Poets

[JazmenFlowers]

anyone here into poetry? I used to really love it (I guess it's the English major in me). I also used to write all the time and won several contests and was in my college's yearly bulletin a few times. Recently, I've been getting back into poetry...Anyway, who is your favorite poet or poem and do you write?

my favorite poem is The Forsaken Merman by Matthew Arnold

COME, dear children, let us away;
Down and away below.
Now my brothers call from the bay;
Now the great winds shoreward blow;
Now the salt tides seaward flow;
Now the wild white horses play,
Champ and chafe and toss in the spray.
Children dear, let us away.
This way, this way!

Call her once before you go.
Call once yet.
In a voice that she will know:
'Margaret! Margaret!'
Children's voices should be dear
(Call once more) to a mother's ear;
Children's voices, wild with pain.
Surely she will come again.
Call her once and come away.
This way, this way!
'Mother dear, we cannot stay.'
The wild white horses foam and fret.
Margaret! Margaret!

Come, dear children, come away down.
Call no more.
One last look at the white-wall'd town,
And the little grey church on the windy shore.
Then come down.
She will not come though you call all day.
Come away, come away.
Children dear, was it yesterday
We heard the sweet bells over the bay?
In the caverns where we lay,
Through the surf and through the swell,
The far-off sound of a silver bell?
Sand-strewn caverns, cool and deep,
Where the winds are all asleep;
Where the spent lights quiver and gleam;
Where the salt weed sways in the stream;
Where the sea-beasts, ranged all round,
Feed in the ooze of their pasture-ground;
Where the sea-snakes coil and twine,
Dry their mail, and bask in the brine;
Where great whales come sailing by,
Sail and sail, with unshut eye,
Round the world for ever and aye?
When did music come this way?
Children dear, was it yesterday?

Children dear, was it yesterday
(Call yet once) that she went away?
Once she sate with you and me,
On a red gold throne in the heart of the sea,
And the youngest sate on her knee.
She comb'd its bright hair, and she tended it well,
When down swung the sound of the far-off bell.
She sigh'd, she look'd up through the clear green sea.
She said, 'I must go, for my kinsfolk pray
In the little grey church on the shore to-day.
'Twill be Easter-time in the world--ah me!
And I lose my poor soul, Merman, here with thee.'
I said, 'Go up, dear heart, through the waves.
Say thy prayer, and come back to the kind sea-caves.'
She smiled, she went up through the surf in the bay.
Children dear, was it yesterday?

Children dear, were we long alone?
'The sea grows stormy, the little ones moan.
Long prayers,' I said, 'in the world they say.
Come,' I said, and we rose through the surf in the bay.
We went up the beach, by the sandy down
Where the sea-stocks bloom, to the white-wall'd town.
Through the narrow paved streets, where all was still,
To the little grey church on the windy hill.
From the church came a murmur of folk at their prayers,
But we stood without in the cold-blowing airs.
We climb'd on the graves, on the stones worn with rains,
And we gazed up the aisle through the small leaded panes.
She sate by the pillar; we saw her dear:
'Margaret, hist! come quick, we are here.
Dear heart,' I said, 'we are long alone.
The sea grows stormy, the little ones moan.'
But, ah! she gave me never a look,
For her eyes were seal'd to the holy book.
Loud prays the priest; shut stands the door.
Came away, children, call no more.
Come away, come down, call no more.

Down, down, down;
Down to the depths of the sea.
She sits at her wheel in the humming town,
Singing most joyfully.
Hark what she sings: 'O joy, O joy,
For the humming street, and the child with its toy.
For the priest, and the bell, and the holy well.
For the wheel where I spun,
And the blessed light of the sun.'
And so she sings her fill,
Singing most joyfully,
Till the shuttle falls from her hand,
And the whizzing wheel stands still.
She steals to the window, and looks at the sand;
And over the sand at the sea;
And her eyes are set in a stare;
And anon there breaks a sigh,
And anon there drops a tear,
From a sorrow-clouded eye,
And a heart sorrow-laden,
A long, long sigh
For the cold strange eyes of a little Mermaiden,
And the gleam of her golden hair.

Come away, away, children.
Come children, come down.
The hoarse wind blows colder;
Lights shine in the town.
She will start from her slumber
When gusts shake the door;
She will hear the winds howling,
Will hear the waves roar.
We shall see, while above us
The waves roar and whirl,
A ceiling of amber,
A pavement of pearl.
Singing, 'Here came a mortal,
But faithless was she:
And alone dwell for ever
The kings of the sea.'

But, children, at midnight,
When soft the winds blow;
When clear falls the moonlight;
When spring-tides are low:
When sweet airs come seaward
From heaths starr'd with broom;
And high rocks throw mildly
On the blanch'd sands a gloom:
Up the still, glistening beaches,
Up the creeks we will hie;
Over banks of bright seaweed
The ebb-tide leaves dry.
We will gaze, from the sand-hills,
At the white, sleeping town;
At the church on the hill-side--
And then come back down.
Singing, 'There dwells a loved one,
But cruel is she.
She left lonely for ever
The kings of the sea.

and this is the most successful of my poems


Rats

I sit behind in the gray velour that
reminds me of rat fur

Rats
seem to eat at my flesh and my heart
my head
is about to explode from thought on top of thought
I swim in a sea of thoughts
my mind can not rest
I am walking the line

Did I not bleed?
Did my eyes not say?
Did my soul not tell yours something was wrong?
Could you not read my mind to
see each "t" was not crossed and I
forgot to dot each i am open
torn open by rats

See my insides spill
finally, you see something
but you will not see me...the little boy I was
and still am
who needed someone
as the rats nibble what is left of my fingers

The rat fur is
starting to get to me
I will be smothered by it and it will consume me and
my silence
will be indefinite
why can't you see?
I want to scream out to you...spit blood at you
but I sit still as we pass the city limit sign

[elie]

My favorite poet is Sylvia Plath and my favorite poem would have to be Lady Lazarus.

Lady Lazarus

I have done it again.
One year in every ten
I manage it----

A sort of walking miracle, my skin
Bright as a Nazi lampshade,
My right foot

A paperweight,
My face a featureless, fine
Jew linen.

Peel off the napkin
0 my enemy.
Do I terrify?----

The nose, the eye pits, the full set of teeth?
The sour breath
Will vanish in a day.

Soon, soon the flesh
The grave cave ate will be
At home on me

And I a smiling woman.
I am only thirty.
And like the cat I have nine times to die.

This is Number Three.
What a trash
To annihilate each decade.

What a million filaments.
The peanut-crunching crowd
Shoves in to see

Them unwrap me hand and foot
The big strip tease.
Gentlemen, ladies

These are my hands
My knees.
I may be skin and bone,

Nevertheless, I am the same, identical woman.
The first time it happened I was ten.
It was an accident.

The second time I meant
To last it out and not come back at all.
I rocked shut

As a seashell.
They had to call and call
And pick the worms off me like sticky pearls.

Dying
Is an art, like everything else,
I do it exceptionally well.

I do it so it feels like hell.
I do it so it feels real.
I guess you could say I've a call.

It's easy enough to do it in a cell.
It's easy enough to do it and stay put.
It's the theatrical

Comeback in broad day
To the same place, the same face, the same brute
Amused shout:

'A miracle!'
That knocks me out.
There is a charge

For the eyeing of my scars, there is a charge
For the hearing of my heart----
It really goes.

And there is a charge, a very large charge
For a word or a touch
Or a bit of blood

Or a piece of my hair or my clothes.
So, so, Herr Doktor.
So, Herr Enemy.

I am your opus,
I am your valuable,
The pure gold baby

That melts to a shriek.
I turn and burn.
Do not think I underestimate your great concern.

Ash, ash ---
You poke and stir.
Flesh, bone, there is nothing there----

A cake of soap,
A wedding ring,
A gold filling.

Herr God, Herr Lucifer
Beware
Beware.

Out of the ash
I rise with my red hair
And I eat men like air.

[jannieC]

Jason, I've never really enjoyed poetry. I think it's because I just don't like to have to think so hard to understand something (which makes me sound really stupid, I know). However, I really enjoy a lot of Maya Angelou's stuff (IN SPITE of her friendship with Hoprah). She came into the hotel I used to work at for lunch, and I said something to her (which we were neever supposed to do). She was very gracious and took my hand in both of hers. Lovely woman, really.

[JazmenFlowers]

Jason, I've never really enjoyed poetry. I think it's because I just don't like to have to think so hard to understand something (which makes me sound really stupid, I know). However, I really enjoy a lot of Maya Angelou's stuff (IN SPITE of her friendship with Hoprah). She came into the hotel I used to work at for lunch, and I said something to her (which we were neever supposed to do). She was very gracious and took my hand in both of hers. Lovely woman, really.
nah...I think lots of people feel that way. I have always had the mindset that if a poem doesn't move me at all and I have to think about it, I move on. There are poems I don't understand AT ALL, but I love because they are so pretty.

[Jyqm]

Thanks for starting this thread! I had mentioned in passing a while back that it would interesting to hear about people's favorite poems or their own work, but I never got around to starting the thread myself.

My favorite poetry tends to be longer epic stuff. It really doesn't get much better (in English, at least) than Paradise Lost (http://darkwing.uoregon.edu/~rbear/lost/lost.html), or The Faerie Queene (http://darkwing.uoregon.edu/~rbear/fqintro.html), or Childe Harold's Pilgrimage (http://website.lineone.net/~ssiggeman/chp/). Or Leaves of Grass (http://www.whitmanarchive.org/works/leaves/1855/text/frameset.html), on the American side of the ocean. Or Howl (http://members.tripod.com/~Sprayberry/poems/howl.txt) (much shorter than those others, of course, but that certainly doesn't make it any less epic).

As for shorter, lyric stuff, I also like Arnold, though of those late Victorian guys, I think I prefer Hopkins (sprung rhyme is pretty awesome; check out "The Windhover" (http://www.bartleby.com/122/12.html)) and Hardy ("The Darkling Thrush" (http://www.bl.uk/services/learning/curriculum/cnv/section6draftactivity3hardypoem4.html)).

Plath is pretty great, too - she was so wonderful with really harsh juxtapositions of imagery - and I think if I'm going to include an actual poem (and not just a link) in this post, it's going to be "The Swarm":

Somebody is shooting at something in our town --
A dull pom, pom in the Sunday street.
Jealousy can open the blood,
It can make black roses.
Who are the shooting at?

It is you the knives are out for
At Waterloo, Waterloo, Napoleon,
The hump of Elba on your short back,
And the snow, marshaling its brilliant cutlery
Mass after mass, saying Shh!

Shh! These are chess people you play with,
Still figures of ivory.
The mud squirms with throats,
Stepping stones for French bootsoles.
The gilt and pink domes of Russia melt and float off

In the furnace of greed. Clouds, clouds.
So the swarm balls and deserts
Seventy feet up, in a black pine tree.
It must be shot down. Pom! Pom!
So dumb it thinks bullets are thunder.

It thinks they are the voice of God
Condoning the beak, the claw, the grin of the dog
Yellow-haunched, a pack-dog,
Grinning over its bone of ivory
Like the pack, the pack, like everybody.

The bees have got so far. Seventy feet high!
Russia, Poland and Germany!
The mild hills, the same old magenta
Fields shrunk to a penny
Spun into a river, the river crossed.

The bees argue, in their black ball,
A flying hedgehog, all prickles.
The man with gray hands stands under the honeycomb
Of their dream, the hived station
Where trains, faithful to their steel arcs,

Leave and arrive, and there is no end to the country.
Pom! Pom! They fall
Dismembered, to a tod of ivy.
So much for the charioteers, the outriders, the Grand Army!
A red tatter, Napoleon!

The last badge of victory.
The swarm is knocked into a cocked straw hat.
Elba, Elba, bleb on the sea!
The white busts of marshals, admirals, generals
Worming themselves into niches.

How instructive this is!
The dumb, banded bodies
Walking the plank draped with Mother France's upholstery
Into a new mausoleum,
An ivory palace, a crotch pine.

The man with gray hands smiles --
The smile of a man of business, intensely practical.
They are not hands at all
But asbestos receptacles.
Pom! Pom! 'They would have killed me.'

Stings big as drawing pins!
It seems bees have a notion of honor,
A black intractable mind.
Napoleon is pleased, he is pleased with everything.
O Europe! O ton of honey!

As for me, I wrote a number of prose sonnets last year. Here's a few of them, with the line breaks marked:

"Sonnet about Strawberries"

So earlier tonight, as I was wal/king down to Karl's apartment, right there on / the sidewalk, cold, abandoned, wet, I saw / these strawberries. They had been spilled. I pon/dered it but briefly as I passed - this taw/dry scene of hugely poignant, yet incon/sequential melancholy - as the raw/ness of the weather kept me focused on / arriving at my destination quick/ly. I was careful, though, and didn't step / on any of the orphaned fruit. No sense / in slipping on red pulp. The streets were slick / enough from hours of rain, and I had fal/len once already. There goes decadence.

14.2.2005


"Two Days after Aunt Jane Fell"

I think what most surprised me when we went / into the house was the near total lack / of stench. I had expected the warm, black / odor of death. Instead, the only scent / to be detected was the faint bouquet / of vodka: empty Smirnoff bottles - four / of them - held vigil near the spot of floor / where red had long since turned to brown. The ta/ble stood defiant. Victory was his. / I looked away. A painting on the wall - / the dog, Frisky. Long dead, if I recall. / Rabies, I think. Forget it. There is busi/ness to attend to yet. What do they say / gets blood stains out of carpet, anyway?

21.2.2005


“Voice of a Generation”

It seems like every time you buy a book-/on-tape these days, it's some celebrity / who's reading it. But what about the peo/ple that we used to hear - the ones with crook/ed teeth and dirty fingernails, the book-/on-tape professionals, who starve so we / can hear our damned beloved Michael Kea/ton narrate Moby Dick or Through the Look/ing Glass? Is modern culture really this / obsessed with Hollywood - that we will screw / folks out of work 'cause People Magazine / has never done a spread on them? 'Course, who / am I to judge? I'd sell my soul to lis/ten to Huck Finn, as read by Charlie Sheen.

14.3.2005

I also wrote this little over-the-top Spenserian excerise, which I rather enjoy:

“A Conversation with Rita, on the Eve of My Departure for Germany”

I, solitary, ‘pon the stalwart strand,
Across the heaving plain out-staring, stood.
Fev’rishly, the spray clutched at the land;
The ivory moon retreated, as it would.
A fleshly link reluctant, ‘cause I could,
I—home, alone—, into the gale, had cried:
“I’m not afraid anymore!” A voice—I should
Say that of Byron—scolded me: “I’d
Have said it better, or at least have harder tried.”

19.9.2005

All right, that's enough out of me. Onward.

[EnchantedSLN]

my favorite poem is The Forsaken Merman by Matthew Arnold

I like it. Thanks for posting.

I love Pablo Neruda, John Keats, Walt Whitman, ee cummings, Rumi. My favorite poem is Thanatopsis by William Cullen Bryant:

TO HIM who in the love of Nature holds
Communion with her visible forms, she speaks
A various language; for his gayer hours
She has a voice of gladness, and a smile
And eloquence of beauty, and she glides
Into his darker musings, with a mild
And healing sympathy, that steals away
Their sharpness, ere he is aware. When thoughts
Of the last bitter hour come like a blight
Over thy spirit, and sad images
Of the stern agony, and shroud, and pall,
And breathless darkness, and the narrow house,
Make thee to shudder, and grow sick at heart;—
Go forth under the open sky, and list
To Nature's teachings, while from all around—
Earth and her waters, and the depths of air—
Comes a still voice—Yet a few days, and thee
The all-beholding sun shall see no more
In all his course; nor yet in the cold ground,
Where thy pale form was laid, with many tears,
Nor in the embrace of ocean, shall exist
Thy image. Earth, that nourished thee, shall claim
Thy growth, to be resolved to earth again,
And, lost each human trace, surrendering up
Thine individual being, shalt thou go
To mix forever with the elements;
To be a brother to the insensible rock,
And to the sluggish clod, which the rude swain
Turns with his share, and treads upon. The oak
Shall send his roots abroad, and pierce thy mould.
Yet not to thine eternal resting-place
Shalt thou retire alone, nor couldst thou wish
Couch more magnificent. Thou shalt lie down
With patriarchs of the infant world,—with kings,
The powerful of the earth,—the wise, the good,
Fair forms, and hoary seers of ages past,
All in one mighty sepulchre. The hills
Rock-ribbed and ancient as the sun; the vales
Stretching in pensive quietness between;
The venerable woods—rivers that move
In majesty, and the complaining brooks
That make the meadows green; and, poured round all,
Old Ocean's gray and melancholy waste,—
Are but the solemn decorations all
Of the great tomb of man! The golden sun,
The planets, all the infinite host of heaven,
Are shining on the sad abodes of death,
Through the still lapse of ages. All that tread
The globe are but a handful to the tribes
That slumber in its bosom.—Take the wings
Of morning, pierce the Barcan wilderness,
Or lose thyself in the continuous woods
Where rolls the Oregon, and hears no sound,
Save his own dashings,—yet the dead are there:
And millions in those solitudes, since first
The flight of years began, have laid them down
In their last sleep—the dead reign there alone.
So shalt thou rest; and what if thou withdraw
In silence from the living, and no friend
Take note of thy departure? All that breathe
Will share thy destiny. The gay will laugh
When thou art gone, the solemn brood of care
Plod on, and each one as before will chase
His favorite phantom; yet all these shall leave
Their mirth and their employments, and shall come
And make their bed with thee. As the long train
Of ages glide away, the sons of men,
The youth in life's green spring, and he who goes
In the full strength of years, matron and maid,
The speechless babe, and the gray-headed man—
Shall one by one be gathered to thy side
By those, who in their turn shall follow them.

So live, that when thy summons comes to join
The innumerable caravan which moves
To that mysterious realm, where each shall take
His chamber in the silent halls of death,
Thou go not, like the quarry-slave at night,
Scourged to his dungeon, but, sustained and soothed
By an unfaltering trust, approach thy grave
Like one who wraps the drapery of his couch
About him, and lies down to pleasant dreams.

[JazmenFlowers]

"Two Days after Aunt Jane Fell"

I think what most surprised me when we went / into the house was the near total lack / of stench. I had expected the warm, black / odor of death. Instead, the only scent / to be detected was the faint bouquet / of vodka: empty Smirnoff bottles - four / of them - held vigil near the spot of floor / where red had long since turned to brown. The ta/ble stood defiant. Victory was his. / I looked away. A painting on the wall - / the dog, Frisky. Long dead, if I recall. / Rabies, I think. Forget it. There is busi/ness to attend to yet. What do they say / gets blood stains out of carpet, anyway?

21.2.2005
see...I do have substance...I'm more than sun-ripened raspberries and polished eyebrows... :laugh:

I love The Windhover and The Darkling Thrush - thanks for posting those...I love the alliteration and sibilance in those poems.

I wrote a "response" to Dylan Thomas' Fern Hill that I should post...it won a couple of awards.

[Jyqm]

Jason, I've never really enjoyed poetry. I think it's because I just don't like to have to think so hard to understand something

I'm almost exactly the opposite (though no, that doesn't make you sound stupid), at least when it comes to lyric poetry: If I completely understand or get a lot out of a poem on first reading, odds are there won't be much to discover when I go back to it. My favorite poems end up being the ones that, after the first reading, had me scratching my head.

My favorite poem is Thanatopsis by William Cullen Bryant:

Good ol' Dubya Cee Bee. I forget about him. Thanks for the reminder!

see...I do have substance...I'm more than sun-ripened raspberries and polished eyebrows...

I don't get it...

I enjoyed your poem! Well, maybe "enjoyed" isn't the right word... But I like poems that thrust that kind of vivid, violent imagery into a seemingly totally banal situation.

I love The Windhover and The Darkling Thrush - thanks for posting those...I love the alliteration and sibilance in those poems.

"The Darkling Thrush" is almost devastating a century later, isn't it? You had no idea, Tom... Not a clue...

[JazmenFlowers]

I don't get it...

I enjoyed your poem! Well, maybe "enjoyed" isn't the right word... But I like poems that thrust that kind of vivid, violent imagery into a seemingly totally banal situation.

"The Darkling Thrush" is almost devastating a century later, isn't it? You had no idea, Tom... Not a clue...
oh I was just poking fun at a few here who pick on me for being slightly (he he slightly) nelly at times I guess...because I use Sun-Ripened Raspberry deodorant and drink Raspberry Ice water and keep my eyebrows in shape...lol

I appreciate what you said about my poem. It's about being in the car with my parents and wanting so bad to tell them something...it's like a conversation with myself I guess...I have a lot of poems that deal with the sexual abuse I experienced, go figure :rolleyes:

oh and I meant to tell you how much I enjoyed your poem...WOW, it's awesome...reminds me of A Rose for Emily. Very nice.

[irishgrl]

The Cremation of Sam McGee, by: Robert Service (1874-1958)

There are strange things done in the midnight sun
By the men who moil for gold;
The Arctic trails have their secret tales
That would make your blood run cold;
The Northern Lights have seen queer sights,
But the queerest they ever did see
Was that night on the marge of Lake Lebarge
I cremated Sam McGee.

Now Sam McGee was from Tennessee, where the cotton blooms and blows.
Why he left his home in the South to roam 'round the Pole, God only knows.
He was always cold, but the land of gold seemed to hold him like a spell;
Though he'd often say in his homely way that "he'd sooner live in hell."

On a Christmas Day we were mushing our way over the Dawson trail.
Talk of your cold! through the parka's fold it stabbed like a driven nail.
If our eyes we'd close, then the lashes froze till sometimes we couldn't see;
It wasn't much fun, but the only one to whimper was Sam McGee.

And that very night, as we lay packed tight in our robes beneath the snow,
And the dogs were fed, and the stars o'erhead were dancing heel and toe,
He turned to me, and "Cap," says he, "I'll cash in this trip, I guess;
And if I do, I'm asking that you won't refuse my last request."

Well, he seemed so low that I couldn't say no; then he says with a sort of moan:
"It's the cursèd cold, and it's got right hold, till I'm chilled clean through to the bone.
Yet 'tain't being dead — it's my awful dread of the icy grave that pains;
So I want you to swear that, foul or fair, you'll cremate my last remains."

A pal's last need is a thing to heed, so I swore I would not fail;
And we started on at the streak of dawn; but God! he looked ghastly pale.
He crouched on the sleigh, and he raved all day of his home in Tennessee;
And before nightfall a corpse was all that was left of Sam McGee.

There wasn't a breath in that land of death, and I hurried, horror-driven,
With a corpse half hid that I couldn't get rid, because of a promise given;
It was lashed to the sleigh, and it seemed to say: "You may tax your brawn and brains,
But you promised true, and it's up to you, to cremate those last remains."

Now a promise made is a debt unpaid, and the trail has its own stern code.
In the days to come, though my lips were dumb, in my heart how I cursed that load.
In the long, long night, by the lone firelight, while the huskies, round in a ring,
Howled out their woes to the homeless snows — Oh God! how I loathed the thing.

And every day that quiet clay seemed to heavy and heavier grow;
And on I went, though the dogs were spent and the grub was getting low;
The trail was bad, and I felt half mad, but I swore I would not give in;
And I'd often sing to the hateful thing, and it hearkened with a grin.

Till I came to the marge of Lake Lebarge, and a derelict there lay;
It was jammed in the ice, but I saw in a trice it was called the "Alice May."
And I looked at it, and I thought a bit, and I looked at my frozen chum;
Then "Here," said I, with a sudden cry, "is my cre-ma-tor-eum."

Some planks I tore from the cabin floor, and I lit the boiler fire;
Some coal I found that was lying around, and I heaped the fuel higher;
The flames just soared, and the furnace roared — such a blaze you seldom see;
And I burrowed a hole in the glowing coal, and I stuffed in Sam McGee.

Then I made a hike, for I didn't like to hear him sizzle so;
And the heavens scowled, and the huskies howled, and the wind began to blow.
It was icy cold, but the hot sweat rolled down my cheeks, and I don't know why;
And the greasy smoke in an inky cloak went streaking down the sky.

I do not know how long in the snow I wrestled with grisly fear;
But the stars came out and they danced about ere again I ventured near;
I was sick with dread, but I bravely said: "I'll just take a peep inside.
I guess he's cooked, and it's time I looked"; ... then the door I opened wide.

And there sat Sam, looking cool and calm, in the heart of the furnace roar;
And he wore a smile you could see a mile, and said: "Please close that door.
It's fine in here, but I greatly fear, you'll let in the cold and storm —
Since I left Plumtree, down in Tennessee, it's the first time I've been warm."

There are strange things done in the midnight sun
By the men who moil for gold;
The Arctic trails have their secret tales
That would make your blood run cold;
The Northern Lights have seen queer sights,
But the queerest they ever did see
Was that night on the marge of Lake Lebarge
I cremated Sam McGee

and for sheer brevity (I cant remember the author's name, he/she was a poetry contest winner):

My skin is thin
but its enough
to keep me in.

[Jyqm]

I appreciate what you said about my poem. It's about being in the car with my parents and wanting so bad to tell them something...it's like a conversation with myself I guess...I have a lot of poems that deal with the sexual abuse I experienced, go figure :rolleyes:

Hey, write what you know, right?

oh and I meant to tell you how much I enjoyed your poem...WOW, it's awesome...reminds me of A Rose for Emily. Very nice.

Thanks! I definitely did not "enjoy" your poem, but I've gone back to read it again several times now, which as I mentioned in my other post, is always a good sign. This last time through, I especially liked this part:

my head
is about to explode from thought on top of thought
I swim in a sea of thoughts
my mind can not rest
I am walking the line

In any other context, I might think, "Geez, talk about your mixed metaphors," but those last three lines really do a great job of expressing how overwhelmed and confused the speaker is in kind of a subtle way.

The Cremation of Sam McGee, by: Robert Service (1874-1958)

Is this strictly a poem, or is it also a song? Or has music ever been written for it? It'd make for a real nice folk/country song.

[hayley]

I love ee cummings, Walt Whitman, T.S. Eliot, & Pablo Neruda. I have two favorite poems, both terribly cliche.

The first is I Do Not Love You Except Because I Love You- by Neruda.

<i>I do not love you except because I love you;
I go from loving to not loving you,
From waiting to not waiting for you
My heart moves from cold to fire.

I love you only because it's you the one I love;
I hate you deeply, and hating you
Bend to you, and the measure of my changing love for you
Is that I do not see you but love you blindly.

Maybe January light will consume
My heart with its cruel
Ray, stealing my key to true calm.

In this part of the story I am the one who
Dies, the only one, and I will die of love because I love you,
Because I love you, Love, in fire and blood.</i>

My other favorite poem is <a href="http://www.poemhunter.com/p/m/poem.asp?poem=174319">The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock</a>, by T.S. Eliot. Cliche, I know. But I can still recite every line of this thing, that's how many times I've read it.

<i>And I have known the eyes already, known them all--
The eyes that fix you in a formulated phrase,
And when I am formulated, sprawling on a pin,
When I am pinned and wriggling on the wall,
Then how should I begin
To spit out all the butt-ends of my days and ways?
And how should I presume?</i>

[irishgrl]

Is this strictly a poem, or is it also a song? Or has music ever been written for it? It'd make for a real nice folk/country song.
as far as I know its only a poem. Robert W. Service has quite a lot of poems dealing with the Yukon/Gold Rush days.........
http://www.robertwservice.com/modules/library/article.php?articleid=30
this is the home page with a voice clip from the old boy hisself:
Robert W. Service (http://www.robertwservice.com/)

another favorite is The Shooting of Dan McGrew (http://www.robertwservice.com/modules/library/article.php?articleid=29)

Another "poem" I like which is actually a song, is The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald I think Gordon Lightfoot did an awesome job with this song/poem.

[BTFLCHLD]

anyone here into poetry? very cool jaz...i thought to add this to the song/lyric thread...but now you have this...very cool...
i love to read poetry... :nod: ive written quite a number myself...

Ode to Beauty
By Ralph Waldo Emerson

WHO gave thee, O Beauty,
The keys of this breast,—
Too credulous lover
Of blest and unblest?
Say, when in lapsed ages
Thee knew I of old?
Or what was the service
For which I was sold?
When first my eyes saw thee,
I found me thy thrall,
By magical drawings,
Sweet tyrant of all!
I drank at thy fountain
False waters of thirst;
Thou intimate stranger,
Thou latest and first!
Thy dangerous glances
Make women of men;
New-born, we are melting
Into nature again.
Lavish, lavish promiser,
Nigh persuading gods to err!
Guest of million painted forms,
Which in turn thy glory warms!
The frailest leaf, the mossy bark,
The acorn’s cup, the raindrop’s arc,
The swinging spider’s silver line,
The ruby of the drop of wine,
The shining pebble of the pond,
Thou inscribest with a bond,
In thy momentary play,
Would bankrupt nature to repay.

Ah, what avails it
To hide or to shun
Whom the Infinite One
Hath granted His throne?
The heaven high over
Is the deep’s lover;
The sun and sea,
Informed by thee,
Before me run,
And draw me on,
Yet fly me still,
As Fate refuses
To me the heart Fate for me chooses.
Is it that my opulent soul
Was mingled from the generous whole;
Sea-valleys and the deep of skies
Furnished several supplies;
And the sands whereof I’m made
Draw me to them, self-betrayed?
I turn the proud portfolios
Which hold the grand designs
Of Salvator, of Guercino,
And Piranesi’s lines.
I hear the lofty paeans
Of the masters of the shell,
Who heard the starry music
And recount the numbers well;
Olympian bards who sung
Divine Ideas below,
Which always find us young,
And always keep us so.
Oft, in streets or humblest places,
I detect far-wandered graces,
Which, from Eden wide astray,
In lonely homes have lost their way.

Thee gliding through the sea of form,
Like the lightning through the storm,
Somewhat not to be possessed,
Somewhat not to be caressed.
No feet so fleet could ever find,
No perfect form could ever bind.
Thou eternal fugitive,
Hovering over all that live,
Quick and skilful to inspire
Sweet, extravagant desire,
Starry space and lily-bell
Filling with thy roseate smell,
Wilt not give the lips to taste
Of the nectar which thou hast.

All that’s good and great with thee
Works in close conspiracy;
Thou hast bribed the dark and lonely
To report thy features only,
And the cold and purple morning
Itself with thoughts of thee adorning;
The leafy dell, the city mart,
Equal trophies of thine art;
E’en the flowing azure air
Thou hast touched for my despair;
And, if I languish into dreams,
Again I meet the ardent beams.
Queen of things! I dare not die
In Being’s deeps past ear and eye;
Lest there I find the same deceiver,
And be the sport of Fate for ever.
Dread Power, but dear! if God thou be,
Unmake me quite, or give thyself to me!

[DavidMn]

I havent seen it in a long time, but I reall like this poem by William Carlos Williams about Nantucket. I'd love to see it again!

[Jyqm]

I havent seen it in a long time, but I reall like this poem by William Carlos Williams about Nantucket. I'd love to see it again!

Nearly every remotely famous poem by every remotely famous poet is online these days, David. Just do some searches, and you'll find all kinds of stuff. Not just the poetry, but commentary, criticism, annotations, etc. Obviously, reading poetry online isn't exactly ideal, but it's beter than nothing!

Nantucket (http://www.americanpoems.com/poets/williams/1037)

Flowers through the window
lavender and yellow

changed by white curtains—
Smell of cleanliness—

Sunshine of late afternoon—
On the glass tray

a glass pitcher, the tumbler
turned down, by which

a key is lying— And the
immaculate white bed

I can't believe I forgot to mention Williams. Up there with Plath as one of the great twentieth century American poets. Here's one of my favorites from him (and of course, having said what I did above, I actually had a relatively tough time finding this one online):

The Poor

It's the anarchy of poverty
delights me, the old
yellow wooden house indented
among the new brick tenements

Or a cast iron balcony
with panels showing oak branches
in full leaf. It fits
the dress of the children

reflecting every stage and
custom of necessity—
Chimneys, roofs, fences of
Wood and metal in an unfenced

age and enclosing next to
nothing at all: the old man

in a sweater and soft black
hat who sweeps the sidewalk—

his own ten feet of it—
in a wind that fitfully

turning his corner has
overwhelmed the entire city

Wallace Stevens can be pretty wonderful, too. Here's an absolutely maddening poem of his:

Sea Surface Full of Clouds

I

In that November off Tehuantepec,
The slopping of the sea grew still one night
And in the morning summer hued the deck

And made one think of rosy chocolate
And gilt umbrellas. Paradisal green
Gave suavity to the perplexed machine

Of ocean, which like limpid water lay.
Who, then, in that ambrosial latitude
Out of the light evolved the morning blooms,

Who, then, evolved the sea-blooms from the clouds
Diffusing balm in that Pacific calm?
C’était mon enfant, mon bijou, mon âme.

The sea-clouds whitened far below the calm
And moved, as blooms move, in the swimming green
And in its watery radiance, while the hue

Of heaven in an antique reflection rolled
Round those flotillas. And sometimes the sea
Poured brilliant iris on the glistening blue.

II

In that November off Tehuantepec
The slopping of the sea grew still one night.
At breakfast jelly yellow streaked the deck

And made one think of chop-house chocolate
And sham umbrellas. And a sham-like green
Capped summer-seeming on the tense machine

Of ocean, which in sinister flatness lay.
Who, then, beheld the rising of the clouds
That strode submerged in that malevolent sheen,

Who saw the mortal massives of the blooms
Of water moving on the water-floor?
C’était mon frère du ciel, ma vie, mon or.

The gongs rang loudly as the windy booms
Hoo-hooed it in the darkened ocean-blooms.
The gongs grew still. And then blue heaven spread

Its crystalline pendentives on the sea
And the macabre of the water-glooms
In an enormous undulation fled.

III

In that November off Tehuantepec,
The slopping of the sea grew still one night
And a pale silver patterned on the deck

And made one think of porcelain chocolate
And pied umbrellas. An uncertain green,
Piano-polished, held the tranced machine

Of ocean, as a prelude holds and holds,
Who, seeing silver petals of white blooms
Unfolding in the water, feeling sure

Of the milk within the saltiest spurge, heard, then,
The sea unfolding in the sunken clouds?
Oh! C’était mon extase et mon amour.

So deeply sunken were they that the shrouds,
The shrouding shadows, made the petals black
Until the rolling heaven made them blue,

A blue beyond the rainy hyacinth,
And smiting the crevasses of the leaves
Deluged the ocean with a sapphire blue.

IV

In that November off Tehuantepec
The night-long slopping of the sea grew still.
A mallow morning dozed upon the deck

And made one think of musky chocolate
And frail umbrellas. A too-fluent green
Suggested malice in the dry machine

Of ocean, pondering dank stratagem.
Who then beheld the figures of the clouds
Like blooms secluded in the thick marine?

Like blooms? Like damasks that were shaken off
From the loosed girdles in the spangling must.
C’était ma foi, la nonchalance divine.

The nakedness would rise and suddenly turn
Salt masks of beard and mouths of bellowing,
Would—But more suddenly the heaven rolled

Its bluest sea-clouds in the thinking green,
And the nakedness became the broadest blooms,
Mile-mallows that a mallow sun cajoled.

V

In that November off Tehuantepec
Night stilled the slopping of the sea.
The day came, bowing and voluble, upon the deck,

Good clown… One thought of Chinese chocolate
And large umbrellas. And a motley green
Followed the drift of the obese machine

Of ocean, perfected in indolence.
What pistache one, ingenious and droll,
Beheld the sovereign clouds as jugglery

And the sea as turquoise-turbaned Sambo, neat
At tossing saucers—cloudy-conjuring sea?
C’était mon esprit bâtard, l’ignominie.

The sovereign clouds came clustering. The conch
Of loyal conjuration trumped. The wind
Of green blooms turning crisped the motley hue

To clearing opalescence. Then the sea
And heaven rolled as one and from the two
Came fresh transfigurings of freshest blue.

[amber]

see...I do have substance...I'm more than sun-ripened raspberries and polished eyebrows... :laugh:

I love The Windhover and The Darkling Thrush - thanks for posting those...I love the alliteration and sibilance in those poems.

I wrote a "response" to Dylan Thomas' Fern Hill that I should post...it won a couple of awards.

You should, I love that poem. In fact it's the only one that came to mind....

[The Tower]

My great-grandfather was a published poet in the early 20th century. I not all that big on "the written word" poetry as much as poetry that happens to be set to music (and by this I am not talking about something like "Listen to the Rain"....).

The Evening Primrose by Benjamin Britten

When once the sun sinks in the West
And dew drops pearl the evenings breast
Almost as pale as moonbeams are
Or its companionable star

The evening primrose ope's anew
Its delicate blossom to the dew
And hermit-like, shunning the light
Wakes its fair bloom upon the night

Who blindfold to its fond caresses
Knows not the beauty he possesses

Thus it blooms on while night is by
When day looks out with open eye
Bashed at the gaze it cannot shun
It faints and withers and is gone

[amber]

That was a nice poem, Towie.

I'm going to put Ferhill, in case no one has read it. "Time held me green and dying, though I sang in my chains like the sea" - oh, that line gets me every time. Why can't Stevie write a Fernhill based song??? :p

This is like, my mind's theme poem. Geez, I knew I shouldn't have stopped to read it, now I'm crying. :o




Fern Hill

by Dylan Thomas

Now as I was young and easy under the apple boughs
About the lilting house and happy as the grass was green,
The night above the dingle starry,
Time let me hail and climb
Golden in the heydays of his eyes,
And honoured among wagons I was prince of the apple towns
And once below a time I lordly had the trees and leaves
Trail with daisies and barley
Down the rivers of the windfall light.

And as I was green and carefree, famous among the barns
About the happy yard and singing as the farm was home,
In the sun that is young once only,
Time let me play and be
Golden in the mercy of his means,
And green and golden I was huntsman and herdsman, the calves
Sang to my horn, the foxes on the hills barked clear and cold,
And the sabbath rang slowly
In the pebbles of the holy streams.

All the sun long it was running, it was lovely, the hay
Fields high as the house, the tunes from the chimneys, it was air
And playing, lovely and watery
And fire green as grass.
And nightly under the simple stars
As I rode to sleep the owls were bearing the farm away,
All the moon long I heard, blessed among stables, the nightjars
Flying with the ricks, and the horses
Flashing into the dark.

And then to awake, and the farm, like a wanderer white
With the dew, come back, the cock on his shoulder: it was all
Shining, it was Adam and maiden,
The sky gathered again
And the sun grew round that very day.
So it must have been after the birth of the simple light
In the first, spinning place, the spellbound horses walking warm
Out of the whinnying green stable
On to the fields of praise.

And honoured among foxes and pheasants by the gay house
Under the new made clouds and happy as the heart was long,
In the sun born over and over,
I ran my heedless ways,
My wishes raced through the house high hay
And nothing I cared, at my sky blue trades, that time allows
In all his tuneful turning so few and such morning songs
Before the children green and golden
Follow him out of grace.

Nothing I cared, in the lamb white days, that time would take me
Up to the swallow thronged loft by the shadow of my hand,
In the moon that is always rising,
Nor that riding to sleep
I should hear him fly with the high fields
And wake to the farm forever fled from the childless land.
Oh as I was young and easy in the mercy of his means,
Time held me green and dying
Though I sang in my chains like the sea.

[Jyqm]

My great-grandfather was a published poet in the early 20th century. I not all that big on "the written word" poetry as much as poetry that happens to be set to music (and by this I am not talking about something like "Listen to the Rain"....).

The Evening Primrose by Benjamin Britten

When once the sun sinks in the West
And dew drops pearl the evenings breast
Almost as pale as moonbeams are
Or its companionable star

The evening primrose ope's anew
Its delicate blossom to the dew
And hermit-like, shunning the light
Wakes its fair bloom upon the night

Who blindfold to its fond caresses
Knows not the beauty he possesses

Thus it blooms on while night is by
When day looks out with open eye
Bashed at the gaze it cannot shun
It faints and withers and is gone


Nice! The second line in particular is just fantastic.

I know there's other people around here who have written poetry of their own. Don't be shy, kids.

[JazmenFlowers]

I found this on postsecret.com and thought it was pretty interesting...
<img src="http://i15.photobucket.com/albums/a378/fulghamjc/gifts.jpg" alt="Image hosting by Photobucket">

[GypsySorcerer]

My favorite poet is William Blake, and my favorite works of his are found in Songs of Innocence and Experience. http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/etext99/sinex10h.htm

I also enjoy Adrienne Rich, Walt Whitman, and Sylvia Plath.

[irishgrl]

I have always thought Paul Simon was a poet. some of the imagery he evokes is just powerful:

hello darkness my old friend, Ive come to talk to you again.....
************
Its a still life watercolor....from a now late afternoon
and the sun shines thru the curtain lace, and shadows wash the room
**************
Old friends, old friends,
Sat on their parkbench like bookends
A newspaper blown through the grass
Falls on the round toes
of the high shoes of the old friends
************
They say that Richard Cory owns one half of this whole town,
With political connections to spread his wealth around.
Born into society, a banker's only child,
He had everything a man could want: power, grace, and style.

But I work in his factory
And I curse the life I'm living
And I curse my poverty
And I wish that I could be,
Oh, I wish that I could be,
Oh, I wish that I could be
Richard Cory.

[Jyqm]

I think this thread should be kept going. Ideally, it should end up longer than the "This could get tricky" thread. Keep the poems comin', people!

Here's "Seascape," by Elizabeth Bishop (the way she constructs the scene, and the total control she has over her images, is just breathtaking):

This celestial seascape, with white herons got up as angels,
flying high as they want and as far as they want sidewise
in tiers and tiers of immaculate reflections;
the whole region, from the highest heron
down to the weightless mangrove island
with bright green leaves edged neatly with bird-droppings
like illumination in silver,
and down to the suggestively Gothic arches of the mangrove roots
and the beautiful pea-green back-pasture
where occasionally a fish jumps, like a wildflower
in an ornamental spray of spray;
this cartoon by Raphael for a tapestry for a Pope:
it does look like heaven.
But a skeletal lighthouse standing there
in black and white clerical dress,
who lives on his nerves, thinks he knows better.
He thinks that hell rages below his iron feet,
that that is why the shallow water is so warm,
and he knows that heaven is not like this.
Heaven is not like flying or swimming,
but has something to do with blackness and a strong glare
and when it gets dark he will remember something
strongly worded to say on the subject.

[Richard B]

I have always thought Paul Simon was a poet. some of the imagery he evokes is just powerful:
I completely agree with you. The man is a poet. He sees life in poetry. He married another beatnik poet, Edie Brickell. A match made in heaven.

Down among the reeds and rushes
A baby boy was found
His eyes as clear as centuries
His silky hair was brown

Never been lonely
Never been lied to
Never had to scuffle in fear
Nothing denied to
Born at the instant
The church bells chime
And the whole world whispering
Born at the right time

Me and my buddies we are travelling people
We like to go down to restaurant row
Spend those Euro-dollars
All the way from Washington to Tokyo
I see them in the airport lounge
Upon their mother's breast
They follow me with open eyes
Their uninvited guest

Never been lonely
Never been lied to
Never had to scuffle in fear
Nothing denied to
Born at the instant
The church bells chime
And the whole world whispering
Born at the right time

Too many people on the bus from the airport
Too many holes in the crust of the earth
The planet groans
Every time it registers another birth

But among the reeds and rushes
A baby girl was found
Her eyes as clear as centuries
Her silky hair was brown

Never been lonely
Never been lied to
Never had to scuffle in fear
Nothing denied to
Born at the instant
The church bells chime
And the whole world whispering
Born at the right time

[dissention]

Margaret Atwood is probably my favorite, and this is my favorite piece by her:

Sekhmet, the Lion-headed Goddess of War

He was the sort of man
who wouldn't hurt a fly.
Many flies are now alive
while he is not.
He was not my patron.
He preferred full granaries, I battle.
My roar meant slaughter.
Yet here we are together
in the same museum.
That's not what I see, though, the fitful
crowds of staring children
learning the lesson of multi-
cultural obliteration, sic transit
and so on.

I see the temple where I was born
or built, where I held power.
I see the desert beyond,
where the hot conical tombs, that look
from a distance, frankly, like dunces' hats,
hide my jokes: the dried-out flesh
and bones, the wooden boats
in which the dead sail endlessly
in no direction.

What did you expect from gods
with animal heads?
Though come to think of it
the ones made later, who were fully human
were not such good news either.
Favour me and give me riches,
destroy my enemies.
That seems to be the gist.
Oh yes: And save me from death.
In return we're given blood
and bread, flowers and prayer,
and lip service.

Maybe there's something in all of this
I missed. But if it's selfless
love you're looking for,
you've got the wrong goddess.

I just sit where I'm put, composed
of stone and wishful thinking:
that the deity who kills for pleasure
will also heal,
that in the midst of your nightmare,
the final one, a kind lion
will come with bandages in her mouth
and the soft body of a woman,
and lick you clean of fever,
and pick your soul up gently by the nape of the neck
and caress you into darkness and paradise.

[amber]

That one is great, thanks for sharing.
Gosh, I love her. I might actually read more of her poetry b/c of this.

[Jyqm]

I was completely unaware Margaret Atwood wrote poetry! That was great.

Here's something I've been playing with tonight, an untitled poem by Arno Holz:

Sieben Septillionen Jahre
zählte ich die Meilensteine am Rande der Milchstrasse.

Sie endeten nicht.

Myriaden Aeonen
versank ich in die Wunder eines einzigen Thautröpfchens.

Es erschlossen sich immer neue.

Mein Herz erzitterte!

Selig ins Moos
streckte ich mich und wurde Erde.

Jetzt ranken Brombeeren
über mir,
auf einem sich wiegenden Schlehdornzweig
zwitschert ein Rotkehlchen.

Aus meiner Brust
springt fröhlich ein Quell,
aus meinem Schädel
wachsen Blumen.

---

For seven septillion years
I counted the milestones on the edge of Milk Street.

They did not end.

For myriads of æons
I plunged into the wonders of a single tiny dewdrop.

They unfolded ever anew.

My heart did tremble!

Enraptured in moss
I stretched myself out and became earth.

Now brambles entwine
over me,
on a swaying blackthorn branch
twitters a robin.

Out of my breast
leaps gaily a spring,
out of my skull
grow flowers.

[Richard B]

I'm also a big fan of Walt Whitman. Not because of Lindsey...my appreciation of Walt came way before his album based on the Walt poem "Out of the Cradle and Endlessly Rocking," which is wonderful. I fell in love with Leaves of Grass.

One of my favorite poems by Walt. Ever.

I Sing The Body Electric

1
I sing the body electric,
The armies of those I love engirth me and I engirth them,
They will not let me off till I go with them, respond to them,
And discorrupt them, and charge them full with the charge of the
soul.

Was it doubted that those who corrupt their own bodies conceal
themselves?
And if those who defile the living are as bad as they who defile the
dead?
And if the body does not do fully as much as the soul?
And if the body were not the soul, what is the soul?

2
The love of the body of man or woman balks account, the body itself
balks account,
That of the male is perfect, and that of the female is perfect.

The expression of the face
balks account,
But the expression of a well-made man appears not only in his face,
It is in his limbs and joints also, it is curiously in the joints of
his hips and wrists,
It is in his walk, the carriage of his neck, the flex of his waist
and knees, dress does not hide him,
The strong sweet quality he has strikes through the cotton and
broadcloth,
To see him pass conveys as much as the best poem, perhaps more,
You linger to see his back, and the back of his neck and
shoulder-side.

The sprawl and fulness of babes, the bosoms and heads of women, the
folds of their dress, their style as we pass in the street, the
contour of their shape downwards,
The swimmer naked in the swimming-bath, seen as he swims through
the transparent green-shine, or lies with his face up and rolls
silently to and from the heave of the water,
The bending forward and backward of rowers in row-boats, the
horse-man in his saddle,
Girls, mothers, house-keepers, in all their performances,
The group of laborers seated at noon-time with their open
dinner-kettles, and their wives waiting,
The female soothing a child, the farmer's daughter in the garden or
cow-yard,
The young fellow hosing corn, the sleigh-driver driving his six
horses through the crowd,
The wrestle of wrestlers, two apprentice-boys, quite grown, lusty,
good-natured, native-born, out on the vacant lot at sundown
after work,
The coats and caps thrown down, the embrace of love and resistance,
The upper-hold and under-hold, the hair rumpled over and blinding
the eyes;
The march of firemen in their own costumes, the play of masculine
muscle through clean-setting trowsers and waist-straps,
The slow return from the fire, the pause when the bell strikes
suddenly again, and the listening on the alert,
The natural, perfect, varied attitudes, the bent head, the curv'd
neck and the counting;
Such-like I love - I loosen myself, pass freely, am at the mother's
breast with the little child,
Swim with the swimmers, wrestle with wrestlers, march in line with
the firemen, and pause, listen, count.

3
I knew a man, a common farmer, the father of five sons,
And in them the fathers of sons, and in them the fathers of sons.

This man was a wonderful vigor, calmness, beauty of person,
The shape of his head, the pale yellow and white of his hair and
beard, the immeasurable meaning of his black eyes, the richness
and breadth of his manners,
These I used to go and visit him to see, he was wise also,
He was six feet tall, he was over eighty years old, his sons were
massive, clean, bearded, tan-faced, handsome,
They and his daughters loved him, all who saw him loved him,
They did not love him by allowance, they loved him with personal
love,
He drank water only, the blood show'd like scarlet through the
clear-brown skin of his face,
He was a frequent gunner and fisher, he sail'd his boat himself, he
had a fine one presented to him by a ship-joiner, he had
fowling-pieces presented to him by men that loved him,
When he went with his five sons and many grand-sons to hunt or fish,
you would pick him out as the most beautiful and vigorous of
the gang,
You would wish long and long to be with him, you would wish to sit
by him in the boat that you and he might touch each other.

4
I have perceiv'd that to be with those I like is enough,
To stop in company with the rest at evening is enough,
To be surrounded by beautiful, curious, breathing, laughing flesh is
enough,
To pass among them or touch any one, or rest my arm ever so lightly
round his or her neck for a moment, what is this then?
I do not ask any more delight, I swim in it as in a sea.

There is something in staying close to men and women and looking
on them, and in the contact and odor of them, that pleases
the soul well,
All things please the soul, but these please the soul well.

5
This is the female form,
A divine nimbus exhales from it from head to foot,
It attracts with fierce undeniable attraction,
I am drawn by its breath as if I were no more than a helpless vapor,
all falls aside but myself and it,
Books, art, religion, time, the visible and solid earth, and what
was expected of heaven or fear'd of hell, are now consumed,
Mad filaments, ungovernable shoots play out of it, the response
likewise ungovernable,
Hair, bosom, hips, bend of legs, negligent falling hands all
diffused, mine too diffused,
Ebb stung by the flow and flow stung by the ebb, love-flesh swelling
and deliciously aching,
Limitless limpid jets of love hot and enormous, quivering jelly of
love, white-blow and delirious nice,
Bridegroom night of love working surely and softly into the
prostrate dawn,
Undulating into the willing and yielding day,
Lost in the cleave of the clasping and sweet-flesh'd day.

This the nucleus - after the child is born of woman, man is born of
woman,
This the bath of birth, this the merge of small and large, and the
outlet again.

Be not ashamed women, your privilege encloses the rest, and is the
exit of the rest,
You are the gates of the body, and you are the gates of the soul.

The female contains all qualities and tempers them,
She is in her place and moves with perfect balance,
She is all things duly veil'd, she is both passive and active,
She is to conceive daughters as well as sons, and sons as well as
daughters.

As I see my soul reflected in Nature,
As I see through a mist, One with inexpressible completeness,
sanity, beauty,
See the bent head and arms folded over the breast, the Female I see.

6
The male is not less the soul nor more, he too is in his place,
He too is all qualities, he is action and power,
The flush of the known universe is in him,
Scorn becomes him well, and appetite and defiance become him well,
The wildest largest passions, bliss that is utmost, sorrow that is
utmost become him well, pride is for him,
The full-spread pride of man is calming and excellent to the soul,
Knowledge becomes him, he likes it always, he brings every thing to
the test of himself,
Whatever the survey, whatever the sea and the sail he strikes
soundings at last only here,
(Where else does he strike soundings except here?)

The man's body is sacred and the woman's body is sacred,
No matter who it is, it is sacred - is it the meanest one in the
laborers' gang?
Is it one of the dull-faced immigrants just landed on the wharf?
Each belongs here or anywhere just as much as the well-off, just as
much as you,
Each has his or her place in the procession.

(All is a procession,
The universe is a procession with measured and perfect motion.)

Do you know so much yourself that you call the meanest ignorant?
Do you suppose you have a right to a good sight, and he or she has
no right to a sight?
Do you think matter has cohered together from its diffuse float, and
the soil is on the surface, and water runs and vegetation
sprouts,
For you only, and not for him and her?

[Jyqm]

I'm also a big fan of Walt Whitman. Not because of Lindsey...my appreciation of Walt came way before his album based on the Walt poem "Out of the Cradle and Endlessly Rocking," which is wonderful. I fell in love with Leaves of Grass.

Part of me has always disliked Lindsey's choice for that album title, because it seems like a really half-assed wink at a really terrible pun.

But yeah, Leaves of Grass is pretty wonderful, though it's really something that's meant to be read while holding the big book in your lap, preferably outside somewhere. They print facsimiles of the first editions nowadays, but I think they can be expensive. The link that I included in my first post in this thread, though, is to a great Whitman site that has all the pages of the 1855 edition scanned in. If you've got to read Whitman online, it's easily the best way to go about it:

http://www.whitmanarchive.org/works/leaves/1855/text/frameset.html

[ragandbone]

I think I first began to love poetry after reading poems of Langston Hughes and William Carlos Williams. I suppose that would have been in Junior High.

A short list of favorites:
Anne Sexton
W.S. Merwin
Sharon Olds
Dylan Thomas
Mary Oliver
Pablo Neruda
W.B. Yeats

[ragandbone]

Wild Geese

You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees
for a hundred miles through the desert, repenting.
You only have to let the soft animal of your body love what it loves.
Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.
Meanwhile the world goes on.
Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain
are moving across the landscapes,
over the prairies and deep trees,
the mountains and the rivers.
Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air
are heading home again.
Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,
the world offers itself to your imagination,
calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting--
over and over announcing your place
in the family of things.

[Jyqm]

Good ol' Merwin, another great one I'd forgotten about:

The River of Bees

In a dream I returned to the river of bees
Five orange trees by the bridge and
Beside two mills my house
Into whose courtyard a blind man followed
The goats and stood singing
Of what was older

Soon it will be fifteen years

He was old he will have fallen into his eyes

I took my eyes
A long way to the calenders
Room after room asking how shall I live

One of the ends is made of streets
One man processions carry through it
Empty bottles their
Images of hope
It was offered to me by name

Once once and once
In the same city I was born
Asking what shall I say

He will have fallen into his mouth
Men think they are better than grass

I return to his voice rising like a forkful of hay

He was old he is not real nothing is real
Nor the noise of death drawing water

We are the echo of the future

On the door it says what to do to survive
But we were not born to survive
Only to live

[Jyqm]

Well, I'm keeping this thread going, dammit. Here's a few random sonnets by some guy, I forget his name, Bill something or other:

XVII

Who will believe my verse in time to come,
If it were fill'd with your most high deserts?
Though yet heaven knows it is but as a tomb
Which hides your life, and shows not half your parts.
If I could write the beauty of your eyes,
And in fresh numbers number all your graces,
The age to come would say 'This poet lies;
Such heavenly touches ne'er touch'd earthly faces.'
So should my papers, yellow'd with their age,
Be scorn'd, like old men of less truth than tongue,
And your true rights be term'd a poet's rage
And stretched metre of an antique song:
But were some child of yours alive that time,
You should live twice, in it, and in my rhyme.


LV


Not marble, nor the gilded monuments
Of princes, shall outlive this powerful rhyme;
But you shall shine more bright in these contents
Than unswept stone, besmear'd with sluttish time.
When wasteful war shall statues overturn,
And broils root out the work of masonry,
Nor Mars his sword, nor war's quick fire shall burn
The living record of your memory.
'Gainst death, and all oblivious enmity
Shall you pace forth; your praise shall still find room
Even in the eyes of all posterity
That wear this world out to the ending doom.
So, till the judgment that yourself arise,
You live in this, and dwell in lovers' eyes.


CXXIII

No, Time, thou shalt not boast that I do change:
Thy pyramids built up with newer might
To me are nothing novel, nothing strange;
They are but dressings of a former sight.
Our dates are brief, and therefore we admire
What thou dost foist upon us that is old;
And rather make them born to our desire
Than think that we before have heard them told.
Thy registers and thee I both defy,
Not wondering at the present nor the past,
For thy records and what we see doth lie,
Made more or less by thy continual haste.
This I do vow and this shall ever be;
I will be true despite thy scythe and thee.

[Jyqm]

His collection of war sonnets c. 1914, including "The Soldier," are probably his most famous works. Nowadays he criticized for being too romantic and idealistic.

Well, idealism and romanticism weren't exactly the biggest literary fashions beyond 1914... I very much liked those sonnets, though! It's one of my favorite forms, and he does a beautiful job with it.

I'm surprised no Stevie fans have posted any Edgar Allen Poe poems. Here's his "Sonnet -- To Science":

Science! true daughter of Old Time thou art!
Who alterest all things with thy peering eyes.
Why preyest thou thus upon the poet's heart,
Vulture, whose wings are dull realities?
How should he love thee? or how deem thee wise,
Who wouldst not leave him in his wandering
To seek for treasure in the jewelled skies,
Albeit he soared with an undaunted wing?
Hast thou not dragged Diana from her car?
And driven the Hamadryad from the wood
To seek a shelter in some happier star?
Hast thou not torn the Naiad from her flood,
The Elfin from the green grass, and from me
The summer dream beneath the tamarind tree?

Damn you, Science!

[Jyqm]

Nope, after the big movement at the turn of the century (I'm probably getting my facts mixed up though!) such writing was out of vogue. I'm glad you enjoyed them.

Well, there was also that little skirmish going on beginning in 1914 that had more than a few writers wondering if there was much of anything left to be romantic and idealistic about!

Siegfried Sassoon wrote some rather biting poems about the ordeal, including this one:

'They'

The Bishop tells us: 'When the boys come back
'They will not be the same; for they'll have fought
'In a just cause: they lead the last attack
'On Anti-Christ; their comrades' blood has bought
'New right to breed an honourable race,
'They have challenged Death and dared him face to face.'

'We're none of us the same!' the boys reply.
'For George lost both his legs; and Bill's stone blind;
'Poor Jim's shot through the lungs and like to die;
'And Bert's gone syphilitic: you'll not find
'A chap who's served that hasn't found some change.
' And the Bishop said: 'The ways of God are strange!'

[ragandbone]

I heard the poet, Robin Robertson read his poem from the book, "The Painted Field" and I wanted to post that recording, but I haven't been able to find it. It is a beautiful poem to read aloud.


ABERDEEN

The grey sea turns in its sleep
disturbing seagulls from the green rock.

We watched the long collapse, the black drop
and frothing of the toppled wave; looked out
on the dark that goes to Norway.

We lay all night in an open boat, that rocked
by the harbour wall—listening to the tyres creak
at the stone quay, trying to keep time—
till the night-fishers came in their arc, their lap
of light: the fat slap of waves, the water's
sway, the water mullioned with light.

The shifting rain, italic rain; the smirr
that drifted down for days; the sleet.
Your hair full of hail, as if sewn there.
In the damp sheets we left each other sea-gifts,
watermarks: long lost now in all these years
of the rip-tide's swell and trawl.

All night the feeding storm banked up
the streets and houses. In the morning
the sky was yellow, the frost ringing.

The grey sea turns in its sleep
disturbing seagulls from the green rock.

[DavidMn]

Nearly every remotely famous poem by every remotely famous poet is online these days, David. Just do some searches, and you'll find all kinds of stuff. Not just the poetry, but commentary, criticism, annotations, etc. Obviously, reading poetry online isn't exactly ideal, but it's beter than nothing!

Nantucket (http://www.americanpoems.com/poets/williams/1037)

Flowers through the window
lavender and yellow

changed by white curtains—
Smell of cleanliness—

Sunshine of late afternoon—
On the glass tray

a glass pitcher, the tumbler
turned down, by which

a key is lying— And the
immaculate white bed

I can't believe I forgot to mention Williams. Up there with Plath as one of the great twentieth century American poets. Here's one of my favorites from him (and of course, having said what I did above, I actually had a relatively tough time finding this one online):

The Poor

It's the anarchy of poverty
delights me, the old
yellow wooden house indented
among the new brick tenements

Or a cast iron balcony
with panels showing oak branches
in full leaf. It fits
the dress of the children

reflecting every stage and
custom of necessity—
Chimneys, roofs, fences of
Wood and metal in an unfenced

age and enclosing next to
nothing at all: the old man

in a sweater and soft black
hat who sweeps the sidewalk—

his own ten feet of it—
in a wind that fitfully

turning his corner has
overwhelmed the entire city

Wallace Stevens can be pretty wonderful, too. Here's an absolutely maddening poem of his:

Sea Surface Full of Clouds

I

In that November off Tehuantepec,
The slopping of the sea grew still one night
And in the morning summer hued the deck

And made one think of rosy chocolate
And gilt umbrellas. Paradisal green
Gave suavity to the perplexed machine

Of ocean, which like limpid water lay.
Who, then, in that ambrosial latitude
Out of the light evolved the morning blooms,

Who, then, evolved the sea-blooms from the clouds
Diffusing balm in that Pacific calm?
C’était mon enfant, mon bijou, mon âme.

The sea-clouds whitened far below the calm
And moved, as blooms move, in the swimming green
And in its watery radiance, while the hue

Of heaven in an antique reflection rolled
Round those flotillas. And sometimes the sea
Poured brilliant iris on the glistening blue.

II

In that November off Tehuantepec
The slopping of the sea grew still one night.
At breakfast jelly yellow streaked the deck

And made one think of chop-house chocolate
And sham umbrellas. And a sham-like green
Capped summer-seeming on the tense machine

Of ocean, which in sinister flatness lay.
Who, then, beheld the rising of the clouds
That strode submerged in that malevolent sheen,

Who saw the mortal massives of the blooms
Of water moving on the water-floor?
C’était mon frère du ciel, ma vie, mon or.

The gongs rang loudly as the windy booms
Hoo-hooed it in the darkened ocean-blooms.
The gongs grew still. And then blue heaven spread

Its crystalline pendentives on the sea
And the macabre of the water-glooms
In an enormous undulation fled.

III

In that November off Tehuantepec,
The slopping of the sea grew still one night
And a pale silver patterned on the deck

And made one think of porcelain chocolate
And pied umbrellas. An uncertain green,
Piano-polished, held the tranced machine

Of ocean, as a prelude holds and holds,
Who, seeing silver petals of white blooms
Unfolding in the water, feeling sure

Of the milk within the saltiest spurge, heard, then,
The sea unfolding in the sunken clouds?
Oh! C’était mon extase et mon amour.

So deeply sunken were they that the shrouds,
The shrouding shadows, made the petals black
Until the rolling heaven made them blue,

A blue beyond the rainy hyacinth,
And smiting the crevasses of the leaves
Deluged the ocean with a sapphire blue.

IV

In that November off Tehuantepec
The night-long slopping of the sea grew still.
A mallow morning dozed upon the deck

And made one think of musky chocolate
And frail umbrellas. A too-fluent green
Suggested malice in the dry machine

Of ocean, pondering dank stratagem.
Who then beheld the figures of the clouds
Like blooms secluded in the thick marine?

Like blooms? Like damasks that were shaken off
From the loosed girdles in the spangling must.
C’était ma foi, la nonchalance divine.

The nakedness would rise and suddenly turn
Salt masks of beard and mouths of bellowing,
Would—But more suddenly the heaven rolled

Its bluest sea-clouds in the thinking green,
And the nakedness became the broadest blooms,
Mile-mallows that a mallow sun cajoled.

V

In that November off Tehuantepec
Night stilled the slopping of the sea.
The day came, bowing and voluble, upon the deck,

Good clown… One thought of Chinese chocolate
And large umbrellas. And a motley green
Followed the drift of the obese machine

Of ocean, perfected in indolence.
What pistache one, ingenious and droll,
Beheld the sovereign clouds as jugglery

And the sea as turquoise-turbaned Sambo, neat
At tossing saucers—cloudy-conjuring sea?
C’était mon esprit bâtard, l’ignominie.

The sovereign clouds came clustering. The conch
Of loyal conjuration trumped. The wind
Of green blooms turning crisped the motley hue

To clearing opalescence. Then the sea
And heaven rolled as one and from the two
Came fresh transfigurings of freshest blue.Thanks Jim. Nantucket is sooo good. It just touches me.:angel:

[Jyqm]

Thanks Jim. Nantucket is sooo good. It just touches me.:angel:

I know this other poem about Nantucket that you might really like, but I probably shouldn't post it here...

Eliza, I really liked the Robertson poem you posted, especially the use of color, and especially the inversion at the beginning and end - making the sea grey and the rocks green. That's a really nice touch.

I wanted to post some Kerouac, but his poetry is diffcult to find online. Here's the 211th chorus of Mexico City Blues:

The wheel of the quivering meat conception
Turns in the void expelling human beings,
Pigs, turtles, frogs, insects, nits,
Mice, lice, lizards, rats, roan
Racinghorses, poxy bubolic pigtics,
Horrible, unnameable lice of vultures,
Murderous attacking dog-armies
Of Africa, Rhinos roaming in the jungle,

Vast boars and huge gigantic bull
Elephants, rams, eagles, condors,
Pones and Porcupines and Pills–
All the endless conception of living beings
Gnashing everywhere in Consciousness
Throughout the ten directions of space
Occupying all the quarters in & out,
From super-microscopic no-bug
To huge Galaxy Lightyear Bowell
Illuminating the sky of one Mind–
Poor! I wish I was free
of that slaving meat wheel
and safe in heaven dead

[DavidMn]

I know this other poem about Nantucket that you might really like, but I probably shouldn't post it here...

Eliza, I really liked the Robertson poem you posted, especially the use of color, and especially the inversion at the beginning and end - making the sea grey and the rocks green. That's a really nice touch.

I wanted to post some Kerouac, but his poetry is diffcult to find online. Here's the 211th chorus of Mexico City Blues:

The wheel of the quivering meat conception
Turns in the void expelling human beings,
Pigs, turtles, frogs, insects, nits,
Mice, lice, lizards, rats, roan
Racinghorses, poxy bubolic pigtics,
Horrible, unnameable lice of vultures,
Murderous attacking dog-armies
Of Africa, Rhinos roaming in the jungle,

Vast boars and huge gigantic bull
Elephants, rams, eagles, condors,
Pones and Porcupines and Pills–
All the endless conception of living beings
Gnashing everywhere in Consciousness
Throughout the ten directions of space
Occupying all the quarters in & out,
From super-microscopic no-bug
To huge Galaxy Lightyear Bowell
Illuminating the sky of one Mind–
Poor! I wish I was free
of that slaving meat wheel
and safe in heaven deadOH dam, I walked right into that one.:lol:

[JazmenFlowers]

Denise Levertov is really interesting. When I worked at the publishing house, we published a "Conversations with..." book. It was a collection of interviews and essays. She has strong opinions on poetry and the poet. My favorite poem of hers is below. It always makes me think of Stevie's The Wild Heart album cover...

In Mind

There's in my mind a woman
of innocence, unadorned but

fair-featured and smelling of
apples or grass. She wears

a utopian smock or shift, her hair
is light brown and smooth, and she

is kind and very clean without
ostentation-

but she has
no imagination

And there's a
turbulent moon-ridden girl

or old woman, or both,
dressed in opals and rags, feathers

and torn taffeta,
who knows strange songs

but she is not kind.

[JazmenFlowers]

Sharon Olds
Sharon is quite cool. I had a friend in college obsessed with Sharon and I mean obsessed; like I'm obsessed with Stevie obsessed...

thought you might find this interesting...

Published on Monday, September 20, 2005 by The Nation (October 10, 2005 Issue)

No Place for a Poet at a Banquet of Shame
by Sharon Olds

For reasons spelled out below, the poet Sharon Olds has declined to attend the National Book Festival in Washington, which, coincidentally or not, takes place September 24, the day of an antiwar mobilization in the capital. Olds, winner of a National Book Critics Circle Award and professor of creative writing at New York University, was invited along with a number of other writers by First Lady Laura Bush to read from their works. Three years ago artist Jules Feiffer declined to attend the festival's White House breakfast as a protest against the Iraq War ("Mr. Feiffer Regrets," November 11, 2002). We suggest that invitees to this year's event consider following their example.
--The Editors

Laura Bush
First Lady
The White House

Dear Mrs. Bush,

I am writing to let you know why I am not able to accept your kind invitation to give a presentation at the National Book Festival on September 24, or to attend your dinner at the Library of Congress or the breakfast at the White House.

In one way, it's a very appealing invitation. The idea of speaking at a festival attended by 85,000 people is inspiring! The possibility of finding new readers is exciting for a poet in personal terms, and in terms of the desire that poetry serve its constituents--all of us who need the pleasure, and the inner and outer news, it delivers.

And the concept of a community of readers and writers has long been dear to my heart. As a professor of creative writing in the graduate school of a major university, I have had the chance to be a part of some magnificent outreach writing workshops in which our students have become teachers. Over the years, they have taught in a variety of settings: a women's prison, several New York City public high schools, an oncology ward for children. Our initial program, at a 900-bed state hospital for the severely physically challenged, has been running now for twenty years, creating along the way lasting friendships between young MFA candidates and their students--long-term residents at the hospital who, in their humor, courage and wisdom, become our teachers.

When you have witnessed someone nonspeaking and almost nonmoving spell out, with a toe, on a big plastic alphabet chart, letter by letter, his new poem, you have experienced, close up, the passion and essentialness of writing. When you have held up a small cardboard alphabet card for a writer who is completely nonspeaking and nonmoving (except for the eyes), and pointed first to the A, then the B, then C, then D, until you get to the first letter of the first word of the first line of the poem she has been composing in her head all week, and she lifts her eyes when that letter is touched to say yes, you feel with a fresh immediacy the human drive for creation, self-expression, accuracy, honesty and wit--and the importance of writing, which celebrates the value of each person's unique story and song.

So the prospect of a festival of books seemed wonderful to me. I thought of the opportunity to talk about how to start up an outreach program. I thought of the chance to sell some books, sign some books and meet some of the citizens of Washington, DC. I thought that I could try to find a way, even as your guest, with respect, to speak about my deep feeling that we should not have invaded Iraq, and to declare my belief that the wish to invade another culture and another country--with the resultant loss of life and limb for our brave soldiers, and for the noncombatants in their home terrain--did not come out of our democracy but was instead a decision made "at the top" and forced on the people by distorted language, and by untruths. I hoped to express the fear that we have begun to live in the shadows of tyranny and religious chauvinism--the opposites of the liberty, tolerance and diversity our nation aspires to.

I tried to see my way clear to attend the festival in order to bear witness--as an American who loves her country and its principles and its writing--against this undeclared and devastating war.

But I could not face the idea of breaking bread with you. I knew that if I sat down to eat with you, it would feel to me as if I were condoning what I see to be the wild, highhanded actions of the Bush Administration.

What kept coming to the fore of my mind was that I would be taking food from the hand of the First Lady who represents the Administration that unleashed this war and that wills its continuation, even to the extent of permitting "extraordinary rendition": flying people to other countries where they will be tortured for us.

So many Americans who had felt pride in our country now feel anguish and shame, for the current regime of blood, wounds and fire. I thought of the clean linens at your table, the shining knives and the flames of the candles, and I could not stomach it.

Sincerely,

Sharon Olds

[Jyqm]

No Place for a Poet at a Banquet of Shame
by Sharon Olds

I love this letter. I remember reading it when it was first published and think that Laura probably got to the end and thought, "Why can't she stomach the idea of clean linens? Does she want us to eat dinner on a dirty tablecloth?"

[JazmenFlowers]

I love this letter. I remember reading it when it was first published and think that Laura probably got to the end and thought, "Why can't she stomach the idea of clean linens? Does she want us to eat dinner on a dirty tablecloth?"
lol. totally.

I watched a special about L. B. preparing for a luncheon with all the governors' wives and I couldn't stomach it...

[Jyqm]

A little something from Charles Bukowski, in anticipation of the State of the Union address in a few hours:

i knew that i was dying.
something in me said, go ahead, die, sleep, become
them, accept.
then something else in me said, no, save the tiniest
bit.
it needn't be much, just a spark.
a spark can set a whole forest on
fire.
just a spark.
save it.

[Richard B]

A little something from Charles Bukowski, in anticipation of the State of the Union address in a few hours:

i knew that i was dying.
something in me said, go ahead, die, sleep, become
them, accept.
then something else in me said, no, save the tiniest
bit.
it needn't be much, just a spark.
a spark can set a whole forest on
fire.
just a spark.
save it.
You are so devoted to this thread. Keep it alive.

[Sahara]

I'm surprised no Stevie fans have posted any Edgar Allen Poe poems.


I was into Poe for ages before I was a fan of Stevie's. I was so thrilled to find out she was into him too, I nearly collapsed when I found the similarities with Planets of the Universe.

[Jyqm]

You are so devoted to this thread. Keep it alive.

Poetry's fun! And I think we're building a pretty cool collection of some very stuff, though I wish more people would post things, or post some of their own work.

[JazmenFlowers]

Poetry's fun! And I think we're building a pretty cool collection of some very stuff, though I wish more people would post things, or post some of their own work.
I'm gonna post my poem "Shadows of Fern Hill" kind of loosely based on "Fern Hill" later tonight...

[Sahara]

I'm gonna post my poem "Shadows of Fern Hill" kind of loosely based on "Fern Hill" later tonight...

I'll post some stuff too if anyone's interested

[JazmenFlowers]

I'll post some stuff too if anyone's interested
of course we are ;)

[Sahara]

of course we are ;)

OK then ... you first!

[JazmenFlowers]

OK then ... you first!
lol. I think I may have worded that post wrong...I didn't intend to come across as a smartass...sorry if it came across that way. I was just saying of course we want to see some of your stuff...especially since you are a Poe fan.

I posted one on the first page. I'll post another later tonight.

[JazmenFlowers]

I was into Poe for ages before I was a fan of Stevie's. I was so thrilled to find out she was into him too, I nearly collapsed when I found the similarities with Planets of the Universe.
dish it...I'm interested to see what you noticed

[Jyqm]

I'll post some stuff too if anyone's interested

Go for it! That's half the reason Jason started the thread! I'll throw in a few more of my prose sonnets in a bit.

[dissention]

I was into Poe for ages before I was a fan of Stevie's. I was so thrilled to find out she was into him too, I nearly collapsed when I found the similarities with Planets of the Universe.

Don't tell me she stole another song! :shocked:

[JazmenFlowers]

Don't tell me she stole another song! :shocked:
stole is such a harsh word :laugh:

I prefer purloin...just sounds better :)

[dissention]

stole is such a harsh word :laugh:

Not when it comes to Richard Ashcroft's "New York," it ain't! :laugh:

I prefer purloin...just sounds better :)

It does. Such a lovely word.

[Jyqm]

I think I already posted my best ones, but here's the rest of the crop. Line breaks included again just to make it easier to check out the meter and the rhyme for those interested in such things:

"A Political Discussion at Café Mud"

Kristin has dropped her book and is reclin/ing on the couch. Her searching eyes are fo/cused on me. "So," she says, "I wrote this po/em yesterday beginning with the line, / 'Everything is all about monsters now, / I swear.'" I laugh out loud, which makes her glad, / and she laughs, too, a minute later add/ing: "Monsters rule." I nod and knit my brow / to signal my agreement. Later, head/ing out, she grabs the comics section from / the Sunday Trib that's on the table. Thumb/ing through it as we walk, she asks, face red, / "Was it okay to take this section of / the paper?" "Probably," I say. "Why not?"

28.2.2005

“Sunrise, Sunset”

I wonder if the MIDI keyboard play/er on the gambling day cruise feels that his / existence is as meaningless and mis/erable as I do. Did he study Bee/thoven and Brahms? Is he a big Tom Waits / fan? Just this week I bet he's had to do / "Sunrise, Sunset" ten times—the ancient Jew/ish bats adore it. Christ, I bet he hates / himself. And when he's done, the vultures shuf/fle over to their nickel slots, and I / move off and take my place next to the wheel / and bet my life on five. I've had enough, / I'm gonna win it all, because it's my / turn this time, I can feel it, can you feel . . . ?

15.8.2005

Jeff Tweedy wrote, "Open your arms as far as they will go / We take off your dress / An embarrassing poem / Was written when I was alone / In love with you." With that in mind:

“Water Damage”

The day before you left, the ceiling just / caved in. At first it buckled—fissures scarred / the plaster. Keeping it together was so ****ing hard. / It burst beneath the weight of it: damp, dust. / That night was glorious. God, what a night. / I told you all the reasons that I loved / you . . . you told me all the ways you loved / me back. Your amber eyes were blinding bright. / We gazed and laughed and ****ed perfection. Af/terwards you cried. The rug absorbed the string / of tears, and you were feeling everything. / I whispered in your ear to make you laugh / again. The next day was the day you left. / The floor caved in, and I fell.

13.8.2005

“At the end of the day”

They finally came today to fix the ceil/ing. Took all day but in the evening when / I looked, as though it'd never even been / there, suddenly the hole was gone. No peel/ing paint, no crumbling plaster. It was sealed. / I don't know how they did it, how they mend/ed such a gaping void. We can pretend / it never happened now. The wound is healed. / I guess nobody told them, though, about / the floor, or they forgot. But I'm still fal/ling, clinging to myself but grasping sand / and dirt, and you're not here to give your hand / and pull me up and heal the wound and all / I can think as I plummet is how will I ever get out?

17.8.2005

[JazmenFlowers]

“Sunrise, Sunset”

I wonder if the MIDI keyboard play/er on the gambling day cruise feels that his / existence is as meaningless and mis/erable as I do. Did he study Bee/thoven and Brahms? Is he a big Tom Waits / fan? Just this week I bet he's had to do / "Sunrise, Sunset" ten times—the ancient Jew/ish bats adore it. Christ, I bet he hates / himself. And when he's done, the vultures shuf/fle over to their nickel slots, and I / move off and take my place next to the wheel / and bet my life on five. I've had enough, / I'm gonna win it all, because it's my / turn this time, I can feel it, can you feel . . . ?
lawd how I can relate...

[Sahara]

The most obvious Poe/Planets reference is "No doubt, no pain, come ever again" -- comes from Eulalie by Poe ["Now doubt now pain come never again"] -- that was the one that made me fall off my chair.

Some others: "Into the seas that have no shores" -- "Looking up at skies on fire" relates to "Mountains toppling evermore into seas without a shore" and "Surging unto skies of fire", both from Poe's Dream-Land.

And: "The bright light is lying down, the Earth and the sea and the sky is at rest with the ocean" -- apparently from a poem called Serenade that's not in my big book of Poe, but Serenade goes like this: "The wearied light is lying down, and eather, and stars, and sea are rendolent with sleep".

There's also a theory that "like a heartbeat drives you mad" in Dreams comes from the Tell Tale Heart.

Check out www.inspiredangel.com, it's interesting.

[Sahara]

Something of mine own...

REAL FICTION
Been scheming my schemes,
I’ve been dreaming my dreams,
Been thinking these thoughts that remind me of you.
I don’t need a reason –
It’s psycho-hunt season,
Discover a world where nobody’s true.
There’s the good and the bad,
The guilty, the sad,
And we all have to pay for our crimes.
There’s always a fight;
It’s tough being right
And I feel like I’m wasting my time.
By the time I get near
You’ll have all disappeared;
I trust in a twist of the knife,
But it’s all just the same,
To you it’s a game,
It’s a game that you’ve played all your life.
My blade shining bright:
I’m a thief in the night
And your soul is what I’ve come to steal;
The sorrow, the pain,
The sting of the rain,
Who said this was part of the deal?
Torn up at the roots
I’m just jumping through hoops
As I dance like a puppet on strings,
Even monsters need names,
I’m a lion being tamed,
For your rod I no longer have wings.
Blood’s all you lack
When you’re stabbed in the back,
They say that true friendship is rare.
But I live without fear
And I’ll always be here,
I guess nobody said life was fair.


August 2004

[ragandbone]

I really love this thread, but work has mademe into a hit and run poster, unable to keep up with the discussion. I wanted to post some favortie merwin poems, and I have had trouble finding the ones I want anywhere but in my books. I guess I will have to resort ot typing. Sigh.

Jyqm, I really like your "Water Damage" piece!
I have been skipping around, and I need togo back and see what other original work I missed.

Here is a poem by Jack Gilbert:
The Great Fires

Love is apart from all things.
Desire and excitement are nothing beside it.
It is not the body that finds love.
What leads us there is the body.
What is not love provokes it.
What is not love quenches it.
Love lays hold of everything we know.
The passions which are called love
also change everything to a newness
at first. Passion is clearly the path
but does not bring us to love.
It opens the castle of our spirit
so that we might find the love which is
a mystery hidden there.
Love is one of many great fires.
Passion is a fire made of many woods,
each of which gives off its special odor
so we can know the many kinds
that are not love. Passion is the paper
and twigs that kindle the flames
but cannot sustain them. Desire perishes
because it tries to be love.
Love is eaten away by appetite.
Love does not last, but it is different
from the passions that do not last.
Love lasts by not lasting.
Isaiah said each man walks in his own fire
for his sins. Love allows us to walk
in the sweet music of our particular heart.

[Jyqm]

I really love this thread, but work has mademe into a hit and run poster, unable to keep up with the discussion. I wanted to post some favortie merwin poems, and I have had trouble finding the ones I want anywhere but in my books. I guess I will have to resort ot typing. Sigh.

Jyqm, I really like your "Water Damage" piece!

Thanks! I tend to feel a little embarrassed by it, but I might be a little too close to it to really judge it on its own merits.

If you post the names of the Merwin poems you want, I can try searching around for them as well. You never know what might turn up if you have multiple people looking!

Most of Tom Waits' early songs are practically beat poems:

The Ghosts of Saturday Night
(After Hours at Napoleone's Pizza House)

A cab combs the snake,
Tryin' to rake in that last night's fare,
And a solitary sailor
Who spends the facts of his life
like small change on strangers...

Paws his inside P-coat pocket
for a welcome twenty-five cents,
And the last bent butt from a package of Kents,
As he dreams of a waitress with Maxwell House eyes
And marmalade thighs with scrambled yellow hair.

Her rhinestone-studded moniker says, "Irene"
As she wipes the wisps of dishwater blonde from her eyes

And the Texaco beacon burns on,
The steel-belted attendant with a 'Ring and Valve Special'...
Cryin' "Fill'er up and check that oil"
"You know it could be a distributor and it could be a coil."

The early mornin' final edition's on the stands,
And that town cryer's cryin' there with nickels in his hands.
Pigs in a blanket sixty-nine cents,
Eggs - roll 'em over and a package of Kents,
Adam and Eve on a log, you can sink 'em damn straight,
Hash browns, hash browns, you know I can't be late.

And the early dawn cracks out a carpet of diamond
Across a cash crop car lot
filled with twilight Coupe Devilles,
Leaving the town in a-keeping
Of the one who is sweeping
Up the ghost of Saturday night...

[ragandbone]

Sibyl

Your whole age sits betwen what you hear
and what you write

When you think you'e getting younger
it's the voice coming closer
but only to you

so much of your words
is the words
once they've come out of the ground
and you've written them down
on petals
if it's spring

the same wind that tells you everything at once
unsititches your memory
you try to write faster than the thread is pulled
you write straight onto the air
if its summer

with your empty needle

straight onto a face if there's light enough
straight onto hands
if it's autumn

[Jyqm]

I was quite struck by this; most of the class hated it, did not care to discuss it, and did not care to absorb it.

Why is that? Did anyone give reasons for disliking it?

thanks for the compliments on my stuff!

[Jyqm]

Here's something I wrote just now:

Insomnia

In the kitchen, hollow-heavy eyes
burn—the world glows grey
again.

Out the window, charcoal birch trees
watch again—and thick-tongued dirt
digs deep into ash-mouthed skin—
and fog-caked hair

East across the still steel lake—which hums,
the mountain defines itself
line by line—
draws itself
against the blue dispersing haze—
as yesterday’s

—and down unceasing pulsing alleys scratched
scratched record birdsong
echoes—I wish that it were night
—again.

1.2.2006

[ragandbone]

Here's something I wrote just now:

the mountain defines itself
line by line—

I like that a lot.
***

Here is one of my favorites from poet/novelist/folksinger lyricist Leonard Cohen…
"Last Year's Man"

The rain falls down on last year's man,
that's a jew's harp on the table,
that's a crayon in his hand.
And the corners of the blueprint are ruined since they rolled
far past the stems of thumbtacks
that still throw shadows on the wood.
And the skylight is like skin for a drum I'll never mend
and all the rain falls down amen
on the works of last year's man.
I met a lady, she was playing with her soldiers in the dark
oh one by one she had to tell them
that her name was Joan of Arc.
I was in that army, yes I stayed a little while;
I want to thank you, Joan of Arc,
for treating me so well.
And though I wear a uniform I was not born to fight;
all these wounded boys you lie beside,
goodnight, my friends, goodnight.

I came upon a wedding that old families had contrived;
Bethlehem the bridegroom,
Babylon the bride.
Great Babylon was naked, oh she stood there trembling for me,
and Bethlehem inflamed us both
like the shy one at some orgy.
And when we fell together all our flesh was like a veil
that I had to draw aside to see
the serpent eat its tail.

Some women wait for Jesus, and some women wait for Cain
so I hang upon my altar
and I hoist my axe again.
And I take the one who finds me back to where it all began
when Jesus was the honeymoon
and Cain was just the man.
And we read from pleasant Bibles that are bound in blood and skin
that the wilderness is gathering
all its children back again.

The rain falls down on last year's man,
an hour has gone by
and he has not moved his hand.
But everything will happen if he only gives the word;
the lovers will rise up
and the mountains touch the ground.
But the skylight is like skin for a drum I'll never mend
and all the rain falls down amen
on the works of last year's man.

[Jyqm]

You didn't really think I was gonna let this thread die, did you? Here's "Ode to a Nightingale" (http://www.bartleby.com/126/40.html) by John Keats, though it really should be read not all aligned to the left like this (click the link for a much better experience):

1.

MY heart aches, and a drowsy numbness pains
My sense, as though of hemlock I had drunk,
Or emptied some dull opiate to the drains
One minute past, and Lethe-wards had sunk:
’Tis not through envy of thy happy lot, 5
But being too happy in thine happiness,—
That thou, light-winged Dryad of the trees,
In some melodious plot
Of beechen green, and shadows numberless,
Singest of summer in full-throated ease. 10

2.

O, for a draught of vintage! that hath been
Cool’d a long age in the deep-delved earth,
Tasting of Flora and the country green,
Dance, and Provencal song, and sunburnt mirth!
O for a beaker full of the warm South, 15
Full of the true, the blushful Hippocrene,
With beaded bubbles winking at the brim,
And purple-stained mouth;
That I might drink, and leave the world unseen,
And with thee fade away into the forest dim: 20

3.

Fade far away, dissolve, and quite forget
What thou among the leaves hast never known,
The weariness, the fever, and the fret
Here, where men sit and hear each other groan;
Where palsy shakes a few, sad, last gray hairs, 25
Where youth grows pale, and spectre-thin, and dies;
Where but to think is to be full of sorrow
And leaden-eyed despairs,
Where Beauty cannot keep her lustrous eyes,
Or new Love pine at them beyond to-morrow. 30

4.

Away! away! for I will fly to thee,
Not charioted by Bacchus and his pards,
But on the viewless wings of Poesy,
Though the dull brain perplexes and retards:
Already with thee! tender is the night, 35
And haply the Queen-Moon is on her throne,
Cluster’d around by all her starry Fays;
But here there is no light,
Save what from heaven is with the breezes blown
Through verdurous glooms and winding mossy ways. 40

5.

I cannot see what flowers are at my feet,
Nor what soft incense hangs upon the boughs,
But, in embalmed darkness, guess each sweet
Wherewith the seasonable month endows
The grass, the thicket, and the fruit-tree wild; 45
White hawthorn, and the pastoral eglantine;
Fast fading violets cover’d up in leaves;
And mid-May’s eldest child,
The coming musk-rose, full of dewy wine,
The murmurous haunt of flies on summer eves. 50

6.

Darkling I listen; and, for many a time
I have been half in love with easeful Death,
Call’d him soft names in many a mused rhyme,
To take into the air my quiet breath;
Now more than ever seems it rich to die, 55
To cease upon the midnight with no pain,
While thou art pouring forth thy soul abroad
In such an ecstasy!
Still wouldst thou sing, and I have ears in vain—
To thy high requiem become a sod. 60

7.

Thou wast not born for death, immortal Bird!
No hungry generations tread thee down;
The voice I hear this passing night was heard
In ancient days by emperor and clown:
Perhaps the self-same song that found a path 65
Through the sad heart of Ruth, when, sick for home,
She stood in tears amid the alien corn;
The same that oft-times hath
Charm’d magic casements, opening on the foam
Of perilous seas, in faery lands forlorn. 70

8.

Forlorn! the very word is like a bell
To toil me back from thee to my sole self!
Adieu! the fancy cannot cheat so well
As she is fam’d to do, deceiving elf.
Adieu! adieu! thy plaintive anthem fades 75
Past the near meadows, over the still stream,
Up the hill-side; and now ’tis buried deep
In the next valley-glades:
Was it a vision, or a waking dream?
Fled is that music:—Do I wake or sleep? 80

[JazmenFlowers]

I finally found this thread. although I can't find the one I created a couple weeks ago. :rolleyes:

my latest.

I only meant well
These are the words that
Fell from your lips
As I stared into your
Vacant eyes
Drowning in the
Words you pronounced
With such ignorance
As usual (but I did not say)

You stood before me
With such admiration
For your own strength
As you tore down
What was left of happy moments
I clung to
Ignorance truly is not bliss

I wanted to rip
Out your tongue
And swallow your pride

This isn’t what I need
These are the last words that
Fell from your lips

But you still speak those words
To me each time I try to love

[BlackWidow]

I finally found this thread. although I can't find the one I created a couple weeks ago. :rolleyes:

my latest.

I only meant well
These are the words that
Fell from your lips
As I stared into your
Vacant eyes
Drowning in the
Words you pronounced
With such ignorance
As usual (but I did not say)

You stood before me
With such admiration
For your own strength
As you tore down
What was left of happy moments
I clung to
Ignorance truly is not bliss

I wanted to rip
Out your tongue
And swallow your pride

This isn’t what I need
These are the last words that
Fell from your lips

But you still speak those words
To me each time I try to love

that was great....sad too.
who did that to you?I will beat his ASS!!

[ragandbone]

This is beauty from pain...thanks for sharing it.

The last line makes me cry. BlackWidow might have the right idea—shall we form a posse?

I finally found this thread. although I can't find the one I created a couple weeks ago. :rolleyes:

my latest.

I only meant well
These are the words that
Fell from your lips
As I stared into your
Vacant eyes
Drowning in the
Words you pronounced
With such ignorance
As usual (but I did not say)

You stood before me
With such admiration
For your own strength
As you tore down
What was left of happy moments
I clung to
Ignorance truly is not bliss

I wanted to rip
Out your tongue
And swallow your pride

This isn’t what I need
These are the last words that
Fell from your lips

But you still speak those words
To me each time I try to love

[ragandbone]

Here's an old one of mine:

Where You will find me, When You Look Again


I.
I am low in the grass, in the belly of a meadow
watching the flutter of lustrous wings:
thin wisps of heart-shaped color,
more air than substance.
Foxtails prick my ankles,
the air hums, and I become a hot breeze
that touches your hair.

II.
A highway stretches into darkness,
pulled tight by a white cord.
The moon is full upon your lap,
and breathes with you.
Stop, and face the trees: we'll sing ourselves
into the night sky

III.
I am toe-to-foam at Second Beach,
now lying in a floating driftwood forest.
I am scattered like a sea bottom:
bits of glass becoming round, smooth,
cool, and unable to cut.
You reach down and gather me up.

[JazmenFlowers]

^^^
love it. my favorite kind of poetry. so visually lush.

reminds me of Fern Hill.

[JazmenFlowers]

...I could kick myself for not dating all my poems.

Growth Spurt (dear _____)

it was bound to happen
for it is written in my history
and I apologize for making you
uncomfortable
it was never my intention to make you feel
like you've lost touch with my heart

I see you speaking to God on occasion
and I wonder, as I see your lips whisper,
if you are asking for a better job, a better car
or a better me
since suddenly the taste of chocolate
is all that makes you smile
it was never my intention to be
the reason you pray

it was bound to happen, you know
a child stumbles through years of fear
and painful heartbeats
until you stand before me with arms
outstretched and longing to be filled
it was never my intention to force you
to pretend

[Grainuaile]

I love the poetry of Plath, Allen Ginsberg, Leonard Cohen, but my favourite poet is T.S. Eliot.

My favourite poem is East Coker : http://www.allspirit.co.uk/coker.html. The first stanza gives me the shivers:

In my beginning is my end. In succession
Houses rise and fall, crumble, are extended,
Are removed, destroyed, restored, or in their place
Is an open field, or a factory, or a by-pass.
Old stone to new building, old timber to new fires,
Old fires to ashes, and ashes to the earth
Which is already flesh, fur and faeces,
Bone of man and beast, cornstalk and leaf.
Houses live and die: there is a time for building
And a time for living and for generation
And a time for the wind to break the loosened pane
And to shake the wainscot where the field-mouse trots
And to shake the tattered arras woven with a silent motto.