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Best Famous Dig In Poems

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Written by Philip Levine | Create an image from this poem

The Negatives

 On March 1, 1958, four deserters from the French Army of North Africa, 
August Rein, Henri Bruette, Jack Dauville, & Thomas Delain, robbed a 
government pay station at Orleansville.
Because of the subsequent confession of Dauville the other three were captured or shot.
Dauville was given his freedom and returned to the land of his birth, the U.
S.
A.
AUGUST REIN: from a last camp near St.
Remy I dig in the soft earth all afternoon, spacing the holes a foot or so from the wall.
Tonight we eat potatoes, tomorrow rice and carrots.
The earth here is like the earth nowhere, ancient with wood rot.
How can anything come forth, I wonder; and the days are all alike, if there is more than one day.
If there is more of this I will not endure.
I have grown so used to being watched I can no longer sleep without my watcher.
The thing I fought against, the dark cape, crimsoned with terror that I so hated comforts me now.
Thomas is dead; insanity, prison, cowardice, or slow inner capitulation has found us all, and all men turn from us, knowing our pain is not theirs or caused by them.
HENRI BRUETTE: from a hospital in Algiers Dear Suzanne: this letter will not reach you because I can't write it; I have no pencil, no paper, only the blunt end of my anger.
My dear, if I had words how could I report the imperfect failure for which I began to die? I might begin by saying that it was for clarity, though I did not find it in terror: dubiously entered each act, unsure of who I was and what I did, touching my face for fear I was another inside my head I played back pictures of my childhood, of my wife even, for it was in her I found myself beaten, safe, and furthest from the present.
It is her face I see now though all I say is meant for you, her face in the slow agony of sexual release.
I cannot see you.
The dark wall ribbed with spittle on which I play my childhood brings me to this bed, mastered by what I was, betrayed by those I trusted.
The one word my mouth must open to is why.
JACK DAUVILLE: from a hotel in Tampa, Florida From Orleansville we drove south until we reached the hills, then east until the road stopped.
I was nervous and couldn't eat.
Thomas took over, told us when to think and when to ****.
We turned north and reached Blida by first dawn and the City by morning, having dumped our weapons beside an empty road.
We were free.
We parted, and to this hour I haven't seen them, except in photographs: the black hair and torn features of Thomas Delain captured a moment before his death on the pages of the world, smeared in the act.
I tortured myself with their betrayal: alone I hurled them into freedom, inner freedom which I can't find nor ever will until they are dead.
In my mind Delain stands against the wall precise in detail, steadied for the betrayal.
"La France C'Est Moi," he cried, but the irony was lost.
Since I returned to the U.
S.
nothing goes well.
I stay up too late, don't sleep, and am losing weight.
Thomas, I say, is dead, but what use telling myself what I won't believe.
The hotel quiets early at night, the aged brace themselves for another sleep, and offshore the sea quickens its pace.
I am suddenly old, caught in a strange country for which no man would die.
THOMAS DELAIN: from a journal found on his person At night wakened by the freight trains boring through the suburbs of Lyon, I watched first light corrode the darkness, disturb what little wildlife was left in the alleys: birds moved from branch to branch, and the dogs leapt at the garbage.
Winter numbed even the hearts of the young who had only their hearts.
We heard the war coming; the long wait was over, and we moved along the crowded roads south not looking for what lost loves fell by the roadsides.
To flee at all cost, that was my youth.
Here in the African night wakened by what I do not know and shivering in the heat, listen as the men fight with sleep.
Loosed from their weapons they cry out, frightened and young, who have never been children.
Once merely to be strong, to live, was moral.
Within these uniforms we accept the evil we were chosen to deliver, and no act human or benign can free us from ourselves.
Wait, sleep, blind soldiers of a blind will, and listen for that old command dreaming of authority.


Written by Kenn Nesbitt | Create an image from this poem

Our teacher likes Minecraft

Our teacher likes Minecraft.
She plays it all day.
She tells us to study
so she can go play.
She’ll dig in her mine,
going deeper and deeper,
then fight off a skeleton,
zombie, or creeper.
She’ll engineer buildings
from dirt, wood, and stone,
then go out exploring
the landscape alone.
She’ll build and collect and
she’ll run, jump, and swing.
There’s only one problem…
we don’t learn a thing.
 --Kenn Nesbitt

Copyright © Kenn Nesbitt 2016. All Rights Reserved.
Written by Robert Browning | Create an image from this poem

Holy-Cross Day

 ON WHICH THE JEWS WERE FORCED TO
ATTEND AN ANNUAL CHRISTIAN SERMON
IN ROME.
[``Now was come about Holy-Cross Day, and now must my lord preach his first sermon to the Jews: as it was of old cared for in tine merciful bowels of the Church, that, so to speak, a crumb at least from her conspicuous table here in Rome should be, though but once yearly, cast to the famishing dogs, under-trampled and bespitten-upon beneath the feet of the guests.
And a moving sight in truth, this, of so many of the besotted blind restif and ready-to-perish Hebrews! now maternally brought---nay (for He saith, `Compel them to come in') haled, as it were, by the head and hair, and against their obstinate hearts, to partake of the heavenly grace.
What awakening, what striving with tears, what working of a yeasty conscience! Nor was my lord wanting to himself on so apt an occasion; witness the abundance of conversions which did incontinently reward him: though not to my lord be altogether the glory.
''---_Diary by the Bishop's Secretary,_ 1600.
] What the Jews really said, on thus being driven to church, was rather to this effect:--- I.
Fee, faw, fum! bubble and squeak! Blessedest Thursday's the fat of the week.
Rumble and tumble, sleek and rough, Stinking and savoury, simug and gruff, Take the church-road, for the bell's due chime Gives us the summons---'tis sermon-time! II.
Bob, here's Barnabas! Job, that's you? Up stumps Solomon---bustling too? Shame, man! greedy beyond your years To handsel the bishop's shaving-shears? Fair play's a jewel! Leave friends in the lurch? Stand on a line ere you start for the church! III.
Higgledy piggledy, packed we lie, Rats in a hamper, swine in a stye, Wasps in a bottle, frogs in a sieve, Worms in a carcase, fleas in a sleeve.
Hist! square shoulders, settle your thumbs And buzz for the bishop---here he comes.
IV.
Bow, wow, wow---a bone for the dog! I liken his Grace to an acorned hog.
What, a boy at his side, with the bloom of a lass, To help and handle my lord's hour-glass! Didst ever behold so lithe a chine? His cheek hath laps like a fresh-singed swine.
V.
Aaron's asleep---shove hip to haunch, Or somebody deal him a dig in the paunch! Look at the purse with the tassel and knob, And the gown with the angel and thingumbob! What's he at, quotha? reading his text! Now you've his curtsey---and what comes next? VI.
See to our converts---you doomed black dozen--- No stealing away---nor cog nor cozen! You five, that were thieves, deserve it fairly; You seven, that were beggars, will live less sparely; You took your turn and dipped in the hat, Got fortune---and fortune gets you; mind that! VII.
Give your first groan---compunction's at work; And soft! from a Jew you mount to a Turk.
Lo, Micah,---the selfsame beard on chin He was four times already converted in! Here's a knife, clip quick---it's a sign of grace--- Or he ruins us all with his hanging-face.
VIII.
Whom now is the bishop a-leering at? I know a point where his text falls pat.
I'll tell him to-morrow, a word just now Went to my heart and made me vow I meddle no more with the worst of trades--- Let somebody else pay his serenades.
IX.
Groan all together now, whee-hee-hee! It's a-work, it's a-work, ah, woe is me! It began, when a herd of us, picked and placed, Were spurred through the Corso, stripped to the waist; Jew brutes, with sweat and blood well spent To usher in worthily Christian Lent.
X.
It grew, when the hangman entered our bounds, Yelled, pricked us out to his church like hounds: It got to a pitch, when the hand indeed Which gutted my purse would throttle my creed: And it overflows when, to even the odd, Men I helped to their sins help me to their God.
XI.
But now, while the scapegoats leave our flock, And the rest sit silent and count the clock, Since forced to muse the appointed time On these precious facts and truths sublime,--- Let us fitly ennploy it, under our breath, In saying Ben Ezra's Song of Death.
XII.
For Rabbi Ben Ezra, the night he died, Called sons and sons' sons to his side, And spoke, ``This world has been harsh and strange; ``Something is wrong: there needeth a change.
``But what, or where? at the last or first? ``In one point only we sinned, at worst.
XIII.
``The Lord will have mercy on Jacob yet, ``And again in his border see Israel set.
``When Judah beholds Jerusalem, ``The stranger-seed shall be joined to them: ``To Jacob's House shall the Gentiles cleave.
``So the Prophet saith and his sons believe.
XIV.
``Ay, the children of the chosen race ``Shall carry and bring them to their place: ``In the land of the Lord shall lead the same, ``Bondsmen and handmaids.
Who shall blame, ``When the slaves enslave, the oppressed ones o'er ``The oppressor triumph for evermore? XV.
``God spoke, and gave us the word to keep, ``Bade never fold the hands nor sleep ``'Mid a faithless world,---at watch and ward, ``Till Christ at the end relieve our guard.
``By His servant Moses the watch was set: ``Though near upon cock-crow, we keep it yet.
XVI.
``Thou! if thou wast He, who at mid-watch came, ``By the starlight, naming a dubious name! ``And if, too heavy with sleep---too rash ``With fear---O Thou, if that martyr-gash ``Fell on Thee coming to take thine own, ``And we gave the Cross, when we owed the Throne--- XVII.
``Thou art the Judge.
We are bruised thus.
``But, the Judgment over, join sides with us! ``Thine too is the cause! and not more thine ``Than ours, is the work of these dogs and swine, ``Whose life laughs through and spits at their creed! ``Who maintain Thee in word, and defy Thee in deed! XVIII.
``We withstood Christ then? Be mindful how ``At least we withstand Barabbas now! ``Was our outrage sore? But the worst we spared, ``To have called these---Christians, had we dared! ``Let defiance to them pay mistrust of Thee, ``And Rome make amends for Calvary! XIX.
``By the torture, prolonged from age to age, ``By the infamy, Israel's heritage, ``By the Ghetto's plague, by the garb's disgrace, ``By the badge of shame, by the felon's place, ``By the branding-tool, the bloody whip, ``And the summons to Christian fellowship,--- XX.
``We boast our proof that at least the Jew ``Would wrest Christ's name from the Devil's crew.
``Thy face took never so deep a shade ``But we fought them in it, God our aid! ``A trophy to bear, as we marchs, thy band, ``South, East, and on to the Pleasant Land!'' [_Pope Gregory XVI.
abolished this bad business of the Sermon.
_---R.
B.
]
Written by Denise Levertov | Create an image from this poem

Settling

 I was welcomed here—clear gold
of late summer, of opening autumn, 
the dawn eagle sunning himself on the highest tree, 
the mountain revealing herself unclouded, her snow 
tinted apricot as she looked west, 
Tolerant, in her steadfastness, of the restless sun 
forever rising and setting.
Now I am given a taste of the grey foretold by all and sundry, a grey both heavy and chill.
I've boasted I would not care, I'm London-born.
And I won't.
I'll dig in, into my days, having come here to live, not to visit.
Grey is the price of neighboring with eagles, of knowing a mountain's vast presence, seen or unseen.
Written by Dorothy Parker | Create an image from this poem

Song of Perfect Propriety

 Oh, I should like to ride the seas,
A roaring buccaneer;
A cutlass banging at my knees,
A dirk behind my ear.
And when my captives' chains would clank I'd howl with glee and drink, And then fling out the quivering plank And watch the beggars sink.
I'd like to straddle gory decks, And dig in laden sands, And know the feel of throbbing necks Between my knotted hands.
Oh, I should like to strut and curse Among my blackguard crew.
.
.
.
But I am writing little verse, As little ladies do.
Oh, I should like to dance and laugh And pose and preen and sway, And rip the hearts of men in half, And toss the bits away.
I'd like to view the reeling years Through unastonished eyes, And dip my finger-tips in tears, And give my smiles for sighs.
I'd stroll beyond the ancient bounds, And tap at fastened gates, And hear the prettiest of sound- The clink of shattered fates.
My slaves I'd like to bind with thongs That cut and burn and chill.
.
.
.
But I am writing little songs, As little ladies will.


Written by Amy Lowell | Create an image from this poem

The Last Quarter of the Moon

 How long shall I tarnish the mirror of life,
A spatter of rust on its polished steel!
The seasons reel
Like a goaded wheel.
Half-numb, half-maddened, my days are strife.
The night is sliding towards the dawn, And upturned hills crouch at autumn's knees.
A torn moon flees Through the hemlock trees, The hours have gnawed it to feed their spawn.
Pursuing and jeering the misshapen thing A rabble of clouds flares out of the east.
Like dogs unleashed After a beast, They stream on the sky, an outflung string.
A desolate wind, through the unpeopled dark, Shakes the bushes and whistles through empty nests, And the fierce unrests I keep as guests Crowd my brain with corpses, pallid and stark.
Leave me in peace, O Spectres, who haunt My labouring mind, I have fought and failed.
I have not quailed, I was all unmailed And naked I strove, 'tis my only vaunt.
The moon drops into the silver day As waking out of her swoon she comes.
I hear the drums Of millenniums Beating the mornings I still must stay.
The years I must watch go in and out, While I build with water, and dig in air, And the trumpets blare Hollow despair, The shuddering trumpets of utter rout.
An atom tossed in a chaos made Of yeasting worlds, which bubble and foam.
Whence have I come? What would be home? I hear no answer.
I am afraid! I crave to be lost like a wind-blown flame.
Pushed into nothingness by a breath, And quench in a wreath Of engulfing death This fight for a God, or this devil's game.

Book: Radiant Verses: A Journey Through Inspiring Poetry