DayPoems: A Seven-Century Poetry Slam
93,142 lines of verse * www.daypoems.net
Timothy Bovee, editor
TRUST thou thy Love: if she be proud, is she not sweet?
Trust thou thy Love: if she be mute, is she not pure?
Lay thou thy soul full in her hands, low at her feet;
Fail, Sun and Breath!--yet, for thy peace, She shall endure.
Once I met a girl
Who drank her tea in a mug
(without ice!),
Who had never said "y'all" in her life,
And who thought an armadillo was a Spanish dinner.
Once I met a girl
Who said "What's a grit?"
And drank "pop" instead of Coke,
And talked way too fast.
Once I met a girl
Who had never caught lightning bugs
Or climbed a tree,
And who had never been fishing
In a distant relative's pond.
Once I met a girl
Who had never seen a duck hung on the wall
Or Spanish moss covering an oak tree
And who said "pe-cahn instead of "pee-can".
Once I met a girl
Who thought I was weird.
A man said unto his Angel:
"My spirits are fallen low,
And I cannot carry this battle:
O brother! where might I go?
"The terrible Kings are on me
With spears that are deadly bright;
Against me so from the cradle
Do fate and my fathers fight."
Then said to the man his Angel:
"Thou wavering, witless soul,
Back to the ranks! What matter
To win or to lose the whole,
"As judged by the little judges
Who hearken not well, nor see?
Not thus, by the outer issue,
The Wise shall interpret thee.
"Thy will is the sovereign measure
And only events of things:
The puniest heart, defying,
Were stronger than all these Kings.
"Though out of the past they gather,
Mind's Doubt, and Bodily Pain,
And pallid Thirst of the Spirit
That is kin to the other twain,
"And Grief, in a cloud of banners,
And ringletted Vain Desires,
And Vice, with the spoils upon him
Of thee and thy beaten sires, --
"While Kings of eternal evil
Yet darken the hills about,
Thy part is with broken sabre
To rise on the last redoubt;
"To fear not sensible failure,
Nor covet the game at all,
But fighting, fighting, fighting,
Die, driven against the wall."
BEAUTY sat bathing by a spring,
Where fairest shades did hide her;
The winds blew calm, the birds did sing,
The cool streams ran beside her.
My wanton thoughts enticed mine eye
To see what was forbidden:
But better memory said Fie;
So vain desire was chidden--
Hey nonny nonny O!
Hey nonny nonny!
Into a slumber then I fell,
And fond imagination
Seemed to see, but could not tell,
Her feature or her fashion:
But ev'n as babes in dreams do smile,
And sometimes fall a-weeping,
So I awaked as wise that while
As when I fell a-sleeping.
IN going to my naked bed as one that would have slept,
I heard a wife sing to her child, that long before had wept;
She sighed sore and sang full sweet, to bring the babe to rest,
That would not cease but cried still, in sucking at her breast.
She was full weary of her watch, and grieved with her child,
She rocked it and rated it, till that on her it smiled.
Then did she say, Now have I found this proverb true to prove,
The falling out of faithful friends renewing is of love.
Then took I paper, pen, and ink, this proverb for to write,
In register for to remain of such a worthy wight:
As she proceeded thus in song unto her little brat,
Much matter utter'd she of weight, in place whereas she sat:
And proved plain there was no beast, nor creature bearing life,
Could well be known to live in love without discord and strife:
Then kissed she her little babe, and sware by God above,
The falling out of faithful friends renewing is of love.
She said that neither king nor prince nor lord could live aright,
Until their puissance they did prove, their manhood and their might.
When manhood shall be matched so that fear can take no place,
Then weary works make warriors each other to embrace,
And left their force that failed them, which did consume the rout,
That might before have lived their time, their strength and nature out:
Then did she sing as one that thought no man could her reprove,
The falling out of faithful friends renewing is of love.
She said she saw no fish nor fowl, nor beast within her haunt,
That met a stranger in their kind, but could give it a taunt:
Since flesh might not endure, but rest must wrath succeed,
And force the fight to fall to play in pasture where they feed,
So noble nature can well end the work she hath begun,
And bridle well that will not cease her tragedy in some:
Thus in song she oft rehearsed, as did her well behove,
The falling out of faithful friends renewing is of love.
I marvel much pardy (quoth she) for to behold the rout,
To see man, woman, boy and beast, to toss the world about:
Some kneel, some crouch, some beck, some check, and some can smoothly
smile,
And some embrace others in arm, and there think many a wile,
Some stand aloof at cap and knee, some humble and some stout,
Yet are they never friends in deed until they once fall out:
Thus ended she her song and said, before she did remove,
The falling out of faithful friends renewing is of love.
I
At the gate of the West I stand,
On the isle where the nations throng.
We call them "scum o' the earth";
Stay, are we doing you wrong,
Young fellow from Socrates' land? --
You, like a Hermes so lissome and strong
Fresh from the Master Praxiteles' hand?
So you're of Spartan birth?
Descended, perhaps, from one of the band --
Deathless in story and song --
Who combed their long hair at Thermopylae's pass?
Ah, I forget the straits, alas!
More tragic than theirs, more compassion-worth,
That have doomed you to march in our "immigrant class"
Where you're nothing but "scum o' the earth".
II
You Pole with the child on your knee,
What dower bring you to the land of the free?
Hark! does she croon
That sad little tune
That Chopin once found on his Polish lea
And mounted in gold for you and for me?
Now a ragged young fiddler answers
In wild Czech melody
That Dvorak took whole from the dancers.
And the heavy faces bloom
In the wonderful Slavic way;
The little, dull eyes, the brows a-gloom,
Suddenly dawn like the day.
While, watching these folk and their mystery,
I forget that they're nothing worth;
That Bohemians, Slovaks, Croatians,
And men of all Slavic nations
Are "polacks" -- and "scum o' the earth".
III
Genoese boy of the level brow,
Lad of the lustrous, dreamy eyes
A-stare at Manhattan's pinnacles now
In the first sweet shock of a hushed surprise;
Within your far-rapt seer's eyes
I catch the glow of the wild surmise
That played on the Santa Maria's prow
In that still gray dawn,
Four centuries gone,
When a world from the wave began to rise.
Oh, it's hard to foretell what high emprise
Is the goal that gleams
When Italy's dreams
Spread wing and sweep into the skies.
Caesar dreamed him a world ruled well;
Dante dreamed Heaven out of Hell;
Angelo brought us there to dwell;
And you, are you of a different birth? --
You're only a "dago", -- and "scum o' the earth"!
IV
Stay, are we doing you wrong
Calling you "scum o' the earth",
Man of the sorrow-bowed head,
Of the features tender yet strong, --
Man of the eyes full of wisdom and mystery
Mingled with patience and dread?
Have not I known you in history,
Sorrow-bowed head?
Were you the poet-king, worth
Treasures of Ophir unpriced?
Were you the prophet, perchance, whose art
Foretold how the rabble would mock
That shepherd of spirits, erelong,
Who should carry the lambs on his heart
And tenderly feed his flock?
Man -- lift that sorrow-bowed head.
Lo! 't is the face of the Christ!
The vision dies at its birth.
You're merely a butt for our mirth.
You're a "sheeny" -- and therefore despised
And rejected as "scum o' the earth".
V
Countrymen, bend and invoke
Mercy for us blasphemers,
For that we spat on these marvelous folk,
Nations of darers and dreamers,
Scions of singers and seers,
Our peers, and more than our peers.
"Rabble and refuse", we name them
And "scum o' the earth", to shame them.
Mercy for us of the few, young years,
Of the culture so callow and crude,
Of the hands so grasping and rude,
The lips so ready for sneers
At the sons of our ancient more-than-peers.
Mercy for us who dare despise
Men in whose loins our Homer lies;
Mothers of men who shall bring to us
The glory of Titian, the grandeur of Huss;
Children in whose frail arms shall rest
Prophets and singers and saints of the West.
Newcomers all from the eastern seas,
Help us incarnate dreams like these.
Forget, and forgive, that we did you wrong.
Help us to father a nation, strong
In the comradeship of an equal birth,
In the wealth of the richest bloods of earth.
(The Lord God speaks to a youth)
Bend now thy body to the common weight!
(But oh, that vine-clad head, those limbs of morn!
Those proud young shoulders I myself made straight!
How shall ye wear the yoke that must be worn?)
Look thou, my son, what wisdom comes to thee!
(But oh, that singing mouth, those radiant eyes!
Those dancing feet -- that I myself made free!
How shall I sadden them to make them wise?)
Nay then, thou shalt! Resist not, have a care!
(Yea, I must work my plans who sovereign sit!
Yet do not tremble so! I cannot bear --
Though I am God -- to see thee so submit!)
SWEET are the rosy memories of the lips
That first kiss'd ours, albeit they kiss no more:
Sweet is the sight of sunset-sailing ships,
Altho' they leave us on a lonely shore:
Sweet are familiar songs, tho' Music dips
Her hollow shell in Thought's forlornest wells:
And sweet, tho' sad, the sound of midnight bells
When the oped casement with the night-rain drips.
There is a pleasure which is born of pain:
The grave of all things hath its violet.
Else why, thro' days which never come again,
Roams Hope with that strange longing, like Regret?
Why put the posy in the cold dead hand?
Why plant the rose above the lonely grave?
Why bring the corpse across the salt sea-wave?
Why deem the dead more near in native land?
Thy name hath been a silence in my life
So long, it falters upon language now,
O more to me than sister or than wife
Once ... and now--nothing! It is hard to know
That such things have been, and are not; and yet
Life loiters, keeps a pulse at even measure,
And goes upon its business and its pleasure,
And knows not all the depths of its regret....
Ah, could the memory cast her spots, as do
The snake's brood theirs in spring! and be once more
Wholly renew'd, to dwell i' the time that 's new,
With no reiterance of those pangs of yore.
Peace, peace! My wild song will go wandering
Too wantonly, down paths a private pain
Hath trodden bare. What was it jarr'd the strain?
Some crush'd illusion, left with crumpled wing
Tangled in Music's web of twined strings--
That started that false note, and crack'd the tune
In its beginning. Ah, forgotten things
Stumble back strangely! and the ghost of June
Stands by December's fire, cold, cold! and puts
The last spark out.--How could I sing aright
With those old airs haunting me all the night
And those old steps that sound when daylight shuts?
For back she comes, and moves reproachfully,
The mistress of my moods, and looks bereft
(Cruel to the last!) as tho' 'twere I, not she,
That did the wrong, and broke the spell, and left
Memory comfortless.--Away! away!
Phantoms, about whose brows the bindweed clings,
Hopeless regret! In thinking of these things
Some men have lost their minds, and others may.
Yet, O for one deep draught in this dull hour!
One deep, deep draught of the departed time!
O for one brief strong pulse of ancient power,
To beat and breathe thro' all the valves of rhyme!
Thou, Memory, with thy downward eyes, that art
The cup-bearer of gods, pour deep and long,
Brim all the vacant chalices of song
With health! Droop down thine urn. I hold my heart
One draught of what I shall not taste again
Save when my brain with thy dark wine is brimm'd,--
One draught! and then straight onward, spite of pain,
And spite of all things changed, with gaze undimm'd,
Love's footsteps thro' the waning Past to explore
Undaunted; and to carve in the wan light
Of Hope's last outposts, on Song's utmost height,
The sad resemblance of an hour or more.
Midnight, and love, and youth, and Italy!
Love in the land where love most lovely seems!
Land of my love, tho' I be far from thee,
Lend, for love's sake, the light of thy moonbeams,
The spirit of thy cypress-groves and all
Thy dark-eyed beauty for a little while
To my desire. Yet once more let her smile
Fall o'er me: o'er me let her long hair fall....
Under the blessed darkness unreproved
We were alone, in that best hour of time
Which first reveal'd to us how much we loved,
'Neath the thick starlight. The young night sublime
Hung trembling o'er us. At her feet I knelt,
And gazed up from her feet into her eyes.
Her face was bow'd: we breathed each other's sighs:
We did not speak: not move: we look'd: we felt.
The night said not a word. The breeze was dead.
The leaf lay without whispering on the tree,
As I lay at her feet. Droop'd was her head:
One hand in mine: and one still pensively
Went wandering through my hair. We were together.
How? Where? What matter? Somewhere in a dream,
Drifting, slow drifting down a wizard stream:
Whither? Together: then what matter whither?
It was enough for me to clasp her hand:
To blend with her love-looks my own: no more.
Enough (with thoughts like ships that cannot land,
Blown by faint winds about a magic shore)
To realize, in each mysterious feeling,
The droop of the warm cheek so near my own:
The cool white arm about my shoulder thrown:
Those exquisite fair feet where I was kneeling.
How little know they life's divinest bliss,
That know not to possess and yet refrain!
Let the young Psyche roam, a fleeting kiss:
Grasp it--a few poor grains of dust remain.
See how those floating flowers, the butterflies,
Hover the garden thro', and take no root!
Desire for ever hath a flying foot:
Free pleasure comes and goes beneath the skies.
Close not thy hand upon the innocent joy
That trusts itself within thy reach. It may,
Or may not, linger. Thou canst but destroy
The winged wanderer. Let it go or stay.
Love thou the rose, yet leave it on its stem.
Think! Midas starved by turning all to gold.
Blessed are those that spare, and that withhold;
Because the whole world shall be trusted them.
The foolish Faun pursues the unwilling Nymph
That culls her flowers beside the precipice
Or dips her shining ankles in the lymph:
But, just when she must perish or be his,
Heaven puts an arm out. She is safe. The shore
Gains some new fountain; or the lilied lawn
A rarer sort of rose: but ah, poor Faun!
To thee she shall be changed for evermore.
Chase not too close the fading rapture. Leave
To Love his long auroras, slowly seen.
Be ready to release as to receive.
Deem those the nearest, soul to soul, between
Whose lips yet lingers reverence on a sigh.
Judge what thy sense can reach not, most thine own,
If once thy soul hath seized it. The unknown
Is life to love, religion, poetry.
The moon had set. There was not any light,
Save of the lonely legion'd watch-stars pale
In outer air, and what by fits made bright
Hot oleanders in a rosy vale
Search'd by the lamping fly, whose little spark
Went in and out, like passion's bashful hope.
Meanwhile the sleepy globe began to slope
A ponderous shoulder sunward thro' the dark.
And the night pass'd in beauty like a dream.
Aloof in those dark heavens paused Destiny,
With her last star descending in the gleam
Of the cold morrow, from the emptied sky.
The hour, the distance from her old self, all
The novelty and loneness of the place
Had left a lovely awe on that fair face,
And all the land grew strange and magical.
As droops some billowy cloud to the crouch'd hill,
Heavy with all heaven's tears, for all earth's care,
She droop'd unto me, without force or will,
And sank upon my bosom, murmuring there
A woman's inarticulate passionate words.
O moment of all moments upon earth!
O life's supreme! How worth, how wildly worth,
Whole worlds of flame, to know this world affords.
What even Eternity can not restore!
When all the ends of life take hands and meet
Round centres of sweet fire. Ah, never more,
Ah never, shall the bitter with the sweet
Be mingled so in the pale after-years!
One hour of life immortal spirits possess.
This drains the world, and leaves but weariness,
And parching passion, and perplexing tears.
Sad is it, that we cannot even keep
That hour to sweeten life's last toil: but Youth
Grasps all, and leaves us: and when we would weep,
We dare not let our tears fall, lest, in truth,
They fall upon our work which must be done.
And so we bind up our torn hearts from breaking:
Our eyes from weeping, and our brows from aching:
And follow the long pathway all alone.
That overnight a rose could come
I one time did believe,
For when the fairies live with one,
They wilfully deceive.
But now I know this perfect thing
Under the frozen sod
In cold and storm grew patiently
Obedient to God.
My wonder grows, since knowledge came
Old fancies to dismiss;
And courage comes. Was not the rose
A winter doing this?
Nor did it know, the weary while,
What color and perfume
With this completed loveliness
Lay in that earthly tomb.
So maybe I, who cannot see
What God wills not to show,
May, some day, bear a rose for Him
It took my life to grow.
SHE 's somewhere in the sunlight strong,
Her tears are in the falling rain,
She calls me in the wind's soft song,
And with the flowers she comes again.
Yon bird is but her messenger,
The moon is but her silver car;
Yea! sun and moon are sent by her,
And every wistful waiting star.
WITH deep affection,
And recollection,
I often think of
Those Shandon bells,
Whose sounds so wild would,
In the days of childhood,
Fling around my cradle
Their magic spells.
On this I ponder
Where'er I wander,
And thus grow fonder,
Sweet Cork, of thee;
With thy bells of Shandon,
That sound so grand on
The pleasant waters
Of the River Lee.
I've heard bells chiming
Full many a clime in,
Tolling sublime in
Cathedral shrine,
While at a glib rate
Brass tongues would vibrate--
But all their music
Spoke naught like thine;
For memory, dwelling
On each proud swelling
Of the belfry knelling
Its bold notes free,
Made the bells of Shandon
Sound far more grand on
The pleasant waters
Of the River Lee.
I've heard bells tolling
Old Adrian's Mole in,
Their thunder rolling
From the Vatican,
And cymbals glorious
Swinging uproarious
In the gorgeous turrets
Of Notre Dame;
But thy sounds were sweeter
Than the dome of Peter
Flings o'er the Tiber,
Pealing solemnly--
O, the bells of Shandon
Sound far more grand on
The pleasant waters
Of the River Lee.
There 's a bell in Moscow,
While on tower and kiosk O!
In Saint Sophia
The Turkman gets,
And loud in air
Calls men to prayer
From the tapering summits
Of tall minarets.
Such empty phantom
I freely grant them;
But there 's an anthem
More dear to me,--
'Tis the bells of Shandon,
That sound so grand on
The pleasant waters
Of the River Lee.
After the War, after everyone fled to the stars
We were left behind.
We were known as the Lost Ones.
As the sky rained down and the oceans boiled off,
We continued warring
We have destroyed Earth
As the ozone layer dissipated, only night was safe
We realize we were hopeless
We had one final prayer
Please, God, forgive us
For destroying your world so great.