Hamara Forums > English Poetry

noorie

Feb 29 2008, 09:36 AM

The Strangest Creature On Earth
- Nazim Hikmet

You're like a scorpion, my brother,
you're in a cowardly darkness like a scorpion.
You're like a sparrow, my brother,
you're in a sparrow's flutter.
You're like a mussel, my brother,
closed as a mussel, tranquil.
And you're dreadful
as the mouth of an extinct volcano, my brother.
Not one,
not five,
you're in millions, unfortunately.
You're like a sheep, my brother,
when the cloaked drover raises his stick
you join the herd at once
and almost proudly run to the slaughter house.
You're the strangest creature on earth, that is,
even stranger than the fish in the sea
which doesn't know the sea.
And in this world, this tyranny
is thanks to you.
And if we're starved, tired, covered with blood
and if we're still being crushed like grapes for our wine
the fault is yours,
- though I can't bring myself to say it -
but a lot of it, my dear brother, is yours.

1947
tr. by Fuat Engin

noorie

Feb 29 2008, 09:43 AM

Love is Enough
-William Morris

Love is enough: though the world be a-waning,
And the woods have no voice but the voice of complaining,
Though the skies be too dark for dim eyes to discover
The gold-cups and daisies fair blooming thereunder,
Though the hills be held shadows, and the sea a dark wonder,
And this day draw a veil over all deeds passed over,
Yet their hands shall not tremble, their feet shall not falter:
The void shall not weary, the fear shall not alter
These lips and these eyes of the loved and the lover.

noorie

Mar 2 2008, 03:30 PM

Time Does Not Bring Relief: You All Have Lied
- Edna St. Vincent Millay

Time does not bring relief; you all have lied
Who told me time would ease me of my pain!
I miss him in the weeping of the rain;
I want him at the shrinking of the tide;
The old snows melt from every mountain-side,
And last year’s leaves are smoke in every lane;
But last year’s bitter loving must remain
Heaped on my heart, and my old thoughts abide.
There are a hundred places where I fear
To go,—so with his memory they brim.
And entering with relief some quiet place
Where never fell his foot or shone his face
I say, “There is no memory of him here!”
And so stand stricken, so remembering him.

noorie

Mar 2 2008, 03:32 PM

The Day is Done
- Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

The day is done, and the darkness
Falls from the wings of Night,
As a feather is wafted downward
From an eagle in his flight.

I see the lights of the village
Gleam through the rain and the mist,
And a feeling of sadness comes o'er me
That my soul cannot resist:

A feeling of sadness and longing,
That is not akin to pain,
And resembles sorrow only
As the mist resembles the rain.

Come, read to me some poem,
Some simple and heartfelt lay,
That shall soothe this restless feeling,
And banish the thoughts of day.

Not from the grand old masters,
Not from the bards sublime,
Whose distant footsteps echo
Through the corridors of Time.

For, like strains of martial music,
Their mighty thoughts suggest
Life's endless toil and endeavor;
And to-night I long for rest.

Read from some humbler poet,
Whose songs gushed from his heart,
As showers from the clouds of summer,
Or tears from the eyelids start;

Who, through long days of labor,
And nights devoid of ease,
Still heard in his soul the music
Of wonderful melodies.

Such songs have power to quiet
The restless pulse of care,
And come like the benediction
That follows after prayer.

Then read from the treasured volume
The poem of thy choice,
And lend to the rhyme of the poet
The beauty of thy voice.

And the night shall be filled with music,
And the cares, that infest the day,
Shall fold their tents, like the Arabs,
And as silently steal away.

noorie

Mar 4 2008, 06:00 PM

Belief
-Josephine Miles

Mother said to call her if the H-bomb exploded
And I said I would, and it about did
When Louis my brother robbed a service station
And lay cursing on the oily cement in handcuffs.

But by that time it was too late to tell Mother,
She was too sick to worry the life out of her
Over why why. Causation is sequence
And everything is one thing after another.

Besides, my other brother, Eddie, had got to be President,
And you can't ask too much of one family.
The chances were as good for a good future
As bad for a bad one.

Therefore it was surprising that, as we kept the newspapers from Mother,
She died feeling responsible for a disaster unverified,
Murmuring, in her sleep as it seemed, the ancient slogan
Noblesse oblige.

noorie

Mar 4 2008, 06:07 PM

Carpentry
- Carl Dennis

Carpenters whose wives have run off
Are sometimes discovered weeping on the job.
But even then they don’t complain of their work.

Whitman’s father was a carpenter.
He was so happy hammering houses
That he jumped with a shout from the roof beam
And rolled with a yawp in the timothy.
This led his son to conclude wrongly
That all workmen are singers.

Whitman’s father was weak.
He had trouble holding a job.
He hoped that the house he was working on
Would be lived in by a man more steady
Than he was, who would earn his sleep,
Dreaming easy under a sound roof
With no rain in his face.

Of course, there are bad carpenters everywhere.
They don’t care if the walls don’t meet.
“After all,” they argue,
“We’re not building airplanes.”
But Whitman’s father measured his nails.
Many mornings, clacking his plane,
He crooned a song to the corners,
Urging them on to a snug fit.
No needles of heat will escape through a crack
If he can help it, no threads of light.

noorie

Mar 4 2008, 06:12 PM

Childhood’s Retreat
- Robert Duncan

It’s in the perilous boughs of the tree
out of blue sky the wind
sings loudest surrounding me.

And solitude, a wild solitude’s
revealed, fearfully, high I’d climb
into the shaking uncertainties,

part out of longing, part daring my self,
part to see that
widening of the world,

part to find my own, my secret
hiding sense and place, where from afar
all voices and scenes come back

—the barking of a dog, autumnal burnings,
far calls, close calls— the boy I was
calls out to me
here the man where I am “Look!
I’ve been where you
most fear to be.”

noorie

Mar 4 2008, 06:18 PM

Marriage a-la-Mode
- John Dryden

Why should a foolish marriage vow,
Which long ago was made,
Oblige us to each other now
When passion is decay'd?
We lov'd, and we lov'd, as long as we could,
Till our love was lov'd out in us both:
But our marriage is dead, when the pleasure is fled:
'Twas pleasure first made it an oath.

If I have pleasures for a friend,
And farther love in store,
What wrong has he whose joys did end,
And who could give no more?
'Tis a madness that he should be jealous of me,
Or that I should bar him of another:
For all we can gain is to give our selves pain,
When neither can hinder the other.

noorie

Mar 4 2008, 06:22 PM

Meeting at Night
-Robert Browning

I
The grey sea and the long black land;
And the yellow half-moon large and low;
And the startled little waves that leap
In fiery ringlets from their sleep,
As I gain the cove with pushing prow,
And quench its speed i' the slushy sand.

II
Then a mile of warm sea-scented beach;
Three fields to cross till a farm appears;
A tap at the pane, the quick sharp scratch
And blue spurt of a lighted match,
And a voice less loud, thro' its joys and fears,
Than the two hearts beating each to each!

pinky

Mar 4 2008, 06:22 PM

Noorie, thanks a lot for all the poems that you have posted,such a beautiful collection..

part out of longing, part daring my self,
part to see that
widening of the world,

part to find my own, my secret
hiding sense and place, where from afar
all voices and scenes come back ...

.....................................

Therefore it was surprising that, as we kept the newspapers from Mother,
She died feeling responsible for a disaster unverified,
Murmuring, in her sleep as it seemed, the ancient slogan
Noblesse oblige.

.......................................

Time does not bring relief; you all have lied
Who told me time would ease me of my pain!

.......................................

you join the herd at once
and almost proudly run to the slaughter house.
You're the strangest creature on earth

.......................................

Thanks

noorie

Mar 4 2008, 06:25 PM

Mutability
- Percy Bysshe Shelley

The flower that smiles to-day
To-morrow dies;
All that we wish to stay
Tempts and then flies.
What is this world's delight?
Lightning that mocks the night,
Brief even as bright.

Virtue, how frail it is!
Friendship how rare!
Love, how it sells poor bliss
For proud despair!
But we, though soon they fall,
Survive their joy, and all
Which ours we call.

Whilst skies are blue and bright,
Whilst flowers are gay,
Whilst eyes that change ere night
Make glad the day;
Whilst yet the calm hours creep,
Dream thou—and from thy sleep
Then wake to weep.

noorie

Mar 4 2008, 06:37 PM

QUOTE(pinky @ Mar 4 2008, 06:22 PM)

Noorie, thanks a lot for all the poems that you have posted,such a beautiful collection..

part out of longing, part daring my self,
part to see that
widening of the world,

part to find my own, my secret
hiding sense and place, where from afar
all voices and scenes come back ...

.....................................

Therefore it was surprising that, as we kept the newspapers from Mother,
She died feeling responsible for a disaster unverified,
Murmuring, in her sleep as it seemed, the ancient slogan
Noblesse oblige.

.......................................

Time does not bring relief; you all have lied
Who told me time would ease me of my pain!

.......................................

you join the herd at once
and almost proudly run to the slaughter house.
You're the strangest creature on earth

.......................................

Thanks

Pinkz, thanks so much!

This is one of the few threads that I know where I won't be unwelcome.
Catch 22, my gratitude to you.

pinky

Mar 4 2008, 06:40 PM

QUOTE(noorie @ Mar 4 2008, 06:37 PM)

QUOTE(pinky @ Mar 4 2008, 06:22 PM)

Noorie, thanks a lot for all the poems that you have posted,such a beautiful collection..

part out of longing, part daring my self,
part to see that
widening of the world,

part to find my own, my secret
hiding sense and place, where from afar
all voices and scenes come back ...

.....................................

Therefore it was surprising that, as we kept the newspapers from Mother,
She died feeling responsible for a disaster unverified,
Murmuring, in her sleep as it seemed, the ancient slogan
Noblesse oblige.

.......................................

Time does not bring relief; you all have lied
Who told me time would ease me of my pain!

.......................................

you join the herd at once
and almost proudly run to the slaughter house.
You're the strangest creature on earth

.......................................

Thanks

Pinkz, thanks so much!

This is one of the few threads that I know where I won't be unwelcome.
Catch 22, my gratitude to you.

I feel the same noorie, what a great thread..

you are most welcome everywhere noorie

iiluu

Mar 4 2008, 06:44 PM

QUOTE(noorie @ Mar 4 2008, 06:37 PM)

QUOTE(pinky @ Mar 4 2008, 06:22 PM)

Noorie, thanks a lot for all the poems that you have posted,such a beautiful collection..

part out of longing, part daring my self,
part to see that
widening of the world,

part to find my own, my secret
hiding sense and place, where from afar
all voices and scenes come back ...

.....................................

Therefore it was surprising that, as we kept the newspapers from Mother,
She died feeling responsible for a disaster unverified,
Murmuring, in her sleep as it seemed, the ancient slogan
Noblesse oblige.

.......................................

Time does not bring relief; you all have lied
Who told me time would ease me of my pain!

.......................................

you join the herd at once
and almost proudly run to the slaughter house.
You're the strangest creature on earth

.......................................

Thanks

Pinkz, thanks so much!

This is one of the few threads that I know where I won't be unwelcome.
Catch 22 , my gratitude to you.

More Poems...

noorie

Mar 5 2008, 04:03 PM

QUOTE(pinky @ Mar 4 2008, 06:40 PM)

QUOTE(noorie @ Mar 4 2008, 06:37 PM)

QUOTE(pinky @ Mar 4 2008, 06:22 PM)

Noorie, thanks a lot for all the poems that you have posted,such a beautiful collection..

part out of longing, part daring my self,
part to see that
widening of the world,

part to find my own, my secret
hiding sense and place, where from afar
all voices and scenes come back ...

.....................................

Therefore it was surprising that, as we kept the newspapers from Mother,
She died feeling responsible for a disaster unverified,
Murmuring, in her sleep as it seemed, the ancient slogan
Noblesse oblige.

.......................................

Time does not bring relief; you all have lied
Who told me time would ease me of my pain!

.......................................

you join the herd at once
and almost proudly run to the slaughter house.
You're the strangest creature on earth

.......................................

Thanks

Pinkz, thanks so much!

This is one of the few threads that I know where I won't be unwelcome.
Catch 22, my gratitude to you.

I feel the same noorie, what a great thread..

you are most welcome everywhere noorie

Catch is a great guy. I wish he hadn't gone away.

Pinkz, about that "welcome" bit, I am not so sure. That's why I don't visit other people's threads anymore.

noorie

Mar 5 2008, 04:06 PM

Sympathy
- Paul Laurence Dunbar

I know what the caged bird feels, alas!
When the sun is bright on the upland slopes;
When the wind stirs soft through the springing grass,
And the river flows like a stream of glass;
When the first bird sings and the first bud opes,
And the faint perfume from its chalice steals—
I know what the caged bird feels!

I know why the caged bird beats his wing
Till its blood is red on the cruel bars;
For he must fly back to his perch and cling
When he fain would be on the bough a-swing;
And a pain still throbs in the old, old scars
And they pulse again with a keener sting—
I know why he beats his wing!

I know why the caged bird sings, ah me,
When his wing is bruised and his bosom sore,—
When he beats his bars and he would be free;
It is not a carol of joy or glee,
But a prayer that he sends from his heart’s deep core,
But a plea, that upward to Heaven he flings—
I know why the caged bird sings!

noorie

Mar 5 2008, 04:09 PM

The Smile
- William Blake

There is a smile of love,
And there is a smile of deceit,
And there is a smile of smiles
In which these two smiles meet;

And there is a frown of hate,
And there is a frown of disdain,
And there is a frown of frowns
Which you strive to forget in vain,

For it sticks in the heart's deep core,
And it sticks in the deep back bone,
And no smile that ever was smil'd,
But only one smile alone

That betwixt the cradle and grave
It only once smil'd can be,
But when it once is smil'd,
There's an end to all misery.

noorie

Mar 5 2008, 04:12 PM

She Was a Phantom of Delight
- William Wordsworth

She was a Phantom of delight
When first she gleamed upon my sight;
A lovely Apparition, sent
To be a moment's ornament;
Her eyes as stars of Twilight fair;
Like Twilight's, too, her dusky hair;
But all things else about her drawn
From May-time and the cheerful Dawn;
A dancing Shape, an Image gay,
To haunt, to startle, and way-lay.
I saw her upon nearer view,
A Spirit, yet a Woman too!
Her household motions light and free,
And steps of virgin-liberty;
A countenance in which did meet
Sweet records, promises as sweet;
A Creature not too bright or good
For human nature's daily food;
For transient sorrows, simple wiles,
Praise, blame, love, kisses, tears, and smiles.
And now I see with eye serene
The very pulse of the machine;
A Being breathing thoughtful breath,
A Traveller between life and death;
The reason firm, the temperate will,
Endurance, foresight, strength, and skill;
A perfect Woman, nobly planned,
To warn, to comfort, and command;
And yet a Spirit still, and bright
With something of angelic light.

noorie

Mar 5 2008, 04:16 PM

The Night is Darkening Round Me
- Emily Jane Brontë

The night is darkening round me,
The wild winds coldly blow;
But a tyrant spell has bound me,
And I cannot, cannot go.

The giant trees are bending
Their bare boughs weighed with snow;
The storm is fast descending,
And yet I cannot go.

Clouds beyond clouds above me,
Wastes beyond wastes below;
But nothing drear can move me:
I will not, cannot go.

pradeepvishwakarma

Mar 10 2008, 09:00 PM

QUOTE(noorie @ Mar 5 2008, 04:09 PM)

The Smile
- William Blake

There is a smile of love,
And there is a smile of deceit,
And there is a smile of smiles
In which these two smiles meet;

And there is a frown of hate,
And there is a frown of disdain,
And there is a frown of frowns
Which you strive to forget in vain,

For it sticks in the heart's deep core,
And it sticks in the deep back bone,
And no smile that ever was smil'd,
But only one smile alone

That betwixt the cradle and grave
It only once smil'd can be,
But when it once is smil'd,
There's an end to all misery.

WoW wht a poem...

pinky

Mar 10 2008, 10:50 PM

QUOTE(noorie @ Mar 5 2008, 04:03 PM)

QUOTE(pinky @ Mar 4 2008, 06:40 PM)

QUOTE(noorie @ Mar 4 2008, 06:37 PM)

QUOTE(pinky @ Mar 4 2008, 06:22 PM)

Noorie, thanks a lot for all the poems that you have posted,such a beautiful collection..

part out of longing, part daring my self,
part to see that
widening of the world,

part to find my own, my secret
hiding sense and place, where from afar
all voices and scenes come back ...

.....................................

Therefore it was surprising that, as we kept the newspapers from Mother,
She died feeling responsible for a disaster unverified,
Murmuring, in her sleep as it seemed, the ancient slogan
Noblesse oblige.

.......................................

Time does not bring relief; you all have lied
Who told me time would ease me of my pain!

.......................................

you join the herd at once
and almost proudly run to the slaughter house.
You're the strangest creature on earth

.......................................

Thanks

Pinkz, thanks so much!

This is one of the few threads that I know where I won't be unwelcome.
Catch 22, my gratitude to you.

I feel the same noorie, what a great thread..

you are most welcome everywhere noorie

Catch is a great guy. I wish he hadn't gone away.

Pinkz, about that "welcome" bit, I am not so sure. That's why I don't visit other people's threads anymore.

I agree 100%

Thanks a million for all the beautiful poems you have posted noorie

noorie

Mar 10 2008, 11:09 PM

QUOTE(pinky @ Mar 10 2008, 10:50 PM)

I agree 100%

Thanks a million for all the beautiful poems you have posted noorie

Thanks Pinkz!

noorie

Mar 10 2008, 11:16 PM

When You Shoot At Me
- Anna Swirszczynska

For a split second
we look each other in the eye.
When the split second passes
you will shoot at me.
It’s hard to die
it’s hard to kill
there is fear in my eyes
there is fear in your eyes
you are killing these two fears
by shooting
at me.

noorie

Mar 10 2008, 11:19 PM

It Appears
- Czeslaw Milosz

It appears that it was all a misunderstanding.
What was only a trial run was taken seriously.
The rivers will return to their beginnings.
The wind will cease in its turning about.
Trees instead of budding will tend to their roots.
Old men will chase a ball, a glance in the mirror -
They are children again.
The dead will wake up, not comprehending.
Till everything that happened has unhappened.
What a relief! Breathe freely, you who suffered much.

noorie

Mar 10 2008, 11:22 PM

Lament
- Edna St. Vincent Millay

Listen, children:
Your father is dead.
From his old coats
I'll make you little jackets;
I'll make you little trousers
From his old pants.
There'll be in his pockets
Things he used to put there,
Keys and pennies
Covered with tobacco;
Dan shall have the pennies
To save in his bank;
Anne shall have the keys
To make a pretty noise with.
Life must go on,
And the dead be forgotten;
Life must go on,
Though good men die;
Anne, eat your breakfast;
Dan, take your medicine;
Life must go on;
I forget just why.

noorie

Mar 10 2008, 11:24 PM

My Soul Is Dark
- Lord Byron

My soul is dark – Oh! quickly string
The harp I yet can brook to hear;
And let thy gentle fingers fling
Its melting murmur o’er mine ear.
If in this heart a hope be dear,
That sound shall charm it forth again:
If in these eyes there lurk a tear,
‘Twill flow, and cease to burn my brain.

But bid the strain be wild and deep,
Nor let thy notes of joy be first:
I tell thee, minstrel, I must weep,
Or else this heavy heart will burst;
For it had been by sorrow nursed,
And ached in sleepless silence long;
And now ‘tis doomed to know the worst,
And break at once – or yield to song.

iiluu

Mar 12 2008, 10:57 PM

Welcome to the real world

I’m beginning to understand.
I saw a sign once
outside a church. It said
Are you really living
or just walking around
to save the expense of a funeral?

I didn’t know
that Love is real life,
and everything else
just a more or less entertaining way
of dying.

And I didn’t know
that Love is like nothing on earth.

Love isn’t what you fall in.
It’s what pulls you out
of what you fall in.

Love isn’t a good feeling.
Love is doing good
when you’re feeling bad.

Love means hanging in
when everyone else
shrugs their shoulders
and goes off to McDonalds.

Love means taking the knocks
and coming back
to try to make things better.

Love hurts.
It’s its way of telling you
that you’re alive.

And the funny thing is that after all
Love does feel good.
People say Love is weak.
But love is tougher than hate.
Hating’s easy.
Most of us have a gift for it.

But Love counts to ten
while Hate slams the door.
Love says you
where Hate says me.

Love is the strongest weapon
known to mankind.
Other weapons blow people up.
Only Love puts them back together again.

And everything that seems real,
that looks smart,
that feels good,
has a sell-by date.
But Love has no sell-by date.
Love is Long Life.
Love is the ultimate preservative.

I don’t know too much about Love
but I know a man who does,
up there on the cross
loving us to death.

Love is the key
to the door of the place
he’s prepared for you
in the kingdom of God.

If you’re beginning to understand
then welcome to the real world.

© Godfrey Rust

From the collection Welcome to the Real World
May be freely reproduced for non-commercial purposes.
godfrey@wordsout.co.uk

noorie

Mar 14 2008, 06:04 PM

A Book on a Shelf
- Roger Mitchell

A history of some sort, one that made us,
a war and what the war had meant, or since
meaning eludes war, what it did to the look
of the trees and the sides of the buildings,
most of which survived, only to be torn down
later to widen the street or put up a new
office complex. There it was on the shelf.
I was there only a moment, but still,
I wanted to know what happened to the man
in the photograph wearing a flat cap
standing outside the important building
cheering. He was there. He was part of that
moment, one of the first into the streets
when the turn of events came, the declaration
or pronouncement, words that would change
the look of everything he smiled on, words
that may have cost him his life. Here it is
in a book I found on a shelf. The person
who lives here bought it at a library
stock reduction sale. No one had read it.
It looked interesting thirty years ago.
It was practically new, the back uncracked.
But the person did what those before her had,
put it up on a shelf and never found
a way back to it. The history sits there,
unread, unbelievable, somebody else's.
Even I have only looked at the pictures,
at the man smiling between the cold pages.
Maybe ending the world as he knew it
was ok. Maybe it was the only way.
Maybe the world has to come to an end
in the first place to be the world. And the man?
He has to smile, though he knows so little
of what's coming, even looking right at it.
As we do, who still haven't read the book.

noorie

Mar 14 2008, 06:08 PM

The Age Demanded
- Ernest M. Hemingway

The age demanded that we sing
And cut away our tongue.

The age demanded that we flow
And hammered in the bung.

The age demanded that we dance
And jammed us into iron pants.

And in the end the age was handed
The sort of $hit that it demanded.

noorie

Mar 14 2008, 06:11 PM

A Parable
- Arthur Conan Doyle

The cheese-mites asked how the cheese got there,
And warmly debated the matter;
The Orthodox said that it came from the air,
And the Heretics said from the platter.
They argued it long and they argued it strong,
And I hear they are arguing now;
But of all the choice spirits who lived in the cheese,
Not one of them thought of a cow.

noorie

Mar 14 2008, 06:14 PM

“Hope” is the thing with feathers
- Emily Dickinson

“Hope” is the thing with feathers—
That perches in the soul—
And sings the tune without the words—
And never stops—at all—

And sweetest—in the Gale—is heard—
And sore must be the storm—
That could abash the little Bird—
That kept so many warm—

I’ve heard it in the chillest land—
And on the strangest Sea—
Yet, never, in Extremity,
It asked a crumb—of Me.

noorie

Mar 14 2008, 06:19 PM

When You Are Old
- W. B. Yeats

When you are old and grey and full of sleep,
And nodding by the fire, take down this book,
And slowly read, and dream of the soft look
Your eyes had once, and of their shadows deep;

How many loved your moments of glad grace,
And loved your beauty with love false or true,
But one man loved the pilgrim soul in you,
And loved the sorrows of your changing face;

And bending down beside the glowing bars,
Murmur, a little sadly, how Love fled
And paced upon the mountains overhead
And hid his face amid a crowd of stars.

noorie

Mar 14 2008, 06:23 PM

Two in August
- John Crowe Ransom

Two that could not have lived their single lives
As can some husbands and wives
Did something strange: they tensed their vocal cords
And attacked each other with silences and words
Like catapulted stones and arrowed knives.

Dawn was not yet; night is for loving or sleeping,
Sweet dreams or safekeeping;
Yet he of the wide brows that were used to laurel
And she, the famed for gentleness, must quarrel.
Furious both of them, and scared, and weeping.

How sleepers groan, twitch, wake to such a mood
Is not well understood,
Nor why two entities grown almost one
Should rend and murder trying to get undone,
With individual tigers in their blood.

She in terror fled from the marriage chamber
Circuiting the dark rooms like a string of amber
Round and round and back,
And would not light one lamp against the black,
And heard the clock that clanged: Remember, Remember.

And he must tread barefooted the dim lawn,
Soon he was up and gone;
High in the trees the night-mastered birds were crying
With fear upon their tongues, no singing nor flying
Which are their lovely attitudes by dawn.

Whether those bird-cries were of heaven or hell
There is no way to tell;
In the long ditch of darkness the man walked
Under the hackberry trees where the birds talked
With words too sad and strange to syllable.

noorie

Mar 14 2008, 06:26 PM

The Children's Hour
- Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Between the dark and the daylight,
When the night is beginning to lower,
Comes a pause in the day's occupations,
That is known as the Children's Hour.

I hear in the chamber above me
The patter of little feet,
The sound of a door that is opened,
And voices soft and sweet.

From my study I see in the lamplight,
Descending the broad hall stair,
Grave Alice, and laughing Allegra,
And Edith with golden hair.

A whisper, and then a silence:
Yet I know by their merry eyes
They are plotting and planning together
To take me by surprise.

A sudden rush from the stairway,
A sudden raid from the hall!
By three doors left unguarded
They enter my castle wall!

They climb up into my turret
O'er the arms and back of my chair;
If I try to escape, they surround me;
They seem to be everywhere.

They almost devour me with kisses,
Their arms about me entwine,
Till I think of the Bishop of Bingen
In his Mouse-Tower on the Rhine!

Do you think, O blue-eyed banditti,
Because you have scaled the wall,
Such an old mustache as I am
Is not a match for you all!

I have you fast in my fortress,
And will not let you depart,
But put you down into the dungeon
In the round-tower of my heart.

And there will I keep you forever,
Yes, forever and a day,
Till the walls shall crumble to ruin,
And moulder in dust away!

noorie

Mar 14 2008, 06:28 PM

Home
- Edgar Albert Guest

It takes a heap o’ livin’ in a house t’ make it home,
A heap o’ sun an’ shadder, an’ ye sometimes have t’ roam
Afore ye really ’preciate the things ye lef’ behind,
An’ hunger fer ’em somehow, with ’em allus on yer mind.
It don’t make any differunce how rich ye get t’ be,
How much yer chairs an’ tables cost, how great yer luxury;
It ain’t home t’ ye, though it be the palace of a king,
Until somehow yer soul is sort o’ wrapped round everything.

Home ain’t a place that gold can buy or get up in a minute;
Afore it’s home there’s got t’ be a heap o’ livin’ in it;
Within the walls there’s got t’ be some babies born, and then
Right there ye’ve got t’ bring ‘em up t’ women good, an’ men;
And gradjerly, as time goes on, ye find ye wouldn’t part
With anything they ever used—they’ve grown into yer heart:
The old high chairs, the playthings, too, the little shoes they wore
Ye hoard; an’ if ye could ye’d keep the thumbmarks on the door.

Ye’ve got t’ weep t’ make it home, ye’ve got t’ sit an’ sigh
An’ watch beside a loved one’s bed, an’ know that Death is nigh;
An’ in the stillness o’ the night t’ see Death’s angel come,
An’ close the eyes o’ her that smiled, an’ leave her sweet voice dumb.
Fer these are scenes that grip the heart, an’ when yer tears are dried,
Ye find the home is dearer than it was, an’ sanctified;
An’ tuggin’ at ye always are the pleasant memories
O’ her that was an’ is no more—ye can’t escape from these.

Ye’ve got t’ sing an’ dance fer years, ye’ve got t’ romp an’ play,
An’ learn t’ love the things ye have by usin’ ’em each day;
Even the roses ’round the porch must blossom year by year
Afore they ’come a part o’ ye, suggestin’ someone dear
Who used t’ love ’em long ago, an’ trained ’em jes’ t’ run
The way they do, so’s they would get the early mornin’ sun;
Ye’ve got t’ love each brick an’ stone from cellar up t’ dome:
It takes a heap o’ livin’ in a house t’ make it home.

noorie

Mar 14 2008, 06:30 PM

Who Am I?
- Carl Sandburg

My head knocks against the stars.
My feet are on the hilltops.
My finger-tips are in the valleys and shores of universal life.
Down in the sounding foam of primal things I reach my hands and play with pebbles of destiny.
I have been to hell and back many times.
I know all about heaven, for I have talked with God.
I dabble in the blood and guts of the terrible.
I know the passionate seizure of beauty
And the marvelous rebellion of man at all signs reading "Keep Off."
My name is Truth and I am the most elusive captive in the universe.

noorie

Mar 14 2008, 06:32 PM

Defeated
- Sophie Jewett

When the last fight is lost, the last sword broken;
The last call sounded, the last order spoken;
When from the field where braver hearts lie sleeping,
Faint, and athirst, and blinded, I come creeping,
With not one waving shred of palm to bring you,
With not one splendid battle-song to sing you,
O Love, in my dishonor and defeat,
Your measureless compassion will be sweet.

noorie

Mar 14 2008, 06:34 PM

Fire and Ice
- Robert Frost

Some say the world will end in fire,
Some say in ice.
From what I've tasted of desire
I hold with those who favor fire.
But if it had to perish twice,
I think I know enough of hate
To say that for destruction ice
Is also great
And would suffice.

noorie

Mar 14 2008, 06:36 PM

Faults
- 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.

pinky

Mar 14 2008, 07:54 PM

Thanks a million noorie

.. they are all so beautiful

noorie

Mar 14 2008, 09:30 PM

QUOTE(pinky @ Mar 14 2008, 07:54 PM)

Thanks a million noorie

.. they are all so beautiful

And you're the sweetest for saying so!

Pinkz, but you know that even without me telling you, right?

You wouldn't believe this but I nearly lost courage to use a smilie on a forum. Thanks for being there for me always Pinkz.

noorie

Mar 19 2008, 01:13 AM

A Bird Came Down The Walk
- Emily Dickinson

A bird came down the walk:
He did not know I saw;
He bit an angle worm in halves
And ate the fellow, raw.

And then he drank a dew
From a convenient grass,
And then hopped sidewise to the wall
To let a beetle pass.

He glanced with rapid eyes
That hurried all abroad, â€“
They looked like frightened beads, I thought
He stirred his velvet head

Like one in danger; cautious,
I offered him a crumb,
And he unrolled his feathers
And rowed him softer home

Than oars divide the ocean,
Too silver for a seam,
Or butterflies, off banks of noon,
Leap, plashless, as they swim.

noorie

Mar 19 2008, 01:17 AM

In Broken Images
- Robert Graves

He is quick, thinking in clear images;
I am slow, thinking in broken images.

He becomes dull, trusting to his clear images;
I become sharp, mistrusting my broken images.

Trusting his images, he assumes their relevance;
Mistrusting my images, I question their relevance.

Assuming their relevance, he assumes the fact;
Questioning their relevance, I question the fact.

When the fact fails him, he questions his senses;
When the fact fails me, I approve my senses.

He continues quick and dull in his clear images;
I continue slow and sharp in my broken images.

He in a new confusion of his understanding;
I in a new understanding of my confusion.

noorie

Mar 19 2008, 01:28 AM

O Do Not Love Too Long
- William Butler Yeats

Sweetheart, do not love too long:
I loved long and long,
And grew to be out of fashion
Like an old song.

All through the years of our youth
Neither could have known
Their own thought from the other's,
We were so much at one.

But O, in a minute she changed--
O do not love too long,
Or you will grow out of fashion
Like an old song.

noorie

Mar 19 2008, 01:30 AM

Chance Meetings
- Conrad Aiken

In the mazes of loitering people, the watchful and furtive,
The shadows of tree-trunks and shadows of leaves,
In the drowse of the sunlight, among the low voices,
I suddenly face you,

Your dark eyes return for a space from her who is with you,
They shine into mine with a sunlit desire,
They say an 'I love you, what star do you live on?'
They smile and then darken,

And silent, I answer 'You too--I have known you,--I love you!--'
And the shadows of tree-trunks and shadows of leaves
Interlace with low voices and footsteps and sunlight
To divide us forever.

noorie

Mar 22 2008, 03:34 AM

Colors Of The Wind

You think I'm an ignorant savage
And you've been so many places
I guess it must be so
But still I cannot see
If the savage one is me
How can there be so much that you don't know?
You don't know ...

You think you own whatever land you land on
The Earth is just a dead thing you can claim
But I know every rock and tree and creature
Has a life, has a spirit, has a name

You think the only people who are people
Are the people who look and think like you
But if you walk the footsteps of a stranger
You'll learn things you never knew you never knew

Have you ever heard the wolf cry to the blue corn moon
Or asked the grinning bobcat why he grinned?
Can you sing with all the voices of the mountains?
Can you paint with all the colors of the wind?
Can you paint with all the colors of the wind?

Come run the hidden pine trails of the forest
Come taste the sunsweet berries of the Earth
Come roll in all the riches all around you
And for once, never wonder what they're worth

The rainstorm and the river are my brothers
The heron and the otter are my friends
And we are all connected to each other
In a circle, in a hoop that never ends

How high will the sycamore grow?
If you cut it down, then you'll never know
And you'll never hear the wolf cry to the blue corn moon

For whether we are white or copper skinned
We need to sing with all the voices of the mountains
We need to paint with all the colors of the wind

You can own the Earth and still
All you'll own is Earth until
You can paint with all the colors of the wind

pinky

Mar 22 2008, 09:44 PM

QUOTE(noorie @ Mar 14 2008, 09:30 PM)

QUOTE(pinky @ Mar 14 2008, 07:54 PM)

Thanks a million noorie

.. they are all so beautiful

And you're the sweetest for saying so!

Pinkz, but you know that even without me telling you, right?

You wouldn't believe this but I nearly lost courage to use a smilie on a forum. Thanks for being there for me always Pinkz.

You are the best noorie...

You think the only people who are people
Are the people who look and think like you
But if you walk the footsteps of a stranger
You'll learn things you never knew you never knew..

Thanks once again for all the lovely poems you have posted

Prince Charming

Mar 24 2008, 01:35 AM

QUOTE(pinky @ Mar 22 2008, 09:44 PM)

QUOTE(noorie @ Mar 14 2008, 09:30 PM)

QUOTE(pinky @ Mar 14 2008, 07:54 PM)

Thanks a million noorie

.. they are all so beautiful

And you're the sweetest for saying so!

Pinkz, but you know that even without me telling you, right?

You wouldn't believe this but I nearly lost courage to use a smilie on a forum. Thanks for being there for me always Pinkz.

You are the best noorie...

You think the only people who are people
Are the people who look and think like you
But if you walk the footsteps of a stranger
You'll learn things you never knew you never knew..

Thanks once again for all the lovely poems you have posted

colourful poem ?

Prince Charming

Mar 24 2008, 02:06 AM

QUOTE(iiluu @ Mar 12 2008, 10:57 PM)

Welcome to the real world

Iï¿½m beginning to understand.
I saw a sign once
outside a church. It said
Are you really living
or just walking around
to save the expense of a funeral?

I didnï¿½t know
that Love is real life,
and everything else
just a more or less entertaining way
of dying.

And I didnï¿½t know
that Love is like nothing on earth.

Love isnï¿½t what you fall in.
Itï¿½s what pulls you out
of what you fall in.

Love isnï¿½t a good feeling.
Love is doing good
when youï¿½re feeling bad.

Love means hanging in
when everyone else
shrugs their shoulders
and goes off to McDonalds.

Love means taking the knocks
and coming back
to try to make things better.

Love hurts.
Itï¿½s its way of telling you
that youï¿½re alive.

And the funny thing is that after all
Love does feel good.
People say Love is weak.
But love is tougher than hate.
Hatingï¿½s easy.
Most of us have a gift for it.

But Love counts to ten
while Hate slams the door.
Love says you
where Hate says me.

Love is the strongest weapon
known to mankind.
Other weapons blow people up.
Only Love puts them back together again.

And everything that seems real,
that looks smart,
that feels good,
has a sell-by date.
But Love has no sell-by date.
Love is Long Life.
Love is the ultimate preservative.

I donï¿½t know too much about Love
but I know a man who does,
up there on the cross
loving us to death.

Love is the key
to the door of the place
heï¿½s prepared for you
in the kingdom of God.

If youï¿½re beginning to understand
then welcome to the real world.

ï¿½ Godfrey Rust

From the collection Welcome to the Real World
May be freely reproduced for non-commercial purposes.
godfrey@wordsout.co.uk

Sweet Poem 4m my . soul where u ... can Catch . if u ... love the person u seen . than i . m sure u love whome u have not seen "God".

iiluu

Mar 30 2008, 11:30 PM

QUOTE(pinky @ Mar 10 2008, 10:50 PM)

QUOTE(noorie @ Mar 5 2008, 04:03 PM)

QUOTE(pinky @ Mar 4 2008, 06:40 PM)

QUOTE(noorie @ Mar 4 2008, 06:37 PM)

QUOTE(pinky @ Mar 4 2008, 06:22 PM)

Noorie, thanks a lot for all the poems that you have posted,such a beautiful collection..

part out of longing, part daring my self,
part to see that
widening of the world,

part to find my own, my secret
hiding sense and place, where from afar
all voices and scenes come back ...

.....................................

Therefore it was surprising that, as we kept the newspapers from Mother,
She died feeling responsible for a disaster unverified,
Murmuring, in her sleep as it seemed, the ancient slogan
Noblesse oblige.

.......................................

Time does not bring relief; you all have lied
Who told me time would ease me of my pain!

.......................................

you join the herd at once
and almost proudly run to the slaughter house.
You're the strangest creature on earth

.......................................

Thanks

Pinkz, thanks so much!

This is one of the few threads that I know where I won't be unwelcome.
Catch 22, my gratitude to you.

I feel the same noorie, what a great thread..

you are most welcome everywhere noorie

Catch is a great guy. I wish he hadn't gone away.

Pinkz, about that "welcome" bit, I am not so sure. That's why I don't visit other people's threads anymore.

I agree 100%

Thanks a million for all the beautiful poems you have posted noorie

Catch.....