Seamus Heaney, “The Strand at Lough Beg” In Memory of Colum McCartney All round this little island, on the strand Far down below there, where the breakers strive Grow the tall rushes from the oozy sand. – Dante, Purgatorio, I, 100-3 Leaving the white glow of filling stations And a few lonely streetlamps among fields You climbed the hills toward […]
Karl Shapiro, “The Alphabet” The letters of the Jews as strict as flames Or little terrible flowers lean Stubbornly upwards through the perfect ages, Singing through solid stone the sacred names. The letters of the Jews are black and clean And lie in chain-line over Christian pages. The chosen letters bristle like barbed wire That hedge the flesh of man, […]
Troop Train It stops the town we come through. Workers raise Their oily arms in good salute and grin. Kids scream as at a circus. Business men Glance hopefully and go their measured way. And women standing at their dumbstruck door More slowly wave and seem to warn us back, As if a tear blinding the course of war Might […]
Thom Gunn, “On the Move” “Man, you gotta Go.” The blue jay scuffling in the bushes follows Some hidden purpose, and the gust of birds That spurts across the field, the wheeling swallows, Has nested in the trees and undergrowth. Seeking their instinct, or their poise, or both, One moves with an uncertain violence Under the dust thrown by a […]
Thom Gunn, “No Speech from the Scaffold” There will be no speech from the scaffold, the scene must be its own commentary. The glossy chipped surface of the block is like something for kitchen use. And the masked man with his chopper: we know him: he works in a warehouse nearby. Last, the prisoner, he is pale, he walks through […]
Yvor Winters, “Time and the Garden” The spring has darkened with activity. The future gathers in vine, bush, and tree: Persimmon, walnut, loquat, fig, and grape, Degrees and kinds of color, taste, and shape. These will advance in their due series, space The season like a tranquil dwelling-place. And yet excitement swells me, vein by vein: I long to crowd […]
Yvor Winters, “The Slow Pacific Swell” Far out of sight forever stands the sea, Bounding the land with pale tranquillity. When a small child, I watched it from a hill At thirty miles or more. The vision still Lies in the eye, soft blue and far away: The rain has washed the dust from April day; Paint-brush and lupine lie […]
Laurie Sheck, “Pompeii” Covered with lapilli we crouch preserved as we were on that first day The last one of our lives Our bodies black marginalia beneath the sky’s unstable searchlight They have unearthed the House of the Fawn the House of the Silver Wedding And the Surgeon’s House Our bread still in our ovens Our tables spread and set […]
Czeslaw Milosz, “My Faithful Mother Tongue” Faithful mother tongue, I have been serving you. Every night, I used to set before you little bowls of colors so you could have your birch, your cricket, your finch as preserved in my memory. This lasted many years. You were my native land; I lacked any other. I believed that you would also […]
Eavan Boland, “The Mother Tongue” The old pale ditch can still be seen less than half a mile from my house – its ancient barrier of mud and brambles which mireth next unto Irishmen is now a mere rise of coarse grass, a rowan tree and some thinned-out spruce, where a child is playing at twilight. I stand in the […]
Genevieve Taggard, “To One Loved Wholly Within Wisdom” Someone will reap you like a field, Pile your gathered plunder, Garner what you bring to yield, Turn your beauty under; In cruel usages, in such Sickle-cutting, heaping; Certain women toil too much, Wearing of their reaping; Someone else may winnow you; Someone else may plunder; I have cut too many new […]
Genevieve Taggard, “To the Powers of Desolation” O mortal boy we cannot stop The leak in that great wall where death seeps in With hands or bodies, frantic mouths, or sleep. Over the wall, over the wall’s top I have seen rising waters, waters of desolation. From my despair bibles are written, children begotten; Women open the wrong doors; men […]
Robinson Jeffers, “Boats in a Fog” Sports and gallantries, the stage, the arts, the antics of dancers, The exuberant voices of music, Have charm for children but lack nobility; it is bitter earnestness That makes beauty; the mind Knows, grown adult. A sudden fog-drift muffled the ocean, A throbbing of engines moved in it, At length, a stone’s-throw out, between […]
W. B. Yeats, “A Prayer for My Daughter” Once more the storm is howling, and half hid Under this cradle-hood and coverlid My child sleeps on. There is no obstacle But Gregory’s Wood and one bare hill Whereby the haystack and roof-levelling wind, Bred on the Atlantic, can be stayed; And for an hour I have walked and prayed Because […]
W. B. Yeats, “A Prayer for My Son” Bid a strong ghost stand at the head That my Michael may sleep sound, Nor cry, nor turn in the bed Till his morning meal come round; And may departing twilight keep All dread afar till morning’s back, That his mother may not lack Her fill of sleep. Bid the ghost have […]
e e cummings, Two Love Poems “in spite of everything” in spite of everything which breathes and moves,since Doom (with white longest hands neatening each crease) will smooth entirely our minds – before leaving my room i turn,and(stooping through the morning)kiss this pillow,dear where our heads lived and were. “since feeling is first” since feeling is first who pays any […]
R. S. Thomas, “Within Sound of the Sea” I have a desire to walk on the shore, To visit the caged beast whose murmurings Kept me awake. What does it mean That I have the power to do this All day long, if I wish to? I know what thoughts will arise, What questions. They have done so before, Unanswered. […]
Marge Piercy, “Girl in white” Don’t think because her petal thighs leap and her slight breasts flatten against your chest that you warm her alligator mind. In August her hand of snow rests on your back. Follow her through the mirror. My wan sister. Love is a trap that would tear her like a rabbit.
Archibald MacLeish, “Voyage West” There was a time for discoveries — For the headlands looming above in the First light and the surf and the Crying of gulls: for the curve of the Coast north into secrecy. That time is past. The last lands have been peopled. The oceans are known now. Señora: once the maps have all been made […]
Marsden Hartley, “Fishmonger” I have taken scales from off The cheeks of the moon. I have made fins from bluejays’ wings, I have made eyes from damsons in the shadow. I have taken flushes from the peachlips in the sun. From all these I have made a fish of heaven for you, Set it swimming on a young October sky. […]
Robinson Jeffers, “Shiva” There is a hawk that is picking the birds out of our sky. She killed the pigeons of peace and security, She has taken honesty and confidence from nations and men, She is hunting the lonely heron of liberty. She loads the arts with nonsense, she is very cunning, Science with dreams and the state with powers […]
Robinson Jeffers, “Vulture” I had walked since dawn and lay down to rest on a bare hillside Above the ocean. I saw through half-shut eyelids a vulture wheeling high up in heaven, And presently it passed again, but lower and nearer, its orbit narrowing, I understood then That I was under inspection. I lay death-still and heard the flight-feathers Whistle […]
Ted Hughes – “Crow’s Song about God” Somebody is sittingUnder the gatepost of heavenUnder the lintelOn which are written the words: “Forbidden to the living.”A knot of eyes, eyeholes, lifeless, in the life-shapeA rooty old oak-stump, aground in the oozeOf some putrid estuary,Snaggy with amputations,His fingernails broken and bitten,His hair vestigial and purposeless, his toenails useless and deformed,His blood filtering […]
Edna St. Vincent Millay, “Spring” To what purpose, April, do you return again? Beauty is not enough. You can no longer quiet me with the redness Of little leaves opening stickily. I know what I know. The sun is hot on my neck as I observe The spikes of the crocus. The smell of the earth is good. It is […]
Conrad Aiken, from “Preludes to Memnon” I Winter for a moment takes the mind; the snow Falls past the arclight; icicles guard a wall; The wind moans through a crack in the window; A keen sparkle of frost is on the sill. Only for a moment; as spring too might engage it, With a single crocus in the loam, or […]
Sea Iris I Weed, moss-weed, root tangled in sand, sea-iris, brittle flower, one petal like a shell is broken, and you print a shadow like a thin twig. Fortunate one, scented and stinging, rigid myrrh-bud, camphor-flower, sweet and salt – you are wind in our nostrils. II Do the murex-fishers drench you as they pass? Do your roots drag up […]
Edgar Lee Masters (1868-1950) One way to understand where poetry is now is to see where it was a hundred years ago. Every Wednesday I’ll be posting not the best, but at least the most representative, poems from the last century, where we can see poetry constantly changing. You can read the other entries here. Edgar Lee Masters at Wiki, […]
Ezra Pound, “Portrait d’une Femme” Your mind and you are our Sargasso Sea, London has swept about you this score years And bright ships left you this or that in fee: Ideas, old gossip, oddments of all things, Strange spars of knowledge and dimmed wares of price. Great minds have sought you – lacking someone else. You have been second […]
W. B. Yeats, “Meru” Civilisation is hooped together, broughtUnder a rule, under the semblance of peaceBy manifold illusion; but man’s life is thought,And he, despite his terror, cannot ceaseRavening through century after century,Ravening, raging, and uprooting that he may comeInto the desolation of reality:Egypt and Greece, good-bye, and good-bye, Rome!Hermits upon Mount Meru or Everest,Caverned in night under the drifted […]
Carl Sandburg, “Chicago” Hog Butcher for the World, Tool Maker, Stacker of Wheat, Player with Railroads and the Nation’s Freight Handler; Stormy, husky, brawling, City of the Big Shoulders: They tell me you are wicked and I believe them, for I have seen your painted women under the gas lamps luring the farm boys. And they tell me you are […]
Louis MacNeice (1907-1963) One way to understand where poetry is now is to see where it was a hundred years ago. Every Wednesday I’ll be posting not the best, but at least the most representative, poems from the last century, where we can see poetry constantly changing. You can read the other entries here. Louis MacNeice at Wiki, Poetry Foundation […]
Amy Lowell, “Lilacs” Lilacs, False blue, White, Purple, Color of lilac, Your great puffs of flowers Are everywhere in this my New England. Among your heart-shaped leaves Orange orioles hop like music-box birds and sing Their little weak soft songs; In the crooks of your branches The bright eyes of song sparrows sitting on spotted eggs Peer restlessly through the […]
Edith Wharton, “Terminus” Wonderful was the long secret night you gave me, my Lover, Palm to palm, breast to breast in the gloom. The faint red lamp Flushing with magical shadows the common-place room of the inn, With its dull impersonal furniture, kindled a mystic flame In the heart of the swinging mirror, the glass that has seen Faces innumerous […]
T. S. Eliot (1888-1965) One way to understand where poetry is now is to see where it was a hundred years ago. Every Saturday I’ll be posting not the best, but at least the most representative, poems from the last century, where we can see poetry constantly changing. You can read the other entries here. T. S. Eliot at tseliot.com, […]
R. S. Thomas (1913-2000) One way to understand where poetry is now is to see where it was a hundred years ago. Every Saturday I’ll be posting not the best, but at least the most representative, poems from the last century, where we can see poetry constantly changing. You can read the other entries here. R. S. Thomas at Wiki, […]
VERNON WATKINS (1906-1967) One way to understand where poetry is now is to see where it was a hundred years ago. Every Saturday I’ll be posting not the best, but at least the most representative, poems from the last century, where we can see poetry constantly changing. You can read the other entries here. Vernon Watkins at Wiki, Poetry Foundation […]
C. DAY-LEWIS (1904-1972) One way to understand where poetry is now is to see where it was a hundred years ago. Every Saturday I’ll be posting not the best, but at least the most representative, poems from the last century, where we can see poetry constantly changing. You can read the other entries here. C. Day-Lewis at Wiki, Poetry Foundation […]
One way to understand where poetry is now is to see where it was a hundred years ago. Every Saturday I’ll be posting not the best, but at least the most representative, poems from the last century, where we can see poetry constantly changing. You can read the other entries here. Chomei at Toyama (Kamo-no-Chomei, born at Kamo 1154, […]
One way to understand where poetry is now is to see where it was a hundred years ago. Every Saturday I’ll be posting not the best, but at least the most representative, poems from the last century, where we can see poetry constantly changing. You can read the other entries here. The Song of a Man who has Come […]
One way to understand where poetry is now is to see where it was a hundred years ago. Every Saturday I’ll be posting not the best, but at least the most representative, poems from the last century, where we can see poetry constantly changing. You can read the other entries here. The Way Through the Woods They shut the […]
One way to understand where poetry is now is to see where it was a hundred years ago. Every Saturday I’ll be posting not the best, but at least the most representative, poems from the last century, where we can see poetry constantly changing. You can read the other entries here. Autumn There is a wind where the rose […]
One way to understand where poetry is now is to see where it was a hundred years ago. Every Saturday I’ll be posting not the best, but at least the most representative, poems from the last century, where we can see poetry constantly changing. You can read the other entries here. Microcosmos The brown-faced nurse has murmured something unintelligible […]
One way to understand where poetry is now is to see where it was a hundred years ago. Every Saturday I’ll be posting not the best, but at least the most representative, poems from the last century, where we can see poetry constantly changing. You can read the other entries here. Insensibility I Happy are men who yet before […]
One way to understand where poetry is now is to see where it was a hundred years ago. Every Saturday I’ll be posting not the best, but at least the most representative, poems from the last century, where we can see poetry constantly changing. You can read the other entries here. It’s nearly impossible to choose only twelve or so […]
One way to understand where poetry is now is to see where it was a hundred years ago. Every Saturday I’ll be posting not the best, but at least the most representative, poems from the last century, where we can see poetry constantly changing. You can read the other entries here. John Squire’s poem about the appalling conditions of the […]
One way to understand where poetry is now is to see where it was a hundred years ago. Every Saturday I’ll be posting not the best, but at least the most representative, poems from the last century, where we can see poetry constantly changing. You can read the other entries here. As the Team’s Head-Brass As the team’s head-brass flashed […]
One way to understand where poetry is now is to see where it was a hundred years ago. Every Saturday I’ll be posting not the best, but at least the most representative, poems from the last century, where we can see poetry constantly changing. You can read the other entries here. Here, with Laurence Binyon’s “Hunger,” is the first […]
One way to understand where poetry is now is to see where it was a hundred years ago. Every Saturday I’ll be posting not the best, but at least the most representative, poems from the last century, where we can see poetry constantly changing. You can read the other entries here. The Rat “That woman there is almost dead, Her […]
One way to understand where poetry is now is to see where it was a hundred years ago. Every Saturday I’ll be posting not the best, but at least the most representative, poems from the last century, where we can see poetry constantly changing. You can read the other entries here. “Loveliest of trees, the cherry now” Loveliest of […]
One way to understand where poetry is now is to see where it was a hundred years ago. Every Saturday I’ll be posting not the best, but at least the most representative, poems from the last century, where we can see poetry constantly changing. You can read the other entries here. And it’s worth asking, as I start with […]
