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I only wrote what I have lived.

classic quote by Theodor Grigoriu
Added by Simona Enache
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VI. Giuseppe Caponsacchi

Answer you, Sirs? Do I understand aright?
Have patience! In this sudden smoke from hell,—
So things disguise themselves,—I cannot see
My own hand held thus broad before my face
And know it again. Answer you? Then that means
Tell over twice what I, the first time, told
Six months ago: 't was here, I do believe,
Fronting you same three in this very room,
I stood and told you: yet now no one laughs,
Who then … nay, dear my lords, but laugh you did,
As good as laugh, what in a judge we style
Laughter—no levity, nothing indecorous, lords!
Only,—I think I apprehend the mood:
There was the blameless shrug, permissible smirk,
The pen's pretence at play with the pursed mouth,
The titter stifled in the hollow palm
Which rubbed the eyebrow and caressed the nose,
When I first told my tale: they meant, you know,
"The sly one, all this we are bound believe!
"Well, he can say no other than what he says.
"We have been young, too,—come, there's greater guilt!
"Let him but decently disembroil himself,
"Scramble from out the scrape nor move the mud,—
"We solid ones may risk a finger-stretch!
And now you sit as grave, stare as aghast
As if I were a phantom: now 't is—"Friend,
"Collect yourself!"—no laughing matter more—
"Counsel the Court in this extremity,
"Tell us again!"—tell that, for telling which,
I got the jocular piece of punishment,
Was sent to lounge a little in the place
Whence now of a sudden here you summon me
To take the intelligence from just—your lips!
You, Judge Tommati, who then tittered most,—
That she I helped eight months since to escape
Her husband, was retaken by the same,
Three days ago, if I have seized your sense,—
(I being disallowed to interfere,
Meddle or make in a matter none of mine,
For you and law were guardians quite enough
O' the innocent, without a pert priest's help)—
And that he has butchered her accordingly,
As she foretold and as myself believed,—
And, so foretelling and believing so,
We were punished, both of us, the merry way:
Therefore, tell once again the tale! For what?
Pompilia is only dying while I speak!
Why does the mirth hang fire and miss the smile?
My masters, there's an old book, you should con
For strange adventures, applicable yet,

[...] Read more

poem by Robert Browning from The Ring and the Book
Added by Veronica Serbanoiu
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Virginia's Story

Elizabeth Gates-Wooten is my Grand mom.

She was born in Canada with her father and brothers.
They owned a Barber Shoppe.
I don't remember exactly where in Canada.
I believe it was right over the border like Windsor or Toronto.
I never knew exactly where it was.

When she was old enough she got married.

First, she married a man by the name of Frank Gates.
He was from Madagascar.
He fathered my mom and her brother and sister.
The boy's name was Frank Gates, Jr.
Two girls name were Anna and Agnes.

Agnes was my mother.

Frank Gates went crazy after the war
He drank a lot and died
Then grandma Elizabeth married a man by the name of Mr. Wooten.
He had a German name, but I don't think he was German.
She took his last name after they got married.

Then they moved to West Virginia in the United States.

Their son, Frank Gates Jr. Became a delegate in the democratic party.
He use to get into a lot of trouble because he liked to fight.
He was a delegate from the 1940's to 1970's.
He died of gout in the 1970's.

Anna was a maid and cook.

She baked cakes and stuff for people as a side line.
She had a hump on her back (scoliosis) .
She had to walk with a cane.
She could cook good though.
She did this kind of work all of her life, just like her mom, Elizabeth

They were both good cooks

They had a lot of money because they had these skills
Especially when people had parties.
Because they would make all of this food and then they would have left-overs.
We got to eat a lot of stuff we normally wouldn't get because of that.
When they cooked, they didn't use no measuring stuff, they would just use there hand.

My moms name was Agnes Barrie Gates.

She married James Wright and moved to Cleveland.

[...] Read more

poem by Talile Ali
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The Circus

I remember when I wrote The Circus
I was living in Paris, or rather we were living in Paris
Janice, Frank was alive, the Whitney Museum
Was still on 8th Street, or was it still something else?
Fernand Léger lived in our building
Well it wasn’t really our building it was the building we lived in
Next to a Grand Guignol troupe who made a lot of noise
So that one day I yelled through a hole in the wall
Of our apartment I don’t know why there was a hole there
Shut up! And the voice came back to me saying something
I don’t know what. Once I saw Léger walk out of the building
I think. Stanley Kunitz came to dinner. I wrote The Circus
In two tries, the first getting most of the first stanza;
That fall I also wrote an opera libretto called Louisa or Matilda.
Jean-Claude came to dinner. He said (about “cocktail sauce”)
It should be good on something but not on these (oysters).
By that time I think I had already written The Circus
When I came back, having been annoyed to have to go
I forget what I went there about
You were back in the apartment what a dump actually we liked it
I think with your hair and your writing and the pans
Moving strummingly about the kitchen and I wrote The Circus
It was a summer night no it was an autumn one summer when
I remember it but actually no autumn that black dusk toward the post office
And I wrote many other poems then but The Circus was the best
Maybe not by far the best Geography was also wonderful
And the Airplane Betty poems (inspired by you) but The Circus was the best.

Sometimes I feel I actually am the person
Who did this, who wrote that, including that poem The Circus
But sometimes on the other hand I don’t.
There are so many factors engaging our attention!
At every moment the happiness of others, the health of those we know and our own!
And the millions upon millions of people we don’t know and their well-being to think about
So it seems strange I found time to write The Circus
And even spent two evenings on it, and that I have also the time
To remember that I did it, and remember you and me then, and write this poem about it
At the beginning of The Circus
The Circus girls are rushing through the night
In the circus wagons and tulips and other flowers will be picked
A long time from now this poem wants to get off on its own
Someplace like a painting not held to a depiction of composing The Circus.

Noel Lee was in Paris then but usually out of it
In Germany or Denmark giving a concert
As part of an endless activity
Which was either his career or his happiness or a combination of both
Or neither I remember his dark eyes looking he was nervous
With me perhaps because of our days at Harvard.

[...] Read more

poem by Kenneth Koch
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Write in Sand and Stone

Today, my friend yelled at me.
I wrote in sand my friend yelled at me.
Today, my friend punched me.
I wrote in sand my friend punched me.
Today, my friend cursed me.
I wrote in sand my friend cursed me.
Today, my friend abandoned me.
I wrote in sand my friend abandoned me.
Today, my friend insulted me.
I wrote in sand my friend insulted me.

Today, my friend asked me for forgiveness.
I wrote in stone my friend asked for forgiveness.
Today, my friend saved my life.
I wrote in stone my friend saved my life.
Today, my friend made me smile.
I wrote in stone my friend made me smile.
Today, my friend told me she cares for me.
I wrote in stone my friend cares for me.
Today, my friend was grateful for me.
I wrote in stone my friend was grateful for me.

I wrote in sand the bad things my friend did to me.
I wrote in stone the nice things did to me.

Winds will erase the bad things written in sand.
Nothing can erase the nice things written in stone.
Forgive and Forget

poem by Natalie Vail
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Dear Michael

She wrote dear michael
Youll probably never get this letter
Michael, I wrote you a hundred times before
Knowing how I feel
Ill write a hundred more
Dear michael, every time your records on
(michael michael)
Michael, I close my eyes and sing along
Dreaming youre singing to me.
(ouuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuh)
And then she wrote:
(ouuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuh)
Michael, I love you
I held the tears back long as I can
(ouuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuh)
Im sealing my feelings in this envelope
(ouuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuh)
cause I wanna be more than just your number one fan
Im gonna answer your letter
(michael michael)
Ill start beginning with the abcs of loving you
(I love ya)
(she wrote)
(michael michael)
(I love ya)
Your letter really touched my heart
(she wrote)
Ive been dreaming of meeting the picture
That you send along, signed with all your love
(michael michael)
(I wrote ya)
(she wrote)
Im gonna write you back, ouuh, I promess you that
(wont you write me back? , please write me back)
Girl, I think I love you
(michael michael)
Hurry, hurry mister postman, take my letter, tell her I love her
(she wrote)
(wont you write me back, please write me back)
(michael michael)
(she wrote)
Hurry, hurry mister postman, take my letter tell her I love her
(wont you write me back, please write me back)
(michael michael)
Yeah,
(I wrote you)
(she wrote)
Im gonna write you back
I promess you that...

song performed by Michael Jackson
Added by Lucian Velea
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A Linda Song

Music: Barry Manilow
Lyrics: Enoch Anderson
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
He never wrote a song for Linda
He wrote as though he lived alone
He wrote of dreams that end
And of sad brave men
Inventing worlds he'd never known
But he never wrote a song for Linda
And she was right there all along
Loved him back to life
When his luck ran low
But he never wrote a Linda song
He nearly broke his heart at writing
Linda kept him from despair
Standin' by his side
through the hungry days
But he hardly seemed to see her there
And he never wrote a song for Linda
And she was right there all along
The one real thing in his crazy world
And he never wrote a Linda song.
When the bills piled up
He couldn't pay
He couldn't dream no more
So he hitched a ride and he rode away
And he left a note for Linda by the door
By the door
When times got rough he'd phone her
Once or twice she took the call
Then she changed her number and she turned her head
And Linda never looked back at all
He'll never write a song for Linda
And she was right there all along
All he knows is no one understands
And he never wrote a Linda song
No he never wrote a Linda song

song performed by Barry Manilow
Added by Lucian Velea
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Working At The Factory

All my life I've been a workin' man
When I was at school they said that's all you'll ever understand
No profession. I didn't figure in their plans
So they sent me down factory to be a workin' man
All I lived for, All I lived for
All I lived for was to get out of the factory
Now I'm here seemingly free, but working at the factory.
The music came along and gave new life to me
And gave me hope back in 1983
The music came and set me free
From working at the factory
All I lived for, All I lived for
All I lived for was to get out of the factory
All I lived for, All I lived for
All I lived for was to get out of the factory
Never wanted to be like everybody else
But now there are so many like me sitting on the shelf
They sold us a dream but in reality
It was just another factory
I made the music , thought that was mine
It made me free , but that was in another time
But then the corporations and the big combines
Turned musicians into factory workers on assembly lines.
All I lived for, All I lived for
All I lived for was to get out of the factory
We made the music to set ourselves free
From working at the factory.
All my life I've put in a working day
Now it's sign the contract. Get production on the way
Take the money, make the music pay
Working at the factory
All I lived for was to get out of the factory.
Never wanted to be like everybody else
But now there are so many like me sitting on the shelf
They sold us a dream but in reality
Was just another factory
Working at the factory.

song performed by Kinks
Added by Lucian Velea
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The Duellist - Book III

Ah me! what mighty perils wait
The man who meddles with a state,
Whether to strengthen, or oppose!
False are his friends, and firm his foes:
How must his soul, once ventured in,
Plunge blindly on from sin to sin!
What toils he suffers, what disgrace,
To get, and then to keep, a place!
How often, whether wrong or right,
Must he in jest or earnest fight,
Risking for those both life and limb
Who would not risk one groat for him!
Under the Temple lay a Cave,
Made by some guilty, coward slave,
Whose actions fear'd rebuke: a maze
Of intricate and winding ways,
Not to be found without a clue;
One passage only, known to few,
In paths direct led to a cell,
Where Fraud in secret loved to dwell,
With all her tools and slaves about her,
Nor fear'd lest Honesty should rout her.
In a dark corner, shunning sight
Of man, and shrinking from the light,
One dull, dim taper through the cell
Glimmering, to make more horrible
The face of darkness, she prepares,
Working unseen, all kinds of snares,
With curious, but destructive art:
Here, through the eye to catch the heart,
Gay stars their tinsel beams afford,
Neat artifice to trap a lord;
There, fit for all whom Folly bred,
Wave plumes of feathers for the head;
Garters the hag contrives to make,
Which, as it seems, a babe might break,
But which ambitious madmen feel
More firm and sure than chains of steel;
Which, slipp'd just underneath the knee,
Forbid a freeman to be free.
Purses she knew, (did ever curse
Travel more sure than in a purse?)
Which, by some strange and magic bands,
Enslave the soul, and tie the hands.
Here Flattery, eldest-born of Guile,
Weaves with rare skill the silken smile,
The courtly cringe, the supple bow,
The private squeeze, the levee vow,
With which--no strange or recent case--
Fools in, deceive fools out of place.

[...] Read more

poem by Charles Churchill
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First Book

OF writing many books there is no end;
And I who have written much in prose and verse
For others' uses, will write now for mine,–
Will write my story for my better self,
As when you paint your portrait for a friend,
Who keeps it in a drawer and looks at it
Long after he has ceased to love you, just
To hold together what he was and is.

I, writing thus, am still what men call young;
I have not so far left the coasts of life
To travel inland, that I cannot hear
That murmur of the outer Infinite
Which unweaned babies smile at in their sleep
When wondered at for smiling; not so far,
But still I catch my mother at her post
Beside the nursery-door, with finger up,
'Hush, hush–here's too much noise!' while her sweet eyes
Leap forward, taking part against her word
In the child's riot. Still I sit and feel
My father's slow hand, when she had left us both,
Stroke out my childish curls across his knee;
And hear Assunta's daily jest (she knew
He liked it better than a better jest)
Inquire how many golden scudi went
To make such ringlets. O my father's hand,
Stroke the poor hair down, stroke it heavily,–
Draw, press the child's head closer to thy knee!
I'm still too young, too young to sit alone.

I write. My mother was a Florentine,
Whose rare blue eyes were shut from seeing me
When scarcely I was four years old; my life,
A poor spark snatched up from a failing lamp
Which went out therefore. She was weak and frail;
She could not bear the joy of giving life–
The mother's rapture slew her. If her kiss
Had left a longer weight upon my lips,
It might have steadied the uneasy breath,
And reconciled and fraternised my soul
With the new order. As it was, indeed,
I felt a mother-want about the world,
And still went seeking, like a bleating lamb
Left out at night, in shutting up the fold,–
As restless as a nest-deserted bird
Grown chill through something being away, though what
It knows not. I, Aurora Leigh, was born
To make my father sadder, and myself
Not overjoyous, truly. Women know
The way to rear up children, (to be just,)

[...] Read more

poem by Elizabeth Barrett Browning from Aurora Leigh (1856)
Added by Veronica Serbanoiu
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Third Book

'TO-DAY thou girdest up thy loins thyself,
And goest where thou wouldest: presently
Others shall gird thee,' said the Lord, 'to go
Where thou would'st not.' He spoke to Peter thus,
To signify the death which he should die
When crucified head downwards.
If He spoke
To Peter then, He speaks to us the same;
The word suits many different martyrdoms,
And signifies a multiform of death,
Although we scarcely die apostles, we,
And have mislaid the keys of heaven and earth.

For tis not in mere death that men die most;
And, after our first girding of the loins
In youth's fine linen and fair broidery,
To run up hill and meet the rising sun,
We are apt to sit tired, patient as a fool,
While others gird us with the violent bands
Of social figments, feints, and formalisms,
Reversing our straight nature, lifting up
Our base needs, keeping down our lofty thoughts,
Head downward on the cross-sticks of the world.
Yet He can pluck us from the shameful cross.
God, set our feet low and our forehead high,
And show us how a man was made to walk!

Leave the lamp, Susan, and go up to bed.
The room does very well; I have to write
Beyond the stroke of midnight. Get away;
Your steps, for ever buzzing in the room,
Tease me like gnats. Ah, letters! throw them down
At once, as I must have them, to be sure,
Whether I bid you never bring me such
At such an hour, or bid you. No excuse.
You choose to bring them, as I choose perhaps
To throw them in the fire. Now, get to bed,
And dream, if possible, I am not cross.

Why what a pettish, petty thing I grow,–
A mere, mere woman,–a mere flaccid nerve,-
A kerchief left out all night in the rain,
Turned soft so,–overtasked and overstrained
And overlived in this close London life!
And yet I should be stronger.
Never burn
Your letters, poor Aurora! for they stare
With red seals from the table, saying each,
'Here's something that you know not.' Out alas,
'Tis scarcely that the world's more good and wise

[...] Read more

poem by Elizabeth Barrett Browning from Aurora Leigh (1856)
Added by Veronica Serbanoiu
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In The Day's When We Are Dead

Listen! The end draws nearer,
Nearer the morning—or night—
And I see with a vision clearer
That the beginning was right!
These shall be words to remember
When all has been done and said,
And my fame is a dying ember
In the days when I am dead.
Listen! We wrote in sorrow,
And we wrote by candle light;
We took no heed of the morrow,
And I think that we were right—
(To-morrow, but not the day after,
And I think that we were right).

We wrote of a world that was human
And we wrote of blood that was red,
For a child, or a man, or a woman—
Remember when we are dead.

Listen! We wrote not for money,
And listen! We wrote not for fame—
We wrote for the milk and the honey
Of Kindness, and not for a name.

We paused not, nor faltered for any,
Though many fell back where we led;
We wrote of the few for the many—
Remember when we are dead.

We suffered as few men suffer,
Yet laughed as few men laugh;
We grin as the road grows rougher,
And a bitterer cup we quaff.

We lived for Right and for Laughter,
And we fought for a Nation ahead—
Remember it, friends, hereafter,
In the years when I am dead—
For to-morrow and not the day after,
For ourselves, and a Nation ahead.

poem by Henry Lawson
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All She Wrote

Something's wrong with your mind
It won't think of me anymore
Was it all a waste of time
Tell me why was I such a chore
Broken glass lies empty
Cut my voice so I can't say
Today was that day
It was that time
And that was all that she wrote for me
You fell away
I don't know why
And that was all that she wrote for me
Lying here in your bed
The one that you liked to do it in
Pieces of long brown hair
Are all over it and still in my brain
I can't explain
What it's like not knowing if I'll ever cross your mind
Today was that day
It was that time
And that was all that she wrote for me
You fell away
I don't know why
And that was all that she wrote for me
Sleep through the day
Fight with the night
Seven a.m. and the tv is white
Covered in snow
I never knew that hell could get so cold
Today was that day
It was that time
And that was all that she wrote for me
You fell away
I don't know why
And that was all that she wrote for me
Today was that day
It was that time
And that was all that she wrote for me
You fell away
I don't know why
And that was all that she wrote for me
Something's wrong with your mind
It won't think of me anymore
Was it all a waste of time

song performed by Default
Added by Lucian Velea
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Legends, Elegies, Pleasures And Norma Jean

The man who wrote Legends of the Fall
Wrote; 'Don't fall in love as if fallin' off a dock at night'
But when you are struck by the thunderbolt
How do you not fall?

The man who wrote the Duino Elegies
Wrote; 'Beauty is only the start of bearable terror'
But to be stuck without beauty
Is unbearable

The woman formerly know as Norma Jean
Wrote; 'I know from life one cannot love another'
I know what she meant, but to love you
How can I not?

The man who wrote The Pleasures of Hope
Wrote; 'How hard it is to find the one just suited to our mind! '
But it is just a little too easy to find one
Who is ill suited

From Legends, Elegies, Pleasures and Norma Jean
What they wrote is unforgettable
And that is what you are muse, though near or far
In every way

poem by MacGregor Tagliaferro
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The poem

I wrote a poem that didn't
ryhme,
i wrote a poem that didn't ryhme to the one I love,
i wrote a poem that didn't ryhme to the one I love
more than life,
i wrote a poem that didn't ryhme to the one I love more than life,
of which she did more than like,
the poem was short,
repeated myself alot,
but the one I loved more than life,
felt that love is like the poem I wrote,
full of joy and full of hurt,
the poem I wrote when I was full of hype,
coz the one I loved more than life is the one that now fills in my life all gaps,
the one that brings me up when am down,
a smile on my face from a frown,
music to my ears when we talk,
love in my heart when I'm near,
i wrote a poem that didn't ryhme for the one I love more than life.

poem by Kennedy Musyoka
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Be Gone

Yes, I wrote this song.
With a promise broken be gone.

I can still hear the tune so stuck in my head.
It brings life into parts of me that were so dead.
Mentally, as well as physically.

Going through the motions.
Even a zombie has his good days.
And I most certainly celebrate them.
Each and everyone most precious.

Yes I wrote this song.
With a promise broken be gone.

I have felt the angels kiss.
It reminds me of the forgotten.
Everything must have a reason.
It is how the world works.

Discovering my own abandonment.
Quietly he went away and we just don't understand.
Under the order of the law.
Rebel with obligation, to child you call your own.
Fight till very last dying breath.
With handcuffs your dragged away.

Yes I wrote this song.
With a promise broken be gone.

You tried, but still have failed.
To breath you must first exhale.
It is no good to hold it all in.
A bottled up bomb.
Light a match, light the fuse, and just run.

Don't ever look back.
For the sight you see will not be any fun.
A turning of the stomach.
A hate for what hes done.

Yes I wrote this song.
With a promise broken be gone.

Yes I wrote this song.
So just be gone.

Memories that eat at the deepest part of the soul.
That make us the vilest creatures in the world.
A women rights as far a child goes, completely out extend a mans.

[...] Read more

poem by Ace Of Black Hearts
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Michael: A Pastoral Poem

If from the public way you turn your steps
Up the tumultuous brook of Greenhead Ghyll,
You will suppose that with an upright path
Your feet must struggle; in such bold ascent
The pastoral mountains front you, face to face.
But, courage! for around that boisterous brook
The mountains have all opened out themselves,
And made a hidden valley of their own.
No habitation can be seen; but they
Who journey thither find themselves alone
With a few sheep, with rocks and stones, and kites
That overhead are sailing in the sky.
It is in truth an utter solitude;
Nor should I have made mention of this Dell
But for one object which you might pass by,
Might see and notice not. Beside the brook
Appears a straggling heap of unhewn stones!
And to that simple object appertains
A story--unenriched with strange events,
Yet not unfit, I deem, for the fireside,
Or for the summer shade. It was the first
Of those domestic tales that spake to me
Of shepherds, dwellers in the valleys, men
Whom I already loved; not verily
For their own sakes, but for the fields and hills
Where was their occupation and abode.
And hence this Tale, while I was yet a Boy
Careless of books, yet having felt the power
Of Nature, by the gentle agency
Of natural objects, led me on to feel
For passions that were not my own, and think
(At random and imperfectly indeed)
On man, the heart of man, and human life.
Therefore, although it be a history
Homely and rude, I will relate the same
For the delight of a few natural hearts;
And, with yet fonder feeling, for the sake
Of youthful Poets, who among these hills
Will be my second self when I am gone.
UPON the forest-side in Grasmere Vale
There dwelt a Shepherd, Michael was his name;
An old man, stout of heart, and strong of limb.
His bodily frame had been from youth to age
Of an unusual strength: his mind was keen,
Intense, and frugal, apt for all affairs,
And in his shepherd's calling he was prompt
And watchful more than ordinary men.
Hence had he learned the meaning of all winds,
Of blasts of every tone; and, oftentimes,
When others heeded not, He heard the South

[...] Read more

poem by William Wordsworth
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VII. Pompilia

I am just seventeen years and five months old,
And, if I lived one day more, three full weeks;
'T is writ so in the church's register,
Lorenzo in Lucina, all my names
At length, so many names for one poor child,
—Francesca Camilla Vittoria Angela
Pompilia Comparini,—laughable!
Also 't is writ that I was married there
Four years ago: and they will add, I hope,
When they insert my death, a word or two,—
Omitting all about the mode of death,—
This, in its place, this which one cares to know,
That I had been a mother of a son
Exactly two weeks. It will be through grace
O' the Curate, not through any claim I have;
Because the boy was born at, so baptized
Close to, the Villa, in the proper church:
A pretty church, I say no word against,
Yet stranger-like,—while this Lorenzo seems
My own particular place, I always say.
I used to wonder, when I stood scarce high
As the bed here, what the marble lion meant,
With half his body rushing from the wall,
Eating the figure of a prostrate man—
(To the right, it is, of entry by the door)
An ominous sign to one baptized like me,
Married, and to be buried there, I hope.
And they should add, to have my life complete,
He is a boy and Gaetan by name—
Gaetano, for a reason,—if the friar
Don Celestine will ask this grace for me
Of Curate Ottoboni: he it was
Baptized me: he remembers my whole life
As I do his grey hair.

All these few things
I know are true,—will you remember them?
Because time flies. The surgeon cared for me,
To count my wounds,—twenty-two dagger-wounds,
Five deadly, but I do not suffer much—
Or too much pain,—and am to die to-night.

Oh how good God is that my babe was born,
—Better than born, baptized and hid away
Before this happened, safe from being hurt!
That had been sin God could not well forgive:
He was too young to smile and save himself.
When they took two days after he was born,
My babe away from me to be baptized
And hidden awhile, for fear his foe should find,—

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poem by Robert Browning from The Ring and the Book
Added by Veronica Serbanoiu
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Loraine

This is the story of one man’s soul.
The paths are stony and passion is blind,
And feet must bleed ere the light we find.
The cypher is writ on Life’s mighty scroll,
And the key is in each man’s mind.
But who read aright, ye have won release,
Ye have touched the joy in the heart of Peace.

PART I

THERE’S a bend of the river on Glenbar run
Which the wild duck haunt at the set of sun,
And the song of the waters is softened so
That scarcely its current is heard to flow;
And the blackfish hide by the shady bank
’Neath the sunken logs where the reeds are rank,
And the halcyon’s mail is an azure gleam
O’er the shifting shoals of the silver bream,
And the magpies chatter their idle whim,
And the wagtails flitter along the brim,
And tiny martins with breasts of snow
Keep fluttering restlessly to and fro,
And the weeping willows have framed the scene
With the trailing fall of their curtains green,
And the grass grows lush on the level leas
’Neath the low gnarled boughs of the apple trees,
Where the drowsy cattle dream away
The noon-tide hours of the summer day.
There’s a shady nook by the old tree where
The track comes winding from Bendemeer.
So faint are the marks of the bridle track,
From the old slip-rails on the ridge’s back,
That few can follow the lines I know—
But I ride with the shadows of long ago!
I am gaunt and gray, I am old and worn,
But my heart goes back to a radiant morn
When someone waited and watched for me
In the friendly shade of that grand old tree.
The winter of Memory brings again
The summer rapture of passionate pain,
And she comes to me with the morning grace
On her sun-gold hair and her lily face,
And her blue eyes soft with the dreamy light
She stole from the stars of the Southern night,
And her slender form like a springtide flower
That sprang from the earth in a magic hour,
With the trembling smile and the tender tone
And the welcome glance—that were mine alone.
And we sit once more as we sat of old
When the future lay in a haze of gold—

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poem by George Essex Evans
Added by Poetry Lover
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I Walked Last Night In A District I Lived In For Almost Twenty Years

I WALKED LAST NIGHT IN A DISTRICT I LIVED IN FOR ALMOST TWENTY YEARS

I walked last night in a district I lived in for almost twenty years
I came back after being away for a time
To visit an old and ailing friend
The streets were empty and lonely as they often were then-
I thought for the first time I understood how lonely the district itself is-
‘A lonely district’
I wondered how I managed to live there all those years
And how anyone still manages to live there-
I looked up at the sky and wrote in my mind a small poem of a kind I wrote many of in my years there
I remembered teachers and friends who had lived there
No longer of this district or any district on earth
I wondered how life goes and how from so many years so much life has been lived without having any place in my memory
I felt as empty inside as the district without
I did not have to wait long for the bus
And relieved inside it I put my heart to home
So many years had been lived there
I remembered taking my small children to the playground there
Now they thank G-d have children of their own
Oh the years go by and the life we have lived in them largely dies
Forever to be unknown again-
I put my heart and mind in a different direction
And began to do what I always do – not think of the district again
Life is this mystery and question we live through and never wholly possess even as we are experiencing it
How long before all will be gone for me
Including the district I live in now?

poem by Shalom Freedman
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Lancelot And Elaine

Elaine the fair, Elaine the loveable,
Elaine, the lily maid of Astolat,
High in her chamber up a tower to the east
Guarded the sacred shield of Lancelot;
Which first she placed where the morning's earliest ray
Might strike it, and awake her with the gleam;
Then fearing rust or soilure fashioned for it
A case of silk, and braided thereupon
All the devices blazoned on the shield
In their own tinct, and added, of her wit,
A border fantasy of branch and flower,
And yellow-throated nestling in the nest.
Nor rested thus content, but day by day,
Leaving her household and good father, climbed
That eastern tower, and entering barred her door,
Stript off the case, and read the naked shield,
Now guessed a hidden meaning in his arms,
Now made a pretty history to herself
Of every dint a sword had beaten in it,
And every scratch a lance had made upon it,
Conjecturing when and where: this cut is fresh;
That ten years back; this dealt him at Caerlyle;
That at Caerleon; this at Camelot:
And ah God's mercy, what a stroke was there!
And here a thrust that might have killed, but God
Broke the strong lance, and rolled his enemy down,
And saved him: so she lived in fantasy.

How came the lily maid by that good shield
Of Lancelot, she that knew not even his name?
He left it with her, when he rode to tilt
For the great diamond in the diamond jousts,
Which Arthur had ordained, and by that name
Had named them, since a diamond was the prize.

For Arthur, long before they crowned him King,
Roving the trackless realms of Lyonnesse,
Had found a glen, gray boulder and black tarn.
A horror lived about the tarn, and clave
Like its own mists to all the mountain side:
For here two brothers, one a king, had met
And fought together; but their names were lost;
And each had slain his brother at a blow;
And down they fell and made the glen abhorred:
And there they lay till all their bones were bleached,
And lichened into colour with the crags:
And he, that once was king, had on a crown
Of diamonds, one in front, and four aside.
And Arthur came, and labouring up the pass,
All in a misty moonshine, unawares

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poem by Alfred Lord Tennyson
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