THE EAGLE He clasps the crag with crooked hands; Close to the sun in lonely hands, Ringed with the azure world, he stands. The wrinkled sea beneath him crawls; He watches from his mountain walls, And like a thunderbolt he fails. Alfred, Lord Tennyson (1809-1892)
DULCE ET DECORUM EST Bent double, like old beggars under sacks, Knock-kneed, coughing like hags, we cursed through sludge, Till on the haunting flares we turned our backs, And towards our distant rest began to trudge. Men marched asleep. Many had lost their boots, But limped on, blood-shod. All went lame, all blind; Drunk with fatigue; deaf even to the hoots Of gas-shells dropping softly behind. Gas! GAS! Quick, boys! - An ecstasy of fumbling, Fitting the clumsy helmets just in time, But someone was still yelling out and stumbling A flound'ring like a man in fire or lime.-- Dim through the misty panes and thick green light, As under a green sea, I saw him drowning. In all my dreams before my helpless sight He plunges at me, guttering, choking, drowning. If in some smothering dreams, you too could pace Behind the wagon that we flung him in, And watch the white eyes writhing in his face, His hanging face, like a devil's sick of sin, If you could hear, at every jolt, the blood Come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs Bitter as the cud Of vile, incurable sores on innocent tongues, -- My friend, you would not tell with such high zest To children ardent for some desperate glory, The old lie: Dulce et decorum est Pro patria mori. Wilfred Owen (1893-1918)
SPRING When daisie pied and violets blue, And lady-smocks all silver white, And cuckoo-buds of yellow hue Do paint the meadows with delight, The cuckoo then, on every tree, Mocks married men; for thus sings he, "Cuckoo! Cuckoo, cuckoo!" O word of fear, Unpleasing to a married ear! When shepherds pipe on oaten straws, And merry larks are plowmen's clocks, When turtles tread, and rooks, and daws, And maidens bleach their summer smocks, The cuckoo then, on every tree, Mocks married men; for thus sings he, "Cuckoo! Cuckoo, cuckoo!" O word of fear, Unpleasing to a married ear! William Shakespeare (1564-1616)
THE TWO RAVENS As I was walking all alone I heard two ravens making a moan; The one unto the other did say, "Where shall we go and dine today?" "In behind yon old turf dike I know there lies a new-slain knight; And nobody knows that he lies there But his hawk, his hound, and his lady fair. "His hound is to the hunting gone, His hawk to fetch the wild-fowl home, His lady's taken another mate, So we may make our dinner sweet. "You'll sit on his white neck-bone, And I'll pick out his bony blue eyes; With one lock of his golden hair We'll thatch our nest when it grows bare. "Many a one for him makes moan, But none shall know where he is gone; O'er his white bones, when they are bare, The wind shall blow forevermore." Anonymous (c. 15th century)
THE COMPUTATION For the first twenty years since yesterday I scarce believed thou couldst be gone away; For fourty more I fed on favors past, And forty on hopes that thou wouldst they might last. Tears drowned one hundred, and sighs blew out two; A thousand, I did neither think nor do, Or not divide, all being one thought of you. Or, in a thousand more, forgot that too. Yet call not this long life; but think that I Am, by being dead, immortal. Can ghosts die? John Donne (1572-1631)
BREAK OF DAY 'Tis true, 'tis day; what though it be? Oh, wilt thou therefore rise from me? Why should we rise because 'tis light? Did we lie down because 'twas night? Love which in spite of darkness brought us hither Should, in despite of light, keep us together. Light hath no tongue, but is all eye; If it could speak as well as spy, This were the worst that it could say: That, being well, I fain would stay, And that I loved my heart and honor so, That I would not from him that had them go. Must business thee from hence remove? Oh, that's the worst disease of love; The poor, the foul, the false, love can Admit, but not the busied man. He which hath business and makes love, doth do Such wrong as when a married man doth woo. John Donne (1572-1631)
MIRROR I am silver and exact. I have no preconceptions. Whatever I see I swallow immediately Just as it is, unmisted by love or dislike. I am not cruel, only truthful -- The eye of a little god, four-cornered. Most of the time I meditate on the opposite wall. It is pink, with speckles. I have looked at it so long I think it is a part of my heart. But it flickers. Faces and darkness separate us over and over. Now I am a lake. A woman bends over me, Searching my reaches for what she really is, Then she turns to those liars, the candles or the moon. I see her back, and reflect it faithfully. She rewards me with tears and an agitation of hands. I am important to her. She comes and goes. Each morning it is her face that replaces the darkness. In me she has drowned a young girl, and in me an old woman Rises toward her day after day, like a terrible fish. Sylvia Plath (1932-1963)
WHEN MY LOVE SWEARS THAT SHE IS MADE OF TRUTH When my love swears that she is made of truth, I do believe her, though I know she lies, That she might think me some untutored youth, Unlearned in the world's false subtleties. Thus vainly thinking that she thinks me young, Although she knows my days are past the best, Simply I credit her false-speaking tongue; On both sides thus is simple truth supprest. But wherefore says she not she is unjust? And wherefore say not I that I am old? Oh, love's best habit is in seeming trust, And age in love loves not to have years told: Therefore I lie with her and she with me, And in our faults by lies we flattered be. William Shakespeare (1564-1616)
CROSS My old man's a white old man And my old mother's black. If ever I cursed my white old man I take my curses back. If I ever cursed my black old mother And wished she were in hell, I'm sorry for that evil wish And now I wish her well. My old man died in a fine big house. My ma died in a shack. I wonder where I'm gonna die, Being neither white nor black? Langston Hughes (1902-1967)
A HYMN TO GOD THE FATHER Wilt thou forgive that sin where I begun, Which is my sin though it were done before? Wilt thou forgive those sins through which I run, And do them still, though still I do deplore? When thou hast done, thou hast not done, For I have more. Wilt thou forgive that sin by which I won Others to sin, and made my sin their door? Wilt thou forgive that sin which I did shun A year or two, but wallowed in a score? When thou hast done, thou hast not done, For I have more. I have a si of fear, that when I have spun My last thread, I shall perish on the shore; Swear by thyself that at my death the Sun Shall shine as it shines now, and heretofore; And having done that, thou hast done. I have no more. John Donne (1572-1631)
BEREFT Where had I heard this wind before Change like this to a deeper roar? What would it take my standing there for, Holding open a restive door, Looking downhill to a frothy shore? Summer was past and day was past. Somber clouds in the west were massed. Out in the porch's sagging floor Leaves got up in a coil and hissed, Blindly struck at my knee and missed. Something sinister in the tone Told me my secret must be known: Word I was in the house alone Somehow must have gooten abroad, Word I was in my life alone, Word I had no one left but God. Robert Frost (1874-1963)
METAPHORS I'm a riddle in nine syllables, An elephant, a ponderous house, A melon strolling on two tendrils, O red fruit, ivory, fine timbers! This loaf's big with its yeasty rising. Money's new-minted in this fat purse. I'm a means, a stage, a cow in calf. I've eaten a bag of green apples, Boarded the train there's no getting off. Sylvia Plath (1932-1963)
DREAM DEFERRED What happens to a dream deferred? Does it dry up like a raisin in the sun? Or fester like a sore-- And then run? Does it stink like rotten meat? Or crust and sugar over-- like a syrupy sweet? Maybe it just sags like a heavy load. Or does it explode? Langston Hughes (1902-1967)
THE ROAD NOT TAKEN 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 kepy 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 had made all the difference. Robert Frost (1874-1963)
THE SICK ROSE O Rose, thou art sick! The invisible worm That flies in the night, In the howling storm, Has found out thy bed Of crimson joy, And his dark secret love Does thy life destroy. William Blake (1757-1827)
TO THE VIRGINS, TO MAKE MUCH OF TIME Gather ye rosebuds while ye may, Old Time is still a-flying; And this same flower that smiles today Tomorrow will be dying. The glorious lamp of heaven, the Sun, The higher he's a-getting, The sooner will his race be run, And nearer he's to setting. The age is best which is the first, When youth and blood are warmer; But being spent, the worse, and worst Times still suceed the former. Then be not coy, but use your time; And while ye may, go marry; For having lost but once your prime, You may forever live tarry. Robert Herrick (1591-1674)
PEACE Sweet Peace, where dost thou dwell? I humbly crave, Let me once know. I sought thee in a secret cave, And asked if Peace were there. A hollow wind did seem to answer, "No, Go seek elsewhere." I did, and going did a rainbow note. "Surely," thought I, "This is the lace of Peace's coat; I will search out the matter." But while I looked, the clouds immediately Did break and scatter. Then I went to a garden, and did spy A gallant flower, The Crown Imperial. "Sure," said I, "Peace at the root must dwell." But when I digged, I saw a worm devour What showed so well. At length I met a reverned good old man, Whom when for Peace I did demand, he thus began: "There was a prince of old At Salem dwelt, who lived with good increase Of flock and fold. "He sweetly lived; yet sweetness did not save His life from foes. But after death out of his grave There sprang twelve stalks of wheat; Which many wondering at, got some of those To plant and set. "It prospered strangely, and did soon disperse Through all the earth, For they that taste it do rehearse That virtue lies therein, A secret virtue, bringing peace and mirth By flight of sin. "Take of this grain, which in my garden grows, And grows for you; Make bread of it; and that repose And peace, which everywhere With so much earnestness you do persue, Is only there." George Herbert (1593-1633)
CURIOSITY may have killed the cat; more likely the cat was just unlucky, or else curious to see what death was like, having no cause to go on licking paws, or fathering litter on litter of kittens, predictably. Nevertheless, to be curious is dangerous enough. To distrust what is always said, what seems, to ask odd questions, interfere in dreams, leave home, smell rats, have hunches do not endear cats to those doggy circles where well-smelt baskets, suitable wives, good lunches are the order of things, and where prevails much wagging of incurious heads and tails. Face it. Curiosity will not cause us to die- only lack of it will. Never to want to see the other side if the hill or that improbable country where living is an idyll (although a probably hell) would kill us all. Only the curious have, if they live, a tale worth telling at all. Dogs say cats love too much, are irresponsible, are changeable, marry too many wives, desert their children, chill all dinner tables with tales of their nine lives. Well, they are lucky. Let them be nine-lived and contradictory, curious enough to change, prepare to pay and die again and again, each time with no less pain. A cat minority of one is all that can be counted on to tell the truth. And what cats have to tell on each return from hell is that: that dying is what the loving do, and that dead dogs are those who do not know that dying is what, to live, each has to do. Alastair Reid (b. 1926)
DUST OF SNOW The way a crow Shook down on me The dust of snow From a hemlock tree Has given my heart A change of mood And saved some part Of a day I had rued. Robert Frost (1874-1963)
ON HIS BLINDNESS When I consider how my light is spent Ere half my days in this dark world and wide, And that one talent which is death to hide Lodged with me useless, though my soul more bent To serve therewith my Maker, and present My true account, lest he returning chide, "Doth God exact day-labor, light denied?" I fonldy ask. But Patience, to prevent That mumur, soon replies, "God doth not need Either man's work of his own gifts. Who best Bear his mild yoke, they serve him best. His state Is kingly: thousands at his bidding speed, And post o'er land and ocean without rest; They also serve who only stand and wait." John Milton (1608-1674)
LEDA AND THE SWAN A sudden blow: the great wings beating still Above the staggering girl, her thighs caressed By the dark webs, her nape caught in his bill, He holds her helpless breast upon his breast. How can those terrified vague fingers push The feathered glory from her loosening thighs? And how can body, laid in that white rush, But feel the strange heart beating where it lies? A shudder in the loins engenders there The broken wall, the burning roof and tower And Agamemnonn dead. Being so caught up, So mastered by the brute blood of the air, Did she put on his knowledge with his power Before the indifferent beak could let her drop? William Butler Yeats (1865-1939)
SNOW WHITE AND THE SEVEN DEADLY SINS Good Catholic, girl, she didn't mind the cleaning. All of her household chores, at first, were small And hardly labors one could find demanding. One's duty was one's refuge, after all. And if she had her doubts at certain moments And once confessed them to the Father, she Was instantly referred to texts in Romans And Peter's First Epistle, chapter III. Years passed. More sinful every day, the Seven Breakfasted, grabbed their pitchforks, donned their horns, And sped to contravene the hopes of heaven, Sowing the neighbors' lawns with tares and thorns. She set to work. Pride's wall of looking glasses Ogled her dimly, smeared with prints of lips; Lust's magazines lay strewn, bare tits and asses Weighted by his "devices" -chains, cuffs, whips. Gluttony's empties covered half the table, Mingling with Avarice's cards and chips, And she'd been told to sew a Bill Blass label Inside the blazert Envy'd bought at Gyp's. She knelt to the cold master bathroom floor as If a petitioner before the Pope, Retrieving several pairs of Sloth's soiled drawers, A sweat-sock and a cake of hairy soap. Then, as she wiped the Windex from the mirror She noticed, and the vision made her cry, How much she'd grayed and paled, and how much clearer Festered the bruise of Wrath beneath her eye. "No poisoned apple needed for this Princess," She murmured, making X's with her thumb. A car door slammed, bringing her to her senses: Ho-hum. Ho-hum. It's home from work we come. And she was out the window in a second, In time to see a Handsome Prince, of course, Who, spying her distressed condition, beckoned For her to mount (What else?) his snow-white horse. Impeccably he spoke. His smile was glowing. So debonair! So charming! And so Male. She took a step, reversed and without slowing Beat it to St. Anne's where she tool the veil. R.S. Gwynn (b.1948)
IN THE GARDEN In the garden there strayed A beautiful maid As fair as the flowers of the morn; The first hour of her life She was made a man's wife, And was buried before she was born. Anonymous
BARTER Life has loveliness to sell, All beautiful and splendid things, Blue waves whitened on a cliff, Soaring fire that sways and sings, And children's faces looking up, Holding wonder like a cup. Life has loveliness to sell, Music like a curve of gold, Scent of pine trees in the rain, Eyes that love you, arms that hold, And for your spirit's still delight, Holy thoughts that star the night. Spend all you have for loveliness, But it and never count the cost; For one white singing hours of peace Count many a year of strife well lost, And for a breath of ecstasy Give all you have been, or could be. Sara Teasdale (1884-1933)
THE INDIFFERENT I can love both fair and brown, Her whom abundance melts, and her whom want betrays, Her who loves loneness best, and her who masks and plays, Her whom the country formed, and whom the town, Her who believes, and her who tries, Her who still weeps with spongy eyes, And her who is dry cork and never cries; I can love her, and her, and you, and you; I can love any, so she be not true. Will no other vice content you? Will it not serve your turn to do as did your mothers? Or have you all old vices spent, and now would find out others? Or doth a fear that men are true torment you? Oh, we are not; be not you so. Let me, and do you, twenty know. Rob me, but bind me not, and let me go. Must I, who came to travail through you, Grow your fixed subject because you are true? Venus heard me sing this song, And by love's sweetest part, variety, she swore She heard not this till now, and that it should be so no more. She went, examined, and returned ere long, And said, "Alas, some two or three Poor heretics in love there be, Which think to 'stablish dangerous constancy, But I have told them, 'Since you will be true, You shall be true to them who are false to you." John Donne (1572-1631)
THE IMMORTAL PART When I meet the morning beam Or lay me down at night to dream, I hear my bones within me say, "Another night, another day. "When shall this slough of sense be cast, This dust of thoughts be laid at last, The man of flesh and soul be slain And the man of bone remain? "This tongue that talks, these lungs that shout, These thews that hustle us about, This brain that fills the skill with schemes, And its humming hive of dreams,- "These to-day are proud in power And lord it in their little hour: The immortal bones obey control Of dying flesh and dying soul. "'Tis long till eve and morn are gone: Slow the endless night comes on, And late to fulness grows at birth That shall last as long as earth. "Wanderers eastward, wanderers west, Know you why you cannot rest? 'Tis that every mother's son Travails with a skeleton. "Lie down in the bed of dust; Bear the fruit that bear you must; Bring the eternal seed to light, And morn is all the same at night. "Rest you so from trouble sore, Fear the heat o' the sun no more, Not the snowing winter wild, Now you labor not with child. "Empty vessel, garment cast, We that wore you long shall last. -Another night, another day." So my bones within me say. Therefore they shall do my will To-day while I am master still, And flesh and soul, now both are strong, Shale hale the sullen slaves along, Before this fire of sense decay, This smoke of thought blown clean away, And leave with ancient night alone The stedfast and enduring bone. A.E. Housman (1859-1936)
A DIALOGUE BETWEEN THE SOUL AND BODY SOUL : Oh, who shall from this dungeon raise A soul enslaved so many ways? With bolts of bones, that fettered stands In feet, and manacled in hands; Here blinded with an eye, and there Deaf with the drumming of an ear; A soul hung up, as 'twere, in chains Of nerves, and arteries, and veins; Tortured, besides each other part, In a vain head, and double heart. BODY : Oh, who shall me deliver whole From bonds of this tyrannic soul? Which, streched upright, impales me so, That mine own precipice I go; And warms and moves this needle frame (A fever could but do the same) And, wanting where its spite to try, Has made me live to let me die; A body that could never rest, Since this ill spirit it possessed. SOUL : What magic could me thus confine Within another's grief to pine? Where, whatsoever it complain, I feel, that cannot feel, the pain, And all my care itself employs, That to preserve, which me destroys; Constrained not only to endure Diseases, but, what's worse, the cure; And ready oft the port to gain, Am shipwrecked into health again. BODY : But physic yet could never reach The maladies thou dost teach; Whom first the cramp of hope does tear, And then the palsy shakes of fear; The pestilence of love does heat, Or hatred's hidden ulcer eat; Joy's cheerful madness does perplex, Or sorrow's other madness vex, Which madness forces me to know, And memory will not forgo. What but a soul could have the wit To build me up for sin so fit? So architects do square and hew Green trees that in the forest grew. Andrew Marvell (1621-1678)
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