through The States ON journeys through the States we start, (Ay, through the world-urged by these songs, Sailing henceforth to every land-to every sea;) We, willing learners of all, teachers of all, and lovers of all. We have watch’d the seasons dispensing themselves, and passing on, We have said, Why should not a man or woman do as […]...
7. Red Dust This harpie with dry red curls Talked openly of her husband, His impotence, his death, the death Of her lover, the birth and death Of her own beauty. She stared Into the mirror next to Our table littered with the wreck Of her appetite and groaned: Look what you’ve done to me! As though only […]...
8. To the stanch Dust To the stanch Dust We safe commit thee Tongue if it hath, Inviolate to thee Silence denote And Sanctity enforce thee Passenger of Infinity...
9. This Dust, and its Feature This Dust, and its Feature Accredited Today Will in a second Future Cease to identify This Mind, and its measure A too minute Area For its enlarged inspection’s Comparison appear This World, and its species A too concluded show For its absorbed Attention’s Remotest scrutiny...
10. The House Of Dust: Part 04: 01: Clairvoyant ‘This envelope you say has something in it Which once belonged to your dead son-or something He knew, was fond of? Something he remembers?- The soul flies far, and we can only call it By things like these. . . a photograph, a letter, Ribbon, or charm, or watch. . . ‘ . . . […]...
11. Dust there are times When you should listen To the world I think Like for instance The time a meteorite came Through the roof and Through the ceiling and Landed on my desk in the middle of The papers and things Undone to say it Smouldered would be To become poetic But it did smoulder And […]...
12. This quiet Dust was Gentleman and Ladies This quiet Dust was Gentleman and Ladies And Lads and Girls Was laughter and ability and Sighing And Frocks and Curls. This Passive Place a Summer’s nimble mansion Where Bloom and Bees Exists an Oriental Circuit Then cease, like these...
13. The Old Dust The living is a passing traveler; The dead, a man come home. One brief journey betwixt heaven and earth, Then, alas! we are the same old dust of ten thousand ages. The rabbit in the moon pounds the medicine in vain; Fu-sang, the tree of immortality, has crumbled to kindling wood. Man dies, his white […]...
14. The House Of Dust: Introduction THE HOUSE OF DUST A Symphony BY CONRAD AIKEN To Jessie NOTE . . . Parts of this poem have been printed in “The North American Review, Others, Poetry, Youth, Coterie, The Yale Review”. . . . I am Indebted to Lafcadio Hearn for the episode called “The Screen Maiden” In Part II. This text […]...
15. Apostroph O MATER! O fils! O brood continental! O flowers of the prairies! O space boundless! O hum of mighty products! O you teeming cities! O so invincible, turbulent, proud! O race of the future! O women! O fathers! O you men of passion and the storm! O native power only! O beauty! O yourself! O […]...
16. To a President ALL you are doing and saying is to America dangled mirages, You have not learn’d of Nature-of the politics of Nature, you have not learn’d the great amplitude, rectitude, impartiality; You have not seen that only such as they are for These States, And that what is less than they, must sooner or later lift […]...
17. Leave Me, O Love Which Reachest But To Dust Leave me, O love which reachest but to dust, And thou, my mind, aspire to higher things; Grow rich in that which never taketh rust: Whatever fades but fading pleasure brings. Draw in thy beams, and humble all thy might To that sweet yoke where lasting freedoms be, Which breaks the clouds and opens forth […]...
18. The House Of Dust: Part 03: 04: Illicit Of what she said to me that night-no matter. The strange thing came next day. My brain was full of music-something she played me-; I couldn’t remember it all, but phrases of it Wreathed and wreathed among faint memories, Seeking for something, trying to tell me something, Urging to restlessness: verging on grief. I tried […]...
19. Walt Whitman's Caution TO The States, or any one of them, or any city of The States, Resist much, obey little; Once unquestioning obedience, once fully enslaved; Once fully enslaved, no nation, state, city, of this earth, ever afterward resumes its liberty....
20. The House Of Dust: Part 03: 09: Cabaret We sit together and talk, or smoke in silence. You say (but use no words) ‘this night is passing As other nights when we are dead will pass. . .’ Perhaps I misconstrue you: you mean only, ‘How deathly pale my face looks in that glass. . .’ You say: ‘We sit and talk, of […]...
21. The House Of Dust: Part 03: 10: Letter From time to time, lifting his eyes, he sees The soft blue starlight through the one small window, The moon above black trees, and clouds, and Venus,- And turns to write. . . The clock, behind ticks softly. It is so long, indeed, since I have written,- Two years, almost, your last is turning yellow,- […]...
22. Happy Dust For Margot Snow that fallest from heaven, bear me aloft on thy wings To the domes of the star-girdled Seven, the abode of Ineffable things, Quintessence of joy and of strength, that, abolishing Future and past, Mak’st the Present an infinite length, my soul all-One With the Vast, The Lone, the Unnameable God, that is […]...
23. The House Of Dust: Part 02: 03: Interlude The warm sun dreams in the dust, the warm sun falls On bright red roofs and walls; The trees in the park exhale a ghost of rain; We go from door to door in the streets again, Talking, laughing, dreaming, turning our faces, Recalling other times and places. . . We crowd, not knowing why, […]...
24. 1887 From Clee to heaven the beacon burns, The shires have seen it plain, From north and south the sign returns And beacons burn again. Look left, look right, the hills are bright, The dales are light between, Because ’tis fifty years to-night That God has saved the Queen. Now, when the flame they watch not […]...
25. The House Of Dust: Part 03: 02: The Screen Maiden You read-what is it, then that you are reading? What music moves so silently in your mind? Your bright hand turns the page. I watch you from my window, unsuspected: You move in an alien land, a silent age. . . . . . The poet-what was his name-? Tokkei-Tokkei- The poet walked alone in […]...
26. The House Of Dust: Part 03: 03: Haunted Chambers The lamplit page is turned, the dream forgotten; The music changes tone, you wake, remember Deep worlds you lived before,-deep worlds hereafter Of leaf on falling leaf, music on music, Rain and sorrow and wind and dust and laughter. Helen was late and Miriam came too soon. Joseph was dead, his wife and children starving. […]...
27. The House Of Dust: Part 02: 05: Retrospect Round white clouds roll slowly above the housetops, Over the clear red roofs they flow and pass. A flock of pigeons rises with blue wings flashing, Rises with whistle of wings, hovers an instant, And settles slowly again on the tarnished grass. And one old man looks down from a dusty window And sees the […]...
28. The House Of Dust: Part 04: 02: Death: And A Derisive Chorus The door is shut. She leaves the curtained office, And down the grey-walled stairs comes trembling slowly Towards the dazzling street. Her withered hand clings tightly to the railing. The long stairs rise and fall beneath her feet. Here in the brilliant sun we jostle, waiting To tear her secret out. . . We laugh, […]...
29. The House Of Dust: Part 04: 07: The sun goes down in a cold pale flare of light The sun goes down in a cold pale flare of light. The trees grow dark: the shadows lean to the east: And lights wink out through the windows, one by one. A clamor of frosty sirens mourns at the night. Pale slate-grey clouds whirl up from the sunken sun. And the wandering one, the inquisitive […]...
30. The House Of Dust: Part 01: 01: The sun goes down in a cold pale flare of light The sun goes down in a cold pale flare of light. The trees grow dark: the shadows lean to the east: And lights wink out through the windows, one by one. A clamor of frosty sirens mourns at the night. Pale slate-grey clouds whirl up from the sunken sun. And the wandering one, the inquisitive […]...
31. The House Of Dust: Part 01: 05: The snow floats down upon us, mingled with rain The snow floats down upon us, mingled with rain. . . It eddies around pale lilac lamps, and falls Down golden-windowed walls. We were all born of flesh, in a flare of pain, We do not remember the red roots whence we rose, But we know that we rose and walked, that after a while […]...
32. Somehow myself survived the Night Somehow myself survived the Night And entered with the Day That it be saved the Saved suffice Without the Formula. Henceforth I take my living place As one commuted led A Candidate for Morning Chance But dated with the Dead....
33. The House Of Dust: Part 02: 11: Snow falls. The sky is grey, and sullenly glares Snow falls. The sky is grey, and sullenly glares With purple lights in the canyoned street. The fiery sign on the dark tower wreathes and flares. . . The trodden grass in the park is covered with white, The streets grow silent beneath our feet. . . The city dreams, it forgets its past to-night. […]...
34. Long I Thought that Knowledge LONG I thought that knowledge alone would suffice me-O if I could but obtain knowledge! Then my lands engrossed me-Lands of the prairies, Ohio’s land, the southern savannas, engrossed me-For them I would live-I would be their orator; Then I met the examples of old and new heroes-I heard of warriors, sailors, and all dauntless […]...
35. The House Of Dust: Part 02: 10: Sudden Death ‘Number four-the girl who died on the table- The girl with golden hair-‘ The purpling body lies on the polished marble. We open the throat, and lay the thyroid bare. . . One, who held the ether-cone, remembers Her dark blue frightened eyes. He heard the sharp breath quiver, and saw her breast More hurriedly […]...
36. The House Of Dust: Part 03: 11: Conversation: Undertones What shall we talk of? Li Po? Hokusai? You narrow your long dark eyes to fascinate me; You smile a little. . . .Outside, the night goes by. I walk alone in a forest of ghostly trees. . . Your pale hands rest palm downwards on your knees. ‘These lines-converging, they suggest such distance! The […]...
37. The House Of Dust: Part 02: 07: Two Lovers: Overtones Two lovers, here at the corner, by the steeple, Two lovers blow together like music blowing: And the crowd dissolves about them like a sea. Recurring waves of sound break vaguely about them, They drift from wall to wall, from tree to tree. ‘Well, am I late?’ Upward they look and laugh, They look at […]...
38. Says 1 I SAY whatever tastes sweet to the most perfect person, that is finally right. 2 I say nourish a great intellect, a great brain; If I have said anything to the contrary, I hereby retract it. 3 I say man shall not hold property in man; I say the least developed person on earth […]...
39. The House Of Dust: Complete (Long) THE HOUSE OF DUST A Symphony BY CONRAD AIKEN To Jessie NOTE . . . Parts of this poem have been printed in “The North American Review, Others, Poetry, Youth, Coterie, The Yale Review”. . . . I am Indebted to Lafcadio Hearn for the episode called “The Screen Maiden” In Part II. This text […]...
40. Poem of Remembrance for a Girl or a Boy YOU just maturing youth! You male or female! Remember the organic compact of These States, Remember the pledge of the Old Thirteen thenceforward to the rights, life, liberty, equality of man, Remember what was promulged by the founders, ratified by The States, signed in black and white by the Commissioners, and read by Washington at […]...