To a President

Related poetry:

1. To the President of Magdalen College, Oxford Since now from woodland mist and flooded clay I am fled beside the steep Devonian shore, Nor stand for welcome at your gothic door, ‘Neath the fair tower of Magdalen and May, Such tribute, Warren, as fond poets pay For generous esteem, I write, not more Enhearten’d than my need is, reckoning o’er My life-long […]...
2. On The Death Of Dr. Lancton President Of Maudlin College When men for injuryes unsatisfy’d, For hopes cutt off, for debts not fully payd, For legacies in vain expected, mourne Over theyr owne respects within the urne, Races of tears all striveing first to fall As frequent are as eye and funerall; Then high swolne sighes drawne in and sent out strong Seeme to call […]...
3. These are the Signs to Nature's Inns These are the Signs to Nature’s Inns Her invitation broad To Whosoever famishing To taste her mystic Bread These are the rites of Nature’s House The Hospitality That opens with an equal width To Beggar and to Bee For Sureties of her staunch Estate Her undecaying Cheer The Purple in the East is set And […]...
4. 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....
5. 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 […]...
6. Behavior BEHAVIOR-fresh, native, copious, each one for himself or herself, Nature and the Soul expressed-America and freedom expressed-In it the finest art, In it pride, cleanliness, sympathy, to have their chance, In it physique, intellect, faith-in it just as much as to manage an army or a city, or to write a book-perhaps more, The youth, […]...
7. 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 […]...
8. 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 […]...
9. 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 […]...
10. Me Imperturbe ME imperturbe, standing at ease in Nature, Master of all, or mistress of all-aplomb in the midst of irrational things, Imbued as they-passive, receptive, silent as they, Finding my occupation, poverty, notoriety, foibles, crimes, less important than I thought; Me private, or public, or menial, or solitary-all these subordinate, (I am eternally equal with the […]...
11. Nocturne Always I knew that it could not last (Gathering clouds, and the snowflakes flying), Now it is part of the golden past (Darkening skies, and the night-wind sighing); It is but cowardice to pretend. Cover with ashes our love’s cold crater- Always I’ve known that it had to end Sooner or later. Always I knew […]...
12. Republican Pioneers We’re marching along, we’re gath’ring strong’ We place on our right reliance, We fling in the air, for all who care, Our first loud notes of defiance! We fling in the air, For all who care, Our first loud notes of defiance! Laugh long and loud, you toady crowd, At the men you call benighted, […]...
13. 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...
14. Her little Parasol to lift Her little Parasol to lift And once to let it down Her whole Responsibility To imitate be Mine. A Summer further I must wear, Content if Nature’s Drawer Present me from sepulchral Crease As blemishless, as Her....
15. 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...
16. This Dust was Once the Man THIS dust was once the Man, Gentle, plain, just and resolute-under whose cautious hand, Against the foulest crime in history known in any land or age, Was saved the Union of These States....
17. Kosmos WHO includes diversity, and is Nature, Who is the amplitude of the earth, and the coarseness and sexuality of the earth, and the great charity of the earth, and the equilibrium also, Who has not look’d forth from the windows, the eyes, for nothing, or whose brain held audience with messengers for nothing; Who contains […]...
18. "Nature" is what we see “Nature” is what we see The Hill the Afternoon Squirrel Eclipse the Bumble bee Nay Nature is Heaven Nature is what we hear The Bobolink the Sea Thunder the Cricket Nay Nature is Harmony Nature is what we know Yet have no art to say So impotent Our Wisdom is To her Simplicity....
19. 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 […]...
20. 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 […]...
21. 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!...
22. Mediums THEY shall arise in the States, They shall report Nature, laws, physiology, and happiness; They shall illustrate Democracy and the kosmos; They shall be alimentive, amative, perceptive; They shall be complete women and men-their pose brawny and supple, their drink water, their blood clean and clear; They shall enjoy materialism and the sight of products-they […]...
23. 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 […]...
24. 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...
25. Sonnet 129: Th' expense of spirit in a waste of shame Th’ expense of spirit in a waste of shame Is lust in action; and, till action, lust Is perjured, murderous, bloody full of blame, Savage, extreme, rude, cruel, not to trust, Enjoyed no sooner but despisèd straight, Past reason hunted, and no sooner had Past reason hated as a swallowed bait On purpose laid to […]...
26. Sonnets CXXIX: Th' expense of spirit in a waste of shame Th’ expense of spirit in a waste of shame Is lust in action; and till action, lust Is perjur’d, murd’rous, bloody, full of blame, Savage, extreme, rude, cruel, not to trust; Enjoy’d no sooner but despised straight; Past reason hunted; and, no sooner had, Past reason hated, as a swallow’d bait, On purpose laid to […]...
27. Sonnet CXXIX The expense of spirit in a waste of shame Is lust in action; and till action, lust Is perjured, murderous, bloody, full of blame, Savage, extreme, rude, cruel, not to trust, Enjoy’d no sooner but despised straight, Past reason hunted, and no sooner had Past reason hated, as a swallow’d bait On purpose laid to […]...
28. Sonnets xix TH’ expense of Spirit in a waste of shame Is lust in action; and till action, lust Is perjured, murderous, bloody, full of blame, Savage, extreme, rude, cruel, not to trust; Enjoy’d no sooner but despised straight; Past reason hunted; and, no sooner had, Past reason hated, as a swallow’d bait On purpose laid to […]...
29. All Watched Over by Machines of Loving Grace I like to think (and The sooner the better!) Of a cybernetic meadow Where mammels and computers Live together in mutually Programming harmony Like pure water Touching clear sky. I like to think (right now, please!) Of a cybernetic forest Filled with pines and electronics Where deer stroll peacefully Past computers As if they were […]...
30. As the Time Draws Nigh 1 AS the time draws nigh, glooming, a cloud, A dread beyond, of I know not what, darkens me. I shall go forth, I shall traverse The States awhile-but I cannot tell whither or how long; Perhaps soon, some day or night while I am singing, my voice will suddenly cease. 2 O book, O […]...
31. To the East and to the West TO the East and to the West; To the man of the Seaside State, and of Pennsylvania, To the Kanadian of the North-to the Southerner I love; These, with perfect trust, to depict you as myself-the germs are in all men; I believe the main purport of These States is to found a superb friendship, […]...
32. I hear it was Charged against Me I HEAR it was charged against me that I sought to destroy institutions; But really I am neither for nor against institutions; (What indeed have I in common with them?-Or what with the destruction of them?) Only I will establish in the Mannahatta, and in every city of These States, inland and seaboard, And in […]...
33. To Rich Givers WHAT you give me, I cheerfully accept, A little sustenance, a hut and garden, a little money-these, as I rendezvous with my poems; A traveler’s lodging and breakfast as I journey through The States-Why should I be ashamed to own such gifts? Why to advertise for them? For I myself am not one who bestows […]...
34. To My Antenor My dear Antenor now give o’re, For my sake talk of Graves no more; Death is not in our power to gain, And is both wish’d and fear’d in vain Let’s be as angry as wee will, Grief sooner may distract then kill, And the unhappy often prove Death is as coy a thing as […]...
35. Full of Life, Now FULL of life, now, compact, visible, I, forty years old the Eighty-third Year of The States, To one a century hence, or any number of centuries hence, To you, yet unborn, these, seeking you. When you read these, I, that was visible, am become invisible; Now it is you, compact, visible, realizing my poems, seeking […]...
36. From Citron-Bower From citron-bower be her bed, Cut from branch of tree a-flower, Fashioned for her maidenhead. From Lydian apples, sweet of hue, Cut the width of board and lathe, Carve the feet from myrtle-wood. Let the palings of her bed Be quince and box-wood overlaid With the scented bark of yew. That all the wood in […]...
37. A Promise to California A PROMISE to California, Also to the great Pastoral Plains, and for Oregon: Sojourning east a while longer, soon I travel toward you, to remain, to teach robust American love; For I know very well that I and robust love belong among you, inland, and along the Western Sea; For These States tend inland, and […]...
38. The Reverend Mullineux I’d reckon his weight as eight-stun-eight, And his height as five-foot-two, With a face as plain as an eight-day clock And a walk as brisk as a bantam-cock Game as a bantam, too, Hard and wiry and full of steam, That’s the boss of the English Team, Reverend Mullineux! Makes no row when the game […]...
39. A Door just opened on a street A Door just opened on a street I lost was passing by An instant’s Width of Warmth disclosed And Wealth and Company. The Door as instant shut And I I lost was passing by Lost doubly but by contrast most Informing misery...
40. The Three Fishers 1 Three fishers went sailing away to the west, 2 Away to the west as the sun went down; 3 Each thought on the woman who loved him the best, 4 And the children stood watching them out of the town; 5 For men must work, and women must weep, 6 And there’s little to […]...