Famous Body Poems by Famous Poets

 1
I CELEBRATE myself; 
And what I assume you shall assume; 
For every atom belonging to me, as good belongs to you. 

I loafe and invite my Soul; 
I lean...Read More

 1
They that in play can do the thing they would,
Having an instinct throned in reason's place,
--And every perfect action hath the grace
Of indolence or thoughtless hardihood--
These are the best:...Read More

 BY 
QUEVEDO REDIVIVUS 


SUGGESTED BY THE COMPOSITION SO ENTITLED BY THE AUTHOR OF 'WAT TYLER' 

'A Daniel come to judgment! yes a Daniel!
I thank thee, Jew for teaching me...Read More

 1
AFOOT and light-hearted, I take to the open road, 
Healthy, free, the world before me, 
The long brown path before me, leading wherever I choose. 

Henceforth I ask not...Read More

 The Argument.


Rintrah roars & shakes his fires in the burdend air;
Hungry clouds swag on the deep

Once meek, and in a perilous path,
The just man kept his course along 
The...Read More

 It is full winter now: the trees are bare,
Save where the cattle huddle from the cold
Beneath the pine, for it doth never wear
The autumn's gaudy livery whose gold
Her jealous...Read More

 For 
 Carl Solomon 


 I 

I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by 
 madness, starving hysterical naked, 
dragging themselves through the negro streets at dawn...Read More

The IDIOT BOY.   'Tis eight o'clock,—a clear March night,  The moon is up—the sky is blue,  The owlet in the moonlight air,  He shouts from nobody knows where;  He lengthens out his lonely shout,  Halloo!...Read More

 DEDICATION 

Of great limbs gone to chaos,
A great face turned to night--
Why bend above a shapeless shroud
Seeking in such archaic cloud
Sight of strong lords and light?

Where seven sunken Englands
Lie...Read More

Copyright Anna Akhmatova
Copyright English translation by Ilya Shambat (ilya_shambat@yahoo.com)
Origin: http://www.geocities.com/ilya_shambat/akhmatova.html

 * I * 

We thought we were beggars, we thought we had nothing at all
But then when we started to...Read More

 CANTO I


 ONE night, when half my life behind me lay, 
 I wandered from the straight lost path afar. 
 Through the great dark was no releasing way;...Read More

 1
O TO make the most jubilant poem! 
Even to set off these, and merge with these, the carols of Death. 
O full of music! full of manhood, womanhood, infancy!...Read More

 Aye, but she?
Your other sister and my other soul
Grave Silence, lovelier
Than the three loveliest maidens, what of her?
Clio, not you,
Not you, Calliope,
Nor all your wanton line,
Not Beauty's perfect self...Read More

 1
AS I sat alone, by blue Ontario’s shore, 
As I mused of these mighty days, and of peace return’d, and the dead that return no
 more, 
A Phantom, gigantic,...Read More

 1.1 Lo now! four other acts upon the stage,
1.2 Childhood, and Youth, the Manly, and Old-age.
1.3 The first: son unto Phlegm, grand-child to water,
1.4 Unstable, supple, moist, and cold's...Read More

 Cass was the youngest and most beautiful of 5 sisters. Cass was the most beautiful girl
in town. 1/2 Indian with a supple and strange body, a snake-like and fiery...Read More

 A Poem for Three Voices

Setting: A Maternity Ward and round about

FIRST VOICE:
I am slow as the world. I am very patient,
Turning through my time, the suns and stars
Regarding me...Read More

 What is death, I ask. 
What is life, you ask. 
I give them both my buttocks, 
my two wheels rolling off toward Nirvana. 
They are neat as a wallet,...Read More

 Now Morn, her rosy steps in the eastern clime 
Advancing, sowed the earth with orient pearl, 
When Adam waked, so customed; for his sleep 
Was aery-light, from pure digestion...Read More

 SPLENDOR of ended day, floating and filling me! 
Hour prophetic—hour resuming the past! 
Inflating my throat—you, divine average! 
You, Earth and Life, till the last ray gleams, I sing....Read More

 I was in love with anatomy
the symmetry of my body
poised for flight,
the heights it would take
over parents, lovers, a keen
riding over truth and detail.
I thought growing up would be
this...Read More

 Smith, great writer of stories, drank; found it immortalized his pen;
Fused in his brain-pan, else a blank, heavens of glory now and then;
Gave him the magical genius touch; God-given...Read More

 As Parmigianino did it, the right hand
Bigger than the head, thrust at the viewer
And swerving easily away, as though to protect
What it advertises. A few leaded panes, old beams,
Fur,...Read More

 Earth in beauty dressed
Awaits returning spring.
All true love must die,
Alter at the best
Into some lesser thing.
Prove that I lie.

Such body lovers have,
Such exacting breath,
That they touch or sigh.
Every touch...Read More

Consider this small dust here running in the glass,
By atoms moved;
Could you believe that this the body was 
Of one that loved?
And in his mistress' flame, playing like a fly,
Turned...Read More