Sara Teasdale Poems

A collection of select Sara Teasdale famous poems that were written by Sara Teasdale or written about the poet by other famous poets. PoetrySoup is a comprehensive educational resource of the greatest poems and poets on history.

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I Am Not Yours

by Sara Teasdale
 I am not yours, not lost in you,
 Not lost, although I long to be
Lost as a candle lit at noon,
 Lost as a snowflake in the sea.

You love me, and I find you still
 A spirit beautiful and bright,
Yet I am I, who long to be
 Lost as a light is lost in light.

Oh plunge me deep in...Read more of this...

Love And Death

by Sara Teasdale
 Shall we, too, rise forgetful from our sleep,
And shall my soul that lies within your hand
Remember nothing, as the blowing sand
Forgets the palm where long blue shadows creep
When winds along the darkened desert sweep?

Or would it still remember, tho' it spanned
A thousand heavens, while the planets fanned
The vacant ether with their voices deep?
Soul of my soul, no word shall...Read more of this...

At Midnight

by Sara Teasdale
 Now at last I have come to see what life is,
Nothing is ever ended, everything only begun,
And the brave victories that seem so splendid
Are never really won.

Even love that I built my spirit's house for,
Comes like a brooding and a baffled guest,
And music and men's praise and even laughter
Are not so good as rest....Read more of this...

But Not To Me

by Sara Teasdale
 The April night is still and sweet
 With flowers on every tree;
Peace comes to them on quiet feet,
 But not to me.

My peace is hidden in his breast
 Where I shall never be;
Love comes to-night to all the rest,
 But not to me....Read more of this...

I Am Not Yours

by Sara Teasdale
I am not yours, not lost in you, 
Not lost, although I long to be 
Lost as a candle lit at noon, 
Lost as a snowflake in the sea. 

You love me, and I find you still 
A spirit beautiful and bright, 
Yet I am I, who long to be 
Lost as a light is lost in light. 

Oh plunge...Read more of this...

Fault

by Sara Teasdale
 They came to tell your faults to me,
They named them over one by one;
I laughed aloud when they were done,
I knew them all so well before, --
Oh, they were blind, too blind to see
Your faults had made me love you more....Read more of this...

A Winter Blue Jay

by Sara Teasdale
Crisply the bright snow whispered,
Crunching beneath our feet;
Behind us as we walked along the parkway,
Our shadows danced,
Fantastic shapes in vivid blue.
Across the lake the skaters
Flew to and fro,
With sharp turns weaving
A frail invisible net.
In ecstasy the earth
Drank the silver sunlight;
In ecstasy the skaters
Drank the wine of speed;
In ecstasy we laughed
Drinking the wine of love.
Had not the music of our joy
Sounded...Read more of this...

I Have Loved Hours At Sea

by Sara Teasdale
 I have loved hours at sea, gray cities,
The fragile secret of a flower,
Music, the making of a poem
That gave me heaven for an hour;

First stars above a snowy hill,
Voices of people kindly and wise,
And the great look of love, long hidden,
Found at last in meeting eyes.

I have loved much and been loved deeply --
Oh when my spirit's fire burns...Read more of this...

The Fountain

by Sara Teasdale
 Oh in the deep blue night
The fountain sang alone;
It sang to the drowsy heart
Of a satyr carved in stone.

The fountain sang and sang
But the satyr never stirred--
Only the great white moon
In the empty heaven heard.

The fountain sang and sang
And on the marble rim
The milk-white peacocks slept,
Their dreams were strange and dim.

Bright dew was on the grass,
And on the ilex...Read more of this...

Spring Rain

by Sara Teasdale
 I thought I had forgotten,
 But it all came back again
To-night with the first spring thunder
 In a rush of rain.

I remembered a darkened doorway
 Where we stood while the storm swept by,
Thunder gripping the earth
 And lightning scrawled on the sky.

The passing motor busses swayed,
 For the street was a river of rain,
Lashed into little golden waves
 In...Read more of this...

After Parting

by Sara Teasdale
 Oh, I have sown my love so wide
 That he will find it everywhere;
It will awake him in the night,
 It will enfold him in the air.

I set my shadow in his sight
 And I have winged it with desire,
That it may be a cloud by day,
 And in the night a shaft of fire....Read more of this...

Sleepless

by Sara Teasdale
 If I could have your arms tonight-
But half the world and the broken sea
Lie between you and me.

The autumn rain reverberates in the courtyard,
Beating all night against the barren stone,
The sound of useless rain in the desolate courtyard
Makes me more alone.

If you were here, if you were only here-
My blood cries out to you all night in vain
As sleepless...Read more of this...

If Death Is Kind

by Sara Teasdale
 Perhaps if Death is kind, and there can be returning,
We will come back to earth some fragrant night,
And take these lanes to find the sea, and bending
Breathe the same honeysuckle, low and white.

We will come down at night to these resounding beaches
And the long gentle thunder of the sea,
Here for a single hour in the wide starlight
We shall be...Read more of this...

Doubt

by Sara Teasdale
 My soul lives in my body's house,
 And you have both the house and her—
But sometimes she is less your own
 Than a wild, gay adventurer;
A restless and an eager wraith,
 How can I tell what she will do—
Oh, I am sure of my body's faith,
 But what if my soul broke faith with you?...Read more of this...

A Cry

by Sara Teasdale
 Oh, there are eyes that he can see,
 And hands to make his hands rejoice,
But to my lover I must be
 Only a voice.

Oh, there are breasts to bear his head,
 And lips whereon his lips can lie,
But I must be till I am dead
 Only a cry....Read more of this...

On A March Day

by Sara Teasdale
 Here in the teeth of this triumphant wind 
 That shakes the naked shadows on the ground, 
Making a key-board of the earth to strike 
 From clattering tree and hedge a separate sound, 

Bear witness for me that I loved my life, 
 All things that hurt me and all things that healed, 
And that I swore it...Read more of this...

Like Barley Bending

by Sara Teasdale
 Like barley bending
In low fields by the sea,
Singing in hard wind
Ceaselessly;

Like barley bending
And rising again,
So would I, unbroken,
Rise from pain;

So would I softly,
Day long, night long,
Change my sorrow
Into song....Read more of this...

Come

by Sara Teasdale
 Come, when the pale moon like a petal
 Floats in the pearly dusk of spring,
Come with arms outstretched to take me,
 Come with lips pursed up to cling.

Come, for life is a frail moth flying,
 Caught in the web of the years that pass,
And soon we two, so warm and eager,
 Will be as the gray stones in the...Read more of this...

Tides

by Sara Teasdale
 Love in my heart was a fresh tide flowing
 Where the starlike sea gulls soar;
The sun was keen and the foam was blowing
 High on the rocky shore.

But now in the dusk the tide is turning,
 Lower the sea gulls soar,
And the waves that rose in resistless yearning
 Are broken forevermore....Read more of this...

It Will Not Change

by Sara Teasdale
 It will not change now
After so many years;
Life has not broken it
With parting or tears;
Death will not alter it,
It will live on
In all my songs for you
When I am gone....Read more of this...

Longing

by Sara Teasdale
 I am not sorry for my soul
That it must go unsatisfied,
For it can live a thousand times,
Eternity is deep and wide.

I am not sorry for my soul,
But oh, my body that must go
Back to a little drift of dust
Without the joy it longed to know....Read more of this...

Tonight

by Sara Teasdale
 The moon is a curving flower of gold,
 The sky is still and blue;
The moon was made for the sky to hold,
 And I for you.

The moon is a flower without a stem,
 The sky is luminous;
Eternity was made for them,
 To-night for us....Read more of this...

After Love

by Sara Teasdale
 There is no magic any more,
 We meet as other people do,
You work no miracle for me
 Nor I for you.

You were the wind and I the sea --
 There is no splendor any more,
I have grown listless as the pool
 Beside the shore.

But though the pool is safe from storm
 And from the tide has found surcease,
It grows...Read more of this...

A November Night

by Sara Teasdale
 There! See the line of lights,
A chain of stars down either side the street --
Why can't you lift the chain and give it to me,
A necklace for my throat? I'd twist it round
And you could play with it. You smile at me
As though I were a little dreamy child
Behind whose eyes the fairies live. . . . And see,
The...Read more of this...

To E

by Sara Teasdale
 I have remembered beauty in the night,
 Against black silences I waked to see
 A shower of sunlight over Italy
And green Ravello dreaming on her height;
I have remembered music in the dark,
 The clean swift brightness of a fugue of Bach's,
 And running water singing on the rocks
When once in English woods I heard a lark.

But all remembered beauty...Read more of this...

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