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Written by T S (Thomas Stearns) Eliot | Create an image from this poem

Four Quartets 1: Burnt Norton

 I

Time present and time past
Are both perhaps present in time future,
And time future contained in time past.
If all time is eternally present All time is unredeemable.
What might have been is an abstraction Remaining a perpetual possibility Only in a world of speculation.
What might have been and what has been Point to one end, which is always present.
Footfalls echo in the memory Down the passage which we did not take Towards the door we never opened Into the rose-garden.
My words echo Thus, in your mind.
But to what purpose Disturbing the dust on a bowl of rose-leaves I do not know.
Other echoes Inhabit the garden.
Shall we follow? Quick, said the bird, find them, find them, Round the corner.
Through the first gate, Into our first world, shall we follow The deception of the thrush? Into our first world.
There they were, dignified, invisible, Moving without pressure, over the dead leaves, In the autumn heat, through the vibrant air, And the bird called, in response to The unheard music hidden in the shrubbery, And the unseen eyebeam crossed, for the roses Had the look of flowers that are looked at.
There they were as our guests, accepted and accepting.
So we moved, and they, in a formal pattern, Along the empty alley, into the box circle, To look down into the drained pool.
Dry the pool, dry concrete, brown edged, And the pool was filled with water out of sunlight, And the lotos rose, quietly, quietly, The surface glittered out of heart of light, And they were behind us, reflected in the pool.
Then a cloud passed, and the pool was empty.
Go, said the bird, for the leaves were full of children, Hidden excitedly, containing laughter.
Go, go, go, said the bird: human kind Cannot bear very much reality.
Time past and time future What might have been and what has been Point to one end, which is always present.
II Garlic and sapphires in the mud Clot the bedded axle-tree.
The trilling wire in the blood Sings below inveterate scars Appeasing long forgotten wars.
The dance along the artery The circulation of the lymph Are figured in the drift of stars Ascend to summer in the tree We move above the moving tree In light upon the figured leaf And hear upon the sodden floor Below, the boarhound and the boar Pursue their pattern as before But reconciled among the stars.
At the still point of the turning world.
Neither flesh nor fleshless; Neither from nor towards; at the still point, there the dance is, But neither arrest nor movement.
And do not call it fixity, Where past and future are gathered.
Neither movement from nor towards, Neither ascent nor decline.
Except for the point, the still point, There would be no dance, and there is only the dance.
I can only say, there we have been: but I cannot say where.
And I cannot say, how long, for that is to place it in time.
The inner freedom from the practical desire, The release from action and suffering, release from the inner And the outer compulsion, yet surrounded By a grace of sense, a white light still and moving, Erhebung without motion, concentration Without elimination, both a new world And the old made explicit, understood In the completion of its partial ecstasy, The resolution of its partial horror.
Yet the enchainment of past and future Woven in the weakness of the changing body, Protects mankind from heaven and damnation Which flesh cannot endure.
Time past and time future Allow but a little consciousness.
To be conscious is not to be in time But only in time can the moment in the rose-garden, The moment in the arbour where the rain beat, The moment in the draughty church at smokefall Be remembered; involved with past and future.
Only through time time is conquered.
III Here is a place of disaffection Time before and time after In a dim light: neither daylight Investing form with lucid stillness Turning shadow into transient beauty With slow rotation suggesting permanence Nor darkness to purify the soul Emptying the sensual with deprivation Cleansing affection from the temporal.
Neither plenitude nor vacancy.
Only a flicker Over the strained time-ridden faces Distracted from distraction by distraction Filled with fancies and empty of meaning Tumid apathy with no concentration Men and bits of paper, whirled by the cold wind That blows before and after time, Wind in and out of unwholesome lungs Time before and time after.
Eructation of unhealthy souls Into the faded air, the torpid Driven on the wind that sweeps the gloomy hills of London, Hampstead and Clerkenwell, Campden and Putney, Highgate, Primrose and Ludgate.
Not here Not here the darkness, in this twittering world.
Descend lower, descend only Into the world of perpetual solitude, World not world, but that which is not world, Internal darkness, deprivation And destitution of all property, Desiccation of the world of sense, Evacuation of the world of fancy, Inoperancy of the world of spirit; This is the one way, and the other Is the same, not in movement But abstention from movement; while the world moves In appetency, on its metalled ways Of time past and time future.
IV Time and the bell have buried the day, The black cloud carries the sun away.
Will the sunflower turn to us, will the clematis Stray down, bend to us; tendril and spray Clutch and cling? Chill Fingers of yew be curled Down on us? After the kingfisher's wing Has answered light to light, and is silent, the light is still At the still point of the turning world.
V Words move, music moves Only in time; but that which is only living Can only die.
Words, after speech, reach Into the silence.
Only by the form, the pattern, Can words or music reach The stillness, as a Chinese jar still Moves perpetually in its stillness.
Not the stillness of the violin, while the note lasts, Not that only, but the co-existence, Or say that the end precedes the beginning, And the end and the beginning were always there Before the beginning and after the end.
And all is always now.
Words strain, Crack and sometimes break, under the burden, Under the tension, slip, slide, perish, Decay with imprecision, will not stay in place, Will not stay still.
Shrieking voices Scolding, mocking, or merely chattering, Always assail them.
The Word in the desert Is most attacked by voices of temptation, The crying shadow in the funeral dance, The loud lament of the disconsolate chimera.
The detail of the pattern is movement, As in the figure of the ten stairs.
Desire itself is movement Not in itself desirable; Love is itself unmoving, Only the cause and end of movement, Timeless, and undesiring Except in the aspect of time Caught in the form of limitation Between un-being and being.
Sudden in a shaft of sunlight Even while the dust moves There rises the hidden laughter Of children in the foliage Quick now, here, now, always— Ridiculous the waste sad time Stretching before and after.


Written by Charlotte Bronte | Create an image from this poem

The Missionary

 Lough, vessel, plough the British main,
Seek the free ocean's wider plain; 
Leave English scenes and English skies,
Unbind, dissever English ties; 
Bear me to climes remote and strange, 
Where altered life, fast-following change,
Hot action, never-ceasing toil, 
Shall stir, turn, dig, the spirit's soil; 
Fresh roots shall plant, fresh seed shall sow, 
Till a new garden there shall grow, 
Cleared of the weeds that fill it now,­ 
Mere human love, mere selfish yearning, 
Which, cherished, would arrest me yet.
I grasp the plough, there's no returning, Let me, then, struggle to forget.
But England's shores are yet in view, And England's skies of tender blue Are arched above her guardian sea.
I cannot yet Remembrance flee; I must again, then, firmly face That task of anguish, to retrace.
Wedded to home­I home forsake, Fearful of change­I changes make; Too fond of ease­I plunge in toil; Lover of calm­I seek turmoil: Nature and hostile Destiny Stir in my heart a conflict wild; And long and fierce the war will be Ere duty both has reconciled.
What other tie yet holds me fast To the divorced, abandoned past? Smouldering, on my heart's altar lies The fire of some great sacrifice, Not yet half quenched.
The sacred steel But lately struck my carnal will, My life-long hope, first joy and last, What I loved well, and clung to fast; What I wished wildly to retain, What I renounced with soul-felt pain; What­when I saw it, axe-struck, perish­ Left me no joy on earth to cherish; A man bereft­yet sternly now I do confirm that Jephtha vow: Shall I retract, or fear, or flee ? Did Christ, when rose the fatal tree Before him, on Mount Calvary ? 'Twas a long fight, hard fought, but won, And what I did was justly done.
Yet, Helen ! from thy love I turned, When my heart most for thy heart burned; I dared thy tears, I dared thy scorn­ Easier the death-pang had been borne.
Helen ! thou mightst not go with me, I could not­dared not stay for thee ! I heard, afar, in bonds complain The savage from beyond the main; And that wild sound rose o'er the cry Wrung out by passion's agony; And even when, with the bitterest tear I ever shed, mine eyes were dim, Still, with the spirit's vision clear, I saw Hell's empire, vast and grim, Spread on each Indian river's shore, Each realm of Asia covering o'er.
There the weak, trampled by the strong, Live but to suffer­hopeless die; There pagan-priests, whose creed is Wrong, Extortion, Lust, and Cruelty, Crush our lost race­and brimming fill The bitter cup of human ill; And I­who have the healing creed, The faith benign of Mary's Son; Shall I behold my brother's need And selfishly to aid him shun ? I­who upon my mother's knees, In childhood, read Christ's written word, Received his legacy of peace, His holy rule of action heard; I­in whose heart the sacred sense Of Jesus' love was early felt; Of his pure full benevolence, His pitying tenderness for guilt; His shepherd-care for wandering sheep, For all weak, sorrowing, trembling things, His mercy vast, his passion deep Of anguish for man's sufferings; I­schooled from childhood in such lore­ Dared I draw back or hesitate, When called to heal the sickness sore Of those far off and desolate ? Dark, in the realm and shades of Death, Nations and tribes and empires lie, But even to them the light of Faith Is breaking on their sombre sky: And be it mine to bid them raise Their drooped heads to the kindling scene, And know and hail the sunrise blaze Which heralds Christ the Nazarene.
I know how Hell the veil will spread Over their brows and filmy eyes, And earthward crush the lifted head That would look up and seek the skies; I know what war the fiend will wage Against that soldier of the cross, Who comes to dare his demon-rage, And work his kingdom shame and loss.
Yes, hard and terrible the toil Of him who steps on foreign soil, Resolved to plant the gospel vine, Where tyrants rule and slaves repine; Eager to lift Religion's light Where thickest shades of mental night Screen the false god and fiendish rite; Reckless that missionary blood, Shed in wild wilderness and wood, Has left, upon the unblest air, The man's deep moan­the martyr's prayer.
I know my lot­I only ask Power to fulfil the glorious task; Willing the spirit, may the flesh Strength for the day receive afresh.
May burning sun or deadly wind Prevail not o'er an earnest mind; May torments strange or direst death Nor trample truth, nor baffle faith.
Though such blood-drops should fall from me As fell in old Gethsemane, Welcome the anguish, so it gave More strength to work­more skill to save.
And, oh ! if brief must be my time, If hostile hand or fatal clime Cut short my course­still o'er my grave, Lord, may thy harvest whitening wave.
So I the culture may begin, Let others thrust the sickle in; If but the seed will faster grow, May my blood water what I sow ! What ! have I ever trembling stood, And feared to give to God that blood ? What ! has the coward love of life Made me shrink from the righteous strife ? Have human passions, human fears Severed me from those Pioneers, Whose task is to march first, and trace Paths for the progress of our race ? It has been so; but grant me, Lord, Now to stand steadfast by thy word ! Protected by salvation's helm, Shielded by faith­with truth begirt, To smile when trials seek to whelm And stand 'mid testing fires unhurt ! Hurling hell's strongest bulwarks down, Even when the last pang thrills my breast, When Death bestows the Martyr's crown, And calls me into Jesus' rest.
Then for my ultimate reward­ Then for the world-rejoicing word­ The voice from Father­Spirit­Son: " Servant of God, well hast thou done !"
Written by Anne Sexton | Create an image from this poem

Angels Of The Love Affair

 "Angels of the love affair, do you know that other,
the dark one, that other me?"

1.
ANGEL OF FIRE AND GENITALS Angel of fire and genitals, do you know slime, that green mama who first forced me to sing, who put me first in the latrine, that pantomime of brown where I was beggar and she was king? I said, "The devil is down that festering hole.
" Then he bit me in the buttocks and took over my soul.
Fire woman, you of the ancient flame, you of the Bunsen burner, you of the candle, you of the blast furnace, you of the barbecue, you of the fierce solar energy, Mademoiselle, take some ice, take come snow, take a month of rain and you would gutter in the dark, cracking up your brain.
Mother of fire, let me stand at your devouring gate as the sun dies in your arms and you loosen it's terrible weight.
2.
ANGEL OF CLEAN SHEETS Angel of clean sheets, do you know bedbugs? Once in the madhouse they came like specks of cinnamon as I lay in a choral cave of drugs, as old as a dog, as quiet as a skeleton.
Little bits of dried blood.
One hundred marks upon the sheet.
One hundred kisses in the dark.
White sheets smelling of soap and Clorox have nothing to do with this night of soil, nothing to do with barred windows and multiple locks and all the webbing in the bed, the ultimate recoil.
I have slept in silk and in red and in black.
I have slept on sand and, on fall night, a haystack.
I have known a crib.
I have known the tuck-in of a child but inside my hair waits the night I was defiled.
3.
ANGEL OF FLIGHT AND SLEIGH BELLS Angel of flight and sleigh bells, do you know paralysis, that ether house where your arms and legs are cement? You are as still as a yardstick.
You have a doll's kiss.
The brain whirls in a fit.
The brain is not evident.
I have gone to that same place without a germ or a stroke.
A little solo act--that lady with the brain that broke.
In this fashion I have become a tree.
I have become a vase you can pick up or drop at will, inanimate at last.
What unusual luck! My body passively resisting.
Part of the leftovers.
Part of the kill.
Angels of flight, you soarer, you flapper, you floater, you gull that grows out of my back in the drreams I prefer, stay near.
But give me the totem.
Give me the shut eye where I stand in stone shoes as the world's bicycle goes by.
4.
ANGEL OF HOPE AND CALENDARS Angel of hope and calendars, do you know despair? That hole I crawl into with a box of Kleenex, that hole where the fire woman is tied to her chair, that hole where leather men are wringing their necks, where the sea has turned into a pond of urine.
There is no place to wash and no marine beings to stir in.
In this hole your mother is crying out each day.
Your father is eating cake and digging her grave.
In this hole your baby is strangling.
Your mouth is clay.
Your eyes are made of glass.
They break.
You are not brave.
You are alone like a dog in a kennel.
Your hands break out in boils.
Your arms are cut and bound by bands of wire.
Your voice is out there.
Your voice is strange.
There are no prayers here.
Here there is no change.
5.
ANGEL OF BLIZZARDS AND BLACKOUTS Angle of blizzards and blackouts, do you know raspberries, those rubies that sat in the gree of my grandfather's garden? You of the snow tires, you of the sugary wings, you freeze me out.
Leet me crawl through the patch.
Let me be ten.
Let me pick those sweet kisses, thief that I was, as the sea on my left slapped its applause.
Only my grandfather was allowed there.
Or the maid who came with a scullery pan to pick for breakfast.
She of the rols that floated in the air, she of the inlaid woodwork all greasy with lemon, she of the feather and dust, not I.
Nonetheless I came sneaking across the salt lawn in bare feet and jumping-jack pajamas in the spongy dawn.
Oh Angel of the blizzard and blackout, Madam white face, take me back to that red mouth, that July 21st place.
6.
ANGEL OF BEACH HOUSES AND PICNICS Angel of beach houses and picnics, do you know solitaire? Fifty-two reds and blacks and only myslef to blame.
My blood buzzes like a hornet's nest.
I sit in a kitchen chair at a table set for one.
The silverware is the same and the glass and the sugar bowl.
I hear my lungs fill and expel as in an operation.
But I have no one left to tell.
Once I was a couple.
I was my own king and queen with cheese and bread and rosé on the rocks of Rockport.
Once I sunbathed in the buff, all brown and lean, watching the toy sloops go by, holding court for busloads of tourists.
Once I called breakfast the sexiest meal of the day.
Once I invited arrest at the peace march in Washington.
Once I was young and bold and left hundreds of unmatched people out in the cold.
Written by Anne Sexton | Create an image from this poem

Doctors

 They work with herbs
and penicillin
They work with gentleness
and the scalpel.
They dig out the cancer, close an incision and say a prayer to the poverty of the skin.
They are not Gods though they would like to be; they are only a human trying to fix up a human.
Many humans die.
They die like the tender, palpitating berries in November.
But all along the doctors remember: First do no harm.
They would kiss if it would heal.
It would not heal.
If the doctors cure then the sun sees it.
If the doctors kill then the earth hides it.
The doctors should fear arrogance more than cardiac arrest.
If they are too proud, and some are, then they leave home on horseback but God returns them on foot.
Written by Robert Browning | Create an image from this poem

Rabbi Ben Ezra

 Grow old along with me!
The best is yet to be,
The last of life, for which the first was made:
Our times are in His hand
Who saith 'A whole I planned,
Youth shows but half; trust God: see all, nor be afraid!'

Not that, amassing flowers,
Youth sighed 'Which rose make ours,
Which lily leave and then as best recall?'
Not that, admiring stars,
It yearned 'Nor Jove, nor Mars;
Mine be some figured flame which blends, transcends them all!'

Not for such hopes and fears
Annulling youth's brief years,
Do I remonstrate: folly wide the mark!
Rather I prize the doubt
Low kinds exist without,
Finished and finite clods, untroubled by a spark.
Poor vaunt of life indeed, Were man but formed to feed On joy, to solely seek and find and feast: Such feasting ended, then As sure an end to men; Irks care the crop-full bird? Frets doubt the maw-crammed beast? Rejoice we are allied To That which doth provide And not partake, effect and not receive! A spark disturbs our clod; Nearer we hold of God Who gives, than of His tribes that take, I must believe.
Then, welcome each rebuff That turns earth's smoothness rough, Each sting that bids nor sit nor stand but go! Be our joys three-parts pain! Strive, and hold cheap the strain; Learn, nor account the pang; dare, never grudge the throe! For thence,--a paradox Which comforts while it mocks,-- Shall life succeed in that it seems to fail: What I aspired to be, And was not, comforts me: A brute I might have been, but would not sink i' the scale.
What is he but a brute Whose flesh has soul to suit, Whose spirit works lest arms and legs want play? To man, propose this test-- Thy body at its best, How far can that project thy soul on its lone way? Yet gifts should prove their use: I own the Past profuse Of power each side, perfection every turn: Eyes, ears took in their dole, Brain treasured up the whole; Should not the heart beat once 'How good to live and learn?' Not once beat 'Praise be Thine! I see the whole design, I, who saw power, see now love perfect too: Perfect I call Thy plan: Thanks that I was a man! Maker, remake, complete,--I trust what Thou shalt do!' For pleasant is this flesh; Our soul, in its rose-mesh Pulled ever to the earth, still yearns for rest; Would we some prize might hold To match those manifold Possessions of the brute,--gain most, as we did best! Let us not always say, 'Spite of this flesh to-day I strove, made head, gained ground upon the whole!' As the bird wings and sings, Let us cry 'All good things Are ours, nor soul helps flesh more, now, than flesh helps soul!' Therefore I summon age To grant youth's heritage, Life's struggle having so far reached its term: Thence shall I pass, approved A man, for aye removed From the developed brute; a god though in the germ.
And I shall thereupon Take rest, ere I be gone Once more on my adventure brave and new: Fearless and unperplexed, When I wage battle next, What weapons to select, what armour to indue.
Youth ended, I shall try My gain or loss thereby; Leave the fire ashes, what survives is gold: And I shall weigh the same, Give life its praise or blame: Young, all lay in dispute; I shall know, being old.
For note, when evening shuts, A certain moment cuts The deed off, calls the glory from the grey: A whisper from the west Shoots--'Add this to the rest, Take it and try its worth: here dies another day.
' So, still within this life, Though lifted o'er its strife, Let me discern, compare, pronounce at last, This rage was right i' the main, That acquiescence vain: The Future I may face now I have proved the Past.
' For more is not reserved To man, with soul just nerved To act to-morrow what he learns to-day: Here, work enough to watch The Master work, and catch Hints of the proper craft, tricks of the tool's true play.
As it was better, youth Should strive, through acts uncouth, Toward making, than repose on aught found made: So, better, age, exempt From strife, should know, than tempt Further.
Thou waitedst age: wait death nor be afraid! Enough now, if the Right And Good and Infinite Be named here, as thou callest thy hand thine own With knowledge absolute, Subject to no dispute From fools that crowded youth, nor let thee feel alone.
Be there, for once and all, Severed great minds from small, Announced to each his station in the Past! Was I, the world arraigned, Were they, my soul disdained, Right? Let age speak the truth and give us peace at last! Now, who shall arbitrate? Ten men love what I hate, Shun what I follow, slight what I receive; Ten, who in ears and eyes Match me: we all surmise, They this thing, and I that: whom shall my soul believe? Not on the vulgar mass Called 'work,' must sentence pass, Things done, that took the eye and had the price; O'er which, from level stand, The low world laid its hand, Found straightway to its mind, could value in a trice: But all, the world's coarse thumb And finger failed to plumb, So passed in making up the main account; All instincts immature, All purposes unsure, That weighed not as his work, yet swelled the man's amount: Thoughts hardly to be packed Into a narrow act, Fancies that broke through language and escaped; All I could never be, All, men ignored in me, This, I was worth to God, whose wheel the pitcher shaped.
Ay, note that Potter's wheel, That metaphor! and feel Why time spins fast, why passive lies our clay,-- Thou, to whom fools propound, When the wine makes its round, 'Since life fleets, all is change; the Past gone, seize to-day!' Fool! All that is, at all, Lasts ever, past recall; Earth changes, but thy soul and God stand sure: What entered into thee, That was, is, and shall be: Time's wheel runs back or stops: Potter and clay endure.
He fixed thee mid this dance Of plastic circumstance, This Present, thou, forsooth, wouldst fain arrest: Machinery just meant To give thy soul its bent, Try thee and turn thee forth, sufficiently impressed.
What though the earlier grooves, Which ran the laughing loves Around thy base, no longer pause and press? What though, about thy rim, Skull-things in order grim Grow out, in graver mood, obey the sterner stress? Look not thou down but up! To uses of a cup, The festal board, lamp's flash and trumpet's peal, The new wine's foaming flow, The Master's lips a-glow! Thou, heaven's consummate cup, what need'st thou with earth's wheel? But I need, now as then, Thee, God, who mouldest men; And since, not even while the whirl was worst, Did I,--to the wheel of life With shapes and colours rife, Bound dizzily,--mistake my end, to slake Thy thirst: So, take and use Thy work: Amend what flaws may lurk, What strain o' the stuff, what warpings past the aim! My times be in Thy hand! Perfect the cup as planned! Let age approve of youth, and death complete the same!


Written by Robert Browning | Create an image from this poem

Childe Roland to the Dark Tower Came

My first thought was, he lied in every word,
That hoary cripple, with malicious eye
Askance to watch the working of his lie
On mine, and mouth scarce able to afford
Suppression of the glee, that pursed and scored
Its edge, at one more victim gained thereby.
What else should he be set for, with his staff? What, save to waylay with his lies, ensnare All travellers who might find him posted there, And ask the road? I guessed what skull-like laugh Would break, what crutch 'gin write my epitaph For pastime in the dusty thoroughfare, If at his council I should turn aside Into that ominous tract which, all agree, Hides the Dark Tower.
Yet acquiescingly I did turn as he pointed: neither pride Nor hope rekindling at the end descried, So much as gladness that some end might be.
For, what with my whole world-wide wandering, What with my search drawn out through years, my hope Dwindled into a ghost not fit to cope With that obstreperous joy success would bring, - I hardly tried now to rebuke the spring My heart made, finding failure in its scope.
As when a sick man very near to death Seems dead indeed, and feels begin and end The tears and takes the farewell of each friend, And hears one bid the other go, draw breath Freelier outside, ('since all is o'er,' he saith, 'And the blow fallen no grieving can amend';) While some discuss if near the other graves Be room enough for this, and when a day Suits best for carrying the corpse away, With care about the banners, scarves and staves: And still the man hears all, and only craves He may not shame such tender love and stay.
Thus, I had so long suffered in this quest, Heard failure prophesied so oft, been writ So many times among 'The Band' - to wit, The knights who to the Dark Tower's search addressed Their steps - that just to fail as they, seemed best, And all the doubt was now - should I be fit? So, quiet as despair, I turned from him, That hateful cripple, out of his highway Into the path he pointed.
All the day Had been a dreary one at best, and dim Was settling to its close, yet shot one grim Red leer to see the plain catch its estray.
For mark! no sooner was I fairly found Pledged to the plain, after a pace or two, Than, pausing to throw backward a last view O'er the safe road, 'twas gone; grey plain all round: Nothing but plain to the horizon's bound.
I might go on; naught else remained to do.
So, on I went.
I think I never saw Such starved ignoble nature; nothing throve: For flowers - as well expect a cedar grove! But cockle, spurge, according to their law Might propagate their kind, with none to awe, You'd think: a burr had been a treasure-trove.
No! penury, inertness and grimace, In some strange sort, were the land's portion.
'See Or shut your eyes,' said Nature peevishly, 'It nothing skills: I cannot help my case: 'Tis the Last Judgement's fire must cure this place, Calcine its clods and set my prisoners free.
' If there pushed any ragged thistle-stalk Above its mates, the head was chopped; the bents Were jealous else.
What made those holes and rents In the dock's harsh swarth leaves, bruised as to balk All hope of greeness? 'tis a brute must walk Pushing their life out, with a brute's intents.
As for the grass, it grew as scant as hair In leprosy; thin dry blades pricked the mud Which underneath looked kneaded up with blood.
One stiff blind horse, his every bone a-stare, Stood stupefied, however he came there: Thrust out past service from the devil's stud! Alive? he might be dead for aught I know, With that red gaunt and colloped neck a-strain, And shut eyes underneath the rusty mane; Seldom went such grotesqueness with such woe; I never saw a brute I hated so; He must be wicked to deserve such pain.
I shut my eyes and turned them on my heart.
As a man calls for wine before he fights, I asked one draught of earlier, happier sights, Ere fitly I could hope to play my part.
Think first, fight afterwards - this soldier's art: One taste of the old time sets all to rights.
Not it! I fancied Cuthbert's reddening face Beneath its garniture of curly gold, Dear fellow, till I almost felt him fold An arm in mine to fix me to the place, That way he used.
Alas, one night's disgrace! Out went my heart's new fire and left it cold.
Giles then, the soul of honour - there he stands Frank as ten years ago when knighted first.
What honest man should dare (he said) he durst.
Good - but the scene shifts - faugh! what hangman-hands Pin to his breast a parchment? His own bands Read it.
Poor traitor, spit upon and curst! Better this present than a past like that; Back therefore to my darkening path again! No sound, no sight as far as eye could strain.
Will the night send a howlet or a bat? I asked: when something on the dismal flat Came to arrest my thoughts and change their train.
A sudden little river crossed my path As unexpected as a serpent comes.
No sluggish tide congenial to the glooms; This, as it frothed by, might have been a bath For the fiend's glowing hoof - to see the wrath Of its black eddy bespate with flakes and spumes.
So petty yet so spiteful! All along, Low scrubby alders kneeled down over it; Drenched willows flung them headlong in a fit Of mute despair, a suicidal throng: The river which had done them all the wrong, Whate'er that was, rolled by, deterred no whit.
Which, while I forded, - good saints, how I feared To set my foot upon a dead man's cheek, Each step, or feel the spear I thrust to seek For hollows, tangled in his hair or beard! - It may have been a water-rat I speared, But, ugh! it sounded like a baby's shriek.
Glad was I when I reached the other bank.
Now for a better country.
Vain presage! Who were the strugglers, what war did they wage, Whose savage trample thus could pad the dank Soil to a plash? Toads in a poisoned tank, Or wild cats in a red-hot iron cage - The fight must so have seemed in that fell cirque.
What penned them there, with all the plain to choose? No foot-print leading to that horrid mews, None out of it.
Mad brewage set to work Their brains, no doubt, like galley-slaves the Turk Pits for his pastime, Christians against Jews.
And more than that - a furlong on - why, there! What bad use was that engine for, that wheel, Or brake, not wheel - that harrow fit to reel Men's bodies out like silk? with all the air Of Tophet's tool, on earth left unaware, Or brought to sharpen its rusty teeth of steel.
Then came a bit of stubbed ground, once a wood, Next a marsh, it would seem, and now mere earth Desperate and done with; (so a fool finds mirth, Makes a thing and then mars it, till his mood Changes and off he goes!) within a rood - Bog, clay and rubble, sand and stark black dearth.
Now blotches rankling, coloured gay and grim, Now patches where some leanness of the soil's Broke into moss or substances like boils; Then came some palsied oak, a cleft in him Like a distorted mouth that splits its rim Gaping at death, and dies while it recoils.
And just as far as ever from the end! Naught in the distance but the evening, naught To point my footstep further! At the thought, A great black bird, Apollyon's bosom-friend, Sailed past, not beat his wide wing dragon-penned That brushed my cap - perchance the guide I sought.
For, looking up, aware I somehow grew, 'Spite of the dusk, the plain had given place All round to mountains - with such name to grace Mere ugly heights and heaps now stolen in view.
How thus they had surprised me, - solve it, you! How to get from then was no clearer case.
Yet half I seemed to recognise some trick Of mischief happened to me, God knows when - In a bad dream perhaps.
Here ended, the, Progress this way.
When, in the very nick Of giving up, one time more, came a click As when a trap shuts - you're inside the den! Burningly it came on me all at once, This was the place! those two hills on the right, Crouched like two bulls locked horn in horn in fight; While to the left, a tall scalped mountain.
.
.
Dunce, Dotard, a-dozing at the very nonce, After a life spent training for the sight! What in the midst lay but the Tower itself? The round squat turret, blind as the fool's heart, Built of brown stone, without a counterpart In the whole world.
The tempest's mocking elf Points to the shipman thus the unseen shelf He strikes on, only when the timbers start.
Not see? because of night perhaps? - why, day Came back again for that! before it left, The dying sunset kindled through a cleft: The hills, like giants at a hunting, lay, Chin upon hand, to see the game at bay, - 'Now stab and end the creature - to the heft!' Not hear? when noise was everywhere! it tolled Increasing like a bell.
Names in my ears Of all the lost adventurers my peers, - How such a one was strong, and such was bold, And such was fortunate, yet each of old Lost, lost! one moment knelled the woe of years.
There they stood, ranged along the hill-sides, met To view the last of me, a living frame For one more picture! in a sheet of flame I saw them and I knew them all.
And yet Dauntless the slug-horn to my lips I set, And blew.
'Childe Roland to the Dark Tower came.
'
Written by William Topaz McGonagall | Create an image from this poem

Jottings of New York

 Oh, mighty city of New York, you are wonderful to behold--
Your buildings are magnificent-- the truth be it told--
They were the only thing that seemed to arrest my eye,
Because many of them are thirteen storeys high;

And as for Central Park, it is lovely to be seen--
Especially in the summer season when its shrubberies are green
And the Burns Statue is there to be seen,
Surrounded by trees on the beautiful sward so green;
Also Shakespeare and the immortal Sir Walter Scott,
Which by Scotchmen and Englishmen will never be forgot.
There are people on the Sabbath day in thousands resort-- All lov'd, in conversation, and eager for sport; And some of them viewing the wild beasts there, While the joyous shouts of children does rend the air-- And also beautiful black swans, I do declare.
And there's beautiful boats to be seen there, And joyous shouts of children does rend the air, While the boats sail along with them o'er Lohengrin Lake, And fare is 5 cents for children, and adults ten is all they take.
And there's also summer-house shades, and merry-go-rounds And with the merry laughter of the children the Park resounds, During the live-long Sabbath day Enjoying themselves at the merry-go-round play.
Then there's the elevated railroads abont five storeys high, Which the inhabitants can hear night and day passing by; Of, such a mass of people there daily do throng-- No less than five 100,000 daily pass along; And all along the city you can get for five cents-- And, believe me, among the passengers there's few discontent.
And the top of the houses are mostly all flat, And in the warm weather the people gather to chat; Besides, on the housetops they dry their clothes; And, also, many people all night on the housetops repose.
And numerous ships end steamboats are there to be seen, Sailing along the East River water, which is very green-- Which is certainly a most beautiful sight To see them sailing o'er the smooth water day and night.
And as for Brooklyn Bridge, it's a very great height, And fills the stranger's heart with wonder at first sight; And with all its loftiness I venture to say It cannot surpass the new railway bridge of the Silvery Tay.
And there's also ten thousand rumsellers there-- Oh, wonderful to think of, I do declare! To accommodate the people of New York therein, And to encourage them to commit all sorts of sin.
And on the Sabbath day ye will see many a man Going for beer with a big tin can, And seems proud to be seen carrying home the beer To treat his neighbours and his family dear.
Then at night numbers of the people dance and sing, Making the walls of their houses to ring With their songs and dancing on Sabbath night, Which I witnessed with disgust, and fled from the sight.
And with regard to New York and the sights I did see-- Believe me, I never saw such sights in Dundee; And the morning I sailed from the city of New York My heart it felt as light as a cork.
Written by Denise Levertov | Create an image from this poem

St. Peter and the Angel

 Delivered out of raw continual pain,
smell of darkness, groans of those others
to whom he was chained--

unchained, and led
past the sleepers,
door after door silently opening--
out!
 And along a long street's
majestic emptiness under the moon:

one hand on the angel's shoulder, one
feeling the air before him,
eyes open but fixed.
.
.
And not till he saw the angel had left him, alone and free to resume the ecstatic, dangerous, wearisome roads of what he had still to do, not till then did he recognize this was no dream.
More frightening than arrest, than being chained to his warders: he could hear his own footsteps suddenly.
Had the angel's feet made any sound? He could not recall.
No one had missed him, no one was in pursuit.
He himself must be the key, now, to the next door, the next terrors of freedom and joy.
Written by Friedrich von Schiller | Create an image from this poem

The Cranes Of Ibycus

 Once to the song and chariot-fight,
Where all the tribes of Greece unite
On Corinth's isthmus joyously,
The god-loved Ibycus drew nigh.
On him Apollo had bestowed The gift of song and strains inspired; So, with light staff, he took his road From Rhegium, by the godhead fired.
Acrocorinth, on mountain high, Now burns upon the wanderer's eye, And he begins, with pious dread, Poseidon's grove of firs to tread.
Naught moves around him, save a swarm Of cranes, who guide him on his way; Who from far southern regions warm Have hither come in squadron gray.
"Thou friendly band, all hail to thee! Who led'st me safely o'er the sea! I deem thee as a favoring sign,-- My destiny resembles thine.
Both come from a far distant coast, Both pray for some kind sheltering place;-- Propitious toward us be the host Who from the stranger wards disgrace!" And on he hastes, in joyous wood, And reaches soon the middle wood When, on a narrow bridge, by force Two murderers sudden bar his course.
He must prepare him for the fray, But soon his wearied hand sinks low; Inured the gentle lyre to play, It ne'er has strung the deadly bow.
On gods and men for aid he cries,-- No savior to his prayer replies; However far his voice he sends, Naught living to his cry attends.
"And must I in a foreign land, Unwept, deserted, perish here, Falling beneath a murderous hand, Where no avenger can appear?" Deep-wounded, down he sinks at last, When, lo! the cranes' wings rustle past.
He hears,--though he no more can see,-- Their voices screaming fearfully.
"By you, ye cranes, that soar on high, If not another voice is heard, Be borne to heaven my murder-cry!" He speaks, and dies, too, with the word.
The naked corpse, ere long, is found, And, though defaced by many a wound, His host in Corinth soon could tell The features that he loved so well.
"And is it thus I find thee now, Who hoped the pine's victorious crown To place upon the singer's brow, Illumined by his bright renown?" The news is heard with grief by all Met at Poseidon's festival; All Greece is conscious of the smart, He leaves a void in every heart; And to the Prytanis [33] swift hie The people, and they urge him on The dead man's manes to pacify And with the murderer's blood atone.
But where's the trace that from the throng The people's streaming crowds among, Allured there by the sports so bright, Can bring the villain back to light? By craven robbers was he slain? Or by some envious hidden foe? That Helios only can explain, Whose rays illume all things below.
Perchance, with shameless step and proud, He threads e'en now the Grecian crowd-- Whilst vengeance follows in pursuit, Gloats over his transgression's fruit.
The very gods perchance he braves Upon the threshold of their fane,-- Joins boldly in the human waves That haste yon theatre to gain.
For there the Grecian tribes appear, Fast pouring in from far and near; On close-packed benches sit they there,-- The stage the weight can scarcely bear.
Like ocean-billows' hollow roar, The teaming crowds of living man Toward the cerulean heavens upsoar, In bow of ever-widening span.
Who knows the nation, who the name, Of all who there together came? From Theseus' town, from Aulis' strand From Phocis, from the Spartan land, From Asia's distant coast, they wend, From every island of the sea, And from the stage they hear ascend The chorus's dread melody.
Who, sad and solemn, as of old, With footsteps measured and controlled, Advancing from the far background, Circle the theatre's wide round.
Thus, mortal women never move! No mortal home to them gave birth! Their giant-bodies tower above, High o'er the puny sons of earth.
With loins in mantle black concealed, Within their fleshless bands they wield The torch, that with a dull red glows,-- While in their cheek no life-blood flows; And where the hair is floating wide And loving, round a mortal brow, Here snakes and adders are descried, Whose bellies swell with poison now.
And, standing in a fearful ring, The dread and solemn chant they sing, That through the bosom thrilling goes, And round the sinner fetters throws.
Sense-robbing, of heart-maddening power, The furies' strains resound through air The listener's marrow they devour,-- The lyre can yield such numbers ne'er.
"Happy the man who, blemish-free, Preserves a soul of purity! Near him we ne'er avenging come, He freely o'er life's path may roam.
But woe to him who, hid from view, Hath done the deed of murder base! Upon his heels we close pursue,-- We, who belong to night's dark race!" "And if he thinks to 'scape by flight, Winged we appear, our snare of might Around his flying feet to cast, So that he needs must fall at last.
Thus we pursue him, tiring ne'er,-- Our wrath repentance cannot quell,-- On to the shadows, and e'en there We leave him not in peace to dwell!" Thus singing, they the dance resume, And silence, like that of the tomb, O'er the whole house lies heavily, As if the deity were nigh.
And staid and solemn, as of old, Circling the theatre's wide round, With footsteps measured and controlled, They vanish in the far background.
Between deceit and truth each breast.
Now doubting hangs, by awe possessed, And homage pays to that dread might, That judges what is hid from sight,-- That, fathomless, inscrutable, The gloomy skein of fate entwines, That reads the bosom's depths full well, Yet flies away where sunlight shines.
When sudden, from the tier most high, A voice is heard by all to cry: "See there, see there, Timotheus! Behold the cranes of Ibycus!" The heavens become as black as night, And o'er the theatre they see, Far over-head, a dusky flight Of cranes, approaching hastily.
"Of Ibycus!"--That name so blest With new-born sorrow fills each breast.
As waves on waves in ocean rise, From mouth to mouth it swiftly flies: "Of Ibycus, whom we lament? Who fell beneath the murderer's hand? What mean those words that from him went? What means this cranes' advancing band?" And louder still become the cries, And soon this thought foreboding flies Through every heart, with speed of light-- "Observe in this the furies' might! The poets manes are now appeased The murderer seeks his own arrest! Let him who spoke the word be seized, And him to whom it was addressed!" That word he had no sooner spoke, Than he its sound would fain invoke; In vain! his mouth, with terror pale, Tells of his guilt the fearful tale.
Before the judge they drag them now The scene becomes the tribunal; Their crimes the villains both avow, When neath the vengeance-stroke they fall.
Written by Charlotte Bronte | Create an image from this poem

Regret

 Long ago I wished to leave 
" The house where I was born; " 
Long ago I used to grieve, 
My home seemed so forlorn.
In other years, its silent rooms Were filled with haunting fears; Now, their very memory comes O'ercharged with tender tears.
Life and marriage I have known, Things once deemed so bright; Now, how utterly is flown Every ray of light ! 'Mid the unknown sea of life I no blest isle have found; At last, through all its wild wave's strife, My bark is homeward bound.
Farewell, dark and rolling deep ! Farewell, foreign shore ! Open, in unclouded sweep, Thou glorious realm before ! Yet, though I had safely pass'd That weary, vexed main, One loved voice, through surge and blast, Could call me back again.
Though the soul's bright morning rose O'er Paradise for me, William ! even from Heaven's repose I'd turn, invoked by thee ! Storm nor surge should e'er arrest My soul, exulting then: All my heaven was once thy breast, Would it were mine again !

Book: Reflection on the Important Things