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  • freakyfreaky
    replied
    Re: Poetry Corner

    Easter, 1916

    I have met them at close of day
    Coming with vivid faces
    From counter or desk among grey
    Eighteenth-century houses.
    I have passed with a nod of the head
    Or polite meaningless words,
    Or have lingered awhile and said
    Polite meaningless words,
    And thought before I had done
    Of a mocking tale or a gibe
    To please a companion
    Around the fire at the club,
    Being certain that they and I
    But lived where motley is worn:
    All changed, changed utterly:
    A terrible beauty is born.

    That woman's days were spent
    In ignorant good will,
    Her nights in argument
    Until her voice grew shrill.
    What voice more sweet than hers
    When young and beautiful,
    She rode to harriers?
    This man had kept a school
    And rode our winged horse.
    This other his helper and friend
    Was coming into his force;
    He might have won fame in the end,
    So sensitive his nature seemed,
    So daring and sweet his thought.
    This other man I had dreamed
    A drunken, vain-glorious lout.
    He had done most bitter wrong
    To some who are near my heart,
    Yet I number him in the song;
    He, too, has resigned his part
    In the casual comedy;
    He, too, has been changed in his turn,
    Transformed utterly:
    A terrible beauty is born.

    Hearts with one purpose alone
    Through summer and winter seem
    Enchanted to a stone
    To trouble the living stream.
    The horse that comes from the road.
    The rider, the birds that range
    From cloud to tumbling cloud,
    Minute by minute change;
    A shadow of cloud on the stream
    Changes minute by minute;
    A horse-hoof slides on the brim,
    And a horse plashes within it
    Where long-legged moor-hens dive,
    And hens to moor-xxxxs call.
    Minute by minute they live:
    The stone's in the midst of all.

    Too long a sacrifice
    Can make a stone of the heart.
    O when may it suffice?
    That is heaven's part, our part
    To murmur name upon name,
    As a mother names her child
    When sleep at last has come
    On limbs that had run wild.
    What is it but nightfall?
    No, no, not night but death;
    Was it needless death after all?
    For England may keep faith
    For all that is done and said.
    We know their dream; enough
    To know they dreamed and are dead.
    And what if excess of love
    Bewildered them till they died?
    I write it out in a verse --
    MacDonagh and MacBride
    And Connolly and Pearse
    Now and in time to be,
    Wherever green is worn,
    Are changed, changed utterly:
    A terrible beauty is born.

    -- William Butler Yeats

    Fern Hill

    Now as I was young and easy under the apple boughs
    About the lilting house and happy as the grass was green,
    The night above the dingle starry,
    Time let me hail and climb
    Golden in the heydays of his eyes,
    And honoured among wagons I was prince of the apple towns
    And once below a time I lordly had the trees and leaves
    Trail with daisies and barley
    Down the rivers of the windfall light.

    And as I was green and carefree, famous among the barns
    About the happy yard and singing as the farm was home,
    In the sun that is young once only,
    Time let me play and be
    Golden in the mercy of his means,
    And green and golden I was huntsman and herdsman, the calves
    Sang to my horn, the foxes on the hills barked clear and cold,
    And the sabbath rang slowly
    In the pebbles of the holy streams.

    All the sun long it was running, it was lovely, the hay
    Fields high as the house, the tunes from the chimneys, it was air
    And playing, lovely and watery
    And fire green as grass.
    And nightly under the simple stars
    As I rode to sleep the owls were bearing the farm away,
    All the moon long I heard, blessed among stables, the nightjars
    Flying with the ricks, and the horses
    Flashing into the dark.

    And then to awake, and the farm, like a wanderer white
    With the dew, come back, the xxxx on his shoulder: it was all
    Shining, it was Adam and maiden,
    The sky gathered again
    And the sun grew round that very day.
    So it must have been after the birth of the simple light
    In the first, spinning place, the spellbound horses walking warm
    Out of the whinnying green stable
    On to the fields of praise.

    And honoured among foxes and pheasants by the gay house
    Under the new made clouds and happy as the heart was long,
    In the sun born over and over,
    I ran my heedless ways,
    My wishes raced through the house high hay
    And nothing I cared, at my sky blue trades, that time allows
    In all his tuneful turning so few and such morning songs
    Before the children green and golden
    Follow him out of grace,

    Nothing I cared, in the lamb white days, that time would take me
    Up to the swallow thronged loft by the shadow of my hand,
    In the moon that is always rising,
    Nor that riding to sleep
    I should hear him fly with the high fields
    And wake to the farm forever fled from the childless land.
    Oh as I was young and easy in the mercy of his means,
    Time held me green and dying
    Though I sang in my chains like the sea.

    -- Dylan Thomas

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  • freakyfreaky
    replied
    Re: Poetry Corner

    Sir Walter Raleigh to His Son

    Three things there be that prosper up apace
    And flourish, whilst they grow asunder far,
    But on a day, they meet all in one place,
    And when they meet, they one another mar;
    And they be these: the wood, the weed, the wag.
    The wood is that which makes the gallow tree;
    The weed is that which strings the hangman's bag;
    The wag, my pretty knave, betokeneth thee.
    Mark well, dear boy, whilst these assemble not,
    Green springs the tree, hemp grows, the wag is wild,
    But when they meet, it makes the timber rot,
    It frets the halter, and it chokes the child.
    Then bless thee, and beware, and let us pray
    We part not with thee at this meeting day.

    -- Sir Walter Raleigh

    Her Reply

    If all the world and love were young,
    And truth in every shepherd’s tongue,
    These pretty pleasures might me move
    To live with thee and be thy Love.

    But Time drives flocks from field to fold,
    When rivers rage and rocks grow cold;
    And Philomel becometh dumb;
    The rest complain of cares to come.

    The flowers do fade, and wanton fields
    To wayward winter reckoning yields:
    A honey tongue, a heart of gall,
    Is fancy’s spring, but sorrow’s fall.

    Thy gowns, thy shoes, thy beds of roses,
    Thy cap, thy kirtle, and thy posies,
    Soon break, soon wither, soon forgotten -
    In folly ripe, in reason rotten.

    Thy belt of straw and ivy buds,
    Thy coral clasps and amber studs, -
    All these in me no means can move
    To come to thee and be thy Love.

    But could youth last, and love still breed,
    Had joys no date, nor age no need,
    Then these delights my mind might move
    To live with thee and be thy Love.

    -- Sir Walter Raleigh

    CORINNA’S GOING A-MAYING

    GET up, get up for shame, the blooming morn
    Upon her wings presents the god unshorn.
    See how Aurora throws her fair
    Fresh-quilted colours through the air :
    Get up, sweet slug-a-bed, and see
    The dew bespangling herb and tree.
    Each flower has wept and bow’d toward the east
    Above an hour since : yet you not dress’d ;
    Nay ! not so much as out of bed?
    When all the birds have matins said
    And sung their thankful hymns, ’tis sin,
    Nay, profanation to keep in,
    Whereas a thousand virgins on this day
    Spring, sooner than the lark, to fetch in May.

    Rise and put on your foliage, and be seen
    To come forth, like the spring-time, fresh and green,
    And sweet as Flora. Take no care
    For xxxels for your gown or hair :
    Fear not ; the leaves will strew
    Gems in abundance upon you :
    Besides, the childhood of the day has kept,
    Against you come, some orient pearls unwept ;
    Come and receive them while the light
    Hangs on the dew-locks of the night :
    And Titan on the eastern hill
    Retires himself, or else stands still
    Till you come forth. Wash, dress, be brief in praying :
    Few beads are best when once we go a-Maying.

    Come, my Corinna, come ; and, coming, mark
    How each field turns a street, each street a park
    Made green and trimm’d with trees : see how
    Devotion gives each house a bough
    Or branch : each porch, each door ere this
    An ark, a tabernacle is,
    Made up of white-thorn neatly interwove ;
    As if here were those cooler shades of love.
    Can such delights be in the street
    And open fields and we not see’t ?
    Come, we’ll abroad ; and let’s obey
    The proclamation made for May :
    And sin no more, as we have done, by staying ;
    But, my Corinna, come, let’s go a-Maying.

    There’s not a budding boy or girl this day
    But is got up, and gone to bring in May.
    A deal of youth, ere this, is come
    Back, and with white-thorn laden home.
    Some have despatch’d their cakes and cream
    Before that we have left to dream :
    And some have wept, and woo’d, and plighted troth,
    And chose their priest, ere we can cast off sloth :
    Many a green-gown has been given ;
    Many a kiss, both odd and even :
    Many a glance too has been sent
    From out the eye, love’s firmament ;
    Many a jest told of the keys betraying
    This night, and locks pick’d, yet we’re not a-Maying.

    Come, let us go while we are in our prime ;
    And take the harmless folly of the time.
    We shall grow old apace, and die
    Before we know our liberty.
    Our life is short, and our days run
    As fast away as does the sun ;
    And, as a vapour or a drop of rain
    Once lost, can ne’er be found again,
    So when or you or I are made
    A fable, song, or fleeting shade,
    All love, all liking, all delight
    Lies drowned with us in endless night.
    Then while time serves, and we are but decaying,
    Come, my Corinna, come, let’s go a-Maying.

    -- Robert Herrick

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  • MrHyeSev
    replied
    Re: Poetry Corner

    The Miracle

    There is a majestic quality-
    In everyone for all to see.
    Some keep it hidden, some never realize-
    The magnificence they hold in others' eyes.

    Ah, yes, life itself is the gift.
    Though the memory, itself, Time doth sift.
    And some might think the reverence gone-
    As those we love one by one pass on.

    But the intricacies Fate doth weave-
    In commemoration for all who grieve.
    Are the blessings given to rebirth-
    From souls no-longer of this earth.

    At first notice I came undone,
    My father staring at me through my son.
    But, now, in joy I ascertain-
    Through him, my father lives again.

    I look to heavens' resounding grace-
    Renewed appreciation of life and my place.
    Knowing as each newborn child opens their eyes-
    The miracle continues, no one really dies.

    by Michael Anderson

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  • retro
    replied
    Re: Poetry Corner

    The Lady of Shalott by Alfred Tennyson

    Loreena McKennitt - The Lady of Shalott
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    On either side the river lie
    Long fields of barley and of rye,
    That clothe the wold and meet the sky;
    And thro' the field the road runs by
    To many-tower'd Camelot;
    And up and down the people go,
    Gazing where the lilies blow
    Round an island there below,
    The island of Shalott.

    Willows whiten, aspens quiver,
    Little breezes dusk and shiver
    Through the wave that runs for ever
    By the island in the river
    Flowing down to Camelot.
    Four grey walls, and four grey towers,
    Overlook a space of flowers,
    And the silent isle imbowers
    The Lady of Shalott.

    By the margin, willow veil'd,
    Slide the heavy barges trail'd
    By slow horses; and unhail'd
    The shallop flitteth silken-sail'd
    Skimming down to Camelot:
    But who hath seen her wave her hand?
    Or at the casement seen her stand?
    Or is she known in all the land,
    The Lady of Shalott?

    Only reapers, reaping early,
    In among the bearded barley
    Hear a song that echoes cheerly
    From the river winding clearly;
    Down to tower'd Camelot;
    And by the moon the reaper weary,
    Piling sheaves in uplands airy,
    Listening, whispers, " 'Tis the fairy
    Lady of Shalott."

    There she weaves by night and day
    A magic web with colours gay.
    She has heard a whisper say,
    A curse is on her if she stay
    To look down to Camelot.
    She knows not what the curse may be,
    And so she weaveth steadily,
    And little other care hath she,
    The Lady of Shalott.

    And moving through a mirror clear
    That hangs before her all the year,
    Shadows of the world appear.
    There she sees the highway near
    Winding down to Camelot;
    There the river eddy whirls,
    And there the surly village churls,
    And the red cloaks of market girls
    Pass onward from Shalott.

    Sometimes a troop of damsels glad,
    An abbot on an ambling pad,
    Sometimes a curly shepherd lad,
    Or long-hair'd page in crimson clad
    Goes by to tower'd Camelot;
    And sometimes through the mirror blue
    The knights come riding two and two.
    She hath no loyal Knight and true,
    The Lady of Shalott.

    But in her web she still delights
    To weave the mirror's magic sights,
    For often through the silent nights
    A funeral, with plumes and lights
    And music, went to Camelot;
    Or when the Moon was overhead,
    Came two young lovers lately wed.
    "I am half sick of shadows," said
    The Lady of Shalott.

    A bow-shot from her bower-eaves,
    He rode between the barley sheaves,
    The sun came dazzling thro' the leaves,
    And flamed upon the brazen greaves
    Of bold Sir Lancelot.
    A red-cross knight for ever kneel'd
    To a lady in his shield,
    That sparkled on the yellow field,
    Beside remote Shalott.

    The gemmy bridle glitter'd free,
    Like to some branch of stars we see
    Hung in the golden Galaxy.
    The bridle bells rang merrily
    As he rode down to Camelot:
    And from his blazon'd baldric slung
    A mighty silver bugle hung,
    And as he rode his armor rung
    Beside remote Shalott.

    All in the blue unclouded weather
    Thick-xxxell'd shone the saddle-leather,
    The helmet and the helmet-feather
    Burn'd like one burning flame together,
    As he rode down to Camelot.
    As often thro' the purple night,
    Below the starry clusters bright,
    Some bearded meteor, burning bright,
    Moves over still Shalott.

    His broad clear brow in sunlight glow'd;
    On burnish'd hooves his war-horse trode;
    From underneath his helmet flow'd
    His coal-black curls as on he rode,
    As he rode down to Camelot.
    From the bank and from the river
    He flashed into the crystal mirror,
    "Tirra lirra," by the river
    Sang Sir Lancelot.

    She left the web, she left the loom,
    She made three paces through the room,
    She saw the water-lily bloom,
    She saw the helmet and the plume,
    She look'd down to Camelot.
    Out flew the web and floated wide;
    The mirror crack'd from side to side;
    "The curse is come upon me," cried
    The Lady of Shalott.

    In the stormy east-wind straining,
    The pale yellow woods were waning,
    The broad stream in his banks complaining.
    Heavily the low sky raining
    Over tower'd Camelot;
    Down she came and found a boat
    Beneath a willow left afloat,
    And around about the prow she wrote
    The Lady of Shalott.

    And down the river's dim expanse
    Like some bold seer in a trance,
    Seeing all his own mischance --
    With a glassy countenance
    Did she look to Camelot.
    And at the closing of the day
    She loosed the chain, and down she lay;
    The broad stream bore her far away,
    The Lady of Shalott.

    Lying, robed in snowy white
    That loosely flew to left and right --
    The leaves upon her falling light --
    Thro' the noises of the night,
    She floated down to Camelot:
    And as the boat-head wound along
    The willowy hills and fields among,
    They heard her singing her last song,
    The Lady of Shalott.

    Heard a carol, mournful, holy,
    Chanted loudly, chanted lowly,
    Till her blood was frozen slowly,
    And her eyes were darkened wholly,
    Turn'd to tower'd Camelot.
    For ere she reach'd upon the tide
    The first house by the water-side,
    Singing in her song she died,
    The Lady of Shalott.

    Under tower and balcony,
    By garden-wall and gallery,
    A gleaming shape she floated by,
    Dead-pale between the houses high,
    Silent into Camelot.
    Out upon the wharfs they came,
    Knight and Burgher, Lord and Dame,
    And around the prow they read her name,
    The Lady of Shalott.

    Who is this? And what is here?
    And in the lighted palace near
    Died the sound of royal cheer;
    And they crossed themselves for fear,
    All the Knights at Camelot;
    But Lancelot mused a little space
    He said, "She has a lovely face;
    God in his mercy lend her grace,
    The Lady of Shalott."

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  • retro
    replied
    Re: Poetry Corner

    The Eagle by Alfred Tennyson

    Enjoy the videos and music you love, upload original content, and share it all with friends, family, and the world on YouTube.


    He clasps the crag with hooked hands;
    Close to the sun in lonely lands,
    Ring'd with the azure world, he stands.

    The wrinkled sea beneath him crawls;
    He watches from his mountain walls,
    And like a thunderbolt he falls.

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  • MrHyeSev
    replied
    Re: Poetry Corner

    Goliath and David

    by: Robert Graves


    Once an earlier David took
    Smooth pebbles from a brook:
    Out between the lines he went
    To that one-sided tournament,
    A shepherd boy who stood out fine
    And young to fight a Philistine
    Clad all in brazen mail. He swears
    That he's killed lions, he's killed bears,
    And those that scorn the God of Zion
    Shall perish so like bear or lion.
    But . . . the historian of that fight
    Had not the heart to tell it right.

    Striding within javelin range
    Goliath marvels at this strange
    Goodly-faced boy so proud of strength.
    David's clear eye measures the length;
    With hand thrust back, he cramps one knee,
    Poises a moment thoughtfully,
    And hurls with a long vengeful swing.
    The pebble, humming from the sling
    Like a wild bee, flies a sure line
    For the forehead of the Philistine;
    Then . . . but there comes a brazen clink.
    And quicker than a man can think
    Goliath's shield parries each cast.
    Clang! clang! and clang! was David's last.
    Scorn blazes in the Giant's eye,
    Towering unhurt six cubit's high.
    Says foolish David, 'Damn your shield!
    And damn my sling! but I'll not yield.'

    He takes his staff of Mamre oak,
    A knotted shepherd-staff that's broke
    The skull of many a wolf and fox
    Come filching lambs from Jesse's flocks.
    Loud laughs Goliath, and that laugh
    Can scatter chariots like blown chaff
    To rout: but David, calm and brave,
    Holds his ground, for God will save.
    Steel crosses wood, a flash, and oh!
    Shame for Beauty's overthrow!
    (God's eyes are dim, His ears are shut.)
    One cruel backhand sabre cut --
    'I'm hit! I'm killed!' young David cries,
    Throws blindly foward, chokes . . . and dies.
    And look, spike-helmeted, grey, grim,
    Goliath straddles over him.

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  • freakyfreaky
    replied
    Re: Poetry Corner

    St Vincent’s

    Thinking of rain clouds that rose over the city
    on the first day of the year

    in the same month
    I consider that I have lived daily and with

    eyes open and ears to hear
    these years across from St Vincent’s Hospital
    above whose roof those clouds rose

    its bricks by day a French red under
    cross facing south
    blown-up neo-classic facades the tall
    dark openings between columns at
    the dawn of history
    exploded into many windows
    in a mortised face

    inside it the ambulances have unloaded
    after sirens’ howling nearer through traffic on
    Seventh Avenue long
    ago I learned not to hear them
    even when the sirens stop

    they turn to back in
    few passers-by stay to look
    and neither do I

    at night two long blue
    windows and one short one on the top floor
    burn all night
    many nights when most of the others are out
    on what floor do they have
    anything

    I have seen the building drift moonlit through geraniums
    late at night when trucks were few
    moon just past the full
    upper windows parts of the sky
    as long as I looked
    I watched it at Christmas and New Year
    early in the morning I have seen the nurses ray out through
    arterial streets
    in the evening have noticed internes blocks away
    on doorsteps one foot in the door

    I have come upon the men in gloves taking out
    the garbage at all hours
    piling up mountains of
    plastic bags white strata with green intermingled and
    black
    I have seen one pile
    catch fire and studied the cloud
    at the ends of the jets of the hoses
    the fire engines as near as that
    red beacons and
    machine-throb heard by the whole body
    I have noticed molded containers stacked outside
    a delivery entrance on Twelfth Street
    whether meals from a meal factory made up with those
    mummified for long journeys by plane
    or specimens for laboratory
    examination sealed at the prescribed temperatures
    either way closed delivery

    and approached faces staring from above
    crutches or tubular clamps
    out for tentative walks
    have paused for turtling wheel-chairs
    heard visitors talking in wind on each corner
    while the lights changed and
    hot dogs were handed over at the curb
    in the middle of afternoon
    mustard ketchup onions and relish
    and police smelling of ether and laundry
    were going back

    and I have known them all less than the papers of our days
    smoke rises from the chimneys do they have an incinerator
    what for
    how warm do they believe they have to maintain the air
    in there
    several of the windows appear
    to be made of tin
    but it may be the light reflected

    I have imagined bees coming and going
    on those sills though I have never seen them

    who was St Vincent

    -- M.S. Merwin

    Hearing

    Back when it took all day to come up
    from the curving broad ponds on the plains
    where the green-winged jaçanas ran on the lily pads

    easing past tracks at the mouths of gorges
    crossing villages silted in hollows
    in the foothills
    each with its lime-washed church by the baked square
    of red earth and its
    talkers eating fruit under trees

    turning a corner and catching
    sight at last of inky forests far above
    steep as faces
    with the clouds stroking them and the glimmering
    airy valleys opening out of them

    waterfalls still roared from the folds
    of the mountain
    white and thundering and spray drifted
    around us swirling into the broad leaves
    and the waiting boughs

    once I took a tin cup and climbed
    the sluiced rocks and mossy branches beside
    one of the high falls
    looking up step by step into
    the green sky from which rain was falling
    when I looked back from a ledge there were only
    dripping leaves below me
    and flowers

    beside me the hissing
    cataract plunged into the trees
    holding on I moved closer
    left foot on a rock in the water
    right foot on a rock in deeper water
    at the edge of the fall
    then from under the weight of my right foot
    came a voice like a small bell singing
    over and over one clear treble
    syllable

    I could feel it move
    I could feel it ring in my foot in my skin
    everywhere
    in my ears in my hair
    I could feel it in my tongue and in the hand
    holding the cup
    as long as I stood there it went on
    without changing

    when I moved the cup
    still it went on
    when I filled the cup
    in the falling column
    still it went on
    when I drank it rang in my eyes
    through the thunder curtain

    when I filled the cup again
    when I raised my foot
    still it went on
    and all the way down
    from wet rock to wet rock
    green branch to green branch
    it came with me

    until I stood
    looking up and we drank
    the light water
    and when we went on we could
    still hear the sound
    as far as the next turn on the way over

    -- M.S. Merwin
    Last edited by freakyfreaky; 07-01-2010, 08:56 PM.

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  • freakyfreaky
    replied
    Re: Poetry Corner

    Prophet Bird

    They found the earth mute and passionless and left.”
    —Frank O’Hara

    Your legend is still green with us, and avid
    To demonstrate how you once scaled a mountain
    Of orange-crates and “knocked them down,” how simply
    Lifting and lighting became the Promethean blaze. . . .
    Now files of ants descend on their current
    Windfall, gaining focus and perhaps a better grasp
    Of the unlikely but all too portable whole,
    Which you discarded in favor of newer stages,
    Reluctant to lock up a plan next to its migrant
    Double, the planetary warning, color of dried blood—
    That impasse, too, was more than beginning
    To dim and accept a kinder remnant of
    Intention: the leaves turn when they fall.
    We have our wishes for you still, the few
    That find a rough-hewn, vine-covered lodging
    For their chattels under the foothills near
    Healing, variably heated springs. The ayes
    And your hardly won singlings-out of praise
    Befriend you for now, knowing you, enkindled
    Early starling, first befriended them.

    -- Alfred Corn

    Prophecy on Lethe

    Echo, the beating of the tide,
    Infringes on the blond curved shore;
    Archaic weeds from sleep's green side
    Bind skull and pelvis till the four
    Seasons of the blood are unified.

    Anonymous sweet carrion,
    Blind mammal floating on the stream
    Of depthless sound, completely one
    In the cinnamon-dark of no dream --
    A pod of silence, bursting when the sun

    Clings to the forehead, will surprise
    The gasping turtle and the leech
    With your strange brain blooming as it lies
    Abandoned to the bipeds on the beach;
    Your jelly-mouth and, crushed, your polyp eyes.

    -- Stanley Kunitz
    Last edited by freakyfreaky; 06-22-2010, 08:04 PM.

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  • freakyfreaky
    replied
    Re: Poetry Corner

    THE DESTRUCTION OF SENNACHERIB

    The Assyrian came down like the wolf on the fold,
    And his cohorts were gleaming in purple and gold;
    And the sheen of their spears was like stars on the sea,
    When the blue wave rolls nightly on deep Galilee.

    Like the leaves of the forest when Summer is green,
    That host with their banners at sunset were seen:
    Like the leaves of the forest when Autumn hath blown,
    That host on the morrow lay withered and strown.

    For the Angel of Death spread his wings on the blast,
    And breathed in the face of the foe as he passed;
    And the eyes of the sleepers waxed deadly and chill,
    And their hearts but once heaved, and for ever grew still!

    And there lay the steed with his nostril all wide,
    But through it there rolled not the breath of his pride;
    And the foam of his gasping lay white on the turf,
    And cold as the spray of the rock-beating surf.

    And there lay the rider distorted and pale,
    With the dew on his brow, and the rust on his mail:
    And the tents were all silent, the banners alone,
    The lances unlifted, the trumpet unblown.

    And the widows of Ashur are loud in their wail,
    And the idols are broke in the temple of Baal;
    And the might of the Gentile, unsmote by the sword,
    Hath melted like snow in the glance of the Lord!

    -- Lord Byron

    The Tear

    When Friendship or Love
    Our sympathies move;
    When Truth, in a glance, should appear,
    The lips may beguile,
    With a dimple or smile,
    But the test of affection’s a Tear:

    Too oft is a smile
    But the hypocrite’s wile,
    To mask detestation, or fear;
    Give me the soft sigh,
    Whilst the soultelling eye
    Is dimm’d, for a time, with a Tear:

    Mild Charity’s glow,
    To us mortals below,
    Shows the soul from barbarity clear;
    Compassion will melt,
    Where this virtue is felt,
    And its dew is diffused in a Tear:

    The man, doom’d to sail
    With the blast of the gale,
    Through billows Atlantic to steer,
    As he bends o’er the wave
    Which may soon be his grave,
    The green sparkles bright with a Tear;

    The Soldier braves death
    For a fanciful wreath
    In Glory’s romantic career;
    But he raises the foe
    When in battle laid low,
    And bathes every wound with a Tear.

    If, with high-bounding pride,
    He return to his bride!
    Renouncing the gore-crimson’d spear;
    All his toils are repaid
    When, embracing the maid,
    From her eyelid he kisses the Tear.

    Sweet scene of my youth!
    Seat of Friendship and Truth,
    Where Love chas’d each fast-fleeting year
    Loth to leave thee, I mourn’d,
    For a last look I turn’d,
    But thy spire was scarce seen through a Tear:

    Though my vows I can pour,
    To my Mary no more,
    My Mary, to Love once so dear,
    In the shade of her bow’r,
    I remember the hour,
    She rewarded those vows with a Tear.

    By another possest,
    May she live ever blest!
    Her name still my heart must revere:
    With a sigh I resign,
    What I once thought was mine,
    And forgive her deceit with a Tear.

    Ye friends of my heart,
    Ere from you I depart,
    This hope to my breast is most near:
    If again we shall meet,
    In this rural retreat,
    May we meet, as we part, with a Tear.

    When my soul wings her flight
    To the regions of night,
    And my corse shall recline on its bier;
    As ye pass by the tomb,
    Where my ashes consume,
    Oh! moisten their dust with a Tear.

    -- Lord Byron

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  • iFemale
    replied
    Re: Poetry Corner

    Originally posted by PepsiAddict View Post
    Anytime iFemale
    are you done with your wise crack comments?
    you were relaxed for a while, what happened your bored?
    What are you talking about? I'm your biggest fan, and I'll follow you until you love me.

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