Poetry

[Dhavaer]

Purpose of thread: Post any poetry you like, have written, or wish to find.

For my part, I'd like to know if anyone knows the author and title of a poem that contains the line: 'Do you remember an inn, Miranda?'

[Jack Squat]

you mean this poem?

Tarantela, by Hilaire Belloc

Do you remember an Inn, Miranda?
Do you remember an Inn?
And the tedding and the shredding
Of the straw for a bedding,
And the fleas that tease in the High Pyrenees,
And the wine that tasted of tar?
And the cheers and the jeers of the young muleteers
(Under the vine of the dark veranda)?
Do you remember an Inn, Miranda,
Do you remember an Inn?
And the cheers and the jeers of the young muleteers
Who hadn't got a penny,
And who weren't paying any,
And the hammer at the doors and the din?
And the hip! hop! hap!
Of the clap
Of the hands to the swirl and the twirl
Of the girl gone chancing,
Glancing,
Dancing,
Backing and advancing,
Snapping of the clapper to the spin
Out and in-
And the ting, tong, tang of the guitar!
Do you remember an Inn,
Miranda?
Do you remember an Inn?

Never more;
Miranda,
Never more.
Only the high peaks hoar;
And Aragon a torrent at the door.
No sound
in the walls of the halls where falls
The tread
Of the feet of the dead to the ground,
No sound:
But the boom
Of the far waterfall like doom.

Google is my friend ;D

One of My favorites
Song of Myself #52 - Walt Whitman
The spotted hawk swoops by and accuses me, he complains
of my gab and my loitering.

I too am not a bit tamed, I too am untranslatable,
I sound my barbaric yawp over the roofs of the world.

The last scud of day holds back for me,
It flings my likeness after the rest and true as any on the
shadow'd wilds,
It coaxes me to the vapor and the dusk.

I depart as air, I shake my white locks at the runaway sun,
I effuse my flesh in eddies, and drift it in lacy jags.

I bequeath myself to the dirt to grow from the grass I love,
If you want me again look for me under your boot-soles.

Don't make me post the entire poem ::)

[Amotis]

One of my all time favorites.

PUEDO ESCRIBIR LOS VERSOS MÁS TRISTES ESTA NOCHE

Puedo escribir los versos más tristes esta noche.

Escribir, por ejemplo: "La noche está estrellada,
y tiritan, azules, los astros, a lo lejos."

El viento de la noche gira en el cielo y canta.

Puedo escribir los versos más tristes esta noche.
Yo la quise, y a veces ella también me quiso.

En las noches como esta la tuve entre mis brazos.
La besé tantas veces bajo el cielo infinito.

Ella me quiso, a veces yo también la quería.
Cómo no haber amado sus grandes ojos fijos.

Puedo escribir los versos más tristes esta noche.
Pensar que no la tengo. Sentir que la he perdido.

Oir la noche inmensa, más inmensa sin ella.
Y el verso cae al alma como al pasto el rocío.

Qué importa que mi amor no pudiera guardarla.
La noche esta estrellada y ella no está conmigo.

Eso es todo. A lo lejos alguien canta. A lo lejos.
Mi alma no se contenta con haberla perdido.

Como para acercarla mi mirada la busca.
Mi corazón la busca, y ella no está conmigo.

La misma noche que hace blanquear los mismos árboles.
Nosotros, los de entonces, ya no somos los mismos.

Ya no la quiero, es cierto, pero cuánto la quise.
Mi voz buscaba el viento para tocar su oído.

De otro. Será de otro. Como antes de mis besos.
Su voz, su cuerpo claro. Sus ojos infinitos.

Ya no la quiero, es cierto, pero tal vez la quiero.
Es tan corto el amor, y es tan largo el olvido.

Porque en noches como esta la tuve entre mis brazos,
mi alma no se contenta con haberla perdido.

Aunque este sea el ultimo dolor que ella me causa,
y estos sean los ultimos versos que yo le escribo.


I suppose I'll post some of my own later.

[Amotis]

One of My favorites
Song of Myself #52 - Walt Whitman
The spotted hawk swoops by and accuses me, he complains
of my gab and my loitering.

I too am not a bit tamed, I too am untranslatable,
I sound my barbaric yawp over the roofs of the world.

The last scud of day holds back for me,
It flings my likeness after the rest and true as any on the
shadow'd wilds,
It coaxes me to the vapor and the dusk.

I depart as air, I shake my white locks at the runaway sun,
I effuse my flesh in eddies, and drift it in lacy jags.

I bequeath myself to the dirt to grow from the grass I love,
If you want me again look for me under your boot-soles.

Don't make me post the entire poem ::)

Walt Whitman? Eww...literally gay poety...

[Jack Squat]

I was about to respond with O Captain, My Captain, but I remembered that was Whitman too.
here's another one I like, by Poe
TO HELEN.

————

Helen, thy beauty is to me
Like those Nicean barks of yore,
That gently, o'er a perfum'd sea,
The weary way-worn wanderer bore
To his own native shore.
On desperate seas long wont to roam,
Thy hyacinth hair, thy classic face,
Thy Naiad airs have brought me home
To the beauty of fair Greece,
And the grandeur of old Rome.

Lo ! in that little window-niche
How statue-like I see thee stand!
The folded scroll within thy hand —
A Psyche from the regions which
Are Holy land !
If no one's guessed, I find transindentalistic poetry among the most interesting, and as such am a big fan of The Dead Poet's Society.

[Ego Slayer]

One of my all time favorites.

*gasp!* I actually understood some of that! ^_^

[Amotis]

One of mine, Dark Stallion might compose and sing to this one.

Untitled

sirens of the auburn sea,
starry waves parting at their feet.
astral strings calling to me,
softly plucking heartstrings,
the lyres of twisted wings,
from torn seams of broken beings.
ethereal rhythm; anvil of the sea,
carving this echoing key,
foaming door of the sea,
wide open at their feet.
twist and pull,
open yourself like a fool.

the fanfare of flight,
to which we drown.
no breath in sight,
no reason to frown.
salvation in the azure angels,
floating to their heavenly above,
the passing sighs of beryl jewels,
the drowning hope of beloved fools,
watch them fly from your grasping gloves.
halos playing to the sea light,
saviors dimming from your sight,
like luna’s diamonds,
fading to unseen islands.

succumb all.
succumb to the great sea.
bring out your downfall.
just twist that key


----------------
Eh, I don't know. Poetry was never something I prided myself on, just something I do, or err did ::)

[Dhavaer]

Wow, thanks jacksquat! ;D My mother's been looking for that for years!
Google is not my friend, apparently.

Here's on I found in someone's sig on the Wizards boards. Can anyone tell me who the author is?

A Mercenary's Love Song

My Lady sings with a sultry voice, of promises to be,
Of when she'll take me inher arms and set my spirit free.

My Lady's touch is ever near, and yet so far away.
I've sought so long her sweet caress, it will be mine someday.

My Lady's eyes are watching me as I prepare for war.
She stands upon the battlefield, like so many times before.

The battle cries, a comrade dies, and falls to her embrace.
And in her arms she takes him now, unto his resting place.

Another time she'll come for me, as I breathe my final breath,
And hold me for a little while, my mistress, Lady Death.

[Jack Squat]

It's Rick Smith from what I found.

EDIT: Couldn't get the page with it on to load

[Dhavaer]

Thanks.

[amorelli]

two of my favorites - one's actually lyrics to a song

Success
by Ralph Waldo Emerson

To laugh often and much
to win the respect of intelligent people
and affection of children; to earn the
appreciation of honest critics and
endure the betrayal of false friends;
to appreciate beauty, to find the best
in others; to leave the world a bit
better, whether by a healthy child
a garden patch or redeemed
social condition; to know even
one life has breathed easier because
you have lived. This is to have
succeeded.



Shed a Little Light
by James Taylor

Let us turn our thoughts today
To Martin Luther King
And recognize that there are ties between us
All men and women
Living on the earth
Ties of hope and love
Sister and brotherhood
That we are bound together
In our desire to see the world become
A place in which our children
Can grow free and strong
We are bound together
By the task that stands before us
And the road that lies ahead
We are bound and we are bound

[Dhavaer]

The Adept - C. Vincent Metzen

I have walked the paths, the shadowed roads, the lead to Terror's breast.
I have plumbed the depths of Hatred's womb, and scaled Destruction's crest.

For every secret left unveiled, for every power learned,
I'd sell the remnants of my soul, regardless how it burned.
And still I sought a higher wisdom few could have attained,
Though I found it, it would leave me - broken, damned and drained.

For now I find this power learned is more unto a curse.
My spirit burns with every spell and each irreverant verse.
Despite this strength and knowledge earned, I have paid a heavy toll.
Never should've traded power for my own immortal soul.

[Krade]

Robert Frost
"Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening"

Whose woods these are I think I know.
His house is in the village though;
He will not see me stopping here
To watch his woods fill up with snow.

My little horse must think it queer
To stop without a farmhouse near
Between the woods and frozen lake
The darkest evening of the year.

He gives his harness bells a shake
To ask if there is some mistake.
The only other sound's the sweep
Of easy wind and downy flake.

The woods are lovely, dark and deep,
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep.

This is one of the few poems I have commited to memory. This is mostly because while I was in my High School Choir, we sang this as a song, and it is by far one of my favorite songs we ever did. It sounds really cool and kinda creepy, and I can't read this poem without singing it in my head or even aloud.

[bosssmiley]

The American Rebellion
by Rudyard Kipling

Note: read *both* parts before you get hot under the collar.

Before
T'was not while England's sword unsheathed
Put half a world to flight,
Nor while their new-built cities breathed
Secure behind her might;
Not while she poured from Pole to Line
Treasure and ships and men--
These worshippers at Freedoms shrine
They did not quit her then!

Not till their foes were driven forth
By England o'er the main--
Not till the Frenchman from the North
Had gone with shattered Spain;
Not till the clean-swept oceans showed
No hostile flag unrolled,
Did they remember that they owed
To Freedom--and were bold!

After

The snow lies thick on Valley Forge,
The ice on the Delaware,
But the poor dead soldiers of King George
They neither know nor care.

Not though the earliest primrose break
On the sunny side of the lane,
And scuffling rookeries awake
Their England' s spring again.

They will not stir when the drifts are gone,
Or the ice melts out of the bay:
And the men that served with Washington
Lie all as still as they.

They will not stir though the mayflower blows
In the moist dark woods of pine,
And every rock-strewn pasture shows
Mullein and columbine.

Each for his land, in a fair fight,
Encountered strove, and died,
And the kindly earth that knows no spite
Covers them side by side.

She is too busy to think of war;
She has all the world to make gay;
And, behold, the yearly flowers are
Where they were in our fathers' day!

Golden-rod by the pasture-wall
When the columbine is dead,
And sumach leaves that turn, in fall,
Bright as the blood they shed.


As valid in 2006 as it was the day he wrote it. Kipling lost his own son in WW1.

A lot of people hate Kipling for what they see as being his flag-waving jingoism. That's an entirely fallacious judgement made by a bunch of snobbish Bloomsbury pseudo-intellectuals who thought poetry had to be about the sort of elevated semtiments that they believed the working classes couldn't possibly hope to understand. Really? They should have read "Recessional" or "If" before passing judgements like that.

[Archonic Energy]

Leisure
By W. H. Davies

WHAT is this life if, full of care,
We have no time to stand and stare?—
No time to stand beneath the boughs,
And stare as long as sheep and cows:

No time to see, when woods we pass,
Where squirrels hide their nuts in grass:

No time to see, in broad daylight,
Streams full of stars, like skies at night:

No time to turn at Beauty's glance,
And watch her feet, how they can dance:

No time to wait till her mouth can
Enrich that smile her eyes began?

A poor life this if, full of care,
We have no time to stand and stare.

I've always been partial to a bit of shakesphere

Sonnet 18

Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?
Thou art more lovely and more temperate:
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,
And summer's lease hath all too short a date:
Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,
And often is his gold complexion dimm'd;
And every fair from fair sometime declines,
By chance or nature's changing course untrimm'd;
But thy eternal summer shall not fade
Nor lose possession of that fair thou owest;
Nor shall Death brag thou wander'st in his shade,
When in eternal lines to time thou growest:
So long as men can breathe or eyes can see,
So long lives this and this gives life to thee.

a line i used from R & J in a letter to someone...

"Parting is such sweet sorrow,
That i shall say goodbye till it be 'morrow."
it didn't work.

Edit: format changed to match other entrys
title of sonnet 18 added

[Quincunx]

Contemporary poetry from my home messageboard:
Wednesday's Ashes, Cyril Darkcloud, 2003?
Arabia, Cerulean, 2000?
There are many good poems there but these are my best-loved.

If someone hadn't mentioned Kipling already, I would have; if I had to confine myself to reading five authors for the rest of my life, Kipling would be one of them (William Golding the second, and the rest nebulous).

"The Garden of Love", from Songs of Experience, William Blake, 1794

I went to the Garden of Love,
And saw what I never had seen:
A chapel was built in the midst,
Where I used to play on the green.

And the gates of this chapel were shut,
And "Thou shalt not" writ over the door;
So I turned to the Garden of Love,
That so many sweet flowers bore,

And I saw it was filled with graves,
And tombstones where flowers should be;
And priests in black gowns were walking their rounds,
And binding with briers my joys and desires.

T.S. Eliot is faaaaaaar too lengthy to quote within a thread but those are poems I can sink into, and wander around in, and never find the way out.

[The_Librarian]

My favourite poem isn't really anything to do with role play or fantasy, but I just love it.

"WARNING" - Jenny Joseph

When I am an old woman, I shall wear purple
with a red hat that doesn't go, and doesn't suit me.
And I shall spend my pension on brandy and summer gloves
and satin candles, and say we've no money for butter.

I shall sit down on the pavement when I am tired
and gobble up samples in shops and press alarm bells
and run my stick along the public railings
and make up for the sobriety of my youth.

I shall go out in my slippers in the rain
and pick the flowers in other people's gardens
and learn to spit.

You can wear terrible shirts and grow more fat
and eat three pounds of sausages at a go
or only bread and pickles for a week
and hoard pens and pencils and beer nuts and things in boxes.

But now we must have clothes that keep us dry
and pay our rent and not swear in the street
and set a good example for the children.

We must have friends to dinner and read the papers.
But maybe I ought to practice a little now?
So people who know me are not too shocked and surprised
When suddenly I am old, and start to wear purple.

[The Vorpal Tribble]

How can no one have yet mentioned The Jabberwocky by Lewis Carroll?

"Beware the Jabberwock, my son!
The jaws that bite, the claws that catch!
Beware the Jubjub bird, and shun
The frumious Bandersnatch!"

He took his vorpal sword in hand:
Long time the manxome foe he sought --
So rested he by the Tumtum tree,
And stood awhile in thought.

And, as in uffish thought he stood,
The Jabberwock, with eyes of flame,
Came whiffling through the tulgey wood,
And burbled as it came!

One, two! One, two! And through and through
The vorpal blade went snicker-snack!
He left it dead, and with its head
He went galumphing back.

"And, has thou slain the Jabberwock?
Come to my arms, my beamish boy!
O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!'
He chortled in his joy.

`Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
Did gyre and gimble in the wabe;
All mimsy were the borogoves,
And the mome raths outgrabe.

My other favorite poem is Ode, which you can find by scrolling down a few posts to the topic, 'We are the music makers...'

[bosssmiley]

What a cool thread. Hats off to you Dhavaer.

Oh, John Keats. *Any* of his 1820 odes (Grecian Urn, Autumn, Melancholy). Read them aloud. ;D

[PhoeKun]

This is a little intimidating. Here I am, looking at some truly great poems from some of the all-time greats, and I've got nothing to add but my own stuff. Which I'm still going to do, since I'm interested in any critique people are willing to give me. Just... don't expect Shakespeare.

The Second Truth From the Left

On a cloudless day, I stared into the sky,
and it stopped being the sky.
Suddenly
blue had an imperfection.
The bird circled once, twice…

A mockery, not part
of the whole. And then I
wanted to fly, too, and feel the wind whipping
my hair.
But god damn biology, that rotten bastard telling me
it was all impossible. Telling me
People. Don’t. Fly.

Well, so what? The
freedom is what matters. Not
impossible. No ‘You can’t.’
The clouds are in my grasp.
The sky is mine.

No more bird. I
knew I was a fool. Tattered feathers, my dream,
burn up in the sun. Not impossible. No, you can’t.
The sky still isn’t the sky. It’s just blue.
I won’t let my hopes reach there again. But,
the sky is mine, and still, I’ll…

Just… wish.

[geek_2049]

To His Coy Mistress by Andrew Marvel

Had we but world enough, and time,
This coyness, Lady, were no crime
We would sit down and think which way
To walk and pass our long love's day.
Thou by the Indian Ganges' side 5
Shouldst rubies find: I by the tide
Of Humber would complain. I would
Love you ten years before the Flood,
And you should, if you please, refuse
Till the conversion of the Jews. 10
My vegetable love should grow
Vaster than empires, and more slow;
An hundred years should go to praise
Thine eyes and on thy forehead gaze;
Two hundred to adore each breast, 15
But thirty thousand to the rest;
An age at least to every part,
And the last age should show your heart.
For, Lady, you deserve this state,
Nor would I love at lower rate. 20
But at my back I always hear
Time's wingèd chariot hurrying near;
And yonder all before us lie
Deserts of vast eternity.
Thy beauty shall no more be found, 25
Nor, in thy marble vault, shall sound
My echoing song: then worms shall try
That long preserved virginity,
And your quaint honour turn to dust,
And into ashes all my lust: 30
The grave 's a fine and private place,
But none, I think, do there embrace.
Now therefore, while the youthful hue
Sits on thy skin like morning dew,
And while thy willing soul transpires 35
At every pore with instant fires,
Now let us sport us while we may,
And now, like amorous birds of prey,
Rather at once our time devour
Than languish in his slow-chapt power. 40
Let us roll all our strength and all
Our sweetness up into one ball,
And tear our pleasures with rough strife
Thorough the iron gates of life:
Thus, though we cannot make our sun 45
Stand still, yet we will make him run.

[Jackrabbit]

One I really like:

Nothing Gold Can Stay - Robert Frost

Nature's first green is gold,
Her hardest hue to hold.
Her early leaf's a flower;
But only so an hour.
Then leaf subsides to leaf.
So Eden sank to grief.
So dawn goes down to day.
Nothing gold can stay.


What may be my family's unofficial creed, my grandfather's favorite, my father's as well, and mine to strive to live up to:

If - Rudyard Kipling

IF you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too;
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or being lied about, don't deal in lies,
Or being hated, don't give way to hating,
And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise:
If you can dream - and not make dreams your master;
If you can think - and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
And treat those two impostors just the same;
If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
And stoop and build 'em up with worn-out tools:

If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breathe a word about your loss;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: 'Hold on!'

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
' Or walk with Kings - nor lose the common touch,
if neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,
If all men count with you, but none too much;
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds' worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,
And - which is more - you'll be a Man, my son!

[Ebon_Drake]

Here are two of my favourite poems I learnt in school so everyone probably knows them, but as they haven't been mentioned yet I feel I should include them, especially the latter. They give two completely different interpretations of war (Crimea and World War One respectively for anyone wondering.)

The Charge of the Light Brigade

Half a league, half a league,
Half a league onward,
All in the valley of Death
Rode the six hundred.
'Forward, the Light Brigade!
Charge for the guns!' he said:
Into the valley of Death
Rode the six hundred.

'Forward, the Light Brigade!'
Was there a man dismay'd ?
Not tho' the soldier knew
Some one had blunder'd:
Their's not to make reply,
Their's not to reason why,
Their's but to do and die:
Into the valley of Death
Rode the six hundred.

Cannon to right of them,
Cannon to left of them,
Cannon in front of them
Volley'd and thunder'd;
Storm'd at with shot and shell,
Boldly they rode and well,
Into the jaws of Death,
Into the mouth of Hell
Rode the six hundred.

Flash'd all their sabres bare,
Flash'd as they turn'd in air
Sabring the gunners there,
Charging an army, while
All the world wonder'd:
Plunged in the battery-smoke
Right thro' the line they broke;
Cossack and Russian
Reel'd from the sabre-stroke
Shatter'd and sunder'd.
Then they rode back, but not
Not the six hundred.

Cannon to right of them,
Cannon to left of them,
Cannon behind them
Volley'd and thunder'd;
Storm'd at with shot and shell,
While horse and hero fell,
They that had fought so well
Came thro' the jaws of Death,
Back from the mouth of Hell,
All that was left of them,
Left of six hundred.

When can their glory fade?
O the wild charge they made!
All the world wonder'd.
Honour the charge they made!
Honour the Light Brigade,
Noble six hundred!

- Alfred Lord Tennyson

..................


Dulce Et Decorum Est

Bent double, like old beggars under sacks,
Knock-kneed, coughing like hags, we cursed through sludge,
Till on the haunting flares we turned our backs
And towards our distant rest began to trudge.
Men marched asleep. Many had lost their boots
But limped on, blood-shod. All went lame; all blind;
Drunk with fatigue; deaf even to the hoots
Of disappointed shells that dropped behind.

GAS! Gas! Quick, boys!-- An ecstasy of fumbling,
Fitting the clumsy helmets just in time;
But someone still was yelling out and stumbling
And floundering like a man in fire or lime.--
Dim, through the misty panes and thick green light
As under a green sea, I saw him drowning.

In all my dreams, before my helpless sight,
He plunges at me, guttering, choking, drowning.

If in some smothering dreams you too could pace
Behind the wagon that we flung him in,
And watch the white eyes writhing in his face,
His hanging face, like a devil's sick of sin;
If you could hear, at every jolt, the blood
Come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs,
Obscene as cancer, bitter as the cud
Of vile, incurable sores on innocent tongues,--
My friend, you would not tell with such high zest
To children ardent for some desperate glory,
The old Lie: Dulce et decorum est
Pro patria mori.

- Wilfred Owen (1893 - 4th November 1918.)

[bosssmiley]

Three words: "the war poets".

Sassoon, Owen, Graves, but not that sentimental propagandist Brooke (Peace was a bad joke, but The Soldier was ok). >:(

If you can still write beautiful poetry even in the living hell of the Western Front then odds are that you probably have something worthwhile to say.

Remorse
by Siegfried Sassoon

Lost in the swamp and welter of the pit,
He flounders off the duck-boards; only he knows
Each flash and spouting crash,--each instant lit
When gloom reveals the streaming rain. He goes
Heavily, blindly on. And, while he blunders,
"Could anything be worse than this?"--he wonders,
Remembering how he saw those Germans run,
Screaming for mercy among the stumps of trees:
Green-faced, they dodged and darted: there was one
Livid with terror, clutching at his knees. . .
Our chaps were sticking 'em like pigs . . . "O hell!"
He thought--"there's things in war one dare not tell
Poor father sitting safe at home, who reads
Of dying heroes and their deathless deeds."

[Arian]

Philip Larkin - This Be The Verse

They **** you up, your mum and dad.
They may not mean to, but they do.
They fill you with the faults they had
And add some extra, just for you.

But they were ****ed up in their turn
By fools in old-style hats and coats,
Who half the time were soppy-stern
And half at one another's throats.

Man hands on misery to man.
It deepens like a coastal shelf.
Get out as early as you can,
And don't have any kids yourself.


and for a lighter mood:


Pam Ayres - Clamp the Mighty Limpet

I am Clamp the Mighty Limpet -
I am solid, I am stuck
I am welded to the rockface
With my superhuman suck
I live along the waterline
And in the dreary caves
I am Clamp the Mighty Limpet
I am Ruler of the Waves.

What care I for the shingle,
For the dragging of the tide,
With my unrelenting sucker
And my granite underside?
There's only one reward
For those who come to prise at me
And that's to watch their fingernails
As they go floating out to sea.

Don't upset me, I'm a limpet
Though it's plankton I devour
Be very, very careful!
I can move an inch an hour!
Don't poke me or prod me
For I warn you - if you do
You stand there for a fortnight
And I might be stuck on you!

[storybookknight]

My favorite Poe poem is the one where he...

Not long ago, the writer of these lines,
In the mad pride of intellectuality,
Maintained "the power of words"- denied that ever
A thought arose within the human brain
Beyond the utterance of the human tongue:
And now, as if in mockery of that boast,
Two words- two foreign soft dissyllables-
Italian tones, made only to be murmured
By angels dreaming in the moonlit "dew
That hangs like chains of pearl on Hermon hill,"
Have stirred from out the abysses of his heart,
Unthought-like thoughts that are the souls of thought,
Richer, far wilder, far diviner visions
Than even seraph harper, Israfel,
(Who has "the sweetest voice of all God's creatures,")
Could hope to utter. And I! my spells are broken.
The pen falls powerless from my shivering hand.
With thy dear name as text, though bidden by thee,
I cannot write- I cannot speak or think-
Alas, I cannot feel; for 'tis not feeling,
This standing motionless upon the golden
Threshold of the wide-open gate of dreams.
Gazing, entranced, adown the gorgeous vista,
And thrilling as I see, upon the right,
Upon the left, and all the way along,
Amid empurpled vapors, far away
To where the prospect terminates- thee only.

Yeah, that one. He's just like - I can't describe how I feel for you, so I'm not even going to try, but it is so totally awesome.

[Tadakimacun]

I have three to contribute. One by Shel Silverstein, one by Theodore Roethke, and one by me. Well, the one by me is actually a song, but I like the way it turned out.


(I love this poem and have it on my wall. It's my favorite Silverstein piece and a great one to cheer myself up when I'm out of sorts.)

Listen to the Mustn'ts
By Shel Silverstein

Listen to the MUSTN'TS, child,
Listen to the DON'TS,
Listen to the SHOULDN'TS,
the IMPOSSIBLES, the WON'TS,
Listen to the NEVER HAVES
Then listen close to me-
ANYTHING can happen, child,
ANYTHING can be.

(I love the lyrical style in this one. Try reading it out loud and whispering the last line in each stanza- it sounds even better aloud than written.)

I Knew a Woman
By Theodore Roethke

I knew a woman, lovely in her bones,
When small birds sighed, she would sigh back at them;
Ah, when she moved, she moved more ways than one:
The shapes a bright container can contain!
Of her choice virtues only gods should speak,
Or English poets who grew up on Greek
(I'd have them sing in chorus, cheek to cheek.)

How well her wishes went! She stroked my chin,
She taught me Turn, and Counter-turn, and stand;
She taught me Touch, that undulant white skin:
I nibbled meekly from her proffered hand;
She was the sickle; I, poor I, the rake,
Coming behind her for her pretty sake
(But what prodigious mowing did we make.)

Love likes a gander, and adores a goose:
Her full lips pursed, the errant note to seize;
She played it quick, she played it light and loose;
My eyes, they dazzled at her flowing knees;
Her several parts could keep a pure repose,
Or one hip quiver with a mobile nose
(She moved in circles, and those circles moved.)

Let seed be grass, and grass turn into hay:
I'm martyr to a motion not my own;
What's freedom for? To know eternity.
I swear she cast a shadow white as stone.
But who would count eternity in days?
These old bones live to learn her wanton ways:
(I measure time by how a body sways.)

(I wrote this a few months back about a snotty, aloof co-worker. He's someone that I pity a great deal.)
Prince
By Tadakimacun

He reminds me of royalty-
His bearing brightly brings to mind
The best shades of nobility
Spoiled prince hoarding his words
For a sparkling new crown;
See it balanced on his brow
As his nose he looks down

At the rabble-rousers rising right before his eyes
Loudly, blindly worshipping the blatant fam'ly ties

Tell me how could someone who seems
Carved from living stone
Practice this pretense to stay aloof and alone....?

I bear silent witness to this facade of not-care;
But underneath his nonchalance I see a person there

No, I'm not wrong; before too long
His bearing wanes, his sadness grows
As he forgets how to be strong;
Village raises child who grows to defend his home-
A man can only perish when
He tries to live alone...

Watch the rabble-rousers rising right before his eyes
Loudly building homage to the blatant fam'ly ties

Tell me how the prince now feels,
Trapped in living stone
Spoiled prince now gets his wish to always be alone...

I bear silent witness as his heart's wish becomes real
Watch a single tear fall down...
And he learns how to feel.

[Arian]

Good old Shel Silverstein! Another three by him (all quoted from memory - can't find them on the Net):


The walrus got braces
And that's why his face is
A tangle of wires and steel.
He'll sit and he'll wait
Till his tusks are both straight,
And then think how much happier he'll feel!
But meanwhile they're ruining his meal.


I am a dry-stone-waller.
All day long, I dry-stone-wall.
Of all appalling callings, dry-stone-walling's
Worst of all.


If you are a dreamer, come in!
If you are a dreamer,
A wisher, a liar,
A hope-er, a pray-er,
A magic bean buyer,
If you're a pretender, come sit by my fire!
For we have some flax-golden tales to spin,
Come in! Come in!

[storybookknight]

Sarah Cynthia Sylvia Stout would not take the garbage out!

Shel Silverstein is officially awesome.

[neos_dionysos]

Nemesis,

by H. P. Lovecraft.

Through the ghoul-guarded gateways of slumber,
Past the wan-mooned abysses of night,
I have lived o'er my lives without number,
I have sounded all things with my sight;
And I struggle and shriek ere the daybreak, being driven to madness with fright.

I have whirled with the earth at the dawning,
When the sky was a vaporous flame;
I have seen the dark universe yawning
Where the black planets roll without aim,
Where they roll in their horror unheeded, without knowledge or lustre or name.

I had drifted o'er seas without ending,
Under sinister grey-clouded skies
That the many-forked lightning is rending,
That resound with hysterical cries;
With the moans of invisible daemons that out of the green waters rise.

I have plunged like a deer through the arches
Of the hoary primoridal grove,
Where the oaks feel the presence that marches
And stalks on where no spirit dares rove,
And I flee from a thing that surrounds me, and leers through dead branches above.

I have stumbled by cave-ridden mountains
That rise barren and bleak from the plain,
I have drunk of the frog-foetid fountains
That ooze down to the marsh and the main;
And in hot cursed tarns I have seen things I care not to gaze on again.

I have scanned the vast ivy-clad palace,
I have trod its untenanted hall,
Where the moon rising up from the valleys
Shows the tapestried things on the wall;
Strange figurres discordantly woven, that I cannot endure to recall.

I have peered from the casements in wonder
At the mouldering meadows around,
At the many-roofed village laid under
The curse of a grave-girdled ground;
And from rows of white urn-carven marble I listen intently for sound.

I have haunted the tombs of the ages,
I have flown on the pinions of fear
Where the smoke-belching Erebus rages;
Where the jokulls loom snow-clad and drear:
And in realms where the sun of the desert consumes what it never can cheer.

I was old when the pharaohs first mounted
The jewel-decked throne by the Nile;
I was old in those epochs uncounted
When I, and I only, was vile;
And Man, yet untainted and happy, dwelt in bliss on the far Artic isle.

Oh, great was the sin of my spirit,
And great is the reach of its doom;
Not the pity of Heaven can cheer it,
Nor can respite be found in the tomb:
Down the infinite aeons come beating the wings of unmerciful gloom.

Through the ghoul-guarded gateways of slumber,
Past the wan-mooned abysses of night,
I have lived o'er my lives without number,
I have sounded all things with my sight;
And I struggle and shriek ere the daybreak, being driven to madness with fright.



but... aren't we violating copyrights by posting poems of other people - even if they are dead - here? I just wondered...