Beautiful Poetry

[Malaikat Maut]

I ask you to please post poetry or prose that you find to be inspiring, despairing, breathtaking, or simply worthy of being read so that others may enjoy them also.

Here are a few of my favorites:

E.E. Cummings - being to timelessness as it's to time,
[quote]
being to timelessness as it's to time,
love did no more begin than love will end:
where nothing is to breathe to stroll to swim
love is the air the ocean and the land

(do lovers suffer?all divinities
proudly descending put on deathful flesh:
are lovers glad?only their smallest joy's
a universe emerging from a wish)

love is the voice under all silences,
the hope which has no opposite in fear:
the strength so strong mere force is feebleness:
the truth more first than sun more last than star

- -do lovers love?why then to heaven with hell.
whatever sages say and fools,all's well
[/quote]

John McCrae - In Flanders Fields
[quote]
In Flanders fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses, row on row
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.

We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved and were loved, and now we lie
In Flanders fields.

Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields.[/quote]

Lord Byron - When We Two Parted
[quote]
When we two parted
In silence and tears,
Half broken-hearted,
To sever for years,
Pale grew thy cheek and cold,
Colder thy kiss;
Truly that hour foretold
Sorrow to this.

The dew of the morning
Sank chill on my brow—
It felt like the warning
Of what I feel now.
Thy vows are all broken,
And light is thy fame:
I hear thy name spoken,
And share in its shame.

They name thee before me,
A knell to mine ear;
A shudder comes o'er me—
Why wert thou so dear?
They know not I knew thee,
Who knew thee too well:—
Long, long shall I rue thee
Too deeply to tell.

In secret we met—
In silence I grieve
That thy heart could forget,
Thy spirit deceive.
If I should meet thee
After long years,
How should I greet thee?—
With silence and tears.[/quote]

W.H. Auden - Funeral Blues
[quote]
Stop all the clocks, cut off the telephone,
Prevent the dog from barking with a juicy bone,
Silence the pianos and with muffled drum
Bring out the coffin, let the mourners come.

Let aeroplanes circle moaning overhead
Scribbling on the sky the message He is Dead.
Put crepe bows round the white necks of the public doves,
Let the traffic policemen wear black cotton gloves.

He was my North, my South, my East and West,
My working week and my Sunday rest,
My noon, my midnight, my talk, my song;
I thought that love would last forever: I was wrong.

The stars are not wanted now; put out every one,
Pack up the moon and dismantle the sun,
Pour away the ocean and sweep up the woods;
For nothing now can ever come to any good.[/quote]

Edited January 29, 2010 by Malaikat Maut

[Magnus X]

i love your mcrae's and byron's. i love the following one, another from cummings, something that is indelible in my soul. it is actually a song, interspersed by excerpts of cumming's poem:

[center]
Sung by Lisa Angelle
With excerpts from the poem “Somewhere I Have Never
Traveled, Gladly” by E.E. Cummings

Poem:
“Somewhere I have never traveled
Gladly beyond any experience
Your eyes have their silence
And your most frail gesture of things
Which enclose me
But which I cannot touch
Because they are too near.”

The first time I loved forever
Was when you whispered my name
And I knew at once you loved me
For the me of who I am

The first time I loved forever
I cast all else aside
And I bid my heart to follow
Be there no more need to hide

And if wishes and dreams
Are merely for children
And if love's a tale for fools
I'll live the dream with you

Poem:
“oh, if your words be to close me
I, my life will shut, very beautifully
Suddenly, as when the heart of this flower
Imagines the snow carefully, everywhere
descending”.

For all my life and forever
There's a truth I will always know
When my world divides and shatters
Your love is where I'll go

Poem:
“I do not know what it is about you that closes
and opens. Only something in me understands
the voice of your eyes is deeper than all roses.
Nobody, not even the rain has such small hands.”

[left]ahh... what can be more beautiful?
[/left][/center]

[Yoshi]

The Poems I find inspiring would be found on Handy Pockets Hate Page. The Poems for the Willow are utterly breathtaking.

[LadyDawn]

I like this one from my own language, so I will try to translate it for you, but mind that the translation shall not give it justice:

Eros – Tanatos

Pil sem te in ne izpil, Ljubezen.
[color="#708090"][i](I drunk but not drunk you all, Love.)[/i][/color]
Ko duhteče vino sladkih trt
[color="#708090"][i](Like wine from sweet wines)[/i][/color]
užil sem te, da nisem bil več trezen
[color="#708090"][i](I consumed you, until I was no more sober)[/i][/color]
in da nisem vedel, da si Smrt.
[color="#708090"][i](and I didnt know that you are Death)[/i][/color]

Zrl sem v strašne teme tvojih brezen:
[color="#708090"][i](I gazed into horrid darks of your deeps;)[/i][/color]
in ker bil pogled je moj zastrt
[color="#708090"][i](and because my sight was veiled)[/i][/color]
od bridkosti, nisem vedel, Smrt,
[color="#708090"][i](with griefes, I did not known, Death,)[/i][/color]
da si najskrivnostnejša Ljubezen.
[color="#708090"][i](that you are the most mysterious Love.)[/i][/color]

Alojz Gradnik

(again, the beauty of it in this translation is hindered very much... I am no poet and my english is not so good)

I would have to say that I also have affinity for Raven by Edgar Alan Poe. I wont past it here since I do believe most of you know it already. And those posted already are also of my liking. Anyhow, I will leave it at that for now.

Edited January 29, 2010 by LadyDawn

[Phantom Orchid]

Greetings,

There are many great poets in MD - Kets (handy pockets), Keith Moon, Kyphis, Asterdai and others. I also have a collection of MD-based or inspired poetry in my personal page.

But for today I wish to share a poem written by an obscure Mexican ventriloquist for author Gabriel Garcia Marquez.

------------------------------------------

[b]The Puppet[/b]

If for a moment God would forget that I am a rag doll and give me a scrap of life, possibly I would not say everything that I think, but I would definitely think everything that I say.
I would value things not for how much they are worth but rather for what they mean.
I would sleep little, dream more. I know that for each minute that we close our eyes we lose sixty seconds of light.
I would walk when the others loiter; I would awaken when the others sleep.
I would listen when the others speak, and how I would enjoy a good chocolate ice cream.
If God would bestow on me a scrap of life, I would dress simply, I would throw myself flat under the sun, exposing not only my body but also my soul.
My God, if I had a heart, I would write my hatred on ice and wait for the sun to come out.
Over the stars I would paint with a Van Gogh dream a Benedetti poem, and a Serrat song would be the serenade I'd offer to the moon.
With my tears I would water roses, to feel the pain of their thorns, and the red kiss of their petals.
My God, if I had a piece of life...
I wouldn't let a single day pass without telling the people I love that I love them.
I would convince each woman and each man that they are my favorites, and I would live in love with love.
I would show men how very wrong they are to think that they cease to be in love when they grow old, not knowing that they grow old when they cease to love!
To a child I shall give wings, but I shall let him learn to fly on his own.
I would teach the old that death does not come with old age, but with forgetting.
So much have I learned from you, oh men... I have learned that everyone wants to live on the peak of the mountain, without knowing that real happiness is in how it is scaled.
I have learned that when a newborn child squeezes for the first time with his tiny fist his father's finger, he has him trapped forever.
I have learned that a man has the right to look down on another only when he has to help the other get to his feet.
From you I have learned so many things, but in truth they won't be of much use, for when I keep them within this suitcase, unhappily shall I be dying.

-------------------------------
And another...
---------------------------------

[b]No One Can Stop The Rain[/b]
(A poem by Assata Shakur)

Watch, the grass is growing.
Watch, but don't make it obvious.
Let your eyes roam casually, but watch! In any prison yard, you can see it - growing.
In the cracks, in the crevices, between the steel and the concrete,
out of the dead gray dust,
the bravest blades of grass shoot up,
bold and full of life.
Watch. the grass is growing.
It is growing through the cracks.
The guards say grass is against the Law.
Grass is contraband in prison.
The guards say that the grass is insolent.
It is uppity grass, radical grass, militant grass, terrorist grass, they call it weeds.
Nasty weeds, nigga weeds, dirty, spic, savage indian, wetback, pinko, commie weeds - subversive! And so the guards try to wipe out the grass.
They yank it from its roots. They poison it with drugs. They maul it, They rake it.
Blades of grass have been found hanging in cells,
covered with bruises. "apparent suicides
The guards say that the GRASS IS UNAUTHORIZED DO NOT LET THE GRASS GROW.
You can spy on the grass. You can lock up the grass.
You can mow it down, temporarily.
But you will never keep it from growing.
Watch, the grass is beautiful.
The guards try to mow it down, but it keeps on growing.
The grass grows into a poem.
The grass grows into a song. The grass paints itself across the canvas of life.
And the picture is clear and the lyrics are true, and the haunting voices sing so sweet and strong that the people hear the grass from far away.
And the people start to dance, and the people start to sing, and the song is freedom.
Watch, the grass is growing.

-----------------------------------
And yet one more.....( I promise, that's it for now).
----------------------------

[b]The Nobodies[/b] - written by Eduardo Galeano

Fleas dream of buying themselves a dog, and nobodies dream
of escaping poverty: that one magical day good luck will
suddenly rain down on them- will rain down in buckets. But
good luck doesn't even fall in a fine drizzle, no matter
how hard the nobodies summon it, even if their left hand is
tickling, or if they begin the new day with their right foot, or
start the new year with a change of brooms.
The nobodies: nobody's children, owners of nothing. The
nobodies: the no ones, the nobodied, running like rabbits,
dying through life, screwed every which way.
Who don't speak languages, but dialects.
Who don't have religions, but superstitions
.
Who don't create art, but handicrafts.
Who don't have culture, but folklore.
Who are not human beings, but human resources
.
Who do not have names, but numbers.
Who do not appear in the history of the world, but in the
police blotter of the local paper.
The nobodies, who are not worth the bullet that kills them

[Grido]

I like these
It's been a while since i've read Funeral Blues Malai, thank you.

I have a few of my own peoms on my Military Ways paper, for lack of anywhere else. These few of others i really enjoy;

"The Road Not Taken" - Robert Frost[quote]Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that, the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
two roads diverged in a wood, and I --
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.[/quote]


"When I am an old woman, I shall wear purple" - Jenny Joseph[quote]When I am an old woman, I shall wear purple
with a red hat that doesn't go, and doesn't suit me.
And I shall spend my pension on brandy and summer gloves
and satin candles, and say we've no money for butter.
I shall sit down on the pavement when I am tired
and gobble up samples in shops and press alarm bells
and run my stick along the public railings
and make up for the sobriety of my youth.
I shall go out in my slippers in the rain
and pick the flowers in other people's gardens
and learn to spit.

You can wear terrible shirts and grow more fat
and eat three pounds of sausages at a go
or only bread and pickles for a week
and hoard pens and pencils and beer nuts and things in boxes.

But now we must have clothes that keep us dry
and pay our rent and not swear in the street
and set a good example for the children.
We must have friends to dinner and read the papers.
But maybe I ought to practice a little now?
So people who know me are not too shocked and surprised
When suddenly I am old, and start to wear purple.[/quote]


"One fine day" - Anon (different version to the one i first heard, but it seems i can only ever find different ones)[quote]One bright day in the middle of the night,
Two dead boys got up to fight.
Back-to-back they faced one another,
Drew their swords and shot each other.
One was blind and the other couldn't see,
So they chose a dummy for a referee.
A blind man went to see fair play,
A dumb man went to shout "hooray!"
A deaf policeman heard the noise,
And came and shot the two dead boys.
A paralyzed donkey walking by,
Kicked the copper in the eye,
Sent him through a rubber wall,
Into a dry ditch and drowned them all.
(If you don't believe this lie is true,
Ask the blind man -- he saw it too!)[/quote]


"One bright September morning" - Anon [quote]One bright September morning in the middle of July,
The sun lay thick upon the ground, the snow shone in the sky.
The flowers were singing gaily, the birds were full of bloom;
I went upstairs to the cellar to clean a downstairs room.
I saw ten thousand miles away a house just out of sight,
It stood alone between two more and it was black-washed white.[/quote]


LE: (just found this in my docs)
"Grieve not" - Mary Frye [quote]Do not stand at my grave and weep;
I am not there, I do not sleep.
I am a thousand winds that blow.
I am the softly falling snow.
I am the gentle showers of rain.
I am the fields of ripening grain.
I am the morning hush.
I am the graceful rush
of beautiful birds in circling flight.
I am the star shine of the night.
I am the flowers that bloom.
I am in a quiet room.
I am the birds that sing.
I am in each lovely thing.
Do not stand at my grave and cry;
I am not there. I did not die.[/quote]

Edited January 30, 2010 by Grido

[Tarquinus]

"A Child Said, What Is The Grass", Walt Whitman
[quote]A child said, What is the grass? fetching it to me with full
hands;
How could I answer the child?. . . .I do not know what it
is any more than he.

I guess it must be the flag of my disposition, out of hopeful
green stuff woven.

Or I guess it is the handkerchief of the Lord,
A scented gift and remembrancer designedly dropped,
Bearing the owner's name someway in the corners, that we
may see and remark, and say Whose?

Or I guess the grass is itself a child. . . .the produced babe
of the vegetation.

Or I guess it is a uniform hieroglyphic,
And it means, Sprouting alike in broad zones and narrow
zones,
Growing among black folks as among white,
Kanuck, Tuckahoe, Congressman, Cuff, I give them the
same, I receive them the same.

And now it seems to me the beautiful uncut hair of graves.

Tenderly will I use you curling grass,
It may be you transpire from the breasts of young men,
It may be if I had known them I would have loved them;
It may be you are from old people and from women, and
from offspring taken soon out of their mother's laps,
And here you are the mother's laps.

This grass is very dark to be from the white heads of old
mothers,
Darker than the colorless beards of old men,
Dark to come from under the faint red roofs of mouths.

O I perceive after all so many uttering tongues!
And I perceive they do not come from the roofs of mouths
for nothing.

I wish I could translate the hints about the dead young men
and women,
And the hints about old men and mothers, and the offspring
taken soon out of their laps.

What do you think has become of the young and old men?
What do you think has become of the women and
children?

They are alive and well somewhere;
The smallest sprouts show there is really no death,
And if ever there was it led forward life, and does not wait
at the end to arrest it,
And ceased the moment life appeared.

All goes onward and outward. . . .and nothing collapses,
And to die is different from what any one supposed, and
luckier.[/quote]

"As I Walked Out One Evening", W.H. Auden
[quote]As I walked out one evening,
Walking down Bristol Street,
The crowds upon the pavement
Were fields of harvest wheat.

And down by the brimming river
I heard a lover sing
Under an arch of the railway:
'Love has no ending.

'I'll love you, dear, I'll love you
Till China and Africa meet,
And the river jumps over the mountain
And the salmon sing in the street,

'I'll love you till the ocean
Is folded and hung up to dry
And the seven stars go squawking
Like geese about the sky.

'The years shall run like rabbits,
For in my arms I hold
The Flower of the Ages,
And the first love of the world.'

But all the clocks in the city
Began to whirr and chime:
'O let not Time deceive you,
You cannot conquer Time.

'In the burrows of the Nightmare
Where Justice naked is,
Time watches from the shadow
And coughs when you would kiss.

'In headaches and in worry
Vaguely life leaks away,
And Time will have his fancy
To-morrow or to-day.

'Into many a green valley
Drifts the appalling snow;
Time breaks the threaded dances
And the diver's brilliant bow.

'O plunge your hands in water,
Plunge them in up to the wrist;
Stare, stare in the basin
And wonder what you've missed.

'The glacier knocks in the cupboard,
The desert sighs in the bed,
And the crack in the tea-cup opens
A lane to the land of the dead.

'Where the beggars raffle the banknotes
And the Giant is enchanting to Jack,
And the Lily-white Boy is a Roarer,
And Jill goes down on her back.

'O look, look in the mirror,
O look in your distress:
Life remains a blessing
Although you cannot bless.

'O stand, stand at the window
As the tears scald and start;
You shall love your crooked neighbour
With your crooked heart.'

It was late, late in the evening,
The lovers they were gone;
The clocks had ceased their chiming,
And the deep river ran on.[/quote]

"if everything happens that can't be done", e.e. cummings
[quote]if everything happens that can't be done
(and anything's righter
than books
could plan)
the stupidest teacher will almost guess
(with a run
skip
around we go yes)
there's nothing as something as one

one hasn't a why or because or although
(and buds know better
than books
don't grow)
one's anything old being everything new
(with a what
which
around we come who)
one's everyanything so

so world is a leaf so a tree is a bough
(and birds sing sweeter
than books
tell how)
so here is away and so your is a my
(with a down
up
around again fly)
forever was never till now

now i love you and you love me
(and books are shuter
than books
can be)
and deep in the high that does nothing but fall
(with a shout
each
around we go all)
there's somebody calling who's we

we're anything brighter than even the sun
(we're everything greater
than books
might mean)
we're everyanything more than believe
(with a spin
leap
alive we're alive)
we're wonderful one times one[/quote]

"Medusa", Sylvia Plath
[quote]Off that landspit of stony mouth-plugs,
Eyes rolled by white sticks,
Ears cupping the sea's incoherences,
You house your unnerving head -- God-ball,
Lens of mercies,
Your stooges
Plying their wild cells in my keel's shadow,
Pushing by like hearts,
Red stigmata at the very center,
Riding the rip tide to the nearest point of
departure,

Dragging their Jesus hair.
Did I escape, I wonder?
My mind winds to you
Old barnacled umbilicus, Atlantic cable,
Keeping itself, it seems, in a state of miraculous
repair.

In any case, you are always there,
Tremulous breath at the end of my line,
Curve of water upleaping
To my water rod, dazzling and grateful,
Touching and sucking.
I didn't call you.
I didn't call you at all.
Nevertheless, nevertheless
You steamed to me over the sea,
Fat and red, a placenta

Paralyzing the kicking lovers.
Cobra light
Squeezing the breath from the blood bells
Of the fuchsia. I could draw no breath,
Dead and moneyless,

Overexposed, like an X-ray.
Who do you think you are?
A Communion wafer? Blubbery Mary?
I shall take no bite of your body,
Bottle in which I live,

Ghastly Vatican.
I am sick to death of hot salt.
Green as eunuchs, your wishes
Hiss at my sins.
Off, off, eely tentacle!

There is nothing between us.[/quote]

[Totenkopf]

[b]THE MYSTIC ROSE by Elsa Barker[/b]

I, WOMAN, am that wonder-breathing rose
That blossoms in the garden of the King.
In all the world there is no lovelier thing,
And the learned stars no secret can disclose
Deeper than mine--that almost no one knows.
The perfume of my petals in the spring
Is inspiration to all bards that sing
Of love, the spirit’s lyric unrepose.

Under my veil is hid the mystery
Of unaccomplished aeons, and my breath
The Master-Lover’s life replenisheth.
The mortal garment that is worn by me
The loom of Time renews continually;
And when I die--the universe knows death.

And on a different note - [b]NON/Boyd Rice - Disney Land can wait - from the album "Music, Martinis and Misanthropy"[/b]

Someday
I'll take you to Disneyland

Someday
I'll take you to Disneyland
We'll go on Mr. Toad's wild ride
And follow him straight to hell
But that's not necessary just now
For now hell's all around us
No rubber devils
No smell of sulphur
But hell nonetheless
Hell more grotesque than any medieval woodcut
Instead of dramatic demons
A lifeless, shuffling horde
Without souls
Without imagination
Without worth
And beyond redemption

Someday I'll take you to Disneyland
I'll buy you a pair of mouse ears
Tons of cotton candy
And a big helium balloon with Mickey inside
But all that can wait
Today I'll buy you a .357 magnum
And lots and lots of bullets
I'll buy you a stack of AK-47s
And a warehouse filled with banana clips
All loaded and ready to go
I'll buy you a B-52
Loaded with neutron bombs
And lots of soldiers
To do whatever's necessary

Disneyland can wait
We have time
Someday there'll be more of us
Maybe then the world can be Disneyland
And visiting hell will be novel again

Hear it here - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PJSsbXDBWXs

Edited January 31, 2010 by Totenkopf

[Treehill]

Hmmm...so little from Walt Whitman he is the god of poems!oh bugger here comes my favorite from him:(though i like to drum taps and leaves on the grass,well all his work to be truthfull)

[center]Sleepers
by Walt Whitman
(1819-1892)[/center]

[center]I wander all night in my vision,
Stepping with light feet, swiftly and noiselessly stepping and stopping,
Bending with open eyes over the shut eyes of sleepers,
Wandering and confused, lost to myself, ill-assorted, contradictory,
Pausing, gazing, bending, and stopping.

How solemn they look there, stretch'd and still,
How quiet they breathe, the little children in their cradles.

The wretched features of ennuyes, the white features of corpses, the livid faces of drunkards, the sick-gray faces of onanists,
The gash'd bodies on battle-fields, the insane in their strong-door'd rooms, the sacred idiots, the new-born emerging from gates, and the dying emerging from gates,
The night pervades them and infolds them.

---------------Jumped a little i like this part too XD,its too big to read-------

I am a dance--play up there! the fit is whirling me
fast!

I am the ever-laughing--it is new moon and twilight,
I see the hiding of douceurs, I see nimble ghosts
whichever way I look,
Cache and cache again deep in the ground and sea, and
where it is neither ground nor sea.

Well do they do their jobs those journeymen divine,
Only from me can they hide nothing, and would not if
they could,
I reckon I am their boss and they make me a pet
besides,
And surround me and lead me and run ahead when I walk,
To lift their cunning covers to signify me with
stretch'd arms, and resume the way;
Onward we move, a gay gang of blackguards! with
mirth-shouting music and wild-flapping pennants of
joy!

I am the actor, the actress, the voter, the politician,
The emigrant and the exile, the criminal that stood in
the box,
He who has been famous and he who shall be famous after
to-day,
The stammerer, the well-form'd person, the wasted or
feeble person.

I am she who adorn'd herself and folded her hair
expectantly,
My truant lover has come, and it is dark.

Double yourself and receive me darkness,
Receive me and my lover too, he will not let me go
without him.

I roll myself upon you as upon a bed, I resign myself
to the dusk.
He whom I call answers me and takes the place of my
lover,
He rises with me silently from the bed.

Darkness, you are gentler than my lover, his flesh was
sweaty and panting,
I feel the hot moisture yet that he left me. [/center]


[center]
Nixon Waterman ( i think,95% sure...XD)

If I Knew You & You Knew Me

If I knew you and you knew me,
If both of us could clearly see,
And with an inner sight divine,
The meaning of your heart and mine,
I'm sure that we would differ less,
And clasp our hands in friendliness;
Our thoughts would pleasantly agree,
If I knew you and you knew me.[/center]

(I used this to dump someone XD,it was more a friend than lover)

"Outwitted"
by Edward Markham

He drew a circle that shut me out:
Heretic, rebel, a thing to flout.
But love and I had the wit to win:
We drew a circle that took him in.

(And this one was an answer from him...i almost got hooked up with him again XD,damn poems always my weak point)

[Malaikat Maut]

Thanks all, and keep them coming. Grido, "Grieve Not" is fantastic.

Nothing from these fine poets yet...

Alfred, Lord Tennyson - A Farewell
[quote]Flow down, cold rivulet, to the sea,
Thy tribute wave deliver:
No more by thee my steps shall be,
For ever and for ever.

Flow, softly flow, by lawn and lea,
A rivulet then a river:
Nowhere by thee my steps shall be
For ever and for ever.

But here will sigh thine alder tree
And here thine aspen shiver;
And here by thee will hum the bee,
For ever and for ever.

A thousand suns will stream on thee,
A thousand moons will quiver;
But not by thee my steps shall be,
For ever and for ever.[/quote]

Edgar Allan Poe - Lenore
[quote]Ah, broken is the golden bowl! the spirit flown forever!
Let the bell toll! -a saintly soul floats on the Stygian river -
And, Guy De Vere, hast thou no tear? -weep now or never more!
See! on yon drear and rigid bier low lies thy love, Lenore!
Come! let the burial rite be read -the funeral song be sung! -
An anthem for the queenliest dead that ever died so young -
A dirge for her, the doubly dead in that she died so young.

"Wretches! ye loved her for her wealth and hated her for her pride,
And when she fell in feeble health, ye blessed her -that she died!
How shall the ritual, then, be read? -the requiem how be sung
By you -by yours, the evil eye, -by yours, the slanderous tongue
That did to death the innocence that died, and died so young?"

Peccavimus; but rave not thus! and let a Sabbath song
Go up to God so solemnly the dead may feel no wrong!
The sweet Lenore hath "gone before," with Hope, that flew beside,
Leaving thee wild for the dear child that should have been thy bride -
For her, the fair and debonnaire, that now so lowly lies,
The life upon her yellow hair but not within her eyes -
The life still there, upon her hair -the death upon her eyes.

Avaunt! tonight my heart is light. No dirge will I upraise,
But waft the angel on her flight with a paean of old days!
Let no bell toll! -lest her sweet soul, amid its hallowed mirth,
Should catch the note, as it doth float up from the damned Earth.
To friends above, from fiends below, the indignant ghost is riven -
From Hell unto a high estate far up within the Heaven -
From grief and groan to a golden throne beside the King of Heaven."[/quote]

William Shakepear - Let me not to the marriage of true minds
[quote]
Let me not to the marriage of true minds
Admit impediments. Love is not love
Which alters when it alteration finds,
Or bends with the remover to remove:
Oh, no! it is an ever-fixéd mark,
That looks on tempests and is never shaken;
It is the star to every wandering bark,
Whose worth's unknown, although his height be taken.
Love's not time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks
Within his bending sickle's compass come'
Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks,
But bears it out even to the edge of doom.
If this be error and upon me proved,
I never writ, nor no man ever loved.[/quote]

[Magnus X]

poe! that reminds me and i had to post it:

[center]The Raven
Edgar Allan Poe
[img]http://www.heise.de/icons/warden/1transp.gif[/img]

Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered weak and weary,
Over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore,
While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping,
As of some one gently rapping, rapping at my chamber door.
`'Tis some visitor,' I muttered, `tapping at my chamber door -
Only this, and nothing more.'

Ah, distinctly I remember it was in the bleak December,
And each separate dying ember wrought its ghost upon the floor.
Eagerly I wished the morrow; - vainly I had sought to borrow
From my books surcease of sorrow - sorrow for the lost Lenore -
For the rare and radiant maiden whom the angels named Lenore -
Nameless here for evermore.

And the silken sad uncertain rustling of each purple curtain
Thrilled me - filled me with fantastic terrors never felt before;
So that now, to still the beating of my heart, I stood repeating
`'Tis some visitor entreating entrance at my chamber door -
Some late visitor entreating entrance at my chamber door; -
This it is, and nothing more,'

Presently my soul grew stronger; hesitating then no longer,
`Sir,' said I, `or Madam, truly your forgiveness I implore;
But the fact is I was napping, and so gently you came rapping,
And so faintly you came tapping, tapping at my chamber door,
That I scarce was sure I heard you' - here I opened wide the door; -
Darkness there, and nothing more.

Deep into that darkness peering, long I stood there wondering, fearing,
Doubting, dreaming dreams no mortal ever dared to dream before
But the silence was unbroken, and the darkness gave no token,
And the only word there spoken was the whispered word, `Lenore!'
This I whispered, and an echo murmured back the word, `Lenore!'
Merely this and nothing more.

Back into the chamber turning, all my soul within me burning,
Soon again I heard a tapping somewhat louder than before.
`Surely,' said I, `surely that is something at my window lattice;
Let me see then, what thereat is, and this mystery explore -
Let my heart be still a moment and this mystery explore; -
'Tis the wind and nothing more!'

Open here I flung the shutter, when, with many a flirt and flutter,
In there stepped a stately raven of the saintly days of yore.
Not the least obeisance made he; not a minute stopped or stayed he;
But, with mien of lord or lady, perched above my chamber door -
Perched upon a bust of Pallas just above my chamber door -
Perched, and sat, and nothing more.

Then this ebony bird beguiling my sad fancy into smiling,
By the grave and stern decorum of the countenance it wore,
`Though thy crest be shorn and shaven, thou,' I said, `art sure no craven.
Ghastly grim and ancient raven wandering from the nightly shore -
Tell me what thy lordly name is on the Night's Plutonian shore!'
Quoth the raven, `Nevermore.'

Much I marvelled this ungainly fowl to hear discourse so plainly,
Though its answer little meaning - little relevancy bore;
For we cannot help agreeing that no living human being
Ever yet was blessed with seeing bird above his chamber door -
Bird or beast above the sculptured bust above his chamber door,
With such name as `Nevermore.'

But the raven, sitting lonely on the placid bust, spoke only,
That one word, as if his soul in that one word he did outpour.
Nothing further then he uttered - not a feather then he fluttered -
Till I scarcely more than muttered `Other friends have flown before -
On the morrow he will leave me, as my hopes have flown before.'
Then the bird said, `Nevermore.'

Startled at the stillness broken by reply so aptly spoken,
`Doubtless,' said I, `what it utters is its only stock and store,
Caught from some unhappy master whom unmerciful disaster
Followed fast and followed faster till his songs one burden bore -
Till the dirges of his hope that melancholy burden bore
Of "Never-nevermore."'

But the raven still beguiling all my sad soul into smiling,
Straight I wheeled a cushioned seat in front of bird and bust and door;
Then, upon the velvet sinking, I betook myself to linking
Fancy unto fancy, thinking what this ominous bird of yore -
What this grim, ungainly, ghastly, gaunt, and ominous bird of yore
Meant in croaking `Nevermore.'

This I sat engaged in guessing, but no syllable expressing
To the fowl whose fiery eyes now burned into my bosom's core;
This and more I sat divining, with my head at ease reclining
On the cushion's velvet lining that the lamp-light gloated o'er,
But whose velvet violet lining with the lamp-light gloating o'er,
[i]She[/i] shall press, ah, nevermore!

Then, methought, the air grew denser, perfumed from an unseen censer
Swung by Seraphim whose foot-falls tinkled on the tufted floor.
`Wretch,' I cried, `thy God hath lent thee - by these angels he has sent thee
Respite - respite and nepenthe from thy memories of Lenore!
Quaff, oh quaff this kind nepenthe, and forget this lost Lenore!'
Quoth the raven, `Nevermore.'

`Prophet!' said I, `thing of evil! - prophet still, if bird or devil! -
Whether tempter sent, or whether tempest tossed thee here ashore,
Desolate yet all undaunted, on this desert land enchanted -
On this home by horror haunted - tell me truly, I implore -
Is there - [i]is[/i] there balm in Gilead? - tell me - tell me, I implore!'
Quoth the raven, `Nevermore.'

`Prophet!' said I, `thing of evil! - prophet still, if bird or devil!
By that Heaven that bends above us - by that God we both adore -
Tell this soul with sorrow laden if, within the distant Aidenn,
It shall clasp a sainted maiden whom the angels named Lenore -
Clasp a rare and radiant maiden, whom the angels named Lenore?'
Quoth the raven, `Nevermore.'

`Be that word our sign of parting, bird or fiend!' I shrieked upstarting -
`Get thee back into the tempest and the Night's Plutonian shore!
Leave no black plume as a token of that lie thy soul hath spoken!
Leave my loneliness unbroken! - quit the bust above my door!
Take thy beak from out my heart, and take thy form from off my door!'
Quoth the raven, `Nevermore.'

And the raven, never flitting, still is sitting, still is sitting
On the pallid bust of Pallas just above my chamber door;
And his eyes have all the seeming of a demon's that is dreaming,
And the lamp-light o'er him streaming throws his shadow on the floor;
And my soul from out that shadow that lies floating on the floor
Shall be lifted - nevermore!


[indent][indent][indent][indent][indent][indent][left]and here's my own, a short one:
[/left][/indent][/indent][/indent][/indent][/indent][/indent]
I'm plunged into darkness -
an abyss my patience
cannot fathom
the sense of solitude is a trick
on the mind

the air is becoming thin
the life at wake begins to falter -
saddling the mare and
taking off into the night

the hooves began to thunder
on the valley of wretched souls
where destiny gambles with death

farther on, the tolling of the bell
announced the coming of the black king -
darker than night, to await at
the sepulcher for the arrival of
the lone rider
of the deathly hour.
[/center]

[LadyDawn]

While looking around, I stumbled upon this, and I think it is beautiful:

In A Dark Time by Theodore Roethke
[quote]In a dark time, the eye begins to see,
I meet my shadow in the deepening shade;
I hear my echo in the echoing wood--
A lord of nature weeping to a tree,
I live between the heron and the wren,
Beasts of the hill and serpents of the den.

What's madness but nobility of soul
At odds with circumstance? The day's on fire!
I know the purity of pure despair,
My shadow pinned against a sweating wall,
That place among the rocks--is it a cave,
Or winding path? The edge is what I have.

A steady storm of correspondences!
A night flowing with birds, a ragged moon,
And in broad day the midnight come again!
A man goes far to find out what he is--
Death of the self in a long, tearless night,
All natural shapes blazing unnatural light.

Dark,dark my light, and darker my desire.
My soul, like some heat-maddened summer fly,
Keeps buzzing at the sill. Which I is I?
A fallen man, I climb out of my fear.
The mind enters itself, and God the mind,
And one is One, free in the tearing wind. [/quote]

[i]And another just for a good mesurment...[/i]

Grief by Elizabeth Barrett Browning
[quote]I tell you hopeless grief is passionless,
That only men incredulous of despair,
Half-taught in anguish, through the midnight air
Beat upward to God's throne in loud access
Of shrieking and reproach. Full desertness
In souls, as countries, lieth silent-bare
Under the blanching, vertical eye-glare
Of the absolute heavens. Deep-hearted man, express
Grief for thy dead in silence like to death—
Most like a monumental statue set
In everlasting watch and moveless woe
Till itself crumble to the dust beneath.
Touch it; the marble eyelids are not wet;
If it could weep, it could arise and go. [/quote]

[Darigan]

I have some poems I wrote a few years ago before I got writers block.... they aren't great but i'll post them here for critic


[quote]
The Box

In the box are untold things
things that go bump in the night
yet things that make men laugh

In the box lies furry hairy things
darkness completly and legs a plenty
the things in the box give quite a fright
to any mother who finds hiding
rather then fighting a sutible situation

In the box there are many eyes
ever watching for anything coming its way
to snatch in its silk of false love
a snack for later once poor beasts
have worn themselves out

In the box...
whats that you say
the box is moving oh my [/quote]


[quote]

Loves End

My heart an open casket
stiff as a board
numb as ice
I've loved once twice
three times too many
each end with heartbreak
and regrets

My eyes open to pain
never seen by child's eyes
my heart my soul shredded to pieces
yet i go on I love again
make mistakes and my heart
patched together falls apart
all the easier

as the darkness falls
you know pain
while i know only loneliness
[/quote]

[quote]

Hates Beginning

I look into your eyes
stare you down and feel
the utmost urge
to rip your cold heart
from your chest
if one exists

Thoughts run through my head
of all the lasting tortures
I'd love to put you through
vengeance seems such a small word
to the damages you've done me

A fist to your face
as you threaten me more
down you go my anger recedes
diminished for now
[/quote]

[quote]

Happy Times

The weather glows
from the passing storms
as time rolls on
and depression fades
trailed by sadness and fear
all lost to the smile on your face
that brightens even the worst of days

I look at you and know
nothing bad will ever last
your grin, your very laugh
scares away all my deepest hurts
knowing your here
forever and always
until god holds out his arms to you
and calls your sweet name
fills me the greatest joy
just to be your friend
[/quote]

[quote]

The End

The end is near
it is very close at hand
when they close the door
and lock the gate
death has come and gone

In a place once cheery with life
now stands but a lonesome tree
the leaves dead on the ground
have turned the sorts of colors
seen in paintings of an end
on the brink of showing itself

Death has come and gone
but it did not step here
until all that was happy
had had its fun
[/quote]

[Malaikat Maut]

Some know but most do not that my wife and I recently had our first child, a wonderful little boy. Before he was born we had this poem engraved, along with his name, on a wooden plaque which now hangs on the wall of his room. I came to find out shortly thereafter that my father also dedicated the poem to me before I was born. Not only is it a wonderful piece, it holds great meaning for me personally.

So, I've chosen to revive this thread by posting "If" by Rudyard Kipling

[quote]If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you;
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too;
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or, being lied about, don't deal in lies,
Or, being hated, don't give way to hating,
And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise;

If you can dream - and not make dreams your master;
If you can think - and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with triumph and disaster
And treat those two imposters just the same;
If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to broken,
And stoop and build 'em up with wornout tools;

If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breath a word about your loss;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: "Hold on";

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with kings - nor lose the common touch;
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you;
If all men count with you, but none too much;
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds' worth of distance run -
Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,
And - which is more - you'll be a Man my son![/quote]

[Ackshan Bemunah]

The Love-Song of J. Alfred Prufrock By T.S. Eliot

 

 

 
S’io credesse che mia risposta fosse
 
A persona che mai tornasse al mondo,
 
Questa fiamma staria senza piu scosse.
 
Ma perciocche giammai di questo fondo
 
Non torno vivo alcun, s’i’odo il vero,
 
Senza tema d’infamia ti rispondo.

Let us go then, you and I, 
When the evening is spread out against the sky 
Like a patient etherized upon a table; 
Let us go, through certain half-deserted streets, 
The muttering retreats 
Of restless nights in one-night cheap hotels 
And sawdust restaurants with oyster-shells: 
Streets that follow like a tedious argument 
Of insidious intent 
To lead you to an overwhelming question. . .                               10 
Oh, do not ask, "What is it?" 
Let us go and make our visit. 

  In the room the women come and go 
Talking of Michelangelo. 

  The yellow fog that rubs its back upon the window-panes 
The yellow smoke that rubs its muzzle on the window-panes 
Licked its tongue into the corners of the evening 
Lingered upon the pools that stand in drains, 
Let fall upon its back the soot that falls from chimneys, 
Slipped by the terrace, made a sudden leap,                               20 
And seeing that it was a soft October night 
Curled once about the house, and fell asleep. 

  And indeed there will be time 
For the yellow smoke that slides along the street, 
Rubbing its back upon the window-panes; 
There will be time, there will be time 
To prepare a face to meet the faces that you meet; 
There will be time to murder and create, 
And time for all the works and days of hands 
That lift and drop a question on your plate;                                30 
Time for you and time for me, 
And time yet for a hundred indecisions 
And for a hundred visions and revisions 
Before the taking of a toast and tea. 

  In the room the women come and go 
Talking of Michelangelo. 

  And indeed there will be time 
To wonder, "Do I dare?" and, "Do I dare?" 
Time to turn back and descend the stair, 
With a bald spot in the middle of my hair—                               40 
[They will say: "How his hair is growing thin!"] 
My morning coat, my collar mounting firmly to the chin, 
My necktie rich and modest, but asserted by a simple pin— 
[They will say: "But how his arms and legs are thin!"] 
Do I dare 
Disturb the universe? 
In a minute there is time 
For decisions and revisions which a minute will reverse. 

  For I have known them all already, known them all; 
Have known the evenings, mornings, afternoons,                       50 
I have measured out my life with coffee spoons; 
I know the voices dying with a dying fall 
Beneath the music from a farther room. 
  So how should I presume? 

  And I have known the eyes already, known them all— 
The eyes that fix you in a formulated phrase, 
And when I am formulated, sprawling on a pin, 
When I am pinned and wriggling on the wall, 
Then how should I begin 
To spit out all the butt-ends of my days and ways?                    60 
  And how should I presume? 

  And I have known the arms already, known them all— 
Arms that are braceleted and white and bare 
[But in the lamplight, downed with light brown hair!] 
Is it perfume from a dress 
That makes me so digress? 
Arms that lie along a table, or wrap about a shawl. 
  And should I then presume? 
  And how should I begin?
        .     .     .     .     .

Shall I say, I have gone at dusk through narrow streets              70 
And watched the smoke that rises from the pipes 
Of lonely men in shirt-sleeves, leaning out of windows? . . . 

I should have been a pair of ragged claws 
Scuttling across the floors of silent seas.
        .     .     .     .     .

And the afternoon, the evening, sleeps so peacefully! 
Smoothed by long fingers, 
Asleep . . . tired . . . or it malingers, 
Stretched on the floor, here beside you and me. 
Should I, after tea and cakes and ices, 
Have the strength to force the moment to its crisis?                  80 
But though I have wept and fasted, wept and prayed, 
Though I have seen my head (grown slightly bald) brought in upon a platter, 
I am no prophet–and here's no great matter; 
I have seen the moment of my greatness flicker, 
And I have seen the eternal Footman hold my coat, and snicker, 
And in short, I was afraid. 

  And would it have been worth it, after all, 
After the cups, the marmalade, the tea, 
Among the porcelain, among some talk of you and me, 
Would it have been worth while,                                             90 
To have bitten off the matter with a smile, 
To have squeezed the universe into a ball 
To roll it toward some overwhelming question, 
To say: "I am Lazarus, come from the dead, 
Come back to tell you all, I shall tell you all" 
If one, settling a pillow by her head, 
  Should say, "That is not what I meant at all. 
  That is not it, at all." 

  And would it have been worth it, after all, 
Would it have been worth while,                                           100 
After the sunsets and the dooryards and the sprinkled streets, 
After the novels, after the teacups, after the skirts that trail along the floor— 
And this, and so much more?— 
It is impossible to say just what I mean! 
But as if a magic lantern threw the nerves in patterns on a screen: 
Would it have been worth while 
If one, settling a pillow or throwing off a shawl, 
And turning toward the window, should say: 
  "That is not it at all, 
  That is not what I meant, at all."                                          110
        .     .     .     .     .

No! I am not Prince Hamlet, nor was meant to be; 
Am an attendant lord, one that will do 
To swell a progress, start a scene or two 
Advise the prince; no doubt, an easy tool, 
Deferential, glad to be of use, 
Politic, cautious, and meticulous; 
Full of high sentence, but a bit obtuse; 
At times, indeed, almost ridiculous— 
Almost, at times, the Fool. 

  I grow old . . . I grow old . . .                                              120 
I shall wear the bottoms of my trousers rolled. 

  Shall I part my hair behind? Do I dare to eat a peach? 
I shall wear white flannel trousers, and walk upon the beach. 
I have heard the mermaids singing, each to each. 

  I do not think they will sing to me. 

  I have seen them riding seaward on the waves 
Combing the white hair of the waves blown back 
When the wind blows the water white and black. 

  We have lingered in the chambers of the sea 
By sea-girls wreathed with seaweed red and brown               130 
Till human voices wake us, and we drown.

 

Edited December 20, 2013 by Ackshan Bemunah