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Post by Nalkarj on Apr 6, 2023 17:57:46 GMT
This thread is a continuation of the “Somewhat different poetry thread” on v2.2. Post poems that you like, are reading, or just want to share with the group. (If you know me, you’ll know I’ll post some Phyllis McGinley at some point! ) The following is a good piece by very good but now virtually unknown poet Charlotte Mew. (I first learned of Mew from a Redditor who often posts pieces by lesser-known poets.) In the Fields
by Charlotte Mew Lord, when I look at lovely things which pass, Under old trees the shadow of young leaves Dancing to please the wind along the grass, Or the gold stillness of the August sun on the August sheaves; Can I believe there is a heavenlier world than this? And if there is Will the heart of any everlasting thing Bring these dreams that take my breath away? They come at evening with the home-flying rooks and the scent of hay, Over the fields. They come in spring.
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Post by Deleted on Apr 6, 2023 18:09:30 GMT
For The Fallen by Laurence Binyon (1869-1943)
With proud thanksgiving, a mother for her children, England mourns for her dead across the sea. Flesh of her flesh they were, spirit of her spirit, Fallen in the cause of the free. (1–4)
Solemn the drums thrill: Death august and royal Sings sorrow up into immortal spheres. There is music in the midst of desolation And a glory that shines upon our tears. (5–8)
They went with songs to the battle, they were young, Straight of limb, true of eye, steady and aglow. They were staunch to the end against odds uncounted, They fell with their faces to the foe. (9–12)
They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old; Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn. At the going down of the sun and in the morning We will remember them. (13–16)
They mingle not with their laughing comrades again; They sit no more at familiar tables at home; They have no lot in our labour of the day-time; They sleep beyond England's foam. (17–20)
But where our desires are and our hopes profound, Felt as a well-spring that is hidden from sight, To the innermost heart of their own land they are known As the stars are known to the Night; (21–24)
As the stars that shall be bright when we are dust, Moving in marches upon the heavenly plain, As the stars that are starry in the time of our darkness, To the end, to the end, they remain. (25–28)
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Post by spiderwort on Apr 6, 2023 21:55:56 GMT
For Keeps by Joy Harjo
Sun makes the day new. Tiny green plants emerge from earth. Birds are singing the sky into place. There is nowhere else I want to be but here. I lean into the rhythm of your heart to see where it will take us. We gallop into a warm, southern wind. I link my legs to yours and we ride together, Toward the ancient encampment of our relatives. Where have you been? they ask. And what has taken you so long? That night after eating, singing, and dancing We lay together under the stars. We know ourselves to be part of mystery. It is unspeakable. It is everlasting. It is for keeps.
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Post by Nalkarj on Apr 7, 2023 13:51:52 GMT
The Trees by Philip Larkin
The trees are coming into leaf Like something almost being said; The recent buds relax and spread, Their greenness is a kind of grief.
Is it that they are born again And we grow old? No, they die too. Their yearly trick of looking new Is written down in rings of grain.
Yet still the unresting castles thresh In fullgrown thickness every May. Last year is dead, they seem to say, Begin afresh, afresh, afresh.
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Post by spiderwort on Apr 11, 2023 22:14:37 GMT
To the New Year by W.S. Merwin
With what stillness at last you appear in the valley your first sunlight reaching down to touch the tips of a few high leaves that do not stir as though they had not noticed and did not know you at all then the voice of a dove calls from far away in itself to the hush of the morning
so this is the sound of you here and now whether or not anyone hears it this is where we have come with our age our knowledge such as it is and our hopes such as they are invisible before us untouched and still possible
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Post by Nalkarj on Apr 14, 2023 19:36:06 GMT
A Rondeau for Geneva, 1542 by Phyllis McGinley
In the City of God with Calvin king, The capital virtues had their fling, But mirth won little or no renown. A cold decorum, a pious frown Were proper Burghers’ appareling.
Nobody laughed much. None might sing Or dance to fiddles or kiss-and-cling. Condemned together were lover and clown In the City of God.
For smiling in church, or slumbering, For wreathing a Maypole come the spring, Jail was the punishment handed down. One wonders if God, when He walked the town, Ever felt homesick or anything In the City of God.
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Post by Nalkarj on Apr 14, 2023 19:44:10 GMT
Now that I think of it, that McGinley is close to a Lorenz Hart lyric (one of his last): Jupiter Forbidby Lorenz Hart, to Richard Rodgers’s music Maybe there’s a place where people never laugh, Maybe there’s a place where kids don’t kid, Maybe there’s a place for just the upper half… Not here — Jupiter forbid!
Maybe there’s a place where people never sing, Where you have to hide each thing you did, Where they have a sign: ‘Keep Off the Grass in Spring’… Not here — Jupiter forbid!
Here, we Dance if we see fit. When he and she fit, It’s fun! Bright, and Light as a dancer, For we must answer To none!
Maybe there’s a place where you’re afraid to kiss, You could only do it if you hid. That’ll never happen in a place like this… Not here — Jupiter forbid!
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Post by spiderwort on May 10, 2023 0:46:22 GMT
The Inside Chance by Marge Piercy
Dance like a jackrabbit in the dunegrass, dance not for release, no the ice holds hard but for the promise. Yesterday the chickadeees sang fever, fever, the mating song. You can still cross ponds leaving tracks in the snow over the sleeping fish but in the marsh the red maples look red again, their buds swelling. Just one week ago a blizzard roared for two days. Ice weeps in the road. Yet spring hides in the snow. On the south wall of the house the first sharp crown of crocus sticks out. Spring lurks inside the hard casing, and the bud begins to crack. What seems dead pares its hunger sharp and stirs groaning. If we have not stopped wanting in the long dark, we will grasp our desires soon by the nape. Inside the fallen brown apple the seed is alive. Freeze and thaw, freeze and thaw, the sap leaps in the maple under the bark and although they have pronounced us dead, we rise again invisibly, we rise and the sun sings in us sweet and smoky as the blood of the maple that will soon open its leaves like thousands of waving hands.
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Post by theravenking on May 12, 2023 22:34:40 GMT
Faces by Sara Teasdale
People that I meet and pass In the city's broken roar, Faces that I lose so soon And have never found before,
Do you know how much you tell In the meeting of our eyes, How ashamed I am, and sad To have pierced your poor disguise?
Secrets rushing without sound Crying from your hiding places - Let me go, I cannot bear The sorrow of the passing faces.
- People in the restless street, Can it be, oh can it be In the meeting of our eyes That you know as much of me?
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Post by theravenking on May 17, 2023 12:04:14 GMT
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.
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Post by thekindercarebear on May 18, 2023 3:44:16 GMT
dang you all are so serious, all i have is this to share with you.
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Post by yggdrasil on May 18, 2023 10:44:04 GMT
Rainer Maria Rilke
Faces
Have I said it before? I am learning to see. Yes, I am beginning. It’s still going badly. But I intend to make the most of my time.
For example, it never occurred to me before how many faces there are. There are multitudes of people, but there are many more faces, because each person has several of them. There are people who wear the same face for years; naturally it wears out, gets dirty, splits at the seams, stretches like gloves worn during a long journey. They are thrifty, uncomplicated people; they never change it, never even have it cleaned. It’s good enough, they say, and who can convince them of the contrary? Of course, since they have several faces, you might wonder what they do with the other ones. They keep them in storage. Their children will wear them. But sometimes it also happens that their dogs go out wearing them. And why not? A face is a face.
Other people change faces incredibly fast, put on one after another, and wear them out. At first, they think they have an unlimited supply; but when they are barely forty years old they come to their last one. There is, to be sure, something tragic about this. They are not accustomed to taking care of faces; their last one is worn through in a week, has holes in it, is in many places as thin as paper, and then, little by little, the lining shows through, the non-face, and they walk around with that on.
But the woman, the woman: she had completely fallen into herself, forward into her hands. It was on the corner of rue Notre-Dame-des-Champs. I began to walk quietly as soon as I saw her. When poor people are thinking, they shouldn’t be disturbed. Perhaps their idea will still occur to them.
The street was too empty; its emptiness had gotten bored and pulled my steps out from under my feet and clattered around in them, all over the street, as if they were wooden clogs. The woman sat up, frightened, she pulled out of herself, too quickly, too violently, so that her face was left in her two hands. I could see it lying there: its hollow form. It cost me an indescribable effort to stay with those two hands, not to look at what had been torn out of them. I shuddered to see a face from the inside, but I was much more afraid of that bare flayed head waiting there, faceless.
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Post by mikef6 on May 20, 2023 1:12:48 GMT
Ernst Dowson lived at the height of the Victorian Era in England (1867-1900). This poem was considered too shocking for the eyes and ears of delicate young ladies. So, if anyone identifies as that, please avert your gaze. (Note the phrase that was taken for a famous book and movie title.)
Cynara by Ernst Dowson
Last night, ah, yesternight, betwixt her lips and mine There fell thy shadow, Cynara! thy breath was shed Upon my soul between the kisses and the wine; And I was desolate and sick of an old passion, Yea, I was desolate and bowed my head: I have been faithful to thee, Cynara! in my fashion.
All night upon mine heart I felt her warm heart beat, Night-long within mine arms in love and sleep she lay; Surely the kisses of her bought red mouth were sweet; But I was desolate and sick of an old passion, When I awoke and found the dawn was gray: I have been faithful to thee, Cynara! in my fashion.
I have forgot much, Cynara! gone with the wind, Flung roses, roses riotously with the throng, Dancing, to put thy pale, lost lilies out of mind; But I was desolate and sick of an old passion, Yea, all the time, because the dance was long: I have been faithful to thee, Cynara! in my fashion.
I cried for madder music and for stronger wine, But when the feast is finished and the lamps expire, Then falls thy shadow, Cynara! the night is thine; And I am desolate and sick of an old passion, Yea, hungry for the lips of my desire: I have been faithful to thee, Cynara! in my fashion.
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Post by spiderwort on May 31, 2023 14:47:02 GMT
The Work of Happiness by May Sarton
I thought of happiness, how it is woven Out of the silence in the empty house each day And how it is not sudden and it is not given But is creation itself like the growth of a tree. No one has seen it happen, but inside the bark Another circle is growing in the expanding ring. No one has heard the root go deeper in the dark, But the tree is lifted by this inward work And its plumes shine, and its leaves are glittering.
So happiness is woven out of the peace of hours And strikes its roots deep in the house alone: The old chest in the corner, cool waxed floors, White curtains softly and continually blown As the free air moves quietly about the room; A shelf of books, a table, and the white-washed wall— These are the dear familiar gods of home, And here the work of faith can best be done, The growing tree is green and musical.
For what is happiness but growth in peace, The timeless sense of time when furniture Has stood a life's span in a single place, And as the air moves, so the old dreams stir The shining leaves of present happiness? No one has heard thought or listened to a mind, But where people have lived in inwardness The air is charged with blessing and does bless; Windows look out on mountains and the walls are kind.
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Post by theravenking on May 31, 2023 15:02:14 GMT
Deserted by Madison Cawein
The old house leans upon a tree Like some old man upon a staff: The night wind in its ancient porch Sounds like a hollow laugh.
The heaven is wrapped in flying clouds As grandeur cloaks itself in gray: The starlight flitting in and out, Glints like a lanthorn ray.
The dark is full of whispers. Now A fox-hound howls: and throught the night, Like some old ghost from out its grave, The moon comes misty white.
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