DayPoems: A Seven-Century Poetry Slam
93,142 lines of verse * www.daypoems.net
Timothy Bovee, editor
Brother Tree:
Why do you reach and reach?
Do you dream some day to touch the sky?
Brother Stream:
Why do you run and run?
Do you dream some day to fill the sea?
Brother Bird:
Why do you sing and sing?
Do you dream --
Young Man:
Why do you talk and talk and talk?
I would paint her green
And if Hope were a color
For all the desires her eyes have seen!
And in between her emerald shades
I would trace her in gold
For the dreams that were made!
A silver-tinged halo then I would place
Encrusted with gems...
To frame her face
Her ebony hair is sprinkled with pearls
With magical, mystical,
Sparkling swirls!
Radiant diamonds that glitter and shine
Her gaze transcends heaven,
Beauty divine
A portrait of Faith -
In verdant love's prose, she is kissed
By the stars, and born of the rose!
What sudden bugle calls us in the night
And wakes us from a dream that we had shaped;
Flinging us sharply up against a fight
We thought we had escaped.
It is no easy waking, and we win
No final peace; our victories are few.
But still imperative forces pull us in
And sweep us somehow through.
Summoned by a supreme and confident power
That wakes our sleeping courage like a blow,
We rise, half-shaken, to the challenging hour,
And answer it -- and go.
MY Damon was the first to wake
The gentle flame that cannot die;
My Damon is the last to take
The faithful bosom's softest sigh:
The life between is nothing worth,
O cast it from thy thought away!
Think of the day that gave it birth,
And this its sweet returning day.
Buried be all that has been done,
Or say that naught is done amiss;
For who the dangerous path can shun
In such bewildering world as this?
But love can every fault forgive,
Or with a tender look reprove;
And now let naught in memory live
But that we meet, and that we love.
Measure me out from the fathomless tun
That somewhere or other you keep
In your vasty cellars, O wealthy one,
Twenty gallons of sleep.
Twenty gallons of balmy sleep,
Dreamless, and deep, and mild,
Of the excellent brand you used to keep
When I was a little child.
I've tasted of all your vaunted stock,
Your clarets and ports of Spain,
The liquid gold of your famous hock,
And your matchless dry champagne.
Of your rich muscats and your sherries fine,
I've drunk both well and deep,
Then, measure me out, O merchant mine,
Twenty gallons of sleep.
Twenty gallons of slumber soft
Of the innocent, baby kind,
When the angels flutter their wings aloft
And the pillow with down is lined;
I have drawn the corks, and drained the lees
Of every vintage pressed,
If I've felt the sting of my honey bees
I've taken it with the rest.
I have lived my life, and I'll not repine,
As I sowed I was bound to reap;
Then, measure me out, O merchant mine,
Twenty gallons of sleep.
All the men of Harbury go down to the sea in ships,
The wind upon their faces, the salt upon their lips.
The little boys of Harbury when they are laid to sleep,
Dream of masts and cabins and the wonders of the deep.
The women-folk of Harbury have eyes like the sea,
Wide with watching wonder, deep with mystery.
I met a woman: "Beyond the bar," she said,
"Beyond the shallow water where the green lines spread,
"Out beyond the sand-bar and the white spray,
My three sons wait for the Judgment Day."
I saw an old man who goes to sea no more,
Watch from morn till evening down on the shore.
"The sea's a hard mistress," the old man said;
"The sea is always hungry and never full fed.
"The sea had my father and took my son from me --
Sometimes I think I see them, walking on the sea!
"I'd like to be in Harbury on the Judgment Day,
When the word is spoken and the sea is wiped away,
"And all the drowned fisher boys, with sea-weed in their hair,
Rise and walk to Harbury to greet the women there.
"I'd like to be in Harbury to see the souls arise,
Son and mother hand in hand, lovers with glad eyes.
"I think there would be many who would turn and look with me,
Hoping for another glimpse of the cruel sea!
"They tell me that in Paradise the fields are green and still,
With pleasant flowers everywhere that all may take who will,
"And four great rivers flowing from out the Throne of God
That no one ever drowns in and souls may cross dry-shod.
"I think among those wonders there will be men like me,
Who miss the old salt danger of the singing sea.
"For in my heart, like some old shell, inland, safe and dry,
Any one who harks will still hear the sea cry."
NOT a drum was heard, not a funeral note,
As his corse to the rampart we hurried;
Not a soldier discharged his farewell shot
O'er the grave where our hero we buried.
We buried him darkly at dead of night,
The sods with our bayonets turning,
By the struggling moonbeam's misty light
And the lanthorn dimly burning.
No useless coffin enclosed his breast,
Not in sheet or in shroud we wound him;
But he lay like a warrior taking his rest
With his martial cloak around him.
Few and short were the prayers we said,
And we spoke not a word of sorrow;
But we steadfastly gazed on the face that was dead,
And we bitterly thought of the morrow.
We thought, as we hollow'd his narrow bed
And smooth'd down his lonely pillow,
That the foe and the stranger would tread o'er his head,
And we far away on the billow!
Lightly they'll talk of the spirit that 's gone,
And o'er his cold ashes upbraid him--
But little he'll reck, if they let him sleep on
In the grave where a Briton has laid him.
But half of our heavy task was done
When the clock struck the hour for retiring;
And we heard the distant and random gun
That the foe was sullenly firing.
Slowly and sadly we laid him down,
From the field of his fame fresh and gory;
We carved not a line, and we raised not a stone,
But we left him alone with his glory.
CHARM me asleep, and melt me so
With thy delicious numbers,
That, being ravish'd, hence I go
Away in easy slumbers.
Ease my sick head,
And make my bed,
Thou power that canst sever
From me this ill,
And quickly still,
Though thou not kill
My fever.
Thou sweetly canst convert the same
From a consuming fire
Into a gentle licking flame,
And make it thus expire.
Then make me weep
My pains asleep;
And give me such reposes
That I, poor I,
May think thereby
I live and die
'Mongst roses.
Fall on me like the silent dew,
Or like those maiden showers
Which, by the peep of day, do strew
A baptim o'er the flowers.
Melt, melt my pains
With thy soft strains;
That, having ease me given,
With full delight
I leave this light,
And take my flight
For Heaven.
CHRISTMAS knows a merry, merry place,
Where he goes with fondest face,
Brightest eye, brightest hair:
Tell the Mermaid where is that one place,
Where?
Raleigh. 'Tis by Devon's glorious halls,
Whence, dear Ben, I come again:
Bright of golden roofs and walls--
El Dorado's rare domain--
Seem those halls when sunlight launches
Shafts of gold thro' leafless branches,
Where the winter's feathery mantle blanches
Field and farm and lane.
CHORUS. Christmas knows a merry, merry place, &c.
Drayton. 'Tis where Avon's wood-sprites weave
Through the boughs a lace of rime,
While the bells of Christmas Eve
Fling for Will the Stratford-chime
O'er the river-flags emboss'd
Rich with flowery runes of frost--
O'er the meads where snowy tufts are toss'd--
Strains of olden time.
CHORUS. Christmas knows a merry, merry place, &c.
Shakespeare's Friend. 'Tis, methinks, on any ground
Where our Shakespeare's feet are set.
There smiles Christmas, holly-crown'd
With his blithest coronet:
Friendship's face he loveth well:
'Tis a countenance whose spell
Sheds a balm o'er every mead and dell
Where we used to fret.
CHORUS. Christmas knows a merry, merry place, &c.
Heywood. More than all the pictures, Ben,
Winter weaves by wood or stream,
Christmas loves our London, when
Rise thy clouds of wassail-steam--
Clouds like these, that, curling, take
Forms of faces gone, and wake
Many a lay from lips we loved, and make
London like a dream.
CHORUS. Christmas knows a merry, merry place, &c.
Ben Jonson. Love's old songs shall never die,
Yet the new shall suffer proof:
Love's old drink of Yule brew I
Wassail for new love's behoof.
Drink the drink I brew, and sing
Till the berried branches swing,
Till our song make all the Mermaid ring--
Yea, from rush to roof.
FINALE. Christmas loves this merry, merry place;
Christmas saith with fondest face,
Brightest eye, brightest hair:
'Ben, the drink tastes rare of sack and mace:
Rare!'
MORE love or more disdain I crave;
Sweet, be not still indifferent:
O send me quickly to my grave,
Or else afford me more content!
Or love or hate me more or less,
For love abhors all lukewarmness.
Give me a tempest if 'twill drive
Me to the place where I would be;
Or if you'll have me still alive,
Confess you will be kind to me.
Give hopes of bliss or dig my grave:
More love or more disdain I crave.
BEATING Heart! we come again
Where my Love reposes;
This is Mabel's window-pane;
These are Mabel's roses.
Is she nested? Does she kneel
In the twilight stilly,
Lily clad from throat to heel,
She, my virgin Lily?
Soon the wan, the wistful stars,
Fading, will forsake her;
Elves of light, on beamy bars,
Whisper then, and wake her.
Let this friendly pebble plead
At her flowery grating;
If she hear me will she heed?
Mabel, I am waiting.
Mabel will be deck'd anon,
Zoned in bride's apparel;
Happy zone! O hark to yon
Passion-shaken carol!
Sing thy song, thou tranced thrush,
Pipe thy best, thy clearest;--
Hush, her lattice moves, O hush--
Dearest Mabel!--dearest...
At night, her black hair, and dark eyes
Stare at me like photographs I have
Hanging from the wall, she is a skull
Grinning constantly at me, she is smiling
And her eyes flash every time she stares at me
I am in love with her
I want to go where she goes,
Where normal women can never go,
The place where we all meet in the end
The harvest ground, the wet, cold earth. . .
There is tiredness to this land
And everything in me feels it,
From the way I pour sugar in my coffee
Every morning to the time it takes
For me to close my eyes and remember nothing. . .
Everything is nothing to that smile you have, though
I want to go and find out where it comes from
Show me.