Written by
Edwin Arlington Robinson |
Here where the wind is always north-north-east
And children learn to walk on frozen toes,
Wonder begets an envy of all those
Who boil elsewhere with such a lyric yeast
Of love that you will hear them at a feast
Where demons would appeal for some repose,
Still clamoring where the chalice overflows
And crying wildest who have drunk the least.
Passion is here a soilure of the wits,
We're told, and Love a cross for them to bear;
Joy shivers in the corner where she knits
And Conscience always has the rocking-chair,
Cheerful as when she tortured into fits
The first cat that was ever killed by Care.
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Written by
Barry Tebb |
It was Karl Shapiro who wrote in his ‘Defence of Ignorance’ how many poets
Go mad or seem to be so and the majority think we should all be in jail
Or mental hospital and you have ended up in both places - fragile as bone china,
Your pale skin taut, your fingers clasped tight round a cup, sitting in a pool
Of midnight light, your cats stretched flat on your desk top’s scatter
Under the laughing eyes of Sexton and Lowell beneath Rollie McKenna’s seamless shutter.
Other nights you hunch in your rocking chair, spilling rhythms
Silently as a bat weaves through midnight’s jade waves
Your sibylline tongue tapping every twist or the syllable count
Deftly as Whistler mixed tints for Nocturnes’ nuances or shade
Or Hokusai tipped every wave crest.
You pause when down the hall a cat snatches at a forbidden plant,
“Schubert, Schubert”, you whisper urgently for it is night and there are neighbours.
The whistle of the forgotten kettle shrills: you turn down the gas
And scurry back to your poem as you would to a sick child
And ease the pain of disordered lines.
The face of your mother smiles like a Madonna bereft
And the faces of our children are always somewhere
As you focus your midnight eyes soft with tears.
You create to survive, a Balzac writing against the clock
A Baudelaire writing against the bailiff’s knock
A Val?ry in the throes of ‘Narcisse Parle’.
When a far clock chimes you sigh and set aside the page:
There is no telephone to ring or call: I am distant and sick,
Frail as an old stick
Our spirits rise and fall like the barometer’s needle
Jerk at a finger tapping on glass
Flashbacks or inspiration cry out at memory loss.
You peer through a magnifying glass at the typeface
Your knuckles white with pain as the sonnet starts to strain
Like a child coming to birth, the third you never bore.
All births, all babies, all poems are the same in coming
The spark of inspiration or spurt of semen,
The silent months of gestation, the waiting and worrying
Until the final agony of creation: for our first son’s
Birth at Oakes we had only a drawer for a crib.
Memories blur: all I know is that it was night
And at home as you always insisted, against all advice
But mine.
I remember feebly holding the mask in place
As the Indian woman doctor brutally stitched you without an anaesthetic
And the silence like no other when even the midwives
Had left: the child slept and we crept round his make-shift cradle.
At Brudenell Road again it was night in the cold house
With bare walls and plug-in fires: Bob, the real father
Paced the front, deep in symphonic thought:
Isaiah slept: I waited and watched - an undiagnosed breech
The doctor’s last minute discovery - made us rush
And scatter to have you admitted.
I fell asleep in the silent house and woke to a chaos
Of blood and towels and discarded dressings and a bemused five year old.
We brought you armsful of daffodils, Easter’s remainders.
“Happy Easter, are the father?” Staff beamed
As we sat by the bedside, Bob, myself and John MacKendrick,
Brecht and Rilke’s best translator
Soon to die by his own hand.
Poetry is born in the breech position
Poems beget poems.
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Written by
Katherine Mansfield |
To and fro, to and fro
In my little boat I go
Sailing far across the sea
All alone, just little me.
And the sea is big and strong
And the journey very long.
To and fro, to and fro
In my little boat I go.
Sea and sky, sea and sky,
Quietly on the deck I lie,
Having just a little rest.
I have really done my best
In an awful pirate fight,
But we cdaptured them all right.
Sea and sky, sea and sky,
Quietly on the deck I lie--
Far away, far away
From my home and from my play,
On a journey without end
Only with the sea for friend
And the fishes in the sea.
But they swim away from me
Far away, far away
From my home and from my play.
Then he cried "O Mother dear.
"
And he woke and sat upright,
They were in the rocking chair,
Mother's arms around him--tight.
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Written by
Louisa May Alcott |
Little shadows, little shadows
Dancing on the chamber wall,
While I sit beside the hearthstone
Where the red flames rise and fall.
Caps and nightgowns, caps and nightgowns,
My three antic shadows wear;
And no sound they make in playing,
For the six small feet are bare.
Dancing gayly, dancing gayly,
To and fro all together,
Like a family of daisies
Blown about in windy weather;
Nimble fairies, nimble fairies,
Playing pranks in the warm glow,
While I sing the nursery ditties
Childish phantoms love and know.
Now what happens, now what happens?
One small shadow's tumbled down:
I can see it on the carpet
Softly rubbing its hurt crown.
No one whimpers, no one whimpers;
A brave-hearted sprite is this:
See! the others offer comfort
In a silent, shadowy kiss.
Hush! they're creeping; hush! they're creeping,
Up about my rocking-chair:
I can feel their loving fingers
Clasp my neck and touch my hair.
Little shadows, little shadows,
Take me captive, hold me tight,
As they climb and cling and whisper,
"Mother dear, good night! good night!"
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Written by
Emily Dickinson |
The Night was wide, and furnished scant
With but a single Star --
That often as a Cloud it met --
Blew out itself -- for fear --
The Wind pursued the little Bush --
And drove away the Leaves
November left -- then clambered up
And fretted in the Eaves --
No Squirrel went abroad --
A Dog's belated feet
Like intermittent Plush, he heard
Adown the empty Street --
To feel if Blinds be fast --
And closer to the fire --
Her little Rocking Chair to draw --
And shiver for the Poor --
The Housewife's gentle Task --
How pleasanter -- said she
Unto the Sofa opposite --
The Sleet -- than May, no Thee --
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Written by
Russell Edson |
The living room is overgrown with grass.
It has
come up around the furniture.
It stretches through
the dining room, past the swinging door into the
kitchen.
It extends for miles and miles into the
walls .
.
.
There's treasure in grass, things dropped or put
there; a stick of rust that was once a penknife, a
grave marker.
.
.
All hidden in the grass at the
scalp of the window .
.
.
In a cellar under the grass an old man sits in a
rocking chair, rocking to and fro.
In his arms he
holds an infant, the infant body of himself.
And
he rocks to and fro under the grass in the
dark .
.
.
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Written by
Robert William Service |
Oh how I'd be gay and glad
If a little house I had,
Snuggled in a shady lot,
With behind a garden plot;
Simple grub, old duds to wear,
A book, a pipe, a rocking-chair .
.
.
You would never hear me grouse
If I had a little house.
Oh if I had just enough
Dough to buy the needful stuff;
Milk and porridge, toast and tea,
How contented I would be!
You could have your cake and wine,
I on cabbage soup would dine,
Joking to the journey's end -
Had I just enough to spend.
Oh had I no boss to please
I'd give thanks on bended knees;
Could I to myself belong,
I would fill the day with song.
Freedom's crust is sweeter far
Than control and caviar;
How my ragged hat I'd toss
If I didn't have a boss.
So you may see my point of view,
But there's nothing I can do;
Oh the weariness of work,
Duties that I may not shirk.
Though simplicity I crave
I must go down to my grave,
Bossed by bullion, crossed by care -
Just a poor damn millionaire.
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Written by
Robert William Service |
Where are the dames I used to know
In Dawson in the days of yore?
Alas, it's fifty years ago,
And most, I guess, have "gone before.
"
The swinging scythe is swift to mow
Alike the gallant and the fair;
And even I, with gouty toe,
Am glad to fill a rocking chair.
Ah me, I fear each gaysome girl
Who in champagne I used to toast,
or cozen in the waltz's whirl,
In now alas, a wistful ghost.
Oh where is Touch The Button Nell?
Or Minnie Dale or Rosa Lee,
Or Lorna Doone or Daisy Bell?
And where is Montreal Maree?
Fair ladies of my lusty youth,
I fear that you are dead and gone:
Where's Gertie of the Diamond Tooth,
And where the Mare of Oregon?
What's come of Violet de Vere,
Claw-fingered Kate and Gumboot Sue?
They've crossed the Great Divide, I fear;
Remembered now by just a few.
A few who like myself can see
Through half a century of haze
A heap of goodness in their glee
And kindness in their wanton ways.
Alas, my sourdough days are dead,
Yet let me toss a tankard down .
.
.
Here's hoping that you wed and bred,
And lives of circumspection led,
Gay dance-hall girls o Dawson Town!
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Written by
Robert William Service |
What would I choose to see when I
To this bright earth shall bid good-bye?
When fades forever from my sight
The world I've loved with long delight?
What would I pray to look on last,
When Death shall draw the Curtain fast?
I've loved the farewell of the Sun,
Low-lapsing after work well done;
Or leaping from a sea forlorn,
Gold-glad to greet a day new born.
.
.
.
Shall I elect to round my dream
The Sun I hail as Lord Supreme?
Ah no! Of Heaven's shining host,
It is the Moon I love the most;
And if, when I shall cease to be,
God lets me keep one memory
Of loveliness that held me thrall,
The Moon's the one I would recall.
.
.
.
The new Moon fine as pearly clip
From Cleopatra's finger-tip;
.
.
.
The ripe Moon vaulting o'er the trees
As ruddy as a Cheddar cheese;
.
.
.
The late Moon, frail and wanly fair,
Relaxed on silver rocking chair.
.
.
.
But most of all, the Moon intense
With radiant indifference;
So placid, glacid, pure, serene,
Of all perfection proudly Queen.
.
.
.
Oh Mistress Mine, let me adore
Your beauty but one moment more!
One last look .
.
.
Let the Curtain fall,
Then let me look no more at all.
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Written by
Robert William Service |
When I am old and worse for wear
I want to buy a rocking-chair,
And set it on a porch where shine
The stars of morning-glory vine;
With just beyond, a gleam of grass,
A shady street where people pass;
And some who come with time to spare,
To yarn beside my rocking-chair.
Then I will light my corn-cob pipe
And dose and dream and rarely gripe.
My morning paper on my knee
I won't allow to worry me.
For if I know the latest news
Is bad,--to read it I'll refuse,
Since I have always tried to see
The side of life that clicks with glee.
And looking back with days nigh done,
I feel I've had a heap of fun.
Of course I guess that more or less
It's you yourself make happiness
And if your needs are small and few,
Like me you may be happy too:
And end up with a hope, a prayer,
A chuckle in a rocking-chair.
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