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108 Cards in this Set
- Front
- Back
William Butler Yeats, The Lake Isle of Innisfree |
I will arise and go now, and go to Innisfree, And a small cabin build there, of clay and wattles made: Nine bean-rows will I have there, a hive for the honey-bee, And live alone in the bee-loud glade.
And I shall have some peace there, for peace comes dropping slow, Dropping from the veils of the morning to where the cricket sings; There midnight's all a glimmer, and noon a purple glow, And evening full of the linnet's wings.
I will arise and go now, for always night and day I hear lake water lapping with low sounds by the shore; While I stand on the roadway, or on the pavements gray, I hear it in the deep heart's core. |
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Robert Hayden, Those Winter Sundays |
Sundays too my father got up early and put his clothes on in the blueblack cold, then with cracked hands that ached from labor in the weekday weather made banked fires blaze. No one ever thanked him.
I'd wake and hear the cold splintering, breaking, When the rooms were warm, he'd call, and slowly I would rise and dress, fearing the chronic angers of that house,
Speaking indifferently to him, who had driven out the cold and polished my good shoes as well. What did I know, what did I know of love's austere and lonely offices? |
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Adrienne Rich, Aunt Jennifer's Tigers |
Aunt Jennifer's tigers prance across a screen, Bright topaz denizens of a world of green. They do not fear the men beneath the tree; They pace in sleek chivalric certainty.
Aunt Jennifer's fingers fluttering through her wool Find even the ivory needle hard to pull. The massive weight of Uncle's wedding band Sits heavily upon Aunt Jennifer's band.
When Aunt is dead, her terrified hands will like Still ringed with ordeals she was mastered by. The tigers in the panel that she made Will go on prancing, proud and unafraid. |
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William Stafford, Ask Me |
Some time when the river is ice ask me mistakes I have made. Ask whether what I have done is my life. Others have come in their slow way into my thought, and some have tried to help or to hurt--ask me what difference their strongest love or hate has made.
I will listen to what you say. You and I can turn and look at the silent river and wait. We know the current is there, hidden; and there are comings and goings from miles away that hold the stillness exactly before us. What the river says, that is what I say. |
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Robert Frost, "Out, out---" |
The buzz saw snarled and rattled in the yard And made dust and dropped stove-length sticks of wood, Sweet-scented stuff when the breeze drew across it. And from there those that lifted eyes could count Five mountain ranges one behind the other Under the sunset far into Vermont. And the saw snarled and rattled, snarled and rattled, As it ran light, or had to bear a load. And nothing happened: day was all but done. Call it a day, I wish they might have said To please the boy by giving him the half hour That a boy counts so much when saved from work. His sister stood beside him in her apron To tell them ‘Supper.’ At the word, the saw, As if to prove saws knew what supper meant, Leaped out at the boy’s hand, or seemed to leap— He must have given the hand. However it was, Neither refused the meeting. But the hand! The boy’s first outcry was a rueful laugh, As he swung toward them holding up the hand Half in appeal, but half as if to keep The life from spilling. Then the boy saw all— Since he was old enough to know, big boy Doing a man’s work, though a child at heart— He saw all spoiled. ‘Don’t let him cut my hand off— The doctor, when he comes. Don’t let him, sister!’ So. But the hand was gone already. The doctor put him in the dark of ether. He lay and puffed his lips out with his breath. And then—the watcher at his pulse took fright. No one believed. They listened at his heart. Little—less—nothing!—and that ended it. No more to build on there. And they, since they Were not the one dead, turned to their affairs. |
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Robert Browning, My Last Duchess |
That’s my last Duchess painted on the wall, Looking as if she were alive. I call That piece a wonder, now: Frà Pandolf’s hands Worked busily a day, and there she stands. Will ‘t please you sit and look at her? I said ‘Frà Pandolf’ by design, for never read Strangers like you that pictured countenance, The depth and passion of its earnest glance, But to myself they turned (since none puts by The curtain I have drawn for you, but I) And seemed as they would ask me, if they durst, How such a glance came there; so, not the first Are you to turn and ask thus. Sir, ‘t was not Her husband’s presence only, called that spot Of joy into the Duchess’ cheek: perhaps Frà Pandolf chanced to say, ‘Her mantle laps Over my lady’s wrist too much,' or ‘Paint Must never hope to reproduce the faint Half-flush that dies along her throat:' such stuff Was courtesy, she thought, and cause enough For calling up that spot of joy. She had A heart -- how shall I say? -- too soon made glad, Too easily impressed; she liked whate’er She looked on, and her looks went everywhere. Sir, ‘t was all one! My favour at her breast, The dropping of the daylight in the West, The bough of cherries some officious fool Broke in the orchard for her, the white mule She rode with round the terrace -- all and each Would draw from her alike the approving speech, Or blush, at least. She thanked men, -- good! but thanked Somehow -- I know not how -- as if she ranked My gift of a nine-hundred-years-old name With anybody’s gift. Who’d stoop to blame This sort of trifling? Even had you skill In speech -- (which I have not) -- to make your will Quite clear to such an one, and say, ‘Just this Or that in you disgusts me; here you miss, Or there exceed the mark’ -- and if she let Herself be lessoned so, nor plainly set Her wits to yours, forsooth, and made excuse, -- E’en then would be some stooping; and I choose Never to stoop. Oh, sir, she smiled, no doubt, Whene’er I passed her; but who passed without Much the same smile? This grew; I gave commands; Then all smiles stopped together. There she stands As if alive. Will ‘t please you rise? We’ll meet The company below then. I repeat, The Count your master’s known munificence Is ample warrant that no just pretence Of mine for dowry will be disallowed; Though his fair daughter’s self, as I avowed At starting, is my object. Nay, we’ll go Together down, sir. Notice Neptune, though, Taming a sea-horse, thought a rarity, Which Claus of Innsbruck cast in bronze for me! |
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Theodore Roethke, My Papa's Waltz |
The whiskey on your breath Could make a small boy dizzy; But I hung on like death: Such waltzing was not easy.
We romped until the pans Slid from the kitchen shelf; My mother’s countenance Could not unfrown itself.
The hand that held my wrist Was battered on one knuckle; At every step you missed My right ear scraped a buckle.
You beat time on my head With a palm caked hard by dirt, Then waltzed me off to bed Still clinging to your shirt. |
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Edwin Arlington Robinson, Richard Cory |
Whenever Richard Cory went down town, We people on the pavement looked at him: He was a gentleman from sole to crown, Clean favored, and imperially slim.
And he was always quietly arrayed, And he was always human when he talked; But still he fluttered pulses when he said, "Good-morning," and he glittered when he walked.
And he was rich—yes, richer than a king— And admirably schooled in every grace: In fine, we thought that he was everything To make us wish that we were in his place.
So on we worked, and waited for the light, And went without the meat, and cursed the bread; And Richard Cory, one calm summer night, Went home and put a bullet through his head. |
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Alfred, Lord Tennyson, Ulysses |
It little profits that an idle king, By this still hearth, among these barren crags, Match'd with an aged wife, I mete and dole Unequal laws unto a savage race, That hoard, and sleep, and feed, and know not me. I cannot rest from travel: I will drink Life to the lees: All times I have enjoy'd Greatly, have suffer'd greatly, both with those That loved me, and alone, on shore, and when Thro' scudding drifts the rainy Hyades Vext the dim sea: I am become a name; For always roaming with a hungry heart Much have I seen and known; cities of men And manners, climates, councils, governments, Myself not least, but honour'd of them all; And drunk delight of battle with my peers, Far on the ringing plains of windy Troy. I am a part of all that I have met; Yet all experience is an arch wherethro' Gleams that untravell'd world whose margin fades For ever and forever when I move. How dull it is to pause, to make an end, To rust unburnish'd, not to shine in use! As tho' to breathe were life! Life piled on life Were all too little, and of one to me Little remains: but every hour is saved From that eternal silence, something more, A bringer of new things; and vile it were For some three suns to store and hoard myself, And this gray spirit yearning in desire To follow knowledge like a sinking star, Beyond the utmost bound of human thought.
This is my son, mine own Telemachus, To whom I leave the sceptre and the isle,— Well-loved of me, discerning to fulfil This labour, by slow prudence to make mild A rugged people, and thro' soft degrees Subdue them to the useful and the good. Most blameless is he, centred in the sphere Of common duties, decent not to fail In offices of tenderness, and pay Meet adoration to my household gods, When I am gone. He works his work, I mine.
There lies the port; the vessel puffs her sail: There gloom the dark, broad seas. My mariners, Souls that have toil'd, and wrought, and thought with me— That ever with a frolic welcome took The thunder and the sunshine, and opposed Free hearts, free foreheads—you and I are old; Old age hath yet his honour and his toil; Death closes all: but something ere the end, Some work of noble note, may yet be done, Not unbecoming men that strove with Gods. The lights begin to twinkle from the rocks: The long day wanes: the slow moon climbs: the deep Moans round with many voices. Come, my friends, 'T is not too late to seek a newer world. Push off, and sitting well in order smite The sounding furrows; for my purpose holds To sail beyond the sunset, and the baths Of all the western stars, until I die. It may be that the gulfs will wash us down: It may be we shall touch the Happy Isles, And see the great Achilles, whom we knew. Tho' much is taken, much abides; and tho' We are not now that strength which in old days Moved earth and heaven, that which we are, we are; One equal temper of heroic hearts, Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield. |
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Countee Cullen, For a Lady I Know |
She even thinks that up in heaven |
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Weldon Kees, For My Daughter |
Looking into my daughter’s eyes I read Beneath the innocence of morning flesh Concealed, hintings of death she does not heed. Coldest of winds have blown this hair, and mesh Of seaweed snarled these miniatures of hands; The night’s slow poison, tolerant and bland, Has moved her blood. Parched years that I have seen That may be hers appear: foul, lingering Death in certain war, the slim legs green. Or, fed on hate, she relishes the sting Of others’ agony; perhaps the cruel Bride of a syphilitic or a fool. These speculations sour in the sun. I have no daughter. I desire none. |
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Edwin Arlington Robinson, Luke Havergal |
Go to the western gate, Luke Havergal, There where the vines cling crimson on the wall, And in the twilight wait for what will come. The leaves will whisper there of her, and some, Like flying words, will strike you as they fall; But go, and if you listen she will call. Go to the western gate, Luke Havergal— Luke Havergal.
No, there is not a dawn in eastern skies To rift the fiery night that’s in your eyes; But there, where western glooms are gathering, The dark will end the dark, if anything: God slays Himself with every leaf that flies, And hell is more than half of paradise. No, there is not a dawn in eastern skies— In eastern skies.
Out of a grave I come to tell you this, Out of a grave I come to quench the kiss That flames upon your forehead with a glow That blinds you to the way that you must go. Yes, there is yet one way to where she is, Bitter, but one that faith may never miss. Out of a grave I come to tell you this— To tell you this.
There is the western gate, Luke Havergal, There are the crimson leaves upon the wall. Go, for the winds are tearing them away,— Nor think to riddle the dead words they say, Nor any more to feel them as they fall; But go, and if you trust her she will call. There is the western gate, Luke Havergal— Luke Havergal. |
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Ted Hughes, Hawk Roosting |
sit in the top of the wood, my eyes closed. |
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W.H. Auden, The Unknown Citizen |
He was found by the Bureau of Statistics to be One against whom there was no official complaint, And all the reports on his conduct agree That, in the modern sense of an old-fashioned word, he was a saint, For in everything he did he served the Greater Community. Except for the War till the day he retired He worked in a factory and never got fired, But satisfied his employers, Fudge Motors Inc. Yet he wasn’t a scab or odd in his views, For his Union reports that he paid his dues, (Our report on his Union shows it was sound) And our Social Psychology workers found That he was popular with his mates and liked a drink. The Press are convinced that he bought a paper every day And that his reactions to advertisements were normal in every way. Policies taken out in his name prove that he was fully insured, And his Health-card shows he was once in hospital but left it cured. Both Producers Research and High-Grade Living declare He was fully sensible to the advantages of the Instalment Plan And had everything necessary to the Modern Man, A phonograph, a radio, a car and a frigidaire. Our researchers into Public Opinion are content That he held the proper opinions for the time of year; When there was peace, he was for peace: when there was war, he went. He was married and added five children to the population, Which our Eugenist says was the right number for a parent of his generation. And our teachers report that he never interfered with their education. Was he free? Was he happy? The question is absurd: Had anything been wrong, we should certainly have heard. |
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Sharon Olds, Rite of Passage |
When I was a connoisseuse of slugs I would part the ivy leaves, and look for the naked jelly of those gold bodies, translucent strangers glistening along the stones, slowly, their gelatinous bodies at my mercy. Made mostly of water, they would shrivel to nothing if they were sprinkled with salt, but I was not interested in that. What I liked was to draw aside the ivy, breathe the odor of the wall, and stand there in silence until the slug forgot I was there and sent it antennae up out of its head, the glimmering umber horns rising like telesopes, until finally the sensitive knobs would pop out the ends, delicate and intimate. Years later, when I first saw a naked man, I gasped with pleasure to see that quiet mystery reenacted, the slow elegant being coming out of hiding and gleaming in the dark air, eager and so trusting you could weep. |
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Edna St. Vincent Millay, Second Fig |
Safe upon the solid rock the ugly houses stand: Come and see my shining palace built upon the sand! |
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Erich Fried, The Measures Taken |
The lazy are slaughtered |
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Emily Dickinson, I like to see it lap the Miles |
I like to see it lap the Miles - And lick the Valleys up - And stop to feed itself at Tanks - And then - prodigious step
Around a Pile of Mountains - And supercilious peer In Shanties - by the sides of Roads - And then a Quarry pare
To fit it's sides And crawl between Complaining all the while In horrid - hooting stanza - Then chase itself down Hill -
And neigh like Boanerges - Then - prompter than a Star Stop - docile and omnipotent At it's own stable door - |
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William Wordsworth, I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud |
I WANDERED lonely as a cloud That floats on high o'er vales and hills, When all at once I saw a crowd, A host, of golden daffodils; Beside the lake, beneath the trees, Fluttering and dancing in the breeze. Continuous as the stars that shine And twinkle on the milky way, They stretched in never-ending line Along the margin of a bay: 10 Ten thousand saw I at a glance, Tossing their heads in sprightly dance. The waves beside them danced; but they Out-did the sparkling waves in glee: A poet could not but be gay, In such a jocund company: I gazed--and gazed--but little thought What wealth the show to me had brought: For oft, when on my couch I lie In vacant or in pensive mood, 20 They flash upon that inward eye Which is the bliss of solitude; And then my heart with pleasure fills, And dances with the daffodils. |
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Robert Graves, Down, Wanton, Down! |
Down, wanton, down! Have you no shame
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Anonymous, Dog Haiku |
Today I sniffed |
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Robert Herrick, Upon Julia's Clothes |
Whenas in silks my Julia goes, Then, then (methinks) how sweetly flows That liquefaction of her clothes.
Next, when I cast mine eyes, and see That brave vibration each way free, O how that glittering taketh me! |
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Kay Ryan, Blandeur |
If it please God, |
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Wendy Cope, Lonely Hearts |
Can someone make my simple wish come true? Gay vegetarian whose friends are few, Executive in search of something new— Successful, straight and solvent? I am too— I'm Libran, inexperienced and blue— |
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Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Aftermath |
When the summer fields are mown, When the birds are fledged and flown, And the dry leaves strew the path; With the falling of the snow, With the cawing of the crow, Once again the fields we mow And gather in the aftermath.
Not the sweet, new grass with flowers Is this harvesting of ours; Not the upland clover bloom; But the rowen mixed with weeds, Tangled tufts from marsh and meads, Where the poppy drops its seeds In the silence and the gloom. |
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Anonymous, Carnation Milk |
Carnation Milk is the best in the land; |
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Gina Valdes, English con Salsa |
Welcome to ESL 100, English Surely Latinized, inglés con chile y cilantro, English as American as Benito Juárez. Welcome, muchachos from Xochicalco, learn the language of dólares and dolores, of kings and queens, of Donald Duck and Batman. Holy Toluca! In four months you’ll be speaking like George Washington, in four weeks you can ask, More coffee? In two months you can say, May I take your order? In one year you can ask for a raise, cool as the Tuxpan River. Welcome, muchachas from Teocaltiche, in this class we speak English refrito, English con sal y limón, English thick as mango juice, English poured from a clay jug, English tuned like a requinto from Uruapan, English lighted by Oaxacan dawns, English spiked with mezcal from Mitla, English with a red cactus flower blooming in its heart. Welcome, welcome, amigos del sur, bring your Zapotec tongues, your Nahuatl tones, your patience of pyramids, your red suns and golden moons, your guardian angels, your duendes, your patron saints, Santa Tristeza, Santa Alegría, Santo Todolopuede. We will sprinkle holy water on pronouns, make the sign of the cross on past participles, jump like fish from Lake Pátzcuaro on gerunds, pour tequila from Jalisco on future perfects, say shoes and ****, grab a cool verb and a pollo loco and dance on the walls like chapulines. When a teacher from La Jolla or a cowboy from Santee asks you, Do you speak English? You’ll answer, Sí, yes, simón, of course. I love English! And you’ll hum a Mixtec chant that touches la tierra and the heavens. |
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Lewis Carroll, Jabberwocky |
’Twas brillig, and the slithy toves Did gyre and gimble in the wabe: All mimsy were the borogoves, And the mome raths outgrabe.
“Beware the Jabberwock, my son! The jaws that bite, the claws that catch! Beware the Jubjub bird, and shun The frumious Bandersnatch!”
He took his vorpal sword in hand; Long time the manxome foe he sought— So rested he by the Tumtum tree And stood awhile in thought.
And, as in uffish thought he stood, The Jabberwock, with eyes of flame, Came whiffling through the tulgey wood, And burbled as it came!
One, two! One, two! And through and through The vorpal blade went snicker-snack! He left it dead, and with its head He went galumphing back.
“And hast thou slain the Jabberwock? Come to my arms, my beamish boy! O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!” He chortled in his joy.
’Twas brillig, and the slithy toves Did gyre and gimble in the wabe: All mimsy were the borogoves, And the mome raths outgrabe. |
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Wallace Stevens, Disillusionment of Ten O'Clock |
The houses are haunted By white night-gowns. None are green, Or purple with green rings, Or green with yellow rings, Or yellow with blue rings. None of them are strange, With socks of lace And beaded ceintures. People are not going To dream of baboons and periwinkles. Only, here and there, an old sailor, Drunk and asleep in his boots, Catches tigers In red weather. |
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Robert Frost, Fire and Ice |
Some say the world will end in fire, Some say in ice. From what I’ve tasted of desire I hold with those who favor fire. But if it had to perish twice, I think I know enough of hate To say that for destruction ice Is also great And would suffice. |
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Timothy Steele, Epitaph |
Here lies Sir Tact, a diplomatic fellow Whose silence was not golden, but just yellow. |
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Diane Thiel, The Minefield |
He was running with his friend from town to town. My father told us this, one night, He brought them with him – the minefields. |
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Alfred, Lord Tennyson, Tears, Idle Tears |
Tears, idle tears, I know not what they mean, |
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Ezra Pound, In a Station of the Metro |
The apparition of these faces in the crowd; Petals on a wet, black bough. |
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Taniguchi Buson, The piercing chill I feel |
The piercing chill I feel: my dead wife's comb, in our bedroom, under my heel.... |
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T. S. Eliot, The winter evening settles down |
The winter evening settles down |
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Gerard Manley Hopkins, Pied Beauty |
Glory be to God for dappled things – For skies of couple-colour as a brinded cow; For rose-moles all in stipple upon trout that swim; Fresh-firecoal chestnut-falls; finches’ wings; Landscape plotted and pieced – fold, fallow, and plough; And áll trádes, their gear and tackle and trim.
All things counter, original, spare, strange; Whatever is fickle, freckled (who knows how?) With swift, slow; sweet, sour; adazzle, dim; He fathers-forth whose beauty is past change: Praise him.
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Matsuo Basho, Heat-lightning streak |
Heat-lightning streak-- through darkness pierces the heron's shriek. |
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Matsuo Basho, In the old stone pool |
In the old stone pool a frogjump: splishhhh |
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Taniguchi Buson, On the one-ton temple bell |
On the one-ton temple bell a moonmoth, folded into sleep, sits still |
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Taniguchi Buson, Moonrise on mudflats |
Moonrise on mudflats, the line of water and sky blurred by a bullfrog |
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Lee Gurga, Visitor's Room |
Visitor's Room-- everything bolted down except my brother. |
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Penny Harter, broken bowl |
broken bowl the pieces still rocking. |
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Paul Goodman, Birthday Cake |
Now isn’t it time
although the fiery crown
But the thicket is too hot and thick
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Stevie Smith, Not Waving but Drowning |
Nobody heard him, the dead man, But still he lay moaning: I was much further out than you thought And not waving but drowning.
Poor chap, he always loved larking And now he’s dead It must have been too cold for him his heart gave way, They said.
Oh, no no no, it was too cold always (Still the dead one lay moaning) I was much too far out all my life And not waving but drowning. |
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Dylan Thomas, In my Craft and Sullen Art |
In my craft or sullen art Exercised in the still night When only the moon rages And the lovers lie abed With all their griefs in their arms, I labor by singing light Not for ambition or bread Or the strut and trade of charms On the ivory stages But for the common wages Of their most secret heart. Not for the proud man apart From the raging moon I write On these spindrift pages Nor for the towering dead With their nightingales and psalms But for the lovers, their arms Round the griefs of the ages, Who pay no praise or wages Nor heed my craft or art. |
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Alfred, Lord Tennyson, The Eagle |
He clasps the crag with crooked 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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William Shakespeare, Shall I compare thee to a summer's day? |
Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day? |
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Howard Moss, Shall I Compare Thee to a Summers Day |
Who says you’re like one of the dog days? |
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Emily Dickinson, My Life had stood--a Loaded Gun |
My Life had stood - a Loaded Gun - In Corners - till a Day The Owner passed - identified - And carried Me away -
And now We roam in Sovreign Woods - And now We hunt the Doe - And every time I speak for Him The Mountains straight reply -
And do I smile, such cordial light Opon the Valley glow - It is as a Vesuvian face Had let it’s pleasure through -
And when at Night - Our good Day done - I guard My Master’s Head - ’Tis better than the Eider Duck’s Deep Pillow - to have shared -
To foe of His - I’m deadly foe - None stir the second time - On whom I lay a Yellow Eye - Or an emphatic Thumb -
Though I than He - may longer live He longer must - than I - For I have but the power to kill, Without - the power to die - |
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William Blake, To see a world in a grain of sand |
To see a World in a Grain of Sand And a Heaven in a Wild Flower, Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand And Eternity in an hour. |
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Sylvia Plath, Metaphors |
I’m a riddle in nine syllables, An elephant, a ponderous house, A melon strolling on two tendrils. O red fruit, ivory, fine timbers! This loaf’s big with its yeasty rising. Money’s new-minted in this fat purse. I’m a means, a stage, a cow in calf. I’ve eaten a bag of green apples, Boarded the train there’s no getting off. |
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Jill Alexander Essbaum, The Heart |
Four simple chambers. A thousand complicated doors. One of them is yours. |
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Margaret Atwood, You fit into me |
you fit into me like a hook into an eye a fish hook an open eye |
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Carl Sandburg, Fog |
The fog comes on little cat feet.
It sits looking over harbor and city on silent hauches and then moves on. |
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A.R. Ammons, Coward |
Bravery runs in my family. |
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Robinson Jeffers, Hands |
nside a cave in a narrow canyon near Tassajara
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Gwendolyn Brooks, We Real Cool |
We real cool. We Left school. We Lurk late. We Strike straight. We Sing sin. We Thin gin. We Jazz June. We Die soon. |
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Alfred, Lord Tennyson, Break, Break, Break |
Break, break, break, On thy cold gray stones, O Sea! And I would that my tongue could utter The thoughts that arise in me.
O, well for the fisherman's boy, That he shouts with his sister at play! O, well for the sailor lad, That he sings in his boat on the bay!
And the stately ships go on To their haven under the hill; But O for the touch of a vanish'd hand, And the sound of a voice that is still!
Break, break, break At the foot of thy crags, O Sea! But the tender grace of a day that is dead Will never come back to me. |
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Dorothy Parker, Resume |
Razors pain you; Rivers are damp; Acids stain you; And drugs cause cramp. Guns aren’t lawful; Nooses give; Gas smells awful; You might as well live. |
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A.E. Housmann, When I was one-and-twenty |
When I was one-and-twenty I heard a wise man say, “Give crowns and pounds and guineas But not your heart away; Give pearls away and rubies But keep your fancy free.” But I was one-and-twenty, No use to talk to me.
When I was one-and-twenty I heard him say again, “The heart out of the bosom Was never given in vain; ’Tis paid with sighs a plenty And sold for endless rue.” And I am two-and-twenty, And oh, ’tis true, ’tis true. |
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William Carlos Williams, Smell! |
strong-ridged and deeply hollowed |
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Walt Whitman, Beat! Beat! Drums! |
Beat! beat! drums!—blow! bugles! blow! Through the windows—through doors—burst like a ruthless force, Into the solemn church, and scatter the congregation, Into the school where the scholar is studying, Leave not the bridegroom quiet—no happiness must he have now with his bride, Nor the peaceful farmer any peace, ploughing his field or gathering his grain, So fierce you whirr and pound you drums—so shrill you bugles blow.
Beat! beat! drums!—blow! bugles! blow! Over the traffic of cities—over the rumble of wheels in the streets; Are beds prepared for sleepers at night in the houses? no sleepers must sleep in those beds, No bargainers’ bargains by day—no brokers or speculators—would they continue? Would the talkers be talking? would the singer attempt to sing? Would the lawyer rise in the court to state his case before the judge? Then rattle quicker, heavier drums—you bugles wilder blow.
Beat! beat! drums!—blow! bugles! blow! Make no parley—stop for no expostulation, Mind not the timid—mind not the weeper or prayer, Mind not the old man beseeching the young man, Let not the child’s voice be heard, nor the mother’s entreaties, Make even the trestles to shake the dead where they lie awaiting the hearses, So strong you thump O terrible drums—so loud you bugles blow. |
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David Mason, Song of the Powers |
Mine, said the stone, mine is the hour. I crush the scissors, such is my power. Stronger than wishes, my power, alone.
Mine, said the paper, mine are the words that smother the stone with imagined birds, reams of them, flown from the mind of the shaper.
Mine, said the scissors, mine all the knives gashing through paper’s ethereal lives; nothing’s so proper as tattering wishes.
As stone crushes scissors, as paper snuffs stone and scissors cut paper, all end alone. So heap up your paper and scissor your wishes and uproot the stone from the top of the hill. They all end alone as you will, you will. |
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Langston Hughes, Dream Boogie |
Good morning, daddy!
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John Updike, Recital |
Eskimos in Manitoba, Barracuda off Aruba Cock an ear when Roger Bobo Starts to solo on the tuba.
Men of every station--Pooh-Bah Nabob, bozo, toff, and hobo-- Cry in unison, "Indubi- Tably, there is simply nobo Dy who compahs on the tubo, Solo, quite like Roger Bubo!" |
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A.E. Housman, Eight O'Clock |
He stood, and heard the steeple Strapped, noosed, nighing his hour,
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James Joyce, All day I hear |
All day I hear the noise of waters |
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William Cole, On my boat on Lake Cayuga |
On my boat on Lake Cayuga |
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Hilarie Belloc, The Hippopotamus |
I shoot the Hippopotamus
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Ogden Nash, The Panther |
The panther is like a leopard,
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Gerard Manley Hopkins, God's Grandeur |
The world is charged with the grandeur of God. It will flame out, like shining from shook foil; It gathers to a greatness, like the ooze of oil Crushed. Why do men then now not reck his rod? Generations have trod, have trod, have trod; And all is seared with trade; bleared, smeared with toil; And wears man's smudge and shares man's smell: the soil Is bare now, nor can foot feel, being shod.
And for all this, nature is never spent; There lives the dearest freshness deep down things; And though the last lights off the black West went Oh, morning, at the brown brink eastward, springs — Because the Holy Ghost over the bent World broods with warm breast and with ah! bright wings. |
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Alexander Pope, Epigram Engraved on the Collar of a Dog |
I am his Highness' dog at Kew; |
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Sir John Harrington, Treason |
Treason doth never prosper; what's the reason? For if it prosper, none dare call it treason. |
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Anonymous, Epitaph on a dentist |
Stranger, approach this spot with gravity; John Brown is filling his laster cavity. |
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Hilaire Belloc, Fatigue |
I'm tired of Love: I'm still more tired of Rhyme. |
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Wendy Cope, Variation on Belloc's "Fatigue" |
I hardly ever tire of love or rhyme-- That's why I'm poor and have a rotten time. |
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William Blake, Tyger, Tyger |
Tyger Tyger, burning bright, In the forests of the night; What immortal hand or eye, Could frame thy fearful symmetry?
In what distant deeps or skies. Burnt the fire of thine eyes? On what wings dare he aspire? What the hand, dare seize the fire?
And what shoulder, & what art, Could twist the sinews of thy heart? And when thy heart began to beat, What dread hand? & what dread feet?
What the hammer? what the chain, In what furnace was thy brain? What the anvil? what dread grasp, Dare its deadly terrors clasp!
When the stars threw down their spears And water'd heaven with their tears: Did he smile his work to see? Did he who made the Lamb make thee?
Tyger Tyger burning bright, In the forests of the night: What immortal hand or eye, Dare frame thy fearful symmetry? |
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William Butler Yeats, When You Are Old |
When you are old and grey and full of sleep, And nodding by the fire, take down this book, And slowly read, and dream of the soft look Your eyes had once, and of their shadows deep;
How many loved your moments of glad grace, And loved your beauty with love false or true, But one man loved the pilgrim soul in you, And loved the sorrows of your changing face;
And bending down beside the glowing bars, Murmur, a little sadly, how Love fled And paced upon the mountains overhead And hid his face amid a crowd of stars.
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William Shakespeare, Let me not to the marriage of true minds |
Let me not to the marriage of true minds Admit impediments. Love is not love Which alters when it alteration finds, Or bends with the remover to remove: O, no! it is an ever-fixed mark, That looks on tempests and is never shaken; It is the star to every wandering bark, Whose worth’s unknown, although his height be taken. Love ’s not Time’s fool, though rosy lips and cheeks Within his bending sickle’s compass come; Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks, But bears it out even to the edge of doom. If this be error, and upon me prov’d, I never writ, nor no man ever lov’d. |
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Michael Drayton, Since there's no help, come let us kiss and part |
Since there's no help,
come let us kiss and part,
Nay, I have done: you get no more of me,
And I am glad, yea glad with all my heart,
That thus so cleanly I myself can free.
Shake hands for ever, cancel all our vows,
And when we meet at any time again
Be it not seen in either of our brows
That we one jot of former love retain.
Now at the last gasp of Love's latest breath,
When his pulse failing, Passion speechless lies,
When Faith is kneeling by his bed of death,
And Innocence is closing up his eyes,
Now, if thou wouldst, when all have given him over,
From death to life thou might'st him yet recover. |
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Edna St. Vincent Millay, What lips my lips have kissed... |
What lips my lips have kissed, and where, and why, I have forgotten, and what arms have lain Under my head till morning; but the rain Is full of ghosts tonight, that tap and sigh Upon the glass and listen for reply, And in my heart there stirs a quiet pain For unremembered lads that not again Will turn to me at midnight with a cry. Thus in winter stands the lonely tree, Nor knows what birds have vanished one by one, Yet knows its boughs more silent than before: I cannot say what loves have come and gone, I only know that summer sang in me A little while, that in me sings no more. |
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Robert Frost, Acquainted with the Night |
I have been one acquainted with the night. I have walked out in rain—and back in rain. I have outwalked the furthest city light.
I have looked down the saddest city lane. I have passed by the watchman on his beat And dropped my eyes, unwilling to explain.
I have stood still and stopped the sound of feet When far away an interrupted cry Came over houses from another street,
But not to call me back or say good-bye; And further still at an unearthly height, One luminary clock against the sky
Proclaimed the time was neither wrong nor right. I have been one acquainted with the night. |
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Kim Addonizio, First Poem for You |
I like to touch your tattoos in complete darkness, when I can’t see them. I’m sure of where they are, know by heart the neat lines of lightning pulsing just above your nipple, can find, as if by instinct, the blue swirls of water on your shoulder where a serpent twists, facing a dragon. When I pull you
to me, taking you until we’re spent and quiet on the sheets, I love to kiss the pictures in your skin. They’ll last until you’re seared to ashes; whatever persists or turns to pain between us, they will still be there. Such permanence is terrifying. So I touch them in the dark; but touch them, trying. |
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A.E. Stallings, Sine Qua Non |
Your absence, father, is nothing. It is nought —
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R.S. Gwynn, Shakespearean Sonnet |
A man is haunted by his father's ghost. |
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Elizabeth Barrett Browning, How Do I Love Thee? |
How do I love thee? Let me count the ways. I love thee to the depth and breadth and height My soul can reach, when feeling out of sight For the ends of being and ideal grace. I love thee to the level of every day’s Most quiet need, by sun and candle-light. I love thee freely, as men strive for right. I love thee purely, as they turn from praise. I love thee with the passion put to use In my old griefs, and with my childhood’s faith. I love thee with a love I seemed to lose With my lost saints. I love thee with the breath, Smiles, tears, of all my life; and, if God choose, I shall but love thee better after death. |
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William Shakespeare, When in Disgrace with Fortune.. |
When in disgrace with fortune and men’s eyes, I all alone beweep my outcast state, And trouble deaf heaven with my bootless cries, And look upon myself and curse my fate, wishing me like to one more rich in hope, Featured like him, like him with friends possessed, Desiring this man’s art, and that man’s scope, With what I most enjoy contented least; Yet in these thoughts myself almost despising, Haply I think on thee--and then my state, Like to the lark at break of day arising From sullen earth sings hymns at heaven’s gate; For thy sweet love remembered such wealth brings, That then I scorn to change my state with kings. |
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Anonymous, Bonny Barbara Allan |
It was in and about the Martinmas time, He sent his men down through the town, O hooly, hooly rose she up, “O it’s I’m sick, and very, very sick, “O dinna ye mind, young man,” said she, He turned his face unto the wall, And slowly, slowly raise she up She had not gane a mile but twa, “O mother, mother, make my bed! |
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Dudley Randall, Ballad of Birmingham |
“Mother dear, may I go downtown Instead of out to play, And march the streets of Birmingham In a Freedom March today?”
“No, baby, no, you may not go, For the dogs are fierce and wild, And clubs and hoses, guns and jails Aren’t good for a little child.”
“But, mother, I won’t be alone. Other children will go with me, And march the streets of Birmingham To make our country free.”
“No, baby, no, you may not go, For I fear those guns will fire. But you may go to church instead And sing in the children’s choir.”
She has combed and brushed her night-dark hair, And bathed rose petal sweet, And drawn white gloves on her small brown hands, And white shoes on her feet.
The mother smiled to know her child Was in the sacred place, But that smile was the last smile To come upon her face.
For when she heard the explosion, Her eyes grew wet and wild. She raced through the streets of Birmingham Calling for her child.
She clawed through bits of glass and brick, Then lifted out a shoe. “O, here’s the shoe my baby wore, But, baby, where are you?” |
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W.H. Auden, As I Walked Out One Evening |
As I walked out one evening, Walking down Bristol Street, The crowds upon the pavement Were fields of harvest wheat. And down by the brimming river I heard a lover sing Under an arch of the railway: ‘Love has no ending. ‘I’ll love you, dear, I’ll love you Till China and Africa meet, And the river jumps over the mountain And the salmon sing in the street, ‘I’ll love you till the ocean Is folded and hung up to dry And the seven stars go squawking Like geese about the sky. ‘The years shall run like rabbits, For in my arms I hold The Flower of the Ages, And the first love of the world.' But all the clocks in the city Began to whirr and chime: ‘O let not Time deceive you, You cannot conquer Time. ‘In the burrows of the Nightmare Where Justice naked is, Time watches from the shadow And coughs when you would kiss. ‘In headaches and in worry Vaguely life leaks away, And Time will have his fancy To-morrow or to-day. ‘Into many a green valley Drifts the appalling snow; Time breaks the threaded dances And the diver’s brilliant bow. ‘O plunge your hands in water, Plunge them in up to the wrist; Stare, stare in the basin And wonder what you’ve missed. ‘The glacier knocks in the cupboard, The desert sighs in the bed, And the crack in the tea-cup opens A lane to the land of the dead. ‘Where the beggars raffle the banknotes And the Giant is enchanting to Jack, And the Lily-white Boy is a Roarer, And Jill goes down on her back. ‘O look, look in the mirror, O look in your distress: Life remains a blessing Although you cannot bless. ‘O stand, stand at the window As the tears scald and start; You shall love your crooked neighbour With your crooked heart.' It was late, late in the evening, The lovers they were gone; The clocks had ceased their chiming, And the deep river ran on. |
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Bob Dylan, The Times They are a-Changing |
Come gather around people In the liner notes for his album Biograph, written by Cameron Crowe, Bob Dylan said the following about this song: “This was definitely a song with a purpose. It was influenced of course by the Irish and Scottish ballads …‘Come All Ye Bold Highway Men’, ‘Come All Ye Tender Hearted Maidens’. I wanted to write a big song, with short concise verses that piled up on each other in a hypnotic way. The civil rights movement and the folk music movement were pretty close for a while and allied together at that time.” ShareLeave a suggestion |
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Dylan Thomas, Do not go gentle into that good night |
Do not go gentle into that good night, |
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Wendy Cope, Lonely Hearts |
Can someone make my simple wish come true? Gay vegetarian whose friends are few, Executive in search of something new— Successful, straight and solvent? I am too— I'm Libran, inexperienced and blue— Please write (with photo) to Box 152. |
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Robert Bridges, Triolet |
When first we met, we did not guess |
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Elizabeth Bishop, Sestina |
September rain falls on the house. |
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Paul Laurence Dunbar, We Wear the Mask |
We wear the mask that grins and lies, It hides our cheeks and shades our eyes,— This debt we pay to human guile; With torn and bleeding hearts we smile, And mouth with myriad subtleties.
Why should the world be over-wise, In counting all our tears and sighs? Nay, let them only see us, while We wear the mask.
We smile, but, O great Christ, our cries To thee from tortured souls arise. We sing, but oh the clay is vile Beneath our feet, and long the mile; But let the world dream otherwise, We wear the mask! |
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Omar Khayyam, Rubai XII |
I want a jug of ruby wine and a book of poems. There must be something to stop my breath from departing, and a half loaf of bread. Then you and I sitting in some deserted ruin would be sweeter than the realm of a sultan. |
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Omar Khayyam, trans. by E. FitzGerald |
ake! for Morning in the Bowl of Night II. Dreaming when Dawn’s Left Hand was in the Sky, III. And, as the Cock crew, those who stood before [Pg 24] IV. Now the New Year reviving old Desires, V. Irám indeed is gone with all its Rose, VI. And David’s Lips are lockt; but in divine VII. Come, fill the Cup, and in the Fire of Spring [Pg 25] VIII. And look—a thousand blossoms with the Day IX. But come with old Khayyám and leave the Lot X. With me along some Strip of Herbage strown XI. Here with a Loaf of Bread beneath the Bough, [Pg 26] XII. “How sweet is mortal Sovranty”—think some: XIII. Look to the Rose that blows about us—“Lo, XIV. The Worldly Hope men set their Hearts upon XV. And those who husbanded the Golden Grain, [Pg 27] XVI. Think, in this batter’d Caravanserai XVII. They say the Lion and the Lizard keep XVIII. I sometimes think that never blows so red XIX. And this delightful Herb whose tender Green [Pg 28] XX. Ah, my Belovéd, fill the cup that clears XXI. Lo! some we loved, the loveliest and the best XXII. And we, that now make merry in the Room XXIII. Ah, make the most of what we yet may spend, [Pg 29] XXIV. Alike for those who for To-day prepare, |
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E.E. Cummings, Buffalo Bill's |
Buffalo Bill 's defunct who used to ride a watersmooth-silver stallion and break onetwothreefourfive pigeonsjustlikethat
Jesus he was a handsome man and what i want to know is how do you like your blueeyed boy Mister Death
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William Carlos Williams, The Dance |
In Brueghel's great picture, The Kermess, |
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Stephen Crane, In the Desert |
In the desert I saw a creature, naked, bestial, Who, squatting upon the ground, Held his heart in his hands, And ate of it. I said, “Is it good, friend?” “It is bitter—bitter,” he answered;
“But I like it “Because it is bitter, “And because it is my heart.” |
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Walt Whitman, Cavalry Crossing a Ford |
A LINE in long array, where they wind betwixt green islands; |
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Ezra Pound, Salutation |
O generation of the thoroughly smug and thoroughly uncomfortable, I have seen the fishermen picnicking in the sun, I have seen them with untidy families I have seen their smiles full of teeth and heard ungainly laughter. And I am happier than you are, And they were happier than I am; And the fish swim in the lake and do not even own clothing. |
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Wallace Stevens, Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird |
I II III IV V VI VII VIII IX X XI XII XIII |
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A.E. Stallings, First Love: A Quiz |
He came up to me: He offered me: I went with him because: The place he took me to: |
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Carole Satyamurti, I Shall Paint My Nails Red |
Because of a bit of color is a public service. Because I am proud of my hands. Because it will remind me I’m a woman. Because I will look like a survivor. Because I can admire them in the mirror. Because my daughter will say ugh. Because my lover will be surprisesd. Because it is quickyer than dyeing my hair. Because it is a ten-minute moratorium. Because it is reversible. |
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Shirley Geok-lin Lim, Learning to love America |
cause it has no pure products Connor, ShareLeave a suggestion |