Get Your Premium Membership

Best Famous Agile Poems

Here is a collection of the all-time best famous Agile poems. This is a select list of the best famous Agile poetry. Reading, writing, and enjoying famous Agile poetry (as well as classical and contemporary poems) is a great past time. These top poems are the best examples of agile poems.

Search and read the best famous Agile poems, articles about Agile poems, poetry blogs, or anything else Agile poem related using the PoetrySoup search engine at the top of the page.

See Also:
Written by Vladimir Mayakovsky | Create an image from this poem

At the Top of My voice

 My most respected
 comrades of posterity!
Rummaging among
 these days’ 
 petrified crap,
exploring the twilight of our times,
you,
 possibly,
 will inquire about me too.

And, possibly, your scholars
 will declare,
with their erudition overwhelming
 a swarm of problems;
once there lived
 a certain champion of boiled water,
and inveterate enemy of raw water.

Professor,
 take off your bicycle glasses!
I myself will expound
 those times
 and myself.

I, a latrine cleaner
 and water carrier,
by the revolution
 mobilized and drafted,
went off to the front
 from the aristocratic gardens 
of poetry - 
 the capricious wench
She planted a delicious garden,
the daughter,
 cottage,
 pond
 and meadow.

Myself a garden I did plant,
myself with water sprinkled it.
some pour their verse from water cans;
others spit water
 from their mouth - 
the curly Macks,
 the clever jacks - 
but what the hell’s it all about!
There’s no damming al this up - 
beneath the walls they mandoline:
“Tara-tina, tara-tine,
tw-a-n-g...” 
It’s no great honor, then,
 for my monuments
to rise from such roses
above the public squares,
 where consumption coughs,
where whores, hooligans and syphilis
 walk.

Agitprop
 sticks
 in my teeth too,
and I’d rather
 compose
 romances for you - 
more profit in it
 and more charm.

But I
 subdued
 myself,
 setting my heel
on the throat
 of my own song.
Listen,
 comrades of posterity,
to the agitator
 the rabble-rouser.

Stifling
 the torrents of poetry,
I’ll skip
 the volumes of lyrics;
as one alive,
 I’ll address the living.
I’ll join you
 in the far communist future,
I who am
 no Esenin super-hero.

My verse will reach you
 across the peaks of ages,
over the heads
 of governments and poets.

My verse 
 will reach you
not as an arrow
 in a cupid-lyred chase,
not as worn penny
Reaches a numismatist,
not as the light of dead stars reaches you.

My verse
 by labor
 will break the mountain chain of years,
and will present itself
 ponderous, 
 crude,
 tangible,
as an aqueduct,
 by slaves of Rome
constructed,
 enters into our days.

When in mounds of books,
 where verse lies buried,
you discover by chance the iron filings of lines,
touch them
 with respect,
 as you would
some antique
 yet awesome weapon.

It’s no habit of mine
 to caress
 the ear
 with words;
a maiden’s ear
 curly-ringed
will not crimson
 when flicked by smut.

In parade deploying
 the armies of my pages,
I shall inspect
 the regiments in line.

Heavy as lead,
 my verses at attention stand,
ready for death
 and for immortal fame.

The poems are rigid,
 pressing muzzle
to muzzle their gaping
 pointed titles.

The favorite 
 of all the armed forces
the cavalry of witticisms
 ready
to launch a wild hallooing charge,
reins its chargers still,
 raising
the pointed lances of the rhymes.
and all
 these troops armed to the teeth,
which have flashed by
 victoriously for twenty years,
all these,
 to their very last page,
I present to you,
 the planet’s proletarian.

The enemy
 of the massed working class
is my enemy too
 inveterate and of long standing.

Years of trial
 and days of hunger
 ordered us
to march 
 under the red flag.

We opened
 each volume
 of Marx
as we would open
 the shutters
 in our own house;
but we did not have to read
 to make up our minds
which side to join,
 which side to fight on.

Our dialectics
 were not learned
 from Hegel.
In the roar of battle
 it erupted into verse,
when,
 under fire,
 the bourgeois decamped
as once we ourselves
 had fled
 from them.
Let fame
 trudge
 after genius
like an inconsolable widow
 to a funeral march - 
die then, my verse,
 die like a common soldier,
like our men
 who nameless died attacking!
I don’t care a spit
 for tons of bronze;
I don’t care a spit
 for slimy marble.
We’re men of kind,
 we’ll come to terms about our fame;
let our
 common monument be
socialism
 built
 in battle.
Men of posterity
 examine the flotsam of dictionaries:
out of Lethe
 will bob up
 the debris of such words
as “prostitution,” 
 “tuberculosis,” 
 “blockade.” 
For you,
 who are now
 healthy and agile,
the poet
 with the rough tongue
 of his posters,
has licked away consumptives’ spittle.
With the tail of my years behind me,
 I begin to resemble
those monsters,
 excavated dinosaurs.
Comrade life,
 let us
 march faster,
march
 faster through what’s left
 of the five-year plan.
My verse
 has brought me
 no rubles to spare:
no craftsmen have made
 mahogany chairs for my house.
In all conscience,
 I need nothing
except
 a freshly laundered shirt.
When I appear 
 before the CCC
 of the coming
 bright years,
by way of my Bolshevik party card,
 I’ll raise
above the heads
 of a gang of self-seeking
 poets and rogues,
all the hundred volumes
 of my 
 communist-committed books.


Transcribed: by Mitch Abidor.


Written by Osip Mandelstam | Create an image from this poem

The Age

 My age, my beast, is there anyone
Who can peer into your eyes
And with his own blood fuse
Two centuries' worth of vertebrae?
The creating blood gushes
From the throat of earthly things,
And the parasite just trembles
On the threshold of new days.

While the creature still has life,
The spine must be delivered,
While with the unseen backbone
A wave distracts itself.
Again they've brought the peak of life
Like a sacrificial lamb,
Like a child's supple cartilage—
The age of infant earth.

To free the age from its confinement,
To instigate a brand new world,
The discordant, tangled days
Must be linked, as with a flute.
It's the age that rocks the swells
With humanity's despair,
And in the undergrowth a serpent breathes
The golden measure of the age.

Still the shoots will swell
And the green buds sprout
But your spinal cord is crushed,
My fantastic, wretched age!
And in lunatic beatitude
You look back, cruel and weak,
Like a beast that once was agile,
At the tracks left by your feet.

The creating blood gushes
From the throat of earthly things,
The lukewarm cartilage of oceans
Splashes like a seething fish ashore.
And from the bird net spread on high
From the humid azure stones,
Streams a flood of helpless apathy
On your single, fatal wound.
Written by William Butler Yeats | Create an image from this poem

The Two Kings

 King Eochaid came at sundown to a wood
Westward of Tara. Hurrying to his queen
He had outridden his war-wasted men
That with empounded cattle trod the mire,
And where beech-trees had mixed a pale green light
With the ground-ivy's blue, he saw a stag
Whiter than curds, its eyes the tint of the sea.
Because it stood upon his path and seemed
More hands in height than any stag in the world
He sat with tightened rein and loosened mouth
Upon his trembling horse, then drove the spur;
But the stag stooped and ran at him, and passed,
Rending the horse's flank. King Eochaid reeled,
Then drew his sword to hold its levelled point
Against the stag. When horn and steel were met
The horn resounded as though it had been silver,
A sweet, miraculous, terrifying sound.
Horn locked in sword, they tugged and struggled there
As though a stag and unicorn were met
Among the African Mountains of the Moon,
Until at last the double horns, drawn backward,
Butted below the single and so pierced
The entrails of the horse. Dropping his sword
King Eochaid seized the horns in his strong hands
And stared into the sea-green eye, and so
Hither and thither to and fro they trod
Till all the place was beaten into mire.
The strong thigh and the agile thigh were met,
The hands that gathered up the might of the world,
And hoof and horn that had sucked in their speed
Amid the elaborate wilderness of the air.
Through bush they plunged and over ivied root,
And where the stone struck fire, while in the leaves
A squirrel whinnied and a bird screamed out;
But when at last he forced those sinewy flanks
Against a beech-bole, he threw down the beast
And knelt above it with drawn knife. On the instant
It vanished like a shadow, and a cry
So mournful that it seemed the cry of one
Who had lost some unimaginable treasure
Wandered between the blue and the green leaf
And climbed into the air, crumbling away,
Till all had seemed a shadow or a vision
But for the trodden mire, the pool of blood,
The disembowelled horse.
 King Eochaid ran
Toward peopled Tara, nor stood to draw his breath
Until he came before the painted wall,
The posts of polished yew, circled with bronze,
Of the great door; but though the hanging lamps
Showed their faint light through the unshuttered windows,
Nor door, nor mouth, nor slipper made a noise,
Nor on the ancient beaten paths, that wound
From well-side or from plough-land, was there noisc;
Nor had there been the noise of living thing
Before him or behind, but that far off
On the horizon edge bellowed the herds.
Knowing that silence brings no good to kings,
And mocks returning victory, he passed
Between the pillars with a beating heart
And saw where in the midst of the great hall
pale-faced, alone upon a bench, Edain
Sat upright with a sword before her feet.
Her hands on either side had gripped the bench.
Her eyes were cold and steady, her lips tight.
Some passion had made her stone. Hearing a foot
She started and then knew whose foot it was;
But when he thought to take her in his arms
She motioned him afar, and rose and spoke:
'I have sent among the fields or to the woods
The fighting-men and servants of this house,
For I would have your judgment upon one
Who is self-accused. If she be innocent
She would not look in any known man's face
Till judgment has been given, and if guilty,
Would never look again on known man's face.'
And at these words hc paled, as she had paled,
Knowing that he should find upon her lips
The meaning of that monstrous day.
 Then she:
'You brought me where your brother Ardan sat
Always in his one seat, and bid me care him
Through that strange illness that had fixed him there.
And should he die to heap his burial-mound
And catve his name in Ogham.' Eochaid said,
'He lives?' 'He lives and is a healthy man.'
'While I have him and you it matters little
What man you have lost, what evil you have found.'
'I bid them make his bed under this roof
And carried him his food with my own hands,
And so the weeks passed by. But when I said,
"What is this trouble?" he would answer nothing,
Though always at my words his trouble grew;
And I but asked the more, till he cried out,
Weary of many questions: "There are things
That make the heart akin to the dumb stone."
Then I replied, "Although you hide a secret,
Hopeless and dear, or terrible to think on,
Speak it, that I may send through the wide world
For Medicine." Thereon he cried aloud
"Day after day you question me, and I,
Because there is such a storm amid my thoughts
I shall be carried in the gust, command,
Forbid, beseech and waste my breath." Then I:
"Although the thing that you have hid were evil,
The speaking of it could be no great wrong,
And evil must it be, if done 'twere worse
Than mound and stone that keep all virtue in,
And loosen on us dreams that waste our life,
Shadows and shows that can but turn the brain."
but finding him still silent I stooped down
And whispering that none but he should hear,
Said, "If a woman has put this on you,
My men, whether it please her or displease,
And though they have to cross the Loughlan waters
And take her in the middle of armed men,
Shall make her look upon her handiwork,
That she may quench the rick she has fired; and though
She may have worn silk clothes, or worn a crown,
She'II not be proud, knowing within her heart
That our sufficient portion of the world
Is that we give, although it be brief giving,
Happiness to children and to men."
Then he, driven by his thought beyond his thought,
And speaking what he would not though he would,
Sighed, "You, even you yourself, could work the cure!"
And at those words I rose and I went out
And for nine days he had food from other hands,
And for nine days my mind went whirling round
The one disastrous zodiac, muttering
That the immedicable mound's beyond
Our questioning, beyond our pity even.
But when nine days had gone I stood again
Before his chair and bending down my head
I bade him go when all his household slept
To an old empty woodman's house that's hidden
Westward of Tara, among the hazel-trees --
For hope would give his limbs the power -- and await
A friend that could, he had told her, work his cure
And would be no harsh friend.
 When night had deepened,
I groped my way from beech to hazel wood,
Found that old house, a sputtering torch within,
And stretched out sleeping on a pile of skins
Ardan, and though I called to him and tried
To Shake him out of sleep, I could not rouse him.
I waited till the night was on the turn,
Then fearing that some labourer, on his way
To plough or pasture-land, might see me there,
Went out.
 Among the ivy-covered rocks,
As on the blue light of a sword, a man
Who had unnatural majesty, and eyes
Like the eyes of some great kite scouring the woods,
Stood on my path. Trembling from head to foot
I gazed at him like grouse upon a kite;
But with a voice that had unnatural music,
"A weary wooing and a long," he said,
"Speaking of love through other lips and looking
Under the eyelids of another, for it was my craft
That put a passion in the sleeper there,
And when I had got my will and drawn you here,
Where I may speak to you alone, my craft
Sucked up the passion out of him again
And left mere sleep. He'll wake when the sun wakes,
push out his vigorous limbs and rub his eyes,
And wonder what has ailed him these twelve months."
I cowered back upon the wall in terror,
But that sweet-sounding voice ran on: "Woman,
I was your husband when you rode the air,
Danced in the whirling foam and in the dust,
In days you have not kept in memory,
Being betrayed into a cradle, and I come
That I may claim you as my wife again."
I was no longer terrified -- his voice
Had half awakened some old memory --
Yet answered him, "I am King Eochaid's wife
And with him have found every happiness
Women can find." With a most masterful voice,
That made the body seem as it were a string
Under a bow, he cried, "What happiness
Can lovers have that know their happiness
Must end at the dumb stone? But where we build
Our sudden palaces in the still air
pleasure itself can bring no weariness.
Nor can time waste the cheek, nor is there foot
That has grown weary of the wandering dance,
Nor an unlaughing mouth, but mine that mourns,
Among those mouths that sing their sweethearts' praise,
Your empty bed." "How should I love," I answered,
"Were it not that when the dawn has lit my bed
And shown my husband sleeping there, I have sighcd,
'Your strength and nobleness will pass away'?
Or how should love be worth its pains were it not
That when he has fallen asleep within my atms,
Being wearied out, I love in man the child?
What can they know of love that do not know
She builds her nest upon a narrow ledge
Above a windy precipice?" Then he:
"Seeing that when you come to the deathbed
You must return, whether you would or no,
This human life blotted from memory,
Why must I live some thirty, forty years,
Alone with all this useless happiness?"
Thereon he seized me in his arms, but I
Thrust him away with both my hands and cried,
"Never will I believe there is any change
Can blot out of my memory this life
Sweetened by death, but if I could believe,
That were a double hunger in my lips
For what is doubly brief."
 And now the shape
My hands were pressed to vanished suddenly.
I staggered, but a beech-tree stayed my fall,
And clinging to it I could hear the cocks
Crow upon Tara.'
 King Eochaid bowed his head
And thanked her for her kindness to his brother,
For that she promised, and for that refused.
Thereon the bellowing of the empounded herds
Rose round the walls, and through the bronze-ringed door
Jostled and shouted those war-wasted men,
And in the midst King Eochaid's brother stood,
And bade all welcome, being ignorant.
Written by Du Fu | Create an image from this poem

In Abbot Zan's Room at Dayun Temple: Four Poems (4)

Boy draw water well shining Agile container rise hand Wet sprinkle not soak earth Sweep surpass like without broom Bright rosy clouds shining again pavilion Clear mist lift high window Lean fill cover path flower Dance end steps willow Difficulty world affair compel Hide away right time after Meet talk agree deep heart How can all restrain mouth Offer goodbye return cane riding crop Temporary part end turn head Vast expanse mud defile person Listen country many dogs Although not free yoke Sometimes come rest rush about Near you like white snow Grasp hot upset how be
The boy draws shining water from the well, He nimbly lifts the bucket to his hand. He sprinkles water without soaking the earth, And sweeps so well as if no broom had passed. The rosy dawn again lights the pagoda, The clearing mist lifts from the higher windows. Leaning blossoms cover over the path, Dancing willow leaves reach down to the steps. I'm driven by these troublesome affairs, Retirement from the world must be put off. We've met and talked, our deepest hearts agreeing, How can our mouths be forced completely shut? I say goodbye and fetch my riding crop, Parting for now, I turn my head at the last. There's so much mud that can defile a man, Just listen to all the dogs throughout the land. Although I cannot get free from this yoke, I'll sometimes come to rest from all the bustle. Your presence, Abbot, acts just like white snow, How can I be upset to grasp what's hot?
Written by Amy Lowell | Create an image from this poem

Nightmare: A Tale for an Autumn Evening

 After a Print by George Cruikshank

It was a gusty night,
With the wind booming, and swooping,
Looping round corners,
Sliding over the cobble-stones,
Whipping and veering,
And careering over the roofs
Like a thousand clattering horses.
Mr. Spruggins had been dining in the city,
Mr. Spruggins was none too steady in his gait,
And the wind played ball with Mr. Spruggins
And laughed as it whistled past him.
It rolled him along the street,
With his little feet pit-a-patting on the flags of the sidewalk,
And his muffler and his coat-tails blown straight out behind him.
It bumped him against area railings,
And chuckled in his ear when he said "Ouch!"
Sometimes it lifted him clear off his little patting feet
And bore him in triumph over three grey flagstones and a quarter.
The moon dodged in and out of clouds, winking.
It was all very unpleasant for Mr. Spruggins,
And when the wind flung him hard against his own front door
It was a relief,
Although the breath was quite knocked out of him.
The gas-lamp in front of the house flared up,
And the keyhole was as big as a barn door;
The gas-lamp flickered away to a sputtering blue star,
And the keyhole went out with it.
Such a stabbing, and jabbing,
And sticking, and picking,
And poking, and pushing, and prying
With that key;
And there is no denying that Mr. Spruggins rapped out an oath or 
two,
Rub-a-dub-dubbing them out to a real snare-drum roll.
But the door opened at last,
And Mr. Spruggins blew through it into his own hall
And slammed the door to so hard
That the knocker banged five times before it stopped.
Mr. Spruggins struck a light and lit a candle,
And all the time the moon winked at him through the window.
"Why couldn't you find the keyhole, Spruggins?"
Taunted the wind.
"I can find the keyhole."
And the wind, thin as a wire,
Darted in and seized the candle flame
And knocked it over to one side
And pummelled it down -- down -- down --!
But Mr. Spruggins held the candle so close that it singed his chin,
And ran and stumbled up the stairs in a surprisingly agile manner,
For the wind through the keyhole kept saying, "Spruggins! Spruggins!"
behind him.
The fire in his bedroom burned brightly.
The room with its crimson bed and window curtains
Was as red and glowing as a carbuncle.
It was still and warm.
There was no wind here, for the windows were fastened;
And no moon,
For the curtains were drawn.
The candle flame stood up like a pointed pear
In a wide brass dish.
Mr. Spruggins sighed with content;
He was safe at home.
The fire glowed -- red and yellow roses
In the black basket of the grate --
And the bed with its crimson hangings
Seemed a great peony,
Wide open and placid.
Mr. Spruggins slipped off his top-coat and his muffler.
He slipped off his bottle-green coat
And his flowered waistcoat.
He put on a flannel dressing-gown,
And tied a peaked night-cap under his chin.
He wound his large gold watch
And placed it under his pillow.
Then he tiptoed over to the window and pulled back the curtain.
There was the moon dodging in and out of the clouds;
But behind him was his quiet candle.
There was the wind whisking along the street.
The window rattled, but it was fastened.
Did the wind say, "Spruggins"?
All Mr. Spruggins heard was "S-s-s-s-s --"
Dying away down the street.
He dropped the curtain and got into bed.
Martha had been in the last thing with the warming-pan;
The bed was warm,
And Mr. Spruggins sank into feathers,
With the familiar ticking of his watch just under his head.
Mr. Spruggins dozed.
He had forgotten to put out the candle,
But it did not make much difference as the fire was so bright . 
. .
Too bright!
The red and yellow roses pricked his eyelids,
They scorched him back to consciousness.
He tried to shift his position;
He could not move.
Something weighed him down,
He could not breathe.
He was gasping,
Pinned down and suffocating.
He opened his eyes.
The curtains of the window were flung back,
The fire and the candle were out,
And the room was filled with green moonlight.
And pressed against the window-pane
Was a wide, round face,
Winking -- winking --
Solemnly dropping one eyelid after the other.
Tick -- tock -- went the watch under his pillow,
Wink -- wink -- went the face at the window.
It was not the fire roses which had pricked him,
It was the winking eyes.
Mr. Spruggins tried to bounce up;
He could not, because --
His heart flapped up into his mouth
And fell back dead.
On his chest was a fat pink pig,
On the pig a blackamoor
With a ten pound weight for a cap.
His mustachios kept curling up and down like angry snakes,
And his eyes rolled round and round,
With the pupils coming into sight, and disappearing,
And appearing again on the other side.
The holsters at his saddle-bow were two port bottles,
And a curved table-knife hung at his belt for a scimitar,
While a fork and a keg of spirits were strapped to the saddle behind.
He dug his spurs into the pig,
Which trampled and snorted,
And stamped its cloven feet deeper into Mr. Spruggins.
Then the green light on the floor began to undulate.
It heaved and hollowed,
It rose like a tide,
Sea-green,
Full of claws and scales
And wriggles.
The air above his bed began to move;
It weighed over him
In a mass of draggled feathers.
Not one lifted to stir the air.
They drooped and dripped
With a smell of port wine and brandy,
Closing down, slowly,
Trickling drops on the bed-quilt.
Suddenly the window fell in with a great scatter of glass,
And the moon burst into the room,
Sizzling -- "S-s-s-s-s -- Spruggins! Spruggins!"
It rolled toward him,
A green ball of flame,
With two eyes in the center,
A red eye and a yellow eye,
Dropping their lids slowly,
One after the other.
Mr. Spruggins tried to scream,
But the blackamoor
Leapt off his pig
With a cry,
Drew his scimitar,
And plunged it into Mr. Spruggins's mouth.
Mr. Spruggins got up in the cold dawn
And remade the fire.
Then he crept back to bed
By the light which seeped in under the window curtains,
And lay there, shivering,
While the bells of St. George the Martyr chimed the quarter after 
seven.


Written by Sarojini Naidu | Create an image from this poem

The Indian Gipsy

 IN tattered robes that hoard a glittering trace 
Of bygone colours, broidered to the knee, 
Behold her, daughter of a wandering race, 
Tameless, with the bold falcon's agile grace, 
And the lithe tiger's sinuous majesty. 


With frugal skill her simple wants she tends, 
She folds her tawny heifers and her sheep 
On lonely meadows when the daylight ends, 
Ere the quick night upon her flock descends 
Like a black panther from the caves of sleep. 


Time's river winds in foaming centuries 
Its changing, swift, irrevocable course 
To far off and incalculable seas; 
She is twin-born with primal mysteries, 
And drinks of life at Time's forgotten source
Written by Rudyard Kipling | Create an image from this poem

Dane-Geld

 A.D. 980-1016

It is always a temptation to an armed and agile nation
 To call upon a neighbour and to say: --
"We invaded you last night -- we are quite prepared to fight,
 Unless you pay us cash to go away."

And that is called asking for Dane-geld,
 And the people who ask ti explain
That you've only to pay 'em the Dane-geld
 And then you'll get rid of the Dane!

It is always a temptation to a rich and lazy nation,
 To puff and look important and to say: --
"Though we know we should defeat you, we have not the time to meet you.
 We will therefore pay you cash to go away."

And that is called paying the Dane-geld;
 But we've proved it again and again,
That if once you have paid him the Dane-geld
 You never get rid of the Dane.

It is wrong to put temptation in the path of any nation,
 For fear they should succumb and go astray;
So when you are requested to pay up or be molested,
 You will find it better policy to say: --

"We never pay any-one Dane-geld,
 No matter how trifling the cost;
For the end of that game is oppression and shame,
 And the nation that plays it is lost!"
Written by Jose Asuncion Silva | Create an image from this poem

Nocturne III

 One night 
one night all full of murmurings, of perfumes and music of wings;
one night 
in which fantastic fireflies burnt in the humid nuptial shadows, 
slowly by my side, pressed altogether close, silent and pale, 
as if a presentiment of infinite bitternesses 
agitated you unto the most hidden fibers of your being,
along the flowering path which crosses the plain
you walked;
and the full moon
in the infinite and profound blue heavens scattered its white light;
and your shadow, 
fine and languid, 
and my shadow 
projected by the rays of the moon, 
upon the sorrowful sands 
of the path, joined together;
and they became one, 
and they became one,
and they became only one long shadow, 
and they became only one long shadow,
and they became only one long shadow....

Tonight
alone; my soul
full of the infinite bitternesses and agonies of your death, 
separated from you by time, by the tomb and by distance, 
by the infinite blackness
where our voice cannot reach, 
silent and alone 
along the path I walked ...
And the barking of dogs at the moon could be heard,
at the pale moon, 
and the chirping 
of the frogs ... 
I felt cold. It was the coldness that in your alcove
your cheeks and your temples and your adoréd hands possessed 
within the snowy whiteness 
of the mortuary sheets.
It was the coldness of the sepulcher, it was the ice of death, 
it was the coldness of oblivion.
And my shadow,
projected by the rays of the moon, 
walked alone, 
walked alone,
walked alone along the solitary plain;
and your shadow, svelte and agile,
fine and languid, 
as in that warm night of springtime death, 
as in that night full of murmurings, of perfumes and music of wings, 
approached and walked with mine, 
approached and walked with mine, 
approached and walked with mine ... Oh, the shadows intertwined!
Oh, the corporeal shadows united with the shadows of the souls!
Oh, the seeking shadows in those nights of sorrows and of tears!
Written by Guillaume Apollinaire | Create an image from this poem

Zone

ZONE 


In the end you are tired of this ancient world 
Shepherd oh Eiffel Tower the herd of bridges is bleating this morning 

You've had enough of living in Greek and Roman antiquity 

Here even the cars look antique 
Only religion has stayed new religion 
Has stayed simple like the hangars at Port-Aviation 

You alone in Europe are not ancient oh Christianity 
The most modern European is you Pope Pius X 
And shame keeps you whom the windows are watching 
From entering a church and going to confession this morning 
You read the flyers catalogues posters that shout out 
There's the morning's poetry and as for prose there are the newspapers 
There are 25 cent tabloids full of crimes 
Celebrity items and a thousand different headlines 

This morning I saw a pretty street whose name I forget 
New and clean it was the sun's herald 
Executives workers and beautiful stenos 
Cross it four times a day from Monday morning to Saturday evening 
In the morning the siren moans three times 
An angry bell barks at noon 
The inscriptions on the signs and walls 
The billboards the notices squawk like parrots 
I love the charm of this industrial street 
In Paris between the Rue Aumont-Thiéville and the Avenue des Ternes 

There's the young street and you're still just a little boy 
Your mother dresses you only in blue and white 
You're very pious and along with your oldest friend René Dalize 
You like nothing better than the rituals of the Church 
It is nine o'clock the gas is low and blue you sneak out of the dormitory 
You pray all night in the school's chapel 
While in eternal adorable amethyst depths 
The flaming glory of Christ revolves forever 
It's the beautiful lily we all cultivate 
It's the torch with red hair the wind can't blow out 
It's the pale rosy son of the grieving mother 
It's the tree always leafy with prayers 
It's the paired gallows of honor and eternity 
It's the star with six branches 
It's God who dies on Friday and comes back to life on Sunday 
It's Christ who climbs to the sky better than any pilot 
He holds the world record for altitude 

Apple Christ of the eye 
Twentieth pupil of the centuries he knows how to do it 
And changed into a bird this century like Jesus climbs into the air 
Devils in their depths raise their heads to look at him 
They say he's copying Simon Magus in Judea 
They shout if he's so good at flying let's call him a fugitive 
Angels gyre around the handsome gymnast 
Icarus Enoch Elijah Apollonius of Tyana 
Hover around the first airplane 
They scatter sometimes to let the ones carrying the Eucharist pass 
Those priests that are forever ascending carrying the host 
Finally the plane lands without folding its wings 
And the sky is full of millions of swallows 
Crows falcons owls come in full flight 
Ibises flamingos storks come from Africa 
The Roc Bird made famous by storytellers and poets 
Soars holding in its claws Adam's skull the first head 
The eagle swoops screaming from the horizon 
And from America the little hummingbird comes 
From China the long agile peehees have come 
They have only one wing and fly in pairs 
Now here's the dove immaculate spirit 
Escorted by the lyre-bird and the spotted peacock 
The phoenix that self-engendering pyre 
For an instant hides all with its burning ash 
Sirens leaving the dangerous straits 
Arrive singing beautifully all three 
And all eagle phoenix peehees from China 
Hang out with the flying Machine 

Now you're walking in Paris all alone in the crowd 
Herds of buses amble by you mooing 
The anguish of love tightens your throat 
As if you were never going to be loved again 
If you lived in the old days you would enter a monastery 
You are ashamed when you catch yourself saying a prayer 
You make fun of yourself and your laughter crackles like the fire of Hell 
The sparks of your laughter gild the abyss of your life 
It is a painting hung in a dark museum 
And sometimes you go look at it close up 

Today you're walking in Paris the women have turned blood-red 
It was and I wish I didn't remember it was at the waning of beauty 
Surrounded by fervent flames Our Lady looked at me in Chartres 
The blood of your Sacred Heart drenched me in Montmartre 
I am sick from hearing blissful phrases 
The love I suffer from is a shameful sickness 
And the image that possesses you makes you survive in insomnia and anguish 
It is always near you this image that passes 

Now you're on the shores of the Mediterranean 
Under the lemon trees that are in flower all year long 
You go boating with some friends 
One is from Nice there's one from Menton and two from La Turbie 
We look with dread at the octopus of the deep 
And among the seaweed fish are swimming symbols of the Savior 

You are in the garden of an inn just outside of Prague 
You feel so happy a rose is on the table 
And you observe instead of writing your story in prose 
The Japanese beetle sleeping in the heart of the rose 

Terrified you see yourself drawn in the agates of Saint Vitus 
You were sad enough to die the day you saw yourself 
You look like Lazarus thrown into a panic by the daylight 
The hands on the clock in the Jewish district go counter-clockwise 
And you too are going slowly backwards in your life 
Climbing up to Hradcany and listening at night 
To Czech songs being sung in taverns 

Here you are in Marseilles in the middle of watermelons 

Here you are in Coblenz at the Giant Hotel 

Here you are in Rome sitting under a Japanese medlar tree 

Here you are in Amsterdam with a young woman you think is beautiful she is ugly 
She is engaged to a student from Leyden 
There they rent rooms in Latin Cubicula Locanda 
I remember I spent three days there and just as many in Gouda 

You are in Paris getting interrogated 
They're arresting you like a criminal 

You made some miserable and happy journeys 
Before you became aware of lies and of age 
You suffered from love at twenty and at thirty 
I've lived like a madman and I've wasted my time 
You don't dare look at your hands anymore and all the time I want to cry 
Over you over the women I love over everything that's terrified you 

Your tear-filled eyes watch the poor emigrants 
They believe in God they pray the women breast-feed the children 
They fill the waiting-room at the St. Lazaire station with their smell 
They have faith in their star like the Magi 
They hope to earn money in Argentina 
And go back to their country after making their fortune 
One family is carrying a red eiderdown the way you carry your heart 
The eiderdown and our dreams are equally unreal 
Some of these emigrants stay here and put up at the 
Rue des Rosiers or the Rue des Ecouffes in hovels 
I've seen them often at night they're out for a breath of air in the street 
And like chess pieces they rarely move 
They are mostly Jews the wives wearing wigs 
Sit still bloodless at the back of store-fronts 

You're standing in front of the counter at a sleazy bar 
You're having coffee for two sous with the down-and-out 

At night you're in a big restaurant 

These women aren't mean but they do have their troubles 
All of them even the ugliest has made her lover suffer 

She is a Jersey policeman's daughter 

Her hands that I hadn't seen are hard and chapped 

I feel immense pity for the scars on her belly 

I humble my mouth now to a poor hooker with a horrible laugh 

You are alone morning is approaching 
Milkmen clink their cans in the streets 

Night withdraws like a half-caste beauty 
Ferdine the false or thoughtful Leah 

And you drink this alcohol burning like your life 
Your life that you drink like an eau-de-vie 

You walk towards Auteuil you want to go home on foot 
To sleep surrounded by your fetishes from the South Seas and from Guinea 
They are Christs in another form and from a different creed 
They are lower Christs of dim expectations 

Goodbye Goodbye 

Sun neck cut 

  


from Alcools, 1913 

Translation copyright Charlotte Mandell 





Written by Ben Jonson | Create an image from this poem

The Noble Balm

HIGH-SPIRITED friend  
I send nor balms nor cor'sives to your wound: 
Your fate hath found 
A gentler and more agile hand to tend 
The cure of that which is but corporal; 5 
And doubtful days which were named critical  
Have made their fairest flight 
And now are out of sight. 
Yet doth some wholesome physic for the mind 
Wrapp'd in this paper lie 10 
Which in the taking if you misapply  
You are unkind. 

Your covetous hand  
Happy in that fair honour it hath gain'd  
Must now be rein'd. 15 
True valour doth her own renown command 
In one full action; nor have you now more 
To do than be a husband of that store. 
Think but how dear you bought 
This fame which you have caught: 20 
Such thoughts will make you more in love with truth. 
'Tis wisdom and that high  
For men to use their fortune reverently  
Even in youth. 

Book: Reflection on the Important Things