Poems Part II
The following poetry is kept sacred.
Living and waiting for that one day where just maybe ...
Maybe one day she'll be the one
figure it out dear
May 30 2002
Ramiz Baig
Books ... people... conversations and them...
Are you thinking of me?
Vows ... hopes and forgotten dreams, I condemn...
Are you thinking of me?
Close your eyes and move forward...
Zombie...
Shut your thoughts and move forward...
Zombie...
The pains and pleasures of life
All the time thinking what you rather are
An image ... a word ... has left me like this...
What if I was G and what I did was how everything turns out to be
Lost in the madness not wanting to go back!
Will Annie hold tighter? If I slip away?
June 6, 2002
Ramiz Baig
Losing my advantage
I don't feel like giving
Why am I writing this...what the hell is wrong with me
Have I turned selfish... all this shit about me
I think it's this time...
I think it's this place...
I think it's
Lost...
Tomorrow will come and nothing will happen
The urge I had will it be forgotten
I think not and wonder where this will stop
This is not a poem and I am not 16!
God dammit stop writing!
Falling is not easy.
Why don't you catch my fall?
Shame on me!
How can I even think of this?
I feel so unafraid
Hiding
Backwards
Inside
Of
Me
Annie hold a little tighter
I just might slip away
Who are you?
Why I feel this way?
Who are you?
Why are you?
Why now?
And its just me
Need to lose myself in you
Need to find myself with you
I never thought it would
Come to this...
I never thought it could...
There is no reason.
This dammit is treason...
--------
It's related yet not
These new demons in my life...
Why am I looking for something which can't be mine?
Why should I be content though with what I have...?
I have given it my all...
For what I though in
Why the sudden change?
My heart beats faster for that thought
Rather than what I have.
Why do I feel this way?
Do you feel this way?
Coincidence is our mutual presence?
Or is what I feel mutual too?
This is not about poetry but my life
This is not about you, but me.
What are you? Me? We?
I am losing control ... after years of myself
What is this I am feeling?
I can't put words on paper ... I can't
Even channel my thoughts
I am not sixteen and this isn't a poem
But blood running through me
Is pumping on a different beat
Been in love... have lost it too
What am I becoming now is it true too?
Chapter 1
by Ramiz Baig
Who are you
why are u having this affect on me
my life was complete
or so I thought
all was said and done
the writing as they say was on the wall
Who are u
with your beautiful green eyes
and a soft serene smile
I dont know u at all
but I want to
Who are u
who says my name so sweetly
who asks such innocent questions
who thanks me for things you really shouldnt have to
?
Who are u
you looked worried today
and I just cant sleep wondering why
Who are u
I approached her
as if its the most natural thing to do
she stood there
as if hiding her real emotions inside
wanting not to reveal what she really felt inside
I say hello
how was your day?
The day was surreal
as if it hasnt really happened
how could it
this isnt my life I am leading
I set out to run a 400m hurdle run
and as I approach the finish line all of sudden I have an urge to go back and re jump a few hurdles
maybe differently
Life is after all unexpected
I do love that about it
as anything mundane turns me off
this has caught me off guard
I switch sides on the bed
not helping
cant sleep
when will the sun rise again?
Light will fall on land soon
there will be day not much later
but the sun will rise when the sunlight hits her face and I am there to receive the reflection of it
Will I see her again? I get out of bed and get dressed
I have to be ready to see her again
as if the entire existence of this world depends on it
or maybe just mine
practicality is my enemy
or maybe in the long run my friend
OUCH!
I cut myself shaving
the blood drops and splashes on the sink
the event is only exaggerated in my thoughts
maybe just to shake me out of it
I look at myself
shake my head
the rest of the day goes by
monotonous to the core
Soon I became restless of my new found solution
ignoring it is helping my reality but its not helping my insides
I need to break free
or at least take a break
to look upon whats approaching me
the serene sight
but where is she?
Things only come to u when your not looking for them
sad fact
but a fact nonetheless
I ran across the Sahara of my mind
swam down the Nile of my thoughts
but couldnt find her
there was everything there
the drowned sorrows in the Nile
the intense heat of love in the Sahara
but only she wasnt there
Where are u
When u close your eyes what do u see?
I sat down writing
I realized I cant do that
have to get on with things
the following days were spent looking for u unconsciously
consciously, I forgot what I did
There is a pleasure in the unknown
in the process
in achieving the achievement
more then the achievement itself
there is this goal
and you are it
where are u
I am surrounded by the demons and ghouls of reality
they cannot stop me
I wont let them
a decoy
of achieved love
will fool them I thought
though who are they working for?
These demons and ghouls, the real or the surreal
The journey might be long
too painstaking to endure
I won't do it
GASP!
There she is
A mirage is evil
Real or surreal? Whoever u are
I wish I loved u
Who am I? Happy today
sad tomorrow
Who am I? Her everything at a moment
a lonely sole the next
Who am I? The worlds at my finger tips a second
the clock strikes 1 and I have no belief
In me or anything else
that dont matter
when you lose faith
you lose it all
I have everything
content I should be
and I am
but
Time is so slow
I want to know how It ends
I have to end up
right or wrong
I have to succeed
Who am I? Someone who hasnt
They
are the ghouls
they are the demons
I achieve
and it doesnt matter
I do and were not talking about that any more
I give
and they take
Restrictions
I want them
for them rather than myself
Greatness
she says I have
before her so did she
Where do I find it? In money
in love
in loss?
When I am rock
money is not
coz I dont have it
Loss though
has made me strong
made me great
a legend
There are no rights or wrongs
So what to do? Dreaming
turns out alright
a smile across my face
and then the realization all this is make belief
What is real? What is surreal?
Real I am
surreal she is
11 play cricket
the 12th man is just temporary
At the Threshold of life I am
where are u?
Wish I could juggle
I wish I didnt have to juggle
No regrets
the seed was pure
a bonsai
in return I have to bear fruit
Where to look
but deep inside
I have to run but not hide
its early days but I am restless
the end
hopeless
The same desert the same Nile
how could I find her
coz where am I?
We should be but I am
Lost
Whoever I am
I wish I wasnt
are u thinking of me?
Vows ... hopes and forgotten dreams, I condemn ...
are u thinking of me?
close your eyes and move forward ...
zombie ...
shut your thoughts and move forward ...
zombie ...
the pains and pleasures of life
all the time thinking what u rather be
an image ... a word ... has left me like this ...
what if I was G and what I did was how everything turns out to be ...
lost in the madness not wanting to go back!
Will Annie hold tighter? If I slip away?
Its related yet not
these new demons in my life...
why am I looking for something which can't be mine.
Why should I be content though with what I have...
I have given it my all...
for what I thought in
why the sudden change?
My heart beats faster for that thought
rather than what I have.
Why do I feel this way?
Do you feel this way?
Coincidence is our mutual presence?
Or is what I feel mutual too?
This is not about poetry but my life
this is not about you, but me
what are you? Me...
I am losing control ... after years of myself ..
What is this I am feeling...
I cant put words on paper ... I cant
even channel my thoughts ...
I am not sixteen and this isn't a poem
but blood running through me
is pumping on a different beat
been in love ... have lost it too
what am I becoming now is it true too?
Losing my advantage ...
I dont feel like giving...
why am I writing this ... what the hell is wrong with me...
have i turned selfish...all this shit about me
i think it's this time...
i think it's this place...
i think it's...
lost...
tomorrow will come and nothing will happen.
The urge I had will it be forgotten...
I think not and wonder where it will stop
this is not a poem and I aunt 16,
stop writing!
Falling is not easy.
why dont u catch my fall...
I feel so unafraid
riding backwards inside of me
Annie hold a little tighter
I just might slip away
shame on me!
How can I even think of this
who are you?
Why I feel this way? Who are you
why are you.
Why now!
and its just me
need to lose myself in you
need to find myself in you
I never thought it would
come to this...
I never thought it could...
there is no reason
this admit is treason
Untitled
by Ramiz Baig
Being alone is torture
To you and to your soul
How we all need someone
Stay alone and be foretold
Here we are creatures of torment
All alone no hearts to mend
But that of our own.
That shattered heart beyond repair
I hate this fucking life of despair
So God lend me a warm hand to hold
Someone loving for my inner cold
Cause I am lovesick
Getting torn apart like a circumcised dick
I need a lovely angel
To dawn on me & rescue me,
To take me to neverland
And to hold me forever and......
Ithaca
provided by Antonio Lopez
When you set out on your journey to Ithaca,
pray that the road is long,
full of adventure, full of knowledge.
The Lestrygonians and the Cyclops,
the angry Poseidon -- do not fear them:
You will never find such as these on your path,
if your thoughts remain lofty, if a fine
emotion touches your spirit and your body.
The Lestrygonians and the Cyclops,
the fierce Poseidon you will never encounter,
if you do not carry them within your soul,
if your soul does not set them up before you.
Pray that the road is long.
That the summer mornings are many, when,
with such pleasure, with such joy
you will enter ports seen for the first time;
stop at Phoenician markets,
and purchase fine merchandise,
mother-of-pearl and coral, amber and ebony,
and sensual perfumes of all kinds,
as many sensual perfumes as you can;
visit many Egyptian cities,
to learn and learn from scholars.
Always keep Ithaca in your mind.
To arrive there is your ultimate goal.
But do not hurry the voyage at all.
It is better to let it last for many years;
and to anchor at the island when you are old,
rich with all you have gained on the way,
not expecting that Ithaca will offer you riches.
Ithaca has given you the beautiful voyage.
Without her you would have never set out on the road.
She has nothing more to give you.
And if you find her poor, Ithaca has not deceived you.
Wise as you have become, with so much experience,
you must already have understood what Ithaca's mean.
The Queen
Provided By Antonio Lopez
I have appointed you Queen.
There are those more slender than you, more slender.
There are those purer than you, purer.
There are those fairer than you, fairer.
But you are Queen.
As you walk the streets
nobody recognizes you.
Nobody sees your crown of crystal; nobody notices
the red and gold carpet
you tread wherever you go,
the carpet that does not exist.
And when you appear
all the rivers
of my body ripple, bells
make the skies tremble
and a song of praise fills the world.
Only you and I,
Only you and I, my love,
Can hear it.
Don't Look
By Elijah
You need not to look
because when you look
you overlook
and when you do that
the one for you
is in front of you
and will pass you by
Maybe Someday
Slammed my fist against the wall
Hoping it would ease the pain
Silence filled the empty room
Stupid girl I've been for you
Smell of you still on my bed
Play my guitar, aching' for sleep
Parting words empty & tense
Kiss on the cheek like IΉm a friend
I guess "Maybe Someday" echoed
Until I drove myself crazy, waiting on you
I thought "Maybe Someday"
YouΉd change your mind but now I know
"Maybe Someday" won't come
Nothing' left for me to say
God Gimme strength to walk away.
Because "Maybe Someday" echoed
Until I drove myself crazy, waiting on you
I thought "Maybe Someday"
YouΉd change your mind but now I know
"Maybe Someday" won't come
Never miss illusions left behind
Cause You're not here with love that matters
IΉm better off when love stays in my head
Dover Beach
by Matthew Arnold
The Sea of Faith
Was once, too, at the full, and round earth's shore
Lay like the folds of a bright girdle furled.
But now I only hear
Its melancholy, long, withdrawing roar,
Retreating, to the breadth
Of the night-wind, down the vast edges drear
And naked shingles of the world.
Ah, love, let us be true
To one another! for the world, which seems
To lie before us like a land of dreams,
So various, so beautiful, so new,
Hath really neither joy, nor love, nor light,
Nor certitude, nor peace, nor help for pain;
And we are here as on a darkling plain
Swept with confused alarms of struggle and flight,
Where ignorant armies clash by night.
The Black Panther
Author unknown
There is a panther caged within my breast;
But what his name, there is no breast shall know.
Save mine, nor what it is that drives him so,
Backward and forward, in a relentless quest-
That silent rage, baffled but unsuppressed.
The soft pad of those stealthy feet that go
Over my body's prison to and fro.
Trying the walls forever without rest.
All day I feed him with my living heart.
But when the night puts forth her dreams and stars
The inexorable frenzy reawakes
His wrath is hurled upon the trembling bars,
The eternal passion stretches me apart
And I lie silent-but my body shakes.
A Reminisce
Author unknown
Just the other day,
I was thinking about
What it was like falling in love with you.
I remember saying goodbye
For a few hours that seemed
Like an eternity.
And then counting every minute
Till we could be together again.
Most of all I remember the
Feeling that only falling in love can give.
Those memories are a special
Part of the love we share today.
Because of them, I know that love
Becomes more beautiful as it grows.
Tears, Idle Tears
Alfred Lord Tennyson
Tears, idle tears, I know not what they mean,
Tears from the depth of some divine despair
Rise in the heart, and gather to the eyes,
In looking on the happy autumn fields,
And thinking of the days that are no more.
Fresh as the first beam glittering on a sail,
That brings our friends up from the underworld,
Sad as the last which reddens over one
That sinks with all we love below the verge;
So sad, so fresh, the days that are no more.
Ah, sad and strange as in dark summer dawns
The earliest pipe of half-awakened birds
To dying ears, when unto dying eyes
The casement slowly grows a glimmering square;
So sad, so strange, the days that are no more.
Dear as remembered kisses after death,
And sweet as those by hopeless fancy feigned
On lips that are for others; deep as love,
Deep as first love, and wild with all regret
O Death in Life, the days that are no more!
Do Not Go Gentle into That Good Night
by Dylan Thomas
Do not go gentle into that good night,
Old age should burn and rave at close of day;
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
Though wise men at their end know dark is right,
Because their words had forked no lightning they
Do not go gentle into that good night.
Good men, the last wave by, crying how bright
Their frail deeds might have danced in a green bay
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
Wild men who caught and sang the sun in flight,
And learn, too late, they grieved it on its way,
Do not go gentle into that good night.
Grave men, near death, who see with blinding sight
Blind eyes could blaze like meteors and be gay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
And you, my father, there on the sad height,
Curse, bless, me now with your fierce tears, I pray.
Do not go gentle into that good night.
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
Mercy-fuck
By Mary Prankster
I'm not amused anymore
And nothings a muse anymore
I sing of love and of hate
But I'm just masturbating my soul
And I don't want to live anymore
And I don't want to give anymore
If I fawn, if I flirt, I just keep getting hurt
And it's taken its toll
I wish I could fuck all my sorrow away
And fuck 'til the dawn of the next fucking day
Fuck the chorus and verse, fuck the pain getting worse
Fuck it all 'til I burn
I wish I could fuck all of you 'til you see
I'm the worst fuck up in all history
Fuck your image and mine, fuck your limp valentine
Fuck it all 'til I learn
I'm not a kid anymore
I don't know what I did anymore
But on every damn pass, karma bushwhacks my ass
And I get it all back
And I don't want to move anymore
I've got nothing to prove anymore
If I run, if I sit, still it all turns to shit
Then it turns to attack
I wish I could fuck all the memory I keep
Fuck the next ten years and just go to sleep
I'm fucked if I do and I'm fucked if I say
I'm fucked if I don't, so I'm fucked anyway
I wish I could fuck all of you 'til you see
I don't need your mercy-fuck sympathy
Fuck your word and your prayers,
Fuck your stares and my cares
Fuck it all 'til I learn
Tempest
by Mary Prankster
My manner is imperious
My logic is empirical
And I'm bad at being a girlfriend
So I'm hoping for a miracle
I fear your disappointment
When I don't turn out ethereal
Though either way for me
I know it means some new material
Now don't go thinking' that you're special Just because you are
'Cause I'm bound to over think it
And I always go too far
But if you think this kind of tempest
May just be your cup of tea
Then I'd like to offer you
The heart of me
Each attempt to clarify
Serves only to confuse
And it feels just like a fracture
But it looks more like a bruise
And my heart can't bear the weight
Of one more empty "I love you"
And I've strained my eyes to blindness
Trying to find a point of view
Now don't go thinking' that I'm crazy
Just because I am
'Cause I wouldn't act indifferent
If I didn't give a damn
And if you think this kind of tempest
May just be your cup of tea
Then I'd like to offer you
The heart of me
Now don't go thinking' that I love you
Just because I do
'Cause I've never met a certainty
I couldn't misconstrue
But if you think this kind of tempest
May just be your cup of tea
Then I'd like to offer you
The heart of me
Yes, I'd like to offer you
The heart of me
Takes His Place
by Mary Prankster
Says, "Baby, I'm all sorts of sorry."
Says, "Babe, you know I'm all kinds of sad."
Says, "Maybe it was fun while it lasted."
I say, "Baby, I just wish that it had."
Stands before me and his arms are folded
Teeth clenched in a too-perfect face
Turns to leave, an anonymous other
Steps in line to take his foolish place
Each lover's conversation
"I love you" "No, I love you more"
A perfect imitation
Of the one who came before
Every lover tells a different story
Every story always ends the same
Every lover spins the same kind of sugar
Only thing that changes is his name
Every dream and childhood recollection
Whispered to me in exactly the same way
Don't ask me where it hurts, now
I swear to God I couldn't say
That which doesn't kill me strengthens me
Repeated end-to-endlessly
If I'm so god damned strong now
How come I feel so lonely?
He says lots of lovely fill-in-the-blank
He so stresses that he's not like other men
I sit back, he stands up
And the cycle circles 'round again
One follows right behind the other
Line forms to the right and single-file
Another break-up, another lover
I haven't felt this old in a while
Each loving lie is spoken
How we mean it at the time
Identical hearts are broken
Another goes to the back of the line
"I love you" "I love you"
"I love you" "No, I love you more"
Each sentiment, each resident
Just the same as the one who came before, yeah
Tell me again until I feel something
Tell me again until I feel something
Tell me again until I feel something
Tell me again until I feel something, yeah
'Cause I feel nothing now
The Burial of the Dead (lines 1-18)
T.S. Eliot
April is the cruelest month, breeding
Lilacs out of the dead land, mixing
Memory and desire, stirring
Dull roots with spring rain.
Winter kept us warm, covering
Earth in forgetful snow, feeding
A little life with dried tubers.
Summer surprised us, coming over the starnbergersee
With a shower of rain, we stopped in the colonnade,
And went on in sunlight, in the Hotgarten,
And drank coffee, and talked for an hour.
Bingarkeine Russin, stamm' aus Litauen, echt deutsch.
And when we were children, staying at the arch-duke's,
My cousin's, he took me out on a sled,
And I was frightened, He said, Marie,
Marie, hold on tight. And down we went.
In the mountains, there you feel free.
I read much of the night, and go south in the winter.
The Hollow Man
T.S. Eliot
I
We are the hollow men
We are the stuffed men
Leaning together
Headpiece filled with straw. Alas!
Our dried voices, when
We whisper together
Are quiet and meaningless
As wind in dry grass
Or rats' feet over broken glass
In our dry cellar
Shape without form, shade without color,
Paralyzed force, gesture without motion;
Those who have crossed
With direct eyes, to death's other Kingdom
Remember us -if at all - not as lost
Violent souls, but only
As the hollow men
The stuffed men
II
Eyes I dare not meet in dreams
In death's dream kingdom
These do not appear:
There, the eyes are
Sunlight on a broken column
There, is a tree swinging
And voices are
In the wind's singing
More distant and more solemn
Than a fading star.
Let me be no nearer
In death's dream kingdom
Let me also wear
Such deliberate disguises
Rat's coat, crowskin, crossed stares
In a field
Behaving as the wind behaves
No nearer-
Not that final meeting
In the twilight kingdom
III
This is the dead land
This is the cactus land
Here the stone images
Are raised, here they receive
The supplication of a dead man's hand
Under the twinkle of a fading star.
Is it like this
In death's other kingdom
Walking alone
At the hour when we are
Trembling with tenderness
Lips that would kiss
Form prayers to broken stone.
IV
The eyes are not here
There are no eyes here
In this valley of dying stars
In this hollow valley
This broken jaw of our lost kingdoms
In this last of meeting places
We grape together
And avoid speech
Gathered on this beach of the tumid river
Sightless, unless
The eyes reappear
As the perpetual star
Multifoliate rose
Of death's twilight kingdom
The hope only
Of empty men.
V
Here we go round the prickly pear
Prickly pear prickly pear
Here we go round the prickly pear
At five o'clock in the morning
Between the idea
And the reality
Between the motion
And the act
Falls the Shadow
For Thine is the Kingdom
Between the conception
And the creation
Between the emotion
And the response
Falls the Shadow
Life is very long
Between the desire
And the spasm
Between the potency
And the existence
Between the essence
And the descent
Falls the Shadow
For Thine is the Kingdom
For Thine is
Life is
For Thine is
This is the way the world ends
This is the way the world ends
This is the way the world ends
Not with a bang but a whimper.
Love Song
W.B. Yeats
My love, we will go, we will go, I and you,
And away in the woods we will scatter the dew;
And the salmon behold, and the ousel too,
My love, we will hear, I and you, we will hear
The calling afar of the doe and the deer.
And the bird in the branches will cry for us clear,
And the cuckoo unseen in his festival mood;
And death, oh my fair one, will never come near
In the bosom afar of the fragrant wood.
Ephemera
W.B. Yeats
'Your eyes that once were never weary of mine
Are bound in sorrow under pendulous lids,
Because our love is waning.'
And then she:
'Although our love is waning, let us stand
By the lone border of the lake once more,
Together in that hour of gentleness
When the poor tired child, Passion, falls asleep.
How far away the stars seem, and how far
Is our first kiss, and ah, how old my heart!'
Pensive they paced along the faded leaves,
While slowly he whose hand held hers replied:
'Passion has often worn our wandering hearts.'
The woods were round them, and the yellow leaves
Fell like faint meteors in the gloom, and once
A rabbit old and lame limped down the path;
Autumn was over him: and now they stood
On the lone border of the lake once more.
Turning, he saw that she had thrust dead leaves
Gathered in silence, dewy as her eyes,
In bosom and hair.
'Ah, do not mourn,' he said,
'That we are tired, for other loves await us;
Hate on and love through unrepining hours.
Before us lies eternity; our souls
Are love, and a continual farewell.'
Ephemera, an Autumn Idyll
W.B. Yeats
'Your eyes that once were never weary of mine
Lie now half hidden under pendulous lids,
Veined in a dreamy sorrow for their love
That wanes.' 'Ah, wistful voice,' replied the other,
'Though our sad love is fading, let us yet
Standby by the border of the lake once more,
Together in that hour of gentleness
When the poor tired child, passion, falls asleep.
How far away the stars seem, and how far
Is our first kiss, and ah, how old my heart!'
Pensive they paced along the faded leaves,
While slowly answered he who hand held hers-
'Often passion worn our wandering hearts,
Earth's aliens. Who so sorrowful? Our souls
Shall warm their lives at many a rustling flame?
The woods were round them, and the yellow leaves
Fell like faint meteors in the gloom, and once
A rabbit old and lame limped down the path-
Autumn was over him - and now they stood
On the lone border of the sullen lake.
Turning, he saw that she had thrust dead leaves,
Gathered in silence, dewy as her eyes,
In bosom and hair.
Then he: 'Let us not mourn
That we are tired, for other loves await us.
Hate on and love through unrepining hours.
Before us lies eternity; our souls
Are love, and a continual farewell.'
He spake once more and fondled with his lips
That word of the soul's peace - 'Eternity.'
The little waves that walked in evening whiteness,
Glimmering in her drooped eyes, saw her lips move
And whisper, 'The innumerable reeds
I know the word they cry "Eternity!"
And sing from shore to shore, and every year
They pine away and yellow and wear out,
And ah, they know not, as they pine and cease,'
Not they are the eternal - 'tis the cry.'
Down by the Salley Gardens
W.B. Yeats
Down by the salley gardens my love and I did meet;
She passed the salley gardens with little snow-white feet.
She bid me take love easy, as the leaves grow on the tree;
But I, being young and foolish, with her would not agree.
In a field by the river my love and I did stand,
And on my leaning shoulder she laid her snow-white hand.
She bid me take life easy, as the grass grows on the weirs;
But I was young and foolish, and now am full of tears.
The Sorrow of Love
W.B. Yeats
The brawling of a sparrow in the eaves
The brilliant moon and all the milky sky,
And all that famous harmony of leaves,
Had botted out man's image and his cry.
A girl arose that had red mournful lips
And seemed the greatness of the world in tears,
Doomed like Odysseus and the laboring ships
And proud as Priam murdered with his peers;
Arose, and on the instant clamorous eaves,
A climbing moon upon an empty sky,
And all that lamentation of the leaves,
Could but compose man's image and his cry.
The Sorrow of Love, circa 1895
W.B. Yeats
The quarrel of the sparrows in the eaves,
The full round moon and the star-laden sky,
And the loud song of the ever-singing leaves
Had hid away earth's old and weary cry.
And then you came with those red mournful lips,
And with you came the whole of the world's tears,
And all the sorrows of her laboring ships,
And all the burden of her myriad years.
And now the sparrows waning in the eaves,
The crumbling moon, the white stars in the sky,
And the loud chanting of the unquiet leaves,
Are shaken with earth's old and weary cry.
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;
Have many loves 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 over head
And hid his face amid a crowd of stars.
Lines 10-12 Circa 1892
Murmur, a little sad, 'From us fled Love
He paced upon the mountains far above,
And hid his face amid a crowd of stars.'
The Everlasting Voices
W.B. Yeats
O sweet everlasting Voices, be still;
Go to the guards of the heavenly fold
And bid them wander obeying your will,
Flame under flame, till Time be no more;
Have you not heard that our hearts are old,
That you call in birds, in wind on the hill,
In shaken boughs, in tide on the shore?
O sweet everlasting Voices, be still.
Into the Twilight
W.B. Yeats
Out-worn heart, in a time-out worn,
Come clear of the nets of wrong and right;
Laugh, heart, again in the grey twilight,
Sigh, heart, again in the dew of the morn.
Your mother Gire is always young,
Dew ever shining and twilight grey;
Though hope fall from you and love decay,
Burning in fires of a slanderous tongue.
Come, heart, where hill is heaped upon hill:
For there the mystical brotherhood
Of sun and moon and hollow and wood
And river and stream work out their will;
And God stands winding His lovely horn,
And time and the world are ever in flight;
And love is less kind then the grey twilight;
And hope is less dear than the dew of the morn.
The Song of Wandering Aengus, Lines 17-24
W.B. Yeats
Though I am old with wandering
Through hollow lands and hilly lands,
I will find out where she has gone,
And kiss her lips and take her hands;
And walk among long dappled grass,
And pluck till time and times are done
The silver apples of the moon
The golden apples of the sun.
He remembers Forgotten Beauty, Lines 1-3
W.B. Yeats
When my arms wrap you round I press
My heart upon the loveliness
That has long faded from the world;
Lines 18-19
And when you sigh from kiss to kiss
I hear white beauty sighing, too,
To his Heart, bidding it have no Fear
W.B. Yeats
Be you still, be you still, trembling heart;
Remember the wisdom out of the old days;
He who trembles before the flame and the flood
And the winds that blow through the starry ways,
Let the starry winds and the flame and the flood
Cover over and hide, for he has no part
With the lonely, majestical multitude.
Adam's Curse
W.B. Yeats
We sat together at one summer's end,
That beautiful mild woman, your close friend,
And you and I, and talked of poetry.
I said, 'A line will take us hours maybe;
Yet if it does not seem a moment's though,
Our stitching and unstitching has been naught.
Better go down upon your marrow-bones
And scrub a kitchen pavement, or break stones
Like an old pauper, in all kinds of weather;
For to articulate sweet sounds together
Is to work harder than all these, and yet
Be though an idler by the noisy set
Of bankers, school masters, and clergymen
The martyrs call the world.'
And thereupon
That beautiful mild woman for whose sake
There's many a one shall find out all heartache
On finding that her voice is sweet and low
Replied, 'To be born woman is to know -
Although they do not talk of it at school-
That we must labour to be beautiful.'
I said, 'It's certain there is no fine thing
Since Adam's fall but needs much labouring.
There have been lovers who though love should be
So much compounded of high courtesy
That they would sigh and quote with learned looks
Precedents out of beautiful old books;
Yet now it seems an idle trade enough.'
We sat grown quiet at the name of love;
We saw the last embers of daylight die,
And in the trembling blue-green of the sky
A moon, worn as if it had been a shell
Washing by time's waters as they rose and fell
About the stars and broke in days and years.
I had a thought for no one's but your ears:
That you were beautiful, and I strove
To love you in the old high way of love;
That it had all seemed happy, and yet we'd grown
As weary-hearted as that hollow moon.
To a Child Dancing in the Wind
W.B. Yeats
Dance there upon the shore;
What need have you to care
For wind or water's roar?
And tumble out your hair
That the salt drops have wet;
Being young you have not known
The fool's triumph, not yet
Love lost as soon as won,
Nor the best labourer dead
And all the sheaves to bind.
What need have you to dread
The monstrous crying of wind?
Two Years Later
W.B. Yeats
Has no one said those daring
Kind eyes should be more learn'd?
Or warned you how despairing
The moths are when they are burned?
I could have warned you; but you are young
So we speak a different tongue.
O you will take whatever's offered
And dream that all the world's a friend,
Suffer as your mother suffered,
Be as broken in the end,
But I am old and you are young
And I speak a barbarous tongue.
Politics
W.B. Yeats
How can I, that girl standing there,
My attention fix
On Roman or on Russian
Or on Spanish politics?
Yet here's a travelled man that knows
What he talks about,
And there's a politician
That has both read and thought,
And maybe what they say is true
Of war and war's alarms,
But O that I were young again
And held her in my arms.
A Prayer for Old Age
W.B. Yeats
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God guard me from those thoughts men think
In the mind alone;
He that sings a lasting song
Things in a marrow-bone;
From all that makes a wise old man
That can be praised of all,
O what am I that I should not seem
For the song's sake a fool?
I pray - for fashion's word is out
And prayer comes round again-
That I may seem, though I die old,
A foolish, passionate man.
The Lady's First Song
W.B. Yeats
I turn round
Like a dumb beast in a show,
Neither knows what I am
Nor where I go,
My language beaten
Into one name
I am in love
And that is my shame.
What hurts the soul
My soul adores,
No better than a beast
Upon all fours.
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