The Road Not Taken
by Robert Frost

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim
Becauseit was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that, the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I marked the first for another day!
Yet knowing how ways leads on to way
I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I,
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.



Success by Emily Dickinson

Success is counted sweetest
By those who ne'er succeed.
To comprehend a nectar
Requires sorest need.

Not one of all the purple host
Who took the flag to-day
Can tell the definition,
So clear, of victory!

As he, defeated, dying,
On whose forbidden ear
The distant strains of triumph
Burst agonized and clear!


i love alot of poems but im just gonna put 2 for now.

Cowards die many times before their death;
The valiant never taste death but once.

William Shakespeare

I learned this poem in School, many years ago.
My only Brother died when he was twenty-seven years old.The West Wind

IT'S a warm wind, the west wind, full of birds' cries;
I never hear the west wind but tears are in my eyes.
For it comes from the west lands, the old brown hills.
And April's in the west wind, and daffodils.

It's a fine land, the west land, for hearts as tired as mine,
Apple orchards blossom there, and the air's like wine.
There is cool green grass there, where men may lie at rest,
And the thrushes are in song there, fluting from the nest.

"Will ye not come home brother? ye have been long away,
It's April, and blossom time, and white is the may;
And bright is the sun brother, and warm is the rain,--
Will ye not come home, brother, home to us again?

"The young corn is green, brother, where the rabbits run.
It's blue sky, and white clouds, and warm rain and sun.
It's song to a man's soul, brother, fire to a man's brain,
To hear the wild bees and see the merry spring again.

"Larks are singing in the west, brother, above the green wheat,
So will ye not come home, brother, and rest your tired feet?
I've a balm for bruised hearts, brother, sleep for aching eyes,"
Says the warm wind, the west wind, full of birds' cries.

It's the white road westwards is the road I must tread
To the green grass, the cool grass, and rest for heart and head,
To the violets, and the warm hearts, and the thrushes' song,
In the fine land, the west land, the land where I belong.

John Masefield

~ penned by shepherd-king David, approx. 3,000 years ago; written from the perspective of a sheep

The LORD is my shepherd;
. .I shall not want.
He makes me to lie down in green pastures;
He leads me beside the still waters.
He restores my soul;
He leads me in the paths of righteousness
For His name's sake.

Yeah, though I walk through
. . the valley of the shadow of death,
I will fear no evil;
For You are with me;
Your rod and Your staff,
. .they comfort me.

You prepare a table before me
. .in the presence of my enemies;
You anoint my head with oil;
My cup runs over.
Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me
All the days of my life;
And I will dwell in the house of the LORD
Forever.

(New King James Version, 1982)

------------------------------
The opposite of joy is not sorrow. It is unbelief. ~ Leslie Weatherhead
Picture me with my ground teeth stalking joy--fully armed too, as it's a highly dangerous quest. ~ Flannery O'Connor

This poem by e.e. cummings is the very first poem my dad and I ever shared.


i carry your heart with me(i carry it in
my heart)i am never without it(anywhere
i go you go,my dear;and whatever is done
by only me is your doing,my darling)
i fear
no fate(for you are my fate,my sweet)i want
no world(for beautiful you are my world,my true)
and it's you are whatever a moon has always meant
and whatever a sun will always sing is you

here is the deepest secret nobody knows
(here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud
and the sky of the sky of a tree called life;which grows
higher than soul can hope or mind can hide)
and this is the wonder that's keeping the stars apart

i carry your heart(i carry it in my heart)



The following poem by W.B. Yeats is the first poem my step-dad read to me.


He Wishes For the Cloths of Heaven

Had I the heavens’ embroidered cloths,
Enwrought with golden and silver light,
The blue and the dim and the dark cloths
Of night and light and the half light,
I would spread the cloths under your feet:
But I, being poor, have only my dreams;
I have spread the cloths beneath your feet;
Tread softly because you tread on my dreams.



I have so many favorites, but I'll only put up one more by Lord Byron.


She walks in Beauty

She walks in beauty, like the night
Of cloudless climes and starry skies;
And all that 's best of dark and bright
Meet in her aspect and her eyes:
Thus mellow'd to that tender light
Which heaven to gaudy day denies.
One shade the more, one ray the less,
Had half impair'd the nameless grace
Which waves in every raven tress,
Or softly lightens o'er her face;
Where thoughts serenely sweet express
How pure, how dear their dwelling-place.

And on that cheek, and o'er that brow,
So soft, so calm, yet eloquent,
The smiles that win, the tints that glow,
But tell of days in goodness spent,
A mind at peace with all below,
A heart whose love is innocent!


Me ke aloha,
Elikapeka.


La medida del amor es amar sin medida.

Time fleats away,
friends go away,
but friendship always remain,
as a unbreakable chain.
For tender love and care,
we have all the time
to spare,
Sweet memories always remain,
as a unbreakable chain....

And another!


Upon Julia's Clothes

Whenas in silks my Julia goes
Then, then, (methinks) how sweetly flows
That liquefaction of her clothes.

Next, when I cast mine eyes and see
That brave vibration each way free;
Oh, how that glittering taketh me!

-- Robert Herrick

Me ke aloha,
Elikapeka.

"Perfect love is rare indeed - for to be a lover will require that you continually have the subtlety of the very wise, the flexibility of the child, the sensitivity of the artist, the understanding of the philosopher, the acceptance of the saint, the tolerance of the scholar and the fortitude of the certain."

--Leo Buscaglia

I have always loved the "silence" of this poem...I have found it very calming to read when I am especially overwhelmed with things to do, such as the recent holiday rush. It makes me stop and take a deep breath and just rel-a-ax. It is probably number one on my list of favorites.

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.

-- Robert Frost

"If a man should pick me wildflowers, he would hold my heart forever" J.

They used part of that poem in the classic movie, "Iron and Silk". It uped my appreciation of the poem and the feeling behind it.
peter

The temple bell stops -
but the sound keeps coming
out of the flowers
Basho 1644-1694

Recently stumbled across Australia's author Adam Lindsay Gordon [1833-70] in my reading of Bartlett's, and was intrigued by the brief quotes. Looked up some of his poetry, and was especially drawn to this one, as I love God's creation, and find I soulically ache when I see men practice such poor stewardship of earth's living resources. It took me 3-4 readings of Lex Talionis(and a reading of biographical sketches of Gordon's life) to ponder the ironies built into the poem's theme of retaliation. Gordon commit suicide when about 36-37yo. When he realized he didn't have the means to pay his publisher for his final book of poems just published, he took a gun into the scrub and killed himself. His seemed a sad life... one of youthful rebellion, bidding farewell to his English homeland forever (and never seeing his parents alive again), declaring his first youthful love to a maid who turned him down, living a reckless horse-racing life, poorly handling his money. Some accounts indicate he also succumbed to alcohol while other accounts say he didn't. In any event, just a few years before his suicide, his only daughter died and he suffered several severe head injuries (horse-related). Adam Lindsay Gordon seemed to have struggled with melancholy much of his life.

Ye Wearie Wayfarer
Fytte V
Lex Talionis
[A Moral Discourse]

"And if there's blood upon his hand,
'Tis but the blood of deer." -- W. Scott.

To beasts of the field, and fowls of the air,
And fish of the sea alike,
Man's hand is ever slow to spare,
And ever ready to strike;
With a license to kill, and to work our will,
In season by land or by water,
To our heart's content we may take our fill
Of the joys we derive from slaughter.

And few, I reckon, our rights gainsay
In this world of rapine and wrong,
Where the weak and the timid seem lawful prey
For the resolute and the strong;
Fins, furs, and feathers, they are and were
For our use and pleasure created,
We can shoot, and hunt, and angle, and snare,
Unquestioned, if not unsated.

I have neither the will nor the right to blame,
Yet to many (though not to all)
The sweets of destruction are somewhat tame
When no personal risks befall;
Our victims suffer but little, we trust
(Mere guess-work and blank enigma),
If they suffer at all, our field sports must
Of cruelty bear the stigma.

Shall we, hard-hearted to their fates, thus
Soft-hearted shrink from our own,
When the measure we mete is meted to us,
When we reap as we've always sown?
Shall we who for pastime have squander'd life,
Who are styled "the Lords of Creation",
Recoil from our chance of more equal strife,
And our risk of retaliation?

Though short is the dying pheasant's pain,
Scant pity you well may spare,
And the partridge slain is a triumph vain,
And a risk that a child may dare;
You feel, when you lower the smoking gun,
Some ruth for yon slaughtered hare,
And hit or miss, in your selfish fun
The widgeon has little share.

But you've no remorseful qualms or pangs
When you kneel by the grizzly's lair,
On that conical bullet your sole chance hangs,
'Tis the weak one's advantage fair,
And the shaggy giant's terrific fangs
Are ready to crush and tear;
Should you miss, one vision of home and friends,
Five words of unfinished prayer,
Three savage knife stabs, so your sport ends
In the worrying grapple that chokes and rends; --
Rare sport, at least, for the bear.

Short shrift! sharp fate! dark doom to dree!
Hard struggle, though quickly ending!
At home or abroad, by land or sea,
In peace or war, sore trials must be,
And worse may happen to you or to me,
For none are secure, and none can flee
From a destiny impending.

Ah! friend, did you think when the LONDON sank,
Timber by timber, plank by plank,
In a cauldron of boiling surf,
How alone at least, with never a flinch,
In a rally contested inch by inch,
You could fall on the trampled turf?
When a livid wall of the sea leaps high,
In the lurid light of a leaden sky,
And bursts on the quarter railing;
While the howling storm-gust seems to vie
With the crash of splintered beams that fly,
Yet fails too oft to smother the cry
Of women and children wailing?

Then those who listen in sinking ships
To despairing sobs from their lov'd one's lips,
Where the green wave thus slowly shatters,
May long for the crescent-claw that rips
The bison into ribbons and strips,
And tears the strong elk to tatters.

Oh! sunderings short of body and breath!
Oh! "battle and murder and sudden death!"
Against which the Liturgy preaches;
By the will of a just, yet a merciful Power,
Less bitter, perchance, in the mystic hour,
When the wings of the shadowy angel lower,
Than man in his blindness teaches!

~ Adam Lindsay Gordon

Further reading:
http://www3.shropshire-cc.gov.uk/gordon.htm
http://www.adamlindsaygordon.org/quotes.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adam_Lindsay_Gordon


However, the most quoted lines from all Gordon's poetry occur in Ye Wearie Wayfarer:

'Question not, but live and labour
Till yon goal be won,
Helping every feeble neighbor,
Seeking help from none;
Life is mostly froth and bubble,
Two things stand like stone,
KINDNESS in another's trouble,
COURAGE in your own.'

http://www.ballarathistory.org/artsalgc.html

------------------------------
The opposite of joy is not sorrow. It is unbelief. ~ Leslie Weatherhead
Picture me with my ground teeth stalking joy--fully armed too, as it's a highly dangerous quest. ~ Flannery O'Connor

I love just about anything by Robert Frost, particularily "Road Not Taken," "Snowy Evening," and "Choose Something Like a Star," but this Whitman poem is definitely up there.


When I Heard the Learn'd Astronomer by Walt Whitman


When I heard the learn'd astronomer;
When the proofs, the figures, were ranged in columns before me;
When I was shown the charts and the diagrams, to add, divide, and
measure them;
When I, sitting, heard the astronomer, where he lectured with much
applause in the lecture-room,
How soon, unaccountable, I became tired and sick;
Till rising and gliding out, I wander'd off by myself,
In the mystical moist night-air, and from time to time,
Look'd up in perfect silence at the stars.



So true, especially for an astronomy major such as myself

~Since when do we have to go with the flow and follow the tide? I'd just as rather set my sails and dare the storm, itself.~

We are what we pretend to be, no matter how much our legs are shaking. - Path of Fate

Astronomy major! You should transfer to the University of Hawaii on the Big Island, where the volcano is, which also happens to make UH good for geology majors. The university gets (I think) 20% of the viewing time at Mauna Kea Observatory. I've been there and it's awwwwesome! My cousin used to volunteer there so he took us to the visitor's center. At night when you descend the mountain, it's like diving into a sea of clouds--it was one of the high points of my life visiting that place...



Me ke aloha,
Elikapeka.

"Perfect love is rare indeed - for to be a lover will require that you continually have the subtlety of the very wise, the flexibility of the child, the sensitivity of the artist, the understanding of the philosopher, the acceptance of the saint, the tolerance of the scholar and the fortitude of the certain."

--Leo Buscaglia

[This message was edited by elikapeka on 01-31-07 at 12:59 AM.]

I love the contrast between these two poems about love by Rudyard Kipling. The first was written when he was 25:

The Explanation

Love and Death once ceased their strife
At the Tavern of Man's Life.
Called for wine, and threw--alas!--
Each his quiver on the grass.
When the bout was o'er they found
Mingled arrows strewed the ground.
Hastily they gathered then
Each the loves and lives of men.
Ah, the fateful dawn deceived!
Mingled arrows each one sheaved.
Death's dread armoury was stored
With the shafts he most abhorred;
Love's light quiver groaned beneath
Venom-headed darts of Death.
Thus it was they wrought our woe
At the Tavern long ago.
Tell me, do our masters know,
Loosing blindly as they fly,
Old men love while young men die?


The second poem was written at age 38, and Kipling seems (to me at least) to have rethought his position on the relationship between love and aging.

The Second Voyage

W've sent our little Cupids all ashore--
They were frightened, they were tired, they were cold.
Our sails of silk and purple go to store,
And we've cut away our mast of beaten gold.
(Foul weather!)
Oh, 'tis hemp and singing pine for to stand against the brine,
But Love he is our master as of old!

The sea has shorn our galleries away,
The salt has soiled our gilding past remede;
Our paint is flaked and blistered by the spray,
Our sides are half a fathom furred in weed.
(Foul weather!)
And the Doves of Venus fled and petrels came instead,
But Love he was our master at our need!

'Was Youth would keep no vigil at the bow,
'Was Pleasure at the helm too drunk to steer--
We've shipped three able quartermasters now.
Men call them Custom, Reverence, and Fear.
(Foul weather!)
They are old and scarred and plain, but we'll run no risk again
From any Port o' Paphos mutineer!

We seek no more the tempest for delight,
We skirt no more the indraught and the shoal--
We ask no more of any day or night
Than to come with least adventure to our goal.
(Foul weather!)
What we find we needs must brook, but we do not go to look
Nor tempt the Lord our God that saved us whole.

Yet, caring so, not overmuch we care
To brace and trim for every foolish blast,
If the squall be pleased to sweep us unaware,
He may bellow off to leeward like the last.
(Foul weather!)
We will blame it on the deep (for the watch must have their sleep),
And Love can come and wake us when 'tis past.

Oh, launch them down with music from the beach,
Oh, warp them out with garlands from the quays--
Most resolute--a damsel unto each--
New prows that seek the old Hesperides!
(Foul weather!)
Though we know their voyage is vain, yet we see our path again
In the saffroned bridesails scenting all the seas!
(Foul weather!)

kmccary~

Welcome to Quoteland!

I haven't read much Kiping, but now I want to!

Thank you for sharing! You should introduce yourself here.

See you around!

Me ke aloha,
Elikapeka.

"Perfect love is rare indeed - for to be a lover will require that you continually have the subtlety of the very wise, the flexibility of the child, the sensitivity of the artist, the understanding of the philosopher, the acceptance of the saint, the tolerance of the scholar and the fortitude of the certain."

--Leo Buscaglia

Silver
Walter De Lamare


Slowly, silently, now the moon
Walks the night in her silver shoon;
This way, and that, she peers, and sees
Silver fruit upon silver trees;
One by one the casements catch
Her beams beneath the silvery thatch;
Couched in his kennel, like a log,
With paws of silver sleeps the dog;
From their shadowy cote the white breasts peep
Of doves in silver feathered sleep
A harvest mouse goes scampering by,
With silver claws, and silver eye;
And moveless fish in the water gleam,
By silver reeds in a silver stream.


I love the imagery in this poem. I see the world turned silver as the moon moves over it.

Elikapeka

This poem by e.e. cummings is the very first poem my dad and I ever shared.

That's so cool! My Dad used to share poetry with me.....
Jabberwocky
Lewis Carroll

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

"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 hast 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

(Surprizingly enough I found a 'dictionary' for this poem on Wickapedia, today.)



"Our differences are what make us interesting."

"The more I experience the world, the less I realize I know."

[This message was edited by Waterlily on 05-30-07 at 01:08 PM.]

[This message was edited by Waterlily on 05-30-07 at 01:11 PM.]

I'm not certain that the version I have is correctly punctuated, but it's irresistable, isn't it?

At The Quinte Hotel (Al Purdy)

I am drinking
I am drinking beer with yellow flowers
in underground sunlight
and you can see that I am a sensitive man
And I notice that the bartender is a sensitive man too
so I tell him about his beer
I tell him the beer he draws
is half fart and half yellow horse piss
and all wonderful yellow flowers
But the bartender is not quite
so sensitive as I supposed he was
the way he looks at me now
and does not appreciate my exquisite analogy
Over in one corner two guys
are quietly making love
in the brief prelude to infinity
Opposite them a peculiar fight
enables the drinkers to lay aside
their comic books and watch with interest
as I watch with interest
A wiry little man slugs another guy
then tracks him bleeding into the toilet
and slugs him to the floor again
with ugly red flowers on the tile
three minutes later he roosters over
to the table where his drunk friend sits
with another friend and slugs both
of em ass-over-electric-kettle
so I have to walk around
on my way for a piss
Now I am a sensitive man
so I say to him mildly as hell
"You shouldn’ta knocked over that good beer
with them beautiful flowers in it"
So he says to me "Come on"
So I come On
like a rabbit with weak kidneys I guess
like a yellow streak charging
on flower power I suppose
and knock the shit outta him & sit on him
(he is a little guy)
and say reprovingly
"Violence will get you nowhere this time chum
Now you take me
I am a sensitive man
and would you believe I write poems?"
But I could see the doubt in his upside down face
in fact in all the faces
"What kind of poems?"
"Flower poems"
"So tell us a poem"
I got off the little guy reluctantly
for he was comfortable
and told them this poem
They crowded around me with tears
in their eyes and wrung my hands feelingly
for my pockets for
it was a heart-warming moment for Literature
and moved by the demonstrable effect
of great Art and the brotherhood of people I remarked
"— the poem oughta be worth some beer"
It was a mistake of terminology
for silence came
and it was brought home to me in the tavern
that poems will not really buy beers or flowers
or a goddam thing
and I was sad
for I am a sensitive man.

No one favorite P.B.Shelley? Ummm...suprising...
I've just start reading English poetry and althought it's hard for me since I am a chinese, I can't help loving Emily Bronte and P.B.Shelley...

SYMPATHY

There should be no despair for you
While nightly stars are burning;
While evening pours its silent dew
And sunshine gilds the morning.
There should be no despair--though tears
May flow down like a river:
Are not the best beloved of years
Around your heart for ever?

They weep, you weep, it must be so;
Winds sigh as you are sighing,
And winter sheds his grief in snow
Where Autumn's leaves are lying:
Yet, these revive, and from their fate
Your fate cannot be parted:
Then, journey on, if not elate,
Still, never broken-hearted!

---Emily Bronte

(I like this so much that I even try to translate it into chinese.)

Remebrance

Cold in the earth, and the deep snow piled above thee!
Far, far removed, cold in the dreary grave!
Have I forgot, my Only Love, to love thee,
Severed at last by Time's all-wearing wave?

Now, when alone, do my thoughts no longer hover
Over the mountains on Angora's shore;
Resting their wings where heath and fern-leaves cover
That noble heart for ever, ever more?

Cold in the earth, and fifteen wild Decembers
From those brown hills have melted into spring--
Faithful indeed is the spirit that remembers
After such years of change and suffering!

Sweet Love of youth, forgive if I forget thee
While the World's tide is bearing me along:
Sterner desires and darker hopes beset me,
Hopes which obscure but cannot do thee wrong.

No other Sun has lightened up my heaven;
No other Star has ever shone for me:
All my life's bliss from thy dear life was given
All my life's bliss is in the grave with thee.

But when the days of golden dreams had perished
And even Despair was powerless to destroy,
Then did I learn how existence could be cherished,
Strengthened and fed without the aid of joy;

Then did I check the tears of useless passion,
Weaned my young soul from yearning after thine;
Sternly denied its burning wish to hasten
Down to that tomb already more than mine!

And even yet, I dare not let it languish,
Dare not indulge in Memory's rapturous pain;
Once drinking deep of that divinest anguish,
How could I seek the empty world again?

---Emily Bronte



Lament for Boromir　　
　　Aragorn:
　　　　Through Rohan over fen and field where the long grass grows
　　　　The West Wind comes walking, and about the walls it goes.
　　　　'What news from the West, O wandering wind, do you bring to me tonight?
　　　　Have you seen Boromir the Tall by moon or by starlight?'
　　　　'I saw him ride over seven streams, over waters wide and grey;
　　　　I saw him walk in empty lands, until he passed away.
　　 Into the shadows of the North. I saw him then no more.
　　　　The North Wind may have heard the horn of the son of Denethor.'
　　　　'O Boromir! From the high walls westward I looked afar,
　　　　But you came not from the empty lands where no men are.'
　　　　
　　Legolas:
　　　　From the mouths of the Sea the South Wind flies, from the sandhills and the stones;
　　　　The wailing of the gulls it bears, and at the gate it moans.
　　　　'What news from the South, O sighing wind, do you bring to me at eve?
　　　　Where now is Boromir the Fair? He tarries and I grieve.'
　　　　'Ask not of me where he doth dwell -- so many bones there lie.
　　 On the white shores and the dark shores under the stormy sky;
　　　　So many have passed down Anduin to find the flowing Sea.
　　　　Ask of the North Wind news of them the North Wind sends to me!'
　　　　'O Boromir! Beyond the gate the seaward road runs south,
　　　　But you came not with the wailing gulls from the grey sea's mouth.'
　　　　
　　Aragorn:
　　　　From the Gate of Kings the North Wind rides, and past the roaring falls;
　　　　And clear and cold about the tower its loud horn calls.
　　　　'What news from the North, O mighty wind, do you bring to me today?
　　　　What news of Boromir the Bold? For he is long away.'
　　　　'Beneath Amon Hen I heard his cry. There many foes he fought.
　　　　His cloven shield, his broken sword, they do the water brought.
　　　　His head so proud, his face so fair, his limbs they laid to rest;
　　　　And Rauros, golden Rauros-falls, bore him upon its breast.'
　　　　'O Boromir! The Tower of Guard shall ever northward gaze
　　　　To Rauros, golden Rauros-falls, until the end of days.'

---J.R.R.Tolkein

(This is my favorite song in LOTR)

A Lament (Swifter far than summer's flight)


I.
Swifter far than summer's flight --
Swifter far than youth's delight --
Swifter far than happy night,
Art thou come and gone --
As the earth when leaves are dead,
As the night when sleep is sped,
As the heart when joy is fled,
I am left lone, alone.

II.
The swallow summer comes again --
The owlet night resumes her reign --
But the wild-swan youth is fain
To fly with thee, false as thou. --
My heart each day desires the morrow;
Sleep itself is turned to sorrow;
Vainly would my winter borrow
Sunny leaves from any bough.

III.
Lilies for a bridal bed --
Roses for a matron's head --
Violets for a maiden dead --
Pansies let my flowers be:
On the living grave I bear
Scatter them without a tear --
Let no friend, however dear,
Waste one hope, one fear for me.

---Percy Bysshe Shelley

(lilies,roses, violets, pansies...Shelley you are so cute >

Faith and Despondency

" THE winter wind is loud and wild,
Come close to me, my darling child;
Forsake thy books, and mateless play;
And, while the night is gathering grey,
We'll talk its pensive hours away;–


"Iernë, round our sheltered hall
November's gusts unheeded call;
Not one faint breath can enter here
Enough to wave my daughter's hair,
And I am glad to watch the blaze
Glance from her eyes, with mimic rays;
To feel her cheek, so softly pressed,
In happy quiet on my breast.


" But, yet, even this tranquillity
Brings bitter, restless thoughts to me;
And, in the red fire's cheerful glow,
I think of deep glens, blocked with snow;
I dream of moor, and misty hill,
Where evening closes dark and chill;
For, lone, among the mountains cold,
Lie those that I have loved of old.
And my heart aches, in hopeless pain
Exhausted with repinings vain,
That I shall greet them ne'er again ! "



" Father, in early infancy,
When you were far beyond the sea,
Such thoughts were tyrants over me !
I often sat, for hours together,
Through the long nights of angry weather,
Raised on my pillow, to descry
The dim moon struggling in the sky;
Or, with strained ear, to catch the shock,
Of rock with wave, and wave with rock;
So would I fearful vigil keep,
And, all for listening, never sleep.
But this world's life has much to dread,
Not so, my Father, with the dead.


" Oh ! not for them, should we despair,
The grave is drear, but they are not there;
Their dust is mingled with the sod,
Their happy souls are gone to God !
You told me this, and yet you sigh,
And murmur that your friends must die.
Ah ! my dear father, tell me why ?
For, if your former words were true,
How useless would such sorrow be;
As wise, to mourn the seed which grew
Unnoticed on its parent tree,
Because it fell in fertile earth,
And sprang up to a glorious birth–
Struck deep its root, and lifted high
Its green boughs, in the breezy sky.


" But, I'll not fear, I will not weep
For those whose bodies rest in sleep,–
I know there is a blessed shore,
Opening its ports for me, and mine;
And, gazing Time's wide waters o'er,
I weary for that land divine,
Where we were born, where you and I
Shall meet our Dearest, when we die;
From suffering and corruption free,
Restored into the Deity."


" Well hast thou spoken, sweet, trustful child !
And wiser than thy sire;
And worldly tempests, raging wild,
Shall strengthen thy desire–
Thy fervent hope, through storm and foam,
Through wind and ocean's roar,
To reach, at last, the eternal home,
The steadfast, changeless, shore ! "


---Emily Bronte


It seems...most of them are lament...oh no ><

Aubade

I work all day, and get half-drunk at night.
Waking at four to soundless dark, I stare.
In time the curtain-edges will grow light.
Till then I see what's really always there:
Unresting death, a whole day nearer now,
Making all thought impossible but how
And where and when I shall myself die.
Arid interrogation: yet the dread
Of dying, and being dead,
Flashes afresh to hold and horrify.
The mind blanks at the glare. Not in remorse
- The good not done, the love not given, time
Torn off unused - nor wretchedly because
An only life can take so long to climb
Clear of its wrong beginnings, and may never;
But at the total emptiness for ever,
The sure extinction that we travel to
And shall be lost in always. Not to be here,
Not to be anywhere,
And soon; nothing more terrible, nothing more true.

This is a special way of being afraid
No trick dispels. Religion used to try,
That vast, moth-eaten musical brocade
Created to pretend we never die,
And specious stuff that says No rational being
Can fear a thing it will not feel, not seeing
That this is what we fear - no sight, no sound,
No touch or taste or smell, nothing to think with,
Nothing to love or link with,
The anasthetic from which none come round.

And so it stays just on the edge of vision,
A small, unfocused blur, a standing chill
That slows each impulse down to indecision.
Most things may never happen: this one will,
And realisation of it rages out
In furnace-fear when we are caught without
People or drink. Courage is no good:
It means not scaring others. Being brave
Lets no one off the grave.
Death is no different whined at than withstood.

Slowly light strengthens, and the room takes shape.
It stands plain as a wardrobe, what we know,
Have always known, know that we can't escape,
Yet can't accept. One side will have to go.
Meanwhile telephones crouch, getting ready to ring
In locked-up offices, and all the uncaring
Intricate rented world begins to rouse.
The sky is white as clay, with no sun.
Work has to be done.
Postmen like doctors go from house to house.

Philip Larkin

Trees by Joyce Kilmer



I THINK that I shall never see
A poem lovely as a tree.

A tree whose hungry mouth is prest
Against the earth's sweet flowing
breast;

A tree that looks at God all day,
And lifts her leafy arms to pray;

A tree that may in Summer wear
A nest of robins in her hair;

Upon whose bosom snow has lain;
Who intimately lives with rain.

Poems are made by fools like me,
But only God can make a tree.

Note from Fair_Gwen: I took the link out of your signature-- please don't post "selling" links on QL. Thanks!

[This message was edited by Fair_GwenofAir on 01-06-09 at 12:17 PM.]

To Althea, from Prison

When love with unconfined wings
Hovers within my gates,
And my divine Althea brings
To whisper at the grates;
When I lie tangled in her hair,
And fettered to her eye,
The birds that wanton in the air
Know no such liberty.

When flowing cups run swiftly round
With no allaying Thames,
Our careless heads with roses bound,
Our hearts with loyal flames;
When thirsty grief in wine we steep,
When healths and draughts go free,
Fishes that tipple in the deep
Know no such liberty.

When, like committed linnets, I
With shriller throat shall sing
The sweetness, mercy, majesty,
And glories of my King;
When I shall voice aloud how good

He is, how great should be,
Enlarged winds that curl the flood
Know no such liberty.

Stone walls do not a prison make,
Nor iron bars a cage;
Minds innocent and quiet take
That for an hermitage;
If I have freedom in my love,
And in my soul am free,
Angels alone, that soar above,
Enjoy such liberty.

~ Richard Lovelace (1618-1658)

quote:

Richard Lovelace (1618-1658)
Richard Lovelace was born in Kent, the son of a wealthy aristocrat. After receiving an honorary degree from Oxford he served as a courtier to King Charles I and fought in the Bishops' Wars. Following these he spent a brief spell in prison and after living abroad for a few years was imprisoned again for his support of the King.

During his first imprisonment he wrote To Althea, from Prison which contains the famous lines "Stone walls do not a prison make / Nor iron bars a cage". During his second period of imprisonment he prepared for publication a collection of poems, Lucasta, Epodes, Odes, Sonnets, Songs, etc. dedicated to his fiancée, Lucy Sacheverell, who in fact, believing he had been killed, married another man. Another volume, Lucasta, Posthume Poems, was published after his death.

Richard Lovelace died a poor man, having lost his fortune through his support of the King. His poetry, though not prolific, is sensitive and finely crafted.

http://www.englishverse.com/poets/lovelace_richard