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Best Famous Cloudy Poems

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Written by Victor Hugo | Create an image from this poem

A Sunset

 I love the evenings, passionless and fair, I love the evens, 
Whether old manor-fronts their ray with golden fulgence leavens, 
In numerous leafage bosomed close; 
Whether the mist in reefs of fire extend its reaches sheer, 
Or a hundred sunbeams splinter in an azure atmosphere 
On cloudy archipelagos. 

Oh, gaze ye on the firmament! a hundred clouds in motion, 
Up-piled in the immense sublime beneath the winds' commotion, 
Their unimagined shapes accord: 
Under their waves at intervals flame a pale levin through, 
As if some giant of the air amid the vapors drew 
A sudden elemental sword. 

The sun at bay with splendid thrusts still keeps the sullen fold; 
And momently at distance sets, as a cupola of gold, 
The thatched roof of a cot a-glance; 
Or on the blurred horizon joins his battle with the haze; 
Or pools the blooming fields about with inter-isolate blaze, 
Great moveless meres of radiance. 

Then mark you how there hangs athwart the firmament's swept track, 
Yonder a mighty crocodile with vast irradiant back, 
A triple row of pointed teeth? 
Under its burnished belly slips a ray of eventide, 
The flickerings of a hundred glowing clouds in tenebrous side 
With scales of golden mail ensheathe. 

Then mounts a palace, then the air vibrates--the vision flees. 
Confounded to its base, the fearful cloudy edifice 
Ruins immense in mounded wrack; 
Afar the fragments strew the sky, and each envermeiled cone 
Hangeth, peak downward, overhead, like mountains overthrown 
When the earthquake heaves its hugy back. 

These vapors, with their leaden, golden, iron, bronzèd glows, 
Where the hurricane, the waterspout, thunder, and hell repose, 
Muttering hoarse dreams of destined harms,-- 
'Tis God who hangs their multitude amid the skiey deep, 
As a warrior that suspendeth from the roof-tree of his keep 
His dreadful and resounding arms! 

All vanishes! The Sun, from topmost heaven precipitated, 
Like a globe of iron which is tossed back fiery red 
Into the furnace stirred to fume, 
Shocking the cloudy surges, plashed from its impetuous ire, 
Even to the zenith spattereth in a flecking scud of fire 
The vaporous and inflamèd spaume. 

O contemplate the heavens! Whenas the vein-drawn day dies pale, 
In every season, every place, gaze through their every veil? 
With love that has not speech for need! 
Beneath their solemn beauty is a mystery infinite: 
If winter hue them like a pall, or if the summer night 
Fantasy them starre brede.


Written by Wallace Stevens | Create an image from this poem

Sunday Morning

1
Complacencies of the peignoir, and late
Coffee and oranges in a sunny chair,
And the green freedom of a cockatoo
Upon a rug mingle to dissipate
The holy hush of ancient sacrifice.
She dreams a little, and she feels the dark
Encroachment of that old catastrophe,
As a calm darkens among water-lights.
The pungent oranges and bright, green wings
Seem things in some procession of the dead,
Winding across wide water, without sound.
The day is like wide water, without sound,
Stilled for the passion of her dreaming feet
Over the seas, to silent Palestine,
Dominion of the blood and sepulchre.

2
Why should she give her bounty to the dead?
What is divinity if it can come
Only in silent shadows and in dreams?
Shall she not find in the comforts of sun,
In pungent fruit and bright, green wings, or else
In any balm or beauty of the earth,
Things to be cherished like the thought of heaven?
Divinity must live within herself:
Passions of rain, or moods in falling snow;
Grievings in loneliness, or unsubdued
Elations when the forest blooms; gusty
Emotions on wet roads on autumn nights;
All pleasures and all pains, remembering
The bough of summer and the winter branch.
These are the measures destined for her soul.

3
Jove in the clouds had his inhuman birth.
No mother suckled him, no sweet land gave
Large-mannered motions to his mythy mind
He moved among us, as a muttering king,
Magnificent, would move among his hinds,
Until our blood, commingling, virginal,
With heaven, brought such requital to desire
The very hinds discerned it, in a star.
Shall our blood fail? Or shall it come to be
The blood of paradise? And shall the earth
Seem all of paradise that we shall know?
The sky will be much friendlier then than now,
A part of labor and a part of pain,
And next in glory to enduring love,
Not this dividing and indifferent blue.

4
She says, "I am content when wakened birds,
Before they fly, test the reality
Of misty fields, by their sweet questionings;
But when the birds are gone, and their warm fields
Return no more, where, then, is paradise?"
There is not any haunt of prophecy,
Nor any old chimera of the grave,
Neither the golden underground, nor isle
Melodious, where spirits gat them home,
Nor visionary south, nor cloudy palm
Remote as heaven's hill, that has endured
As April's green endures; or will endure
Like her rememberance of awakened birds,
Or her desire for June and evening, tipped
By the consummation of the swallow's wings.

5
She says, "But in contentment I still feel
The need of some imperishable bliss."
Death is the mother of beauty; hence from her,
Alone, shall come fulfillment to our dreams
And our desires. Although she strews the leaves
Of sure obliteration on our paths,
The path sick sorrow took, the many paths
Where triumph rang its brassy phrase, or love
Whispered a little out of tenderness,
She makes the willow shiver in the sun
For maidens who were wont to sit and gaze
Upon the grass, relinquished to their feet.
She causes boys to pile new plums and pears
On disregarded plate. The maidens taste
And stray impassioned in the littering leaves.

6
Is there no change of death in paradise?
Does ripe fruit never fall? Or do the boughs
Hang always heavy in that perfect sky,
Unchanging, yet so like our perishing earth,
With rivers like our own that seek for seas
They never find, the same receeding shores
That never touch with inarticulate pang?
Why set the pear upon those river-banks
Or spice the shores with odors of the plum?
Alas, that they should wear our colors there,
The silken weavings of our afternoons,
And pick the strings of our insipid lutes!
Death is the mother of beauty, mystical,
Within whose burning bosom we devise
Our earthly mothers waiting, sleeplessly.

7
Supple and turbulent, a ring of men
Shall chant in orgy on a summer morn
Their boisterous devotion to the sun,
Not as a god, but as a god might be,
Naked among them, like a savage source.
Their chant shall be a chant of paradise,
Out of their blood, returning to the sky;
And in their chant shall enter, voice by voice,
The windy lake wherein their lord delights,
The trees, like serafin, and echoing hills,
That choir among themselves long afterward.
They shall know well the heavenly fellowship
Of men that perish and of summer morn.
And whence they came and whither they shall go
The dew upon their feet shall manifest.

8
She hears, upon that water without sound,
A voice that cries, "The tomb in Palestine
Is not the porch of spirits lingering.
It is the grave of Jesus, where he lay."
We live in an old chaos of the sun,
Or old dependency of day and night,
Or island solitude, unsponsered, free,
Of that wide water, inescapable.
Deer walk upon our mountains, and the quail
Whistle about us their spontaneous cries;
Sweet berries ripen in the wilderness;
And, in the isolation of the sky,
At evening, casual flocks of pigeons make
Abiguous undulations as they sink,
Downward to darkness, on extended wings.
Written by Nazim Hikmet | Create an image from this poem

Things I Didnt Know I Loved

 it's 1962 March 28th
I'm sitting by the window on the Prague-Berlin train 
night is falling
I never knew I liked
night descending like a tired bird on a smoky wet plain 
I don't like
comparing nightfall to a tired bird

I didn't know I loved the earth
can someone who hasn't worked the earth love it 
I've never worked the earth
it must be my only Platonic love

and here I've loved rivers all this time
whether motionless like this they curl skirting the hills
European hills crowned with chateaus
or whether stretched out flat as far as the eye can see
I know you can't wash in the same river even once
I know the river will bring new lights you'll never see
I know we live slightly longer than a horse but not nearly as long as a crow
I know this has troubled people before
 and will trouble those after me
I know all this has been said a thousand times before 
 and will be said after me

I didn't know I loved the sky 
cloudy or clear
the blue vault Andrei studied on his back at Borodino
in prison I translated both volumes of War and Peace into Turkish 
I hear voices
not from the blue vault but from the yard 
the guards are beating someone again
I didn't know I loved trees
bare beeches near Moscow in Peredelkino
they come upon me in winter noble and modest 
beeches are Russian the way poplars are Turkish 
"the poplars of Izmir
losing their leaves. . .
they call me The Knife. . .
 lover like a young tree. . .
I blow stately mansions sky-high"
in the Ilgaz woods in 1920 I tied an embroidered linen handkerchief 
 to a pine bough for luck

I never knew I loved roads 
even the asphalt kind
Vera's behind the wheel we're driving from Moscow to the Crimea 
 Koktebele
 formerly "Goktepé ili" in Turkish 
the two of us inside a closed box
the world flows past on both sides distant and mute 
I was never so close to anyone in my life
bandits stopped me on the red road between Bolu and Geredé
 when I was eighteen
apart from my life I didn't have anything in the wagon they could take 
and at eighteen our lives are what we value least
I've written this somewhere before
wading through a dark muddy street I'm going to the shadow play 
Ramazan night
a paper lantern leading the way
maybe nothing like this ever happened
maybe I read it somewhere an eight-year-old boy
 going to the shadow play
Ramazan night in Istanbul holding his grandfather's hand 
 his grandfather has on a fez and is wearing the fur coat
 with a sable collar over his robe
 and there's a lantern in the servant's hand
 and I can't contain myself for joy
flowers come to mind for some reason 
poppies cactuses jonquils
in the jonquil garden in Kadikoy Istanbul I kissed Marika 
fresh almonds on her breath
I was seventeen
my heart on a swing touched the sky 
I didn't know I loved flowers
friends sent me three red carnations in prison

I just remembered the stars 
I love them too
whether I'm floored watching them from below 
or whether I'm flying at their side

I have some questions for the cosmonauts 
were the stars much bigger
did they look like huge jewels on black velvet
 or apricots on orange
did you feel proud to get closer to the stars
I saw color photos of the cosmos in Ogonek magazine now don't 
 be upset comrades but nonfigurative shall we say or abstract 
 well some of them looked just like such paintings which is to 
 say they were terribly figurative and concrete
my heart was in my mouth looking at them 
they are our endless desire to grasp things
seeing them I could even think of death and not feel at all sad 
I never knew I loved the cosmos

snow flashes in front of my eyes
both heavy wet steady snow and the dry whirling kind 
I didn't know I liked snow

I never knew I loved the sun
even when setting cherry-red as now
in Istanbul too it sometimes sets in postcard colors 
but you aren't about to paint it that way
I didn't know I loved the sea
 except the Sea of Azov
or how much

I didn't know I loved clouds
whether I'm under or up above them
whether they look like giants or shaggy white beasts

moonlight the falsest the most languid the most petit-bourgeois 
strikes me
I like it

I didn't know I liked rain
whether it falls like a fine net or splatters against the glass my 
 heart leaves me tangled up in a net or trapped inside a drop 
 and takes off for uncharted countries I didn't know I loved 
 rain but why did I suddenly discover all these passions sitting 
 by the window on the Prague-Berlin train
is it because I lit my sixth cigarette 
one alone could kill me
is it because I'm half dead from thinking about someone back in Moscow
her hair straw-blond eyelashes blue

the train plunges on through the pitch-black night
I never knew I liked the night pitch-black
sparks fly from the engine
I didn't know I loved sparks
I didn't know I loved so many things and I had to wait until sixty 
 to find it out sitting by the window on the Prague-Berlin train 
 watching the world disappear as if on a journey of no return

 19 April 1962
 Moscow
Written by Henry Kendall | Create an image from this poem

Mountains

RIFTED mountains, clad with forests, girded round by gleaming pines, 
Where the morning, like an angel, robed in golden splendour shines; 
Shimmering mountains, throwing downward on the slopes a mazy glare 
Where the noonday glory sails through gulfs of calm and glittering air; 
Stately mountains, high and hoary, piled with blocks of amber cloud, 
Where the fading twilight lingers, when the winds are wailing loud; 

Grand old mountains, overbeetling brawling brooks and deep ravines, 
Where the moonshine, pale and mournful, flows on rocks and evergreens. 

Underneath these regal ridges - underneath the gnarly trees, 
I am sitting, lonely-hearted, listening to a lonely breeze! 
Sitting by an ancient casement, casting many a longing look 
Out across the hazy gloaming - out beyond the brawling brook! 
Over pathways leading skyward - over crag and swelling cone, 

Past long hillocks looking like to waves of ocean turned to stone; 
Yearning for a bliss unworldly, yearning for a brighter change, 
Yearning for the mystic Aidenn, built beyond this mountain range. 


Happy years, amongst these valleys, happy years have come and gone, 
And my youthful hopes and friendships withered with them one by one; 
Days and moments bearing onward many a bright and beauteous dream, 
All have passed me like to sunstreaks flying down a distant stream. 

Oh, the love returned by loved ones! Oh, the faces that I knew! 
Oh, the wrecks of fond affection! Oh, the hearts so warm and true! 
But their voices I remember, and a something lingers still, 
Like a dying echo roaming sadly round a far off hill. 


I would sojourn here contented, tranquil as I was of yore, 
And would never wish to clamber, seeking for an unknown shore; 
I have dwelt within this cottage twenty summers, and mine eyes 

Never wandered erewhile round in search of undiscovered skies; 
But a spirit sits beside me, veiled in robes of dazzling white, 
And a dear one's whisper wakens with the symphonies of night; 
And a low sad music cometh, borne along on windy wings, 
Like a strain familiar rising from a maze of slumbering springs. 


And the Spirit, by my window, speaketh to my restless soul, 
Telling of the clime she came from, where the silent moments roll; 

Telling of the bourne mysterious, where the sunny summers flee 
Cliffs and coasts, by man untrodden, ridging round a shipless sea. 

There the years of yore are blooming - there departed life-dreams dwell, 
There the faces beam with gladness that I loved in youth so well; 
There the songs of childhood travel, over wave-worn steep and strand - 
Over dale and upland stretching out behind this mountain land. 


``Lovely Being, can a mortal, weary of this changeless scene, 

Cross these cloudy summits to the land where man hath never been? 
Can he find a pathway leading through that wildering mass of pines, 
So that he shall reach the country where ethereal glory shines; 
So that he may glance at waters never dark with coming ships; 
Hearing round him gentle language floating from angelic lips; 
Casting off his earthly fetters, living there for evermore; 
All the blooms of Beauty near him, gleaming on that quiet shore? 


``Ere you quit this ancient casement, tell me, is it well to yearn 
For the evanescent visions, vanished never to return? 
Is it well that I should with to leave this dreary world behind, 
Seeking for your fair Utopia, which perchance I may not find? 
Passing through a gloomy forest, scaling steeps like prison walls, 
Where the scanty sunshine wavers and the moonlight seldom falls? 
Oh, the feelings re-awakened! Oh, the hopes of loftier range! 

Is it well, thou friendly Being, well to wish for such a change?'' 


But the Spirit answers nothing! and the dazzling mantle fades; 
And a wailing whisper wanders out from dismal seaside shades! 
``Lo, the trees are moaning loudly, underneath their hood-like shrouds, 
And the arch above us darkens, scarred with ragged thunder clouds!'' 
But the spirit answers nothing, and I linger all alone, 
Gazing through the moony vapours where the lovely Dream has flown; 

And my heart is beating sadly, and the music waxeth faint, 
Sailing up to holy Heaven, like the anthems of a Saint.
Written by Robert Seymour Bridges | Create an image from this poem

From The Testament of Beauty

 'Twas at that hour of beauty when the setting sun
squandereth his cloudy bed with rosy hues, to flood
his lov'd works as in turn he biddeth them Good-night;
and all the towers and temples and mansions of men
face him in bright farewell, ere they creep from their pomp
naked beneath the darkness;- while to mortal eyes
'tis given, ifso they close not of fatigue, nor strain
at lamplit tasks-'tis given, as for a royal boon
to beggarly outcasts in homeless vigil, to watch
where uncurtain's behind the great windows of space
Heav'n's jewel'd company circleth unapproachably-
'Twas at sunset that I, fleeing to hide my soul
in refuge of beauty from a mortal distress,
walk'd alone with the Muse in her garden of thought,
discoursing at liberty with the mazy dreams
that came wavering pertinaciously about me; as when
the small bats, issued from their hangings, flitter o'erhead
thru' the summer twilight, with thin cries to and fro
hunting in muffled flight atween the stars and flowers.
Then fell I in strange delusion, illusion strange to tell;
for as a man who lyeth fast asleep in his bed
may dream he waketh, and that he walketh upright
pursuing some endeavour in full conscience-so 'twas
with me; but contrawise; for being in truth awake
methought I slept and dreamt; and in thatt dream methought
I was telling a dream; nor telling was I as one
who, truly awaked from a true sleep, thinketh to tell
his dream to a friend, but for his scant remembrances
findeth no token of speech-it was not so with me;
for my tale was my dream and my dream the telling,
and I remember wondring the while I told it
how I told it so tellingly. And yet now 'twould seem
that Reason inveighed me with her old orderings;
as once when she took thought to adjust theology,
peopling the inane that vex'd her between God and man
with a hierarchy of angels; like those asteroids
wherewith she later fill'd the gap 'twixt Jove and Mars.
Verily by Beauty it is that we come as WISDOM,
yet not by Reason at Beauty; and now with many words
pleasing myself betimes I am fearing lest in the end
I play the tedious orator who maundereth on
for lack of heart to make an end of his nothings.
Wherefor as when a runner who hath run his round
handeth his staff away, and is glad of his rest,
here break I off, knowing the goal was not for me
the while I ran on telling of what cannot be told.

For not the Muse herself can tell of Goddes love;
which cometh to the child from the Mother's embrace,
an Idea spacious as the starry firmament's
inescapable infinity of radiant gaze,
that fadeth only as it outpasseth mortal sight:
and this direct contact is 't with eternities,
this springtide miracle of the soul's nativity
that oft hath set philosophers adrift in dream;
which thing Christ taught, when he set up a little child
to teach his first Apostles and to accuse their pride,
saying, 'Unless ye shall receive it as a child,
ye cannot enter into the kingdom of heaven.'
So thru'out all his young mental apprenticehood
the child of very simplicity, and in the grace
and beauteous attitude of infantine wonder,
is apt to absorb Ideas in primal purity,
and by the assimilation of thatt immortal food
may build immortal life; but ever with the growth
of understanding, as the sensible images
are more and more corrupt, troubled by questioning thought,
or with vainglory alloy'd, 'tis like enought the boy
in prospect of his manhood wil hav cast to th' winds
his Baptism with his Babyhood; nor might he escape
the fall of Ev'ryman, did not a second call
of nature's Love await him to confirm his Faith
or to revoke him if he is whollylapsed therefrom.
And so mighty is this second vision, which cometh
in puberty of body and adolescence of mind
that, forgetting his Mother, he calleth it 'first Love';
for it mocketh at suasion or stubbornness of heart,
as the oceantide of the omnipotent Pleasur of God,
flushing all avenues of life, and unawares
by thousandfold approach forestalling its full flood
with divination of the secret contacts of Love,--
of faintest ecstasies aslumber in Nature's calm,
like thought in a closed book, where some poet long since
sang his throbbing passion to immortal sleep-with coy
tenderness delicat as the shifting hues
that sanctify the silent dawn with wonder-gleams,
whose evanescence is the seal of their glory,
consumed in self-becoming of eternity;
til every moment as it flyeth, cryeth 'Seize!
Seize me ere I die! I am the Life of Life.'
'Tis thus by near approach to an eternal presence
man's heart with divine furor kindled and possess'd
falleth in blind surrender; and finding therewithal
in fullest devotion the full reconcilement
betwixt his animal and spiritual desires,
such welcome hour of bliss standeth for certain pledge
of happiness perdurable: and coud he sustain
this great enthusiasm, then the unbounded promise
would keep fulfilment; since the marriage of true minds
is thatt once fabled garden, amidst of which was set
the single Tree that bore such med'cinable fruit
that if man ate thereof he should liv for ever.
Friendship is in loving rather than in being lov'd,
which is its mutual benediction and recompense;
and tho' this be, and tho' love is from lovers learn'd,
it springeth none the less from the old essence of self.
No friendless man ('twas well said) can be truly himself;
what a man looketh for in his friend and findeth,
and loving self best, loveth better than himself,
is his own better self, his live lovable idea,
flowering by expansion in the loves of his life.
And in the nobility of our earthly friendships
we hav al grades of attainment, and the best may claim
perfection of kind; and so, since ther be many bonds
other than breed (friendships of lesser motiv, found
even in the brutes) and since our politick is based
on actual association of living men, 'twil come
that the spiritual idea of Friendship, the huge
vastidity of its essence, is fritter'd away
in observation of the usual habits of men;
as happ'd with the great moralist, where his book saith
that ther can be no friendship betwixt God and man
because of their unlimited disparity.
From this dilemma of pagan thought, this poison of faith,
Man-soul made glad escape in the worship of Christ;
for his humanity is God's Personality,
and communion with him is the life of the soul.
Of which living ideas (when in the struggle of thought
harden'd by language they became symbols of faith)
Reason builded her maze, wherefrom none should escape,
wandering intent to map and learn her tortuous clews,
chanting their clerkly creed to the high-echoing stones
of their hand-fashion'd temple: but the Wind of heav'n
bloweth where it listeth, and Christ yet walketh the earth,
and talketh still as with those two disciples once 
on the road to Emmaus-where they walk and are sad;
whose vision of him then was his victory over death,
thatt resurrection which all his lovers should share,
who in loving him had learn'd the Ethick of happiness;
whereby they too should come where he was ascended
to reign over men's hearts in the Kingdom of God.
Our happiest earthly comradeships hold a foretaste
of the feast of salvation and by thatt virtue in them
provoke desire beyond them to out-reach and surmount
their humanity in some superhumanity
and ultimat perfection: which, howe'ever 'tis found
or strangeley imagin'd, answereth to the need of each
and pulleth him instinctivly as to a final cause.
Thus unto all who hav found their high ideal in Christ,
Christ is to them the essence discern'd or undeiscern'd
of all their human friendships; and each lover of him
and of his beauty must be as a bud on the Vine
and hav participation in him; for Goddes love
is unescapable as nature's environment,
which if a man ignore or think to thrust it off
he is the ill-natured fool that runneth blindly on death.
This Individualism is man's true Socialism.
This is the rife Idea whose spiritual beauty
multiplieth in communion to transcendant might.
This is thatt excelent way whereon if we wil walk
all things shall be added unto us-thatt Love which inspired
the wayward Visionary in his doctrinal ode
to the three christian Graces, the Church's first hymn
and only deathless athanasian creed,--the which
'except a man believe he cannot be saved.'
This is the endearing bond whereby Christ's company
yet holdeth together on the truth of his promise
that he spake of his grat pity and trust in man's love,
'Lo, I am with you always ev'n to the end of the world.'
Truly the Soul returneth the body's loving
where it hath won it...and God so loveth the world...
and in the fellowship of the friendship of Christ
God is seen as the very self-essence of love,
Creator and mover of all as activ Lover of all,
self-express'd in not-self, mind and body, mother and child,
'twixt lover and loved, God and man: but ONE ETERNAL
in the love of Beauty and in the selfhood of Love.


Written by Thomas Hardy | Create an image from this poem

The Darkling Thrush

I leant upon a coppice gate
     When Frost was spectre-gray,
And Winter's dregs made desolate
     The weakening eye of day.
The tangled bine-stems scored the sky
     Like strings of broken lyres,
And all mankind that haunted nigh
     Had sought their household fires. 

The land's sharp features seemed to be
     The Century's corpse outleant,
His crypt the cloudy canopy,
     The wind his death-lament.
The ancient pulse of germ and birth
     Was shrunken hard and dry,
And every spirit upon earth
     Seemed fevourless as I.

At once a voice arose among
     The bleak twigs overhead
In a full-hearted evensong
     Of joy illimited;
An aged thrush, frail, gaunt, and small,
     In blast-beruffled plume,
Had chosen thus to fling his soul
     Upon the growing gloom.

So little cause for carolings
     Of such ecstatic sound
Was written on terrestrial things
     Afar or nigh around,
That I could think there trembled through
     His happy good-night air
Some blessed Hope, whereof he knew
     And I was unaware.
Written by Alexander Pushkin | Create an image from this poem

The Water-Nymph

 In lakeside leafy groves, a friar
Escaped all worries; there he passed
His summer days in constant prayer,
Deep studies and eternal fast.
Already with a humble shovel
The elder dug himself a grave -
As, calling saints to bless his hovel,
Death - nothing other - did he crave.

So once, upon a falling night, he
Was bowing by his wilted shack
With meekest prayer to the Almighty.
The grove was turning slowly black;
Above the lake a mist was lifting;
Through milky clouds across the sky
The ruddy moon was softly drifting,
When water drew the friar's eye...

He's looking puzzled, full of trouble,
Of fear he cannot quite explain,
He sees the waves begin to bubble
And suddenly grow calm again.
Then -- white as first snow in the highlands,
Light-footed as nocturnal shade,
There comes ashore, and sits in silence
Upon the bank, a naked maid.

She eyes the monk and brushes gently
Her hair, and water off her arms.
He shakes with fear and looks intently
At her, and at her lovely charms.
With eager hand she waves and beckons,
Nods quickly, smiles as from afar
And shoots, within two flashing seconds,
Into still water like a star.

The glum old man slept not an instant;
All day, not even once he prayed:
Before his eyes still hung and glistened
The wondrous, the relentless shade...
The grove puts on its gown of nightfall;
The moon walks on the cloudy floor;
And there's the maiden - pale, delightful,
Reclining on the spellbound shore.

She looks at him, her hair she brushes,
Blows airy kisses, gestures wild,
Plays with the waves - caresses, splashes -
Now laughs, now whimpers like a child,
Moans tenderly, calls louder, louder...
"Come, monk, come, monk! To me, to me!.."
Then - disappears in limpid water,
And all is silent instantly...

On the third day the zealous hermit
Was sitting by the shore, in love,
Awaiting the delightful mermaid,
As shade was covering the grove...
Dark ceded to the sun's emergence;
Our monk had wholly disappeared -
Before a crowd of local urchins,
While fishing, found his hoary beard.

Translated by: Genia Gurarie, summer of 1995
Copyright retained by Genia Gurarie.
email: egurarie@princeton.edu
http://www.princeton.edu/~egurarie/
For permission to reproduce, write personally to the translator.
Written by Edgar Allan Poe | Create an image from this poem

Fairy-Land

 Dim vales- and shadowy floods-
And cloudy-looking woods,
Whose forms we can't discover
For the tears that drip all over!
Huge moons there wax and wane-
Again- again- again-
Every moment of the night-
Forever changing places-
And they put out the star-light
With the breath from their pale faces.
About twelve by the moon-dial,
One more filmy than the rest
(A kind which, upon trial,
They have found to be the best)
Comes down- still down- and down,
With its centre on the crown
Of a mountain's eminence,
While its wide circumference
In easy drapery falls
Over hamlets, over halls,
Wherever they may be-
O'er the strange woods- o'er the sea-
Over spirits on the wing-
Over every drowsy thing-
And buries them up quite
In a labyrinth of light-
And then, how deep!- O, deep!
Is the passion of their sleep.
In the morning they arise,
And their moony covering
Is soaring in the skies,
With the tempests as they toss,
Like- almost anything-
Or a yellow Albatross.
They use that moon no more
For the same end as before-
Videlicet, a tent-
Which I think extravagant:
Its atomies, however,
Into a shower dissever,
Of which those butterflies
Of Earth, who seek the skies,
And so come down again,
(Never-contented things!)
Have brought a specimen
Upon their quivering wings.
Written by Charlotte Bronte | Create an image from this poem

Frances

 SHE will not sleep, for fear of dreams, 
But, rising, quits her restless bed, 
And walks where some beclouded beams 
Of moonlight through the hall are shed.

Obedient to the goad of grief, 
Her steps, now fast, now lingering slow, 
In varying motion seek relief 
From the Eumenides of woe.

Wringing her hands, at intervals­ 
But long as mute as phantom dim­ 
She glides along the dusky walls, 
Under the black oak rafters, grim.

The close air of the grated tower 
Stifles a heart that scarce can beat, 
And, though so late and lone the hour, 
Forth pass her wandering, faltering feet;

And on the pavement, spread before 
The long front of the mansion grey, 
Her steps imprint the night-frost hoar, 
Which pale on grass and granite lay.

Not long she stayed where misty moon 
And shimmering stars could on her look, 
But through the garden arch-way, soon 
Her strange and gloomy path she took.

Some firs, coeval with the tower, 
Their straight black boughs stretched o'er her head, 
Unseen, beneath this sable bower, 
Rustled her dress and rapid tread. 

There was an alcove in that shade, 
Screening a rustic-seat and stand; 
Weary she sat her down and laid 
Her hot brow on her burning hand.

To solitude and to the night, 
Some words she now, in murmurs, said; 
And, trickling through her fingers white, 
Some tears of misery she shed.

' God help me, in my grievous need, 
God help me, in my inward pain; 
Which cannot ask for pity's meed, 
Which has no license to complain;

Which must be borne, yet who can bear, 
Hours long, days long, a constant weight­ 
The yoke of absolute despair, 
A suffering wholly desolate ?

Who can for ever crush the heart, 
Restrain its throbbing, curb its life ? 
Dissemble truth with ceaseless art, 
With outward calm, mask inward strife ?'

She waited­as for some reply;
The still and cloudy night gave none; 
Erelong, with deep-drawn, trembling sigh, 
Her heavy plaint again begun. 

' Unloved­I love; unwept­I weep; 
Grief I restrain­hope I repress: 
Vain is this anguish­fixed and deep; 
Vainer, desires and dreams of bliss.

My love awakes no love again, 
My tears collect, and fall unfelt; 
My sorrow touches none with pain, 
My humble hopes to nothing melt.

For me the universe is dumb, 
Stone-deaf, and blank, and wholly blind; 
Life I must bound, existence sum 
In the strait limits of one mind;

That mind my own. Oh ! narrow cell; 
Dark­imageless­a living tomb ! 
There must I sleep, there wake and dwell 
Content, with palsy, pain, and gloom.'

Again she paused; a moan of pain, 
A stifled sob, alone was heard; 
Long silence followed­then again, 
Her voice the stagnant midnight stirred.

' Must it be so ? Is this my fate ?
Can I nor struggle, nor contend ?
And am I doomed for years to wait,
Watching death's lingering axe descend ? 

And when it falls, and when I die, 
What follows ? Vacant nothingness ? 
The blank of lost identity ? 
Erasure both of pain and bliss ?

I've heard of heaven­I would believe; 
For if this earth indeed be all, 
Who longest lives may deepest grieve, 
Most blest, whom sorrows soonest call.

Oh ! leaving disappointment here, 
Will man find hope on yonder coast ? 
Hope, which, on earth, shines never clear, 
And oft in clouds is wholly lost.

Will he hope's source of light behold, 
Fruition's spring, where doubts expire, 
And drink, in waves of living gold, 
Contentment, full, for long desire ?

Will he find bliss, which here he dreamed ? 
Rest, which was weariness on earth ? 
Knowledge, which, if o'er life it beamed, 
Served but to prove it void of worth ?

Will he find love without lust's leaven, 
Love fearless, tearless, perfect, pure, 
To all with equal bounty given, 
In all, unfeigned, unfailing, sure ? 

Will he, from penal sufferings free, 
Released from shroud and wormy clod, 
All calm and glorious, rise and see 
Creation's Sire­Existence' God ?

Then, glancing back on Time's brief woes, 
Will he behold them, fading, fly; 
Swept from Eternity's repose, 
Like sullying cloud, from pure blue sky ?

If so­endure, my weary frame; 
And when thy anguish strikes too deep, 
And when all troubled burns life's flame,
Think of the quiet, final sleep;

Think of the glorious waking-hour, 
Which will not dawn on grief and tears, 
But on a ransomed spirit's power, 
Certain, and free from mortal fears.

Seek now thy couch, and lie till morn, 
Then from thy chamber, calm, descend, 
With mind nor tossed, nor anguish-torn, 
But tranquil, fixed, to wait the end.

And when thy opening eyes shall see
Mementos, on the chamber wall,
Of one who has forgotten thee,
Shed not the tear of acrid gall. 

The tear which, welling from the heart, 
Burns where its drop corrosive falls, 
And makes each nerve, in torture, start, 
At feelings it too well recalls:

When the sweet hope of being loved, 
Threw Eden sunshine on life's way; 
When every sense and feeling proved 
Expectancy of brightest day.

When the hand trembled to receive 
A thrilling clasp, which seemed so near, 
And the heart ventured to believe,
Another heart esteemed it dear.

When words, half love, all tenderness, 
Were hourly heard, as hourly spoken, 
When the long, sunny days of bliss, 
Only by moonlight nights were broken.

Till drop by drop, the cup of joy 
Filled full, with purple light, was glowing, 
And Faith, which watched it, sparkling high, 
Still never dreamt the overflowing.

It fell not with a sudden crashing, 
It poured not out like open sluice; 
No, sparkling still, and redly flashing, 
Drained, drop by drop, the generous juice. 

I saw it sink, and strove to taste it, 
My eager lips approached the brim; 
The movement only seemed to waste it, 
It sank to dregs, all harsh and dim.

These I have drank, and they for ever 
Have poisoned life and love for me; 
A draught from Sodom's lake could never 
More fiery, salt, and bitter, be.

Oh ! Love was all a thin illusion; 
Joy, but the desert's flying stream; 
And, glancing back on long delusion,
My memory grasps a hollow dream.

Yet, whence that wondrous change of feeling, 
I never knew, and cannot learn, 
Nor why my lover's eye, congealing, 
Grew cold, and clouded, proud, and stern.

Nor wherefore, friendship's forms forgetting, 
He careless left, and cool withdrew; 
Nor spoke of grief, nor fond regretting, 
Nor even one glance of comfort threw.

And neither word nor token sending,
Of kindness, since the parting day,
His course, for distant regions bending,
Went, self-contained and calm, away. 

Oh, bitter, blighting, keen sensation, 
Which will not weaken, cannot die, 
Hasten thy work of desolation, 
And let my tortured spirit fly !

Vain as the passing gale, my crying; 
Though lightning-struck, I must live on; 
I know, at heart, there is no dying 
Of love, and ruined hope, alone.

Still strong, and young, and warm with vigour, 
Though scathed, I long shall greenly grow, 
And many a storm of wildest rigour 
Shall yet break o'er my shivered bough.

Rebellious now to blank inertion, 
My unused strength demands a task; 
Travel, and toil, and full exertion, 
Are the last, only boon I ask.

Whence, then, this vain and barren dreaming 
Of death, and dubious life to come ? 
I see a nearer beacon gleaming 
Over dejection's sea of gloom.

The very wildness of my sorrow 
Tells me I yet have innate force; 
My track of life has been too narrow, 
Effort shall trace a broader course. 

The world is not in yonder tower, 
Earth is not prisoned in that room, 
'Mid whose dark pannels, hour by hour, 
I've sat, the slave and prey of gloom.

One feeling­turned to utter anguish, 
Is not my being's only aim; 
When, lorn and loveless, life will languish, 
But courage can revive the flame.

He, when he left me, went a roving
To sunny climes, beyond the sea; 
And I, the weight of woe removing, 
Am free and fetterless as he.

New scenes, new language, skies less clouded,
May once more wake the wish to live; 
Strange, foreign towns, astir, and crowded, 
New pictures to the mind may give.

New forms and faces, passing ever, 
May hide the one I still retain, 
Defined, and fixed, and fading never, 
Stamped deep on vision, heart, and brain.

And we might meet­time may have changed him;
Chance may reveal the mystery,
The secret influence which estranged him;
Love may restore him yet to me. 

False thought­false hope­in scorn be banished ! 
I am not loved­nor loved have been; 
Recall not, then, the dreams scarce vanished, 
Traitors ! mislead me not again !

To words like yours I bid defiance, 
'Tis such my mental wreck have made; 
Of God alone, and self-reliance, 
I ask for solace­hope for aid.

Morn comes­and ere meridian glory
O'er these, my natal woods, shall smile, 
Both lonely wood and mansion hoary 
I'll leave behind, full many a mile.
Written by Thomas Hood | Create an image from this poem

Autumn

 I Saw old Autumn in the misty morn 
Stand shadowless like Silence, listening 
To silence, for no lonely bird would sing 
Into his hollow ear from woods forlorn, 
Nor lowly hedge nor solitary thorn;— 
Shaking his languid locks all dewy bright 
With tangled gossamer that fell by night, 
Pearling his coronet of golden corn. 

Where are the songs of Summer?—With the sun, 
Oping the dusky eyelids of the south, 
Till shade and silence waken up as one, 
And Morning sings with a warm odorous mouth. 
Where are the merry birds?—Away, away, 
On panting wings through the inclement skies, 
Lest owls should prey 
Undazzled at noonday, 
And tear with horny beak their lustrous eyes. 

Where are the blooms of Summer?—In the west, 
Blushing their last to the last sunny hours, 
When the mild Eve by sudden Night is prest 
Like tearful Proserpine, snatch'd from her flow'rs 
To a most gloomy breast. 
Where is the pride of Summer,—the green prime,— 
The many, many leaves all twinkling?—Three 
On the moss'd elm; three on the naked lime 
Trembling,—and one upon the old oak-tree! 
Where is the Dryad's immortality?— 
Gone into mournful cypress and dark yew, 
Or wearing the long gloomy Winter through 
In the smooth holly's green eternity. 

The squirrel gloats on his accomplish'd hoard, 
The ants have brimm'd their garners with ripe grain, 
And honey bees have stored 
The sweets of Summer in their luscious cells; 
The swallows all have wing'd across the main; 
But here the Autumn melancholy dwells, 
And sighs her tearful spells 
Amongst the sunless shadows of the plain. 
Alone, alone, 
Upon a mossy stone, 
She sits and reckons up the dead and gone 
With the last leaves for a love-rosary, 
Whilst all the wither'd world looks drearily, 
Like a dim picture of the drownèd past 
In the hush'd mind's mysterious far away, 
Doubtful what ghostly thing will steal the last 
Into that distance, gray upon the gray. 

O go and sit with her, and be o'ershaded 
Under the languid downfall of her hair: 
She wears a coronal of flowers faded 
Upon her forehead, and a face of care;— 
There is enough of wither'd everywhere 
To make her bower,—and enough of gloom; 
There is enough of sadness to invite, 
If only for the rose that died, whose doom 
Is Beauty's,—she that with the living bloom 
Of conscious cheeks most beautifies the light: 
There is enough of sorrowing, and quite 
Enough of bitter fruits the earth doth bear,— 
Enough of chilly droppings for her bowl; 
Enough of fear and shadowy despair, 
To frame her cloudy prison for the soul!

Book: Reflection on the Important Things