Poems

[Jacob Orlove]

There are some great poems out there. Post your favorites.

OZYMANDIAS
I met a traveller from an antique land
Who said:—Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert. Near them on the sand,
Half sunk, a shatter'd visage lies, whose frown
And wrinkled lip and sneer of cold command
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamp'd on these lifeless things,
The hand that mock'd them and the heart that fed.
And on the pedestal these words appear:
"My name is Ozymandias, king of kings:
Look on my works, ye mighty, and despair!"
Nothing beside remains: round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare,
The lone and level sands stretch far away.
-Percy Bysshe Shelley

[Jacob Orlove]

Ray Robillard (iamfishman) introduced this one to me:

Desiderata

Go placidly amid the noise and haste,
and remember what peace there may be in silence.
As far as possible without surrender
be on good terms with all persons.
Speak your truth quietly and clearly;
and listen to others,
even the dull and the ignorant;
they too have their story.

Avoid loud and aggressive persons,
they are vexations to the spirit.
If you compare yourself with others,
you may become vain and bitter;
for always there will be greater and lesser persons than yourself.
Enjoy your achievements as well as your plans.

Keep interested in your own career, however humble;
it is a real possession in the changing fortunes of time.
Exercise caution in your business affairs;
for the world is full of trickery.
But let this not blind you to what virtue there is;
many persons strive for high ideals;
and everywhere life is full of heroism.

Be yourself.
Especially, do not feign affection.
Neither be cynical about love;
for in the face of all aridity and disenchantment
it is as perennial as the grass.

Take kindly the counsel of the years,
gracefully surrendering the things of youth.
Nurture strength of spirit to shield you in sudden misfortune.
But do not distress yourself with dark imaginings.
Many fears are born of fatigue and loneliness.
Beyond a wholesome discipline,
be gentle with yourself.

You are a child of the universe,
no less than the trees and the stars;
you have a right to be here.
And whether or not it is clear to you,
no doubt the universe is unfolding as it should.

Therefore be at peace with God,
whatever you conceive Him to be,
and whatever your labors and aspirations,
in the noisy confusion of life keep peace with your soul.

With all its sham, drudgery, and broken dreams,
it is still a beautiful world.
Be cheerful.
Strive to be happy.

Max Ehrmann, Desiderata, Copyright 1952.

[The Chosen One]

Not sure if this is really  a poem or not, but it was in my english teachers classroom in high school and it's always stuck with me since its so easy to remember and actually a little disturbing to think about. Author I am unsure of.

The stages of life in five words(using the same five words)

Not old enough to know
Old enough to know
Not old enough
Old enough
Not old
Old
Not

[Royal Ass.]

Remember me:
I am the master of astrology,
The chief of wizardry
The cord of blackest curtainry,
The supreme key
Of every treasury,
The pen by whose calligraphy
Black book and amulet come to be,
The hand which subtilely
Spreads out the sands of prophecy
And draws electuary
From written charactry;
Being talismanic energy
My word is victory.
I make the malady
Turn aside and flee
To the emunctory;
I scorn contemptuously
In my great artistry
Either inflammatory,
Or any vomitory,
Or sternutatory,
Prayers jaculatory,
Or words of suppliancy,
Or modes propitiatory;
Thus I can guarantee
With certainty
Immediate remedy.
I am the chief of wizardry;
Come speedily,
I take not currency
Nor any other fee,
But work entirely
For notoriety:
Remember me!

-One Thousand Nights and One Night

[Sextiger]

I've always liked T.S. Eliot

The Hollow Men

 I

We are the hollow men
We are the stuffed men
Leaning together
Headpiece filled with straw. Alas!
Our dried voices, when
We whisper together
Are quiet and meaningless
As wind in dry grass
Or rats' feet over broken glass
In our dry cellar

Shape without form, shade without colour,
Paralyzed force, gesture without motion;

Those who have crossed
With direct eyes, to death's other Kingdom
Remember us -- if at all -- not as lost
Violent souls, but only
As the hollow men
The stuffed men.

II

Eyes I dare not meet in dreams
In death's dream kingdom
These do not appear:
There, the eyes are
Sunlight on a broken column
There, is a tree swinging
And voices are
In the wind's singing
More distant and more solemn
Than a fading star.

Let me be no nearer
In death's dream kingdom
Let me also wear
Such deliberate disguises
Rat's coat, crowskin, crossed staves
In a field
Behaving as the wind behaves
No nearer --

Not that final meeting
In the twilight kingdom

III

This is the dead land
This is cactus land
Here the stone images
Are raised, here they receive
The supplication of a dead man's hand
Under the twinkle of a fading star.

Is it like this
In death's other kingdom
Waking alone
At the hour when we are
Trembling with tenderness
Lips that would kiss
Form prayers to broken stone.

IV

The eyes are not here
There are no eyes here
In this valley of dying stars
In this hollow valley
This broken jaw of our lost kingdoms

In this last of meeting places
We grope together
And avoid speech
Gathered on this beach of the tumid river

Sightless, unless
The eyes reappear
As the perpetual star
Multifoliate rose
Of death's twilight kingdom
The hope only
Of empty men.

V

Here we go round the prickly pear
Prickly pear prickly pear
Here we go round the prickly pear
At five o'clock in the morning.

Between the idea
And the reality
Between the motion
And the act
Falls the Shadow

For Thine is the Kingdom

Between the conception
And the creation
Between the emotion
And the response
Falls the Shadow

Life is very long

Between the desire
And the spasm
Between the potency
And the existence
Between the essence
And the descent
Falls the Shadow
For Thine is the Kingdom

For Thine is
Life is
For Thine is the

This is the way the world ends
This is the way the world ends
This is the way the world ends
Not with a bang but a whimper.

[Pave]

Didactic Poem

John Forbes


I never liked
Cat Stevens much
           (apart from
           Matthew & Son)
until one day
I fell asleep on a bus
& woke up when it stopped
at a service station outside Murwillumbah–
the morning light was still clear
despite the humid air, with blue hills
& vivid green paddocks
& the kiosk radio playing Peace Train
   & that’s how I suddenly felt,
at peace with every cliche
they use like our senses
to keep us happy with / despite our philosophy
that fails just where success should begin
             because we can’t accept
             hippies buying Mars Bars
& the grace this surrender brings.



“THOUGHT IS SURROUNDED BY A HALO”
– Ludwig Wittgenstein, Philosophical Investigations 97

Gwen Harwood


Show me the order of the world,
the hard-edge light of this-is-so
prior to all experience
and common to both world and thought,
no model, but the truth itself.

   Language is not a perfect game,
   and if it were, how could we play?
   The world’s more than the sum of things
   like moon, sky, centre, body, bed,
   as all the singing masters know.

   Picture two lovers side by side
   who sleep and dream and wake to hold
   the real and imagined world
   body by body, word by word
   in the wild halo of their thought.

[erictehfatz0r]

"I cannot go to school today,"
Said little Peggy Ann McKay,
"I have the measles and the mumps,
A gash, a rash, and purple bumps.
My mouth is wet, my throat is dry,
I'm going blind in my right eye.
My tonsils are as big as rocks,
I've counted sixteen chicken pox
And there's one more--that's seventeen,
And don't you think my face looks green?
My leg is cut, my eyes are blue--
It might be instamatic flu.
I cough and sneeze and gasp and choke,
I'm sure that my left leg is broke--
My hip hurts when I move my chin,
My belly button's caving in,
My back is wrenched, my ankle's sprained,
My 'pendix pains each time it rains.
My nose is cold, my toes are numb,
I have a sliver in my thumb.
My neck is stiff, my voice is weak,
I hardly whisper when I speak.
My tongue is filling up my mouth,
I think my hair is falling out.
My elbow's bent, my spine ain't straight,
My temperature is one-o-eight.
My brain is shrunk, I cannot hear,
There is a hole inside my ear.
I have a hangnail, and my heart is--what?
What's that? What's that you say?
You say today is---Saturday?
G'bye, I'm going out to play!"

-Shel Silverstein

[Magi]

I have a plaque of Desiderata hanging on my wall. It's an awesome poem.



Here's a powerful love poem by E.E. Cummings. Use it wisely.
(all grammar is how he put it on the paper)

***

somewhere i have never travelled,gladly beyond
any experience,your eyes have their silence:
in your most frail gesture are things which enclose me,
or which I cannot touch because they are too near

your slightest look easily will unclose me
though i have closed myself as fingers,
you open always petal by petal myself as Spring opens
(touching skilfully,mysteriously)her first rose

or if your wish be to close me,i and
my life will shut very beautifully,suddenly,
as when the heart of this flower imagines
the snow carefully everywhere descending;

nothing which we are to perceive in this world equals
the power of your intense fragility:whose texture
compels me with the colour of its countries,
rendering death and forever with each breathing

(i do not know what it is about you that closes
and opens;only something in me understands
the voice of your eyes is deeper than all roses)
nobody,not even the rain,has such small hands

[Hi-Val]

Pave, I really dig that first one.

BEER
Charles Bukowski
from: Love is A Mad Dog From Hell

I don't know how many bottles of beer
I have consumed while waiting for things
to get better
I dont know how much wine and whisky
and beer
mostly beer
I have consumed after
splits with women-
waiting for the phone to ring
waiting for the sound of footsteps,
and the phone to ring
waiting for the sounds of footsteps,
and the phone never rings
until much later
and the footsteps never arrive
until much later
when my stomach is coming up
out of my mouth
they arrive as fresh as spring flowers:
"what the hell have you done to yourself?
it will be 3 days before you can fuck me!"

the female is durable
she lives seven and one half years longer
than the male, and she drinks very little beer
because she knows its bad for the figure.

while we are going mad
they are out
dancing and laughing
with horney cowboys.

well, there's beer
sacks and sacks of empty beer bottles
and when you pick one up
the bottle fall through the wet bottom
of the paper sack
rolling
clanking
spilling gray wet ash
and stale beer,
or the sacks fall over at 4 a.m.
in the morning
making the only sound in your life.

beer
rivers and seas of beer
the radio singing love songs
as the phone remains silent
and the walls stand
straight up and down
and beer is all there is.



Bukowski is the poet for people who don't like poems. I hope other fans of his work will post some.


The sky was candy luminous...

by E. E. Cummings

[Bardo]

@ Magi - Yeah, that's my favorite by cummings. Really gorgeous.

Re: Desiderata. It reminds me of that "Remember to wear sun-screen" thing falsely attributed to Vonnegut, but that's some good advice; not better than the Sermon on the Mount, but solid.

Doug beat me to Bukowski, so I was going to c/p a fine poem by Rainer Rilke (probably my favorite poet), but realized it doesn't read well on the Internet.

So, I chose my favorite by Eliot (next to The Wasteland):

"BURNT NORTON"
(No. 1 of 'Four Quartets')
T.S. Eliot

I

Time present and time past
Are both perhaps present in time future,
And time future contained in time past.
If all time is eternally present
All time is unredeemable.
What might have been is an abstraction
Remaining a perpetual possibility
Only in a world of speculation.
What might have been and what has been
Point to one end, which is always present.
Footfalls echo in the memory
Down the passage which we did not take
Towards the door we never opened
Into the rose-garden. My words echo
Thus, in your mind.

                              But to what purpose
Disturbing the dust on a bowl of rose-leaves
I do not know.

                        Other echoes
Inhabit the garden. Shall we follow?
Quick, said the bird, find them, find them,
Round the corner. Through the first gate,
Into our first world, shall we follow
The deception of the thrush? Into our first world.
There they were, dignified, invisible,
Moving without pressure, over the dead leaves,
In the autumn heat, through the vibrant air,
And the bird called, in response to
The unheard music hidden in the shrubbery,
And the unseen eyebeam crossed, for the roses
Had the look of flowers that are looked at.
There they were as our guests, accepted and accepting.
So we moved, and they, in a formal pattern,
Along the empty alley, into the box circle,
To look down into the drained pool.
Dry the pool, dry concrete, brown edged,
And the pool was filled with water out of sunlight,
And the lotos rose, quietly, quietly,
The surface glittered out of heart of light,
And they were behind us, reflected in the pool.
Then a cloud passed, and the pool was empty.
Go, said the bird, for the leaves were full of children,
Hidden excitedly, containing laughter.
Go, go, go, said the bird: human kind
Cannot bear very much reality.
Time past and time future
What might have been and what has been
Point to one end, which is always present.

[Sextiger]

I ordered Foil Wastelands just for the flavor text,"I will show you fear in a handful of dust," which happens to be from Eliot's Wasteland.  They never showed up and the dealer disappeared from Ebay.   

[Bardo]

If I had to pick one poem, that is like the best poem ever written, it would be T.S. Eliot's The Wasteland.

Four Quartets is outrageously brilliant, but "The Wasteland" delivers the goods like nothing else. It's breathtaking.

"The Wasteland"
by T.S. Eliot

I. The Burial of the Dead

APRIL is the cruellest month, breeding   
Lilacs out of the dead land, mixing   
Memory and desire, stirring   
Dull roots with spring rain.   
Winter kept us warm, covering          
Earth in forgetful snow, feeding   
A little life with dried tubers.   
Summer surprised us, coming over the Starnbergersee   
With a shower of rain; we stopped in the colonnade,   
And went on in sunlight, into the Hofgarten,    
And drank coffee, and talked for an hour.   
Bin gar keine Russin, stamm' aus Litauen, echt deutsch.   
And when we were children, staying at the archduke's,   
My cousin's, he took me out on a sled,   
And I was frightened. He said, Marie,    
Marie, hold on tight. And down we went.   
In the mountains, there you feel free.   
I read, much of the night, and go south in the winter.   
 
What are the roots that clutch, what branches grow   
Out of this stony rubbish? Son of man,    
You cannot say, or guess, for you know only   
A heap of broken images, where the sun beats,   
And the dead tree gives no shelter, the cricket no relief,   
And the dry stone no sound of water. Only   
There is shadow under this red rock,    
(Come in under the shadow of this red rock),   
And I will show you something different from either   
Your shadow at morning striding behind you   
Or your shadow at evening rising to meet you;   
I will show you fear in a handful of dust.    
                Frisch weht der Wind   
                Der Heimat zu.   
                Mein Irisch Kind,   
                Wo weilest du?   
'You gave me hyacinths first a year ago;    
'They called me the hyacinth girl.'   
—Yet when we came back, late, from the Hyacinth garden,   
Your arms full, and your hair wet, I could not   
Speak, and my eyes failed, I was neither   
Living nor dead, and I knew nothing,    
Looking into the heart of light, the silence.   
Od' und leer das Meer.   
 
Madame Sosostris, famous clairvoyante,   
Had a bad cold, nevertheless   
Is known to be the wisest woman in Europe,    
With a wicked pack of cards. Here, said she,   
Is your card, the drowned Phoenician Sailor,   
(Those are pearls that were his eyes. Look!)   
Here is Belladonna, the Lady of the Rocks,   
The lady of situations.    
Here is the man with three staves, and here the Wheel,   
And here is the one-eyed merchant, and this card,   
Which is blank, is something he carries on his back,   
Which I am forbidden to see. I do not find   
The Hanged Man. Fear death by water.    
I see crowds of people, walking round in a ring.   
Thank you. If you see dear Mrs. Equitone,   
Tell her I bring the horoscope myself:   
One must be so careful these days.   
 
Unreal City,    
Under the brown fog of a winter dawn,   
A crowd flowed over London Bridge, so many,   
I had not thought death had undone so many.   
Sighs, short and infrequent, were exhaled,   
And each man fixed his eyes before his feet.    
Flowed up the hill and down King William Street,   
To where Saint Mary Woolnoth kept the hours   
With a dead sound on the final stroke of nine.   
There I saw one I knew, and stopped him, crying 'Stetson!   
'You who were with me in the ships at Mylae!    
'That corpse you planted last year in your garden,   
'Has it begun to sprout? Will it bloom this year?   
'Or has the sudden frost disturbed its bed?   
'Oh keep the Dog far hence, that's friend to men,   
'Or with his nails he'll dig it up again!    
'You! hypocrite lecteur!—mon semblable,—mon frère!'

[The Atog Lord]

The Haunted Palace by Edgar Allan Poe

In the greenest of our valleys
By good angels tenanted,
Once a fair and stately palace-
Radiant palace–reared its head.
In the monarch Thought's dominion-
It stood there!
Never seraph spread a pinion
Over fabric half so fair!
Banners yellow, glorious, golden,
On its roof did float and flow,
(This–all this–was in the olden
Time long ago,)
And every gentle air that dallied,
In that sweet day,
Along the ramparts plumed and pallid,
A winged odor went away.
Wanderers in that happy valley,
Through two luminous windows, saw
Spirits moving musically,
To a lute's well-tuned law,
Round about a throne where, sitting
(Porphyrogene!)
In state his glory well-befitting,
The ruler of the realm was seen.
And all with pearl and ruby glowing
Was the fair palace door,
Through which came flowing, flowing, flowing,
And sparkling evermore,
A troop of Echoes, whose sweet duty
Was but to sing,
In voices of surpassing beauty,
The wit and wisdom of their king.
But evil things, in robes of sorrow,
Assailed the monarch's high estate.
(Ah, let us mourn!–for never morrow
Shall dawn upon him desolate!)
And round about his home the glory
That blushed and bloomed,
Is but a dim-remembered story
Of the old time entombed.
And travellers, now, within that valley,
Through the red-litten windows see
Vast forms, that move fantastically
To a discordant melody,
While, like a ghastly rapid river,
Through the pale door
A hideous throng rush out forever
And laugh–but smile no more.

[Matt]

Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird
Wallace Stevens

I
Among twenty snowy mountains,
The only moving thing
Was the eye of the blackbird.

II
I was of three minds,
Like a tree
In which there are three blackbirds.

III
The blackbird whirled in the autumn winds.
It was a small part of the pantomime.

IV
A man and a woman
Are one.
A man and a woman and a blackbird
Are one.

V
I do not know which to prefer,
The beauty of inflections
Or the beauty of innuendoes,
The blackbird whistling
Or just after.

VI
Icicles filled the long window
With barbaric glass.
The shadow of the blackbird
Crossed it, to and fro.
The mood
Traced in the shadow
An indecipherable cause.

VII
O thin men of Haddam,
Why do you imagine golden birds?
Do you not see how the blackbird
Walks around the feet
Of the women about you?

VIII
I know noble accents
And lucid, inescapable rhythms;
But I know, too,
That the blackbird is involved
In what I know.

IX
When the blackbird flew out of sight,
It marked the edge
Of one of many circles.

X
At the sight of blackbirds
Flying in a green light,
Even the bawds of euphony
Would cry out sharply.

XI
He rode over Connecticut
In a glass coach.
Once, a fear pierced him,
In that he mistook
The shadow of his equipage
For blackbirds.

XII
The river is moving.
The blackbird must be flying.

XIII
It was evening all afternoon.
It was snowing
And it was going to snow.
The blackbird sat
In the cedar-limbs.

[Liam-K]

I guess I'll be the first to be completely shameless and post something I've written myself.  This fairly recent piece seems to get a good response.

(untitled)
a thousand shining shards of light
the night, reflected in the drifts
deep white
panes of the moon shine out from luminescent softness
stars in the cold earth's blanket
heavy, muffling, gift to silence
wrapping the dark, vast, glittering quiet in calm
save for trails of breath
spidering chill creeping along the skin
and faintest murmurs of ice winds
sharing thoughts below hearing over blood rushing in the ear
wet weights of flakes drag on spiney boughs
evergreens, black this still hour in the crystal air
bright land, dark sky
empty
timeless
untouched but for me



Alright, and something I didn't do...

A Code

Believe this.
Believe that every second spent following this code is a second not spent leading your own life.
Believe that every second spent contemplating this code is a minute not spent acting.
Believe that you cannot dismiss every conceivable situation with a convenient quotation from this code.
Believe that every situation deserves individual calculation and contemplation, and
Believe that this code cannot help you.
Believe that that this code is indecipherable.
Believe that living by this code is conforming with this code.
Believe that every dogmatic word of this code is a chain around your neck.
Believe that this code says you should do what I think is right, not what you think is right.
Believe that to challenge this code will mark you out as a dissident and your prospects for advancement will be automatically reassessed.
Believe that once you accept this code, you will be just like all the other people who accept this code.
Believe that learning this by heart means that you can recite it without thinking of its damaging implications.
Believe that there is nothing to believe here.
Believe that there is nothing to see here.
Move along.

- Richard Irvine

[forests failed you]

I recently did a research paper on Modern Balkan poets, and thought I would share a few poems I thought to be particularly good.

BLOOD AND THE STORM
Jure Kastelan

I sliced by veins on sleep's sharp glass
In my blood the sy mirrors itself.
Here in the Balkans, by the Sava River, by the Adriatic
Even the ravens are fed up with flesh.

Mirrors of terror, show us a picture
Without a rope around a neck.
Blood, blood, my blood shrieks
Through the earth of my people.

I open my veins and the bloodstained
Seeds of my words.
The hiss of the switch, the storm strikes.
Stones moan.

THE SHE WOLF
Vasko Popa

They trap the she-wolf with steel jaws
Stretched from horizon to horizon

They take the golden mask from her muzzle
And tear the seceret grass
From between her haunches

They bind her and set
Tracker and pointer dogs
To defile her

They hack her to pieces
And leave her
To the vultures

With the stump of her tongue the she-wolf
Catches
Living waters from the jaws of clouds
And puts herself together again.

[Twaun007]

This is one that I got from an urban poet named Rick Ross


"Hustlin'"

Hustle, hustlin' hustlin'
Hustle, hustlin' hustlin'
Hustle, hustlin' hustlin'
Hustle, hustlin' hustlin'
Hustle, hustlin' hustlin'
Hustle, hustlin' hustlin'
Hustle, hustlin' hustlin'

Everyday I'm hustlin'
Everyday I'm hustlin'
Everyday I'm hustlin'
Everyday I'm hustlin'
Everyday I'm hustlin'
Everyday I'm, everyday I'm, everyday I'm hustlin'
Ev-ev-ev-everyday I'm hustlin'
Everyday I'm hustlin'
Ev-ev-ev-everyday I'm hustlin'
Ev-ev-everyday I'm, everyday I'm, everyday I'm hustlin'
Everyday I'm hustlin' hustlin' hustlin' hust-hustlin'

Who the fuck you think you fuckin' with, I'm the fuckin' boss
Seven forty-five, white on white that's fuckin' Ross
I cut 'em wide, I cut 'em long, I cut 'em fat (What)
I keep 'em comin' back (What), we keep 'em comin' back
I'm in the distribution, I'm like Atlantic
I got them motherfuckers flyin' 'cross the Atlantic
I know Pablo, Noriega, the real Noriega
He owe me a hundred favors
I ain't petty nigga, we buy the whole thang
See most of my niggas really still deal cocaine
My roof back, my money rides
I'm on the pedal, show you what I'm runnin' like
When they snatch black I cry for a hundred nights
He got a hundred bodies, servin' a hundred lives

Everyday I'm hustlin'
Ev-everyday I'm hustlin'
Everyday I'm hustlin'
Ev-everyday I'm hustlin'
Everyday I'm hustlin'
Everyday I'm hustlin'
Everyday I'm hustlin'
Everyday I'm, everyday I'm

We never steal cars, but we deal hard
Whip it real hard whip it whip it real hard
I caught a charge, I caught a charge
Whip it real hard, whip it whip it real hard
Ain't bout no funny shit still bitches and business
I'm on my money shit still whippin' them Benz
Major league who catchin' because I'm pitchin'
Jose Canseco just snitchin' because he's finish
I feed 'em steroids to strengthen up all my chickens
They flyin' over Pacific to be specific
Triple C's you know it's back we holdin' sacks
So nigga go on rat, run and tell 'em that
Mo' cars, mo' hoes, mo' clothes, mo blows

Everyday I'm hustlin'
Ev-everyday I'm hustlin'
Everyday I'm hustlin'
Ev-everyday I'm hustlin'
Everyday I'm hustlin'
Everyday I'm hustlin'
Everyday I'm hustlin'
Everyday I'm, everyday I'm

It's time to spend my thrills, custom spinnin' wheels
I ain't drove in a week them bitches spinnin' still
Talk about me because these suckers scared to talk about me
Killers talkin' bout me, it ain't no talk about me
It ain't no walkin' 'round me, see all these killers 'round me
Lot of drug dealin' 'round me goin' down in Dade County
Don't tote no twenty-twos, Magnum cost me twenty-two
Sat it on them twenty-twos, birds go for twenty-two
Lil' mama super thick, she say she twenty-two
She seen them twenty-twos, we in room two twenty-two
I touch work like I'm convertible Burt
I got distribution so I'm convertin' the work
In the M-I-A-YO them niggaz rich off that YAYO
Steady slangin' YAYO, my Chevy bangin' Yayo

[Ephraim]

To make a prairie
by Emily Dickinson

To make a prairie it takes a clover and one bee,
One clover, and a bee.
And revery.
The revery alone will do,
If bees are few.

***

To me, this poem just speaks of intense serenity.  I am both deeply moved just to experience it vicariously and deeply envious because I have not yet experienced that kind of serenity firsthand.

[Pave]

Go to Karakas.

[ashiXIII]

To make a prairie
by Emily Dickinson

To make a prairie it takes a clover and one bee,
One clover, and a bee.
And revery.
The revery alone will do,
If bees are few.

***

To me, this poem just speaks of intense serenity.  I am both deeply moved just to experience it vicariously and deeply envious because I have not yet experienced that kind of serenity firsthand.

I've always liked this poem.

My favorite -


Annabel Lee

It was many and many a year ago,
In a kingdom by the sea,
That a maiden there lived whom you may know
By the name of ANNABEL LEE;
And this maiden she lived with no other thought
Than to love and be loved by me.

I was a child and she was a child,
In this kingdom by the sea;
But we loved with a love that was more than love-
I and my Annabel Lee;
With a love that the winged seraphs of heaven
Coveted her and me.

And this was the reason that, long ago,
In this kingdom by the sea,
A wind blew out of a cloud, chilling
My beautiful Annabel Lee;
So that her highborn kinsman came
And bore her away from me,
To shut her up in a sepulchre
In this kingdom by the sea.

The angels, not half so happy in heaven,
Went envying her and me-
Yes!- that was the reason (as all men know,
In this kingdom by the sea)
That the wind came out of the cloud by night,
Chilling and killing my Annabel Lee.

But our love it was stronger by far than the love
Of those who were older than we-
Of many far wiser than we-
And neither the angels in heaven above,
Nor the demons down under the sea,
Can ever dissever my soul from the soul
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee.

For the moon never beams without bringing me dreams
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;
And the stars never rise but I feel the bright eyes
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;
And so, all the night-tide, I lie down by the side
Of my darling- my darling- my life and my bride,
In the sepulchre there by the sea,
In her tomb by the sounding sea.

- Edgar Allan Poe

[Illissius]

I'd love to post my favorite poems, but most of them are in Hungarian. But it seems that no one has posted Invictus yet, so I will remedy this situation:

Invictus by William Ernest Henley

Out of the night that covers me,
      Black as the Pit from pole to pole,
I thank whatever gods may be
      For my unconquerable soul.
In the fell clutch of circumstance
      I have not winced nor cried aloud.
Under the bludgeonings of chance
       My head is bloody, but unbowed.
Beyond this place of wrath and tears
      Looms but the Horror of the shade,
And yet the menace of the years
      Finds, and shall find me, unafraid.
It matters not how strait the gate,
      How charged with punishments the scroll,
I am the master of my fate:
      I am the captain of my soul.

[erictehfatz0r]

There were some scientists,
Trying to figure out the Sasquatch riddle.
Then they figured out it was a missing link.

In search of Sasquatch,
That was a kick-ass In Search Of,
With Leonard Nimoy
Kickin' out the jams...ha!

He captured imagination,
Of people all around the globe.

His name was Sasquatch, so I'm told.

His legend's ancient,
In the ancient scribe of the indian tribe.
Apache tribe.

Scientists have proven that the Sasquatch, he is real.
Take a look at the plaster cast of his foot, now you know he's real.
Listen real close to the audio tape, not human no you know he's real.
Couldn't be a man in gorilla suit, no fuckin' way.
No, you know he's real.
Real, real, real real, real, real, really real, real.

-Jack Black and Kyle Gass

[Kowal]

Something broken looms
Hand, lands, dudes swept far away
Balance is so good

[Anusien]

Not going to try and reformat it myself:

Samuel Taylor Coleridge's Christabel

[nataz]

I died as a mineral and became a plant;
I died as a plant and rose to animal;
I died as animal and I was a man.
Why should I fear? When was I less by dying?
Yet once more I shall die as man to soar
With angels blest. But even from an angel
I must pass on: all except God must perish.
When I have sacrificed my angel soul,
I shall become what no mind ever conceived.

Jelaluddin Rumi

[ashiXIII]

Another one of my faves:

I see 10 Birthdays
My Grandkids grow old, move out
Please resolve Brainstorm

by Ray Robilliard

[The Chosen One]

Epitaph of the Twilight
 

Unknown where the Cursed Wave was born...
After the stars doth cross the heavens...
The sky in the East doth darken.
And air doth fills with mourning.
From the chosen land beyond the forest,
A sign of the Wave comes.
Riding the Wave is: Skeith, the Shadow of Death,
to drown all that stands.
Mirage of Deceit, Innis,
Betray all with the flawed image,
and did aid the Wave.
And by the Power of Magus,
a drop from the Wave doth reach the heavens,
and creates a new Wave.

With the Wave, Fidchell,
the power to tell the dark future,
hope darkens, sadness and despair rule.
Gorre schemes when swallowed by the Cursed Wave.
Macha seduces with the sweet trap.
Wave reaches the Pinnacle, and escape none can.
Tarvos still remains with more cruelty to punish and destroy.
And with the turbulent destruction after the Wave.
Only a void remains.
From deep within the void arrives Corbenik.

Yet to return, the shadowed one.
Who quests for the Twilight Dragon
Rumbles the Dark Hearth,
And Helba, Queen of the Dark, has raised finally her army.
Apeiron, King of Light, beckons...
At the base of the rainbow they meet.
Against the abominable "Wave," together they fight.
Alba's lake boils.
Light's great tree doth fall.
Power - all now to droplets turned in the temple of Arche Koeln.
Returns to nothing, this world of shadowless ones.
Never to return, the shadowless one.
Who quests for the Twilight Dragon.

The wife buffeted by "waves" turns her back on the field.
The daughter that waited for the shadows repeated,
"For sure... For sure I can go home."
But the girl did not know...
The truth that waited at the end of the journey
The eternal mourning of her land. 

In the place of the calamitous, only life was known.
After the circling stars
When the eastern dark void, the air full of despair
In the depths of the divided forest, in the land of Karma,

Riding fast on the path is Skeith
Bearing death's shadow, it eliminates all that seek to thwart it.
The Confusing Mirage, Innis
Deceives those that see it with illusions, rescues the waves

The wave soaring high, when its head is smashed,
A new wave will emerge
To become Magus's power.
When questioning the wave,
Hope's light will be lost when he speaks of the dark future of where
sorrow and resignation reign.
Using Fiddlehiem's Technique

When engulfed by the Waves of Calamity, Gorre will plan
The sweet snare of conciliation is Macha
The Waves, an exceeding maelstrom
Nothing can escape

When you think you have escaped, Tarvos exists
To destroy those with his exceeding cruelty
Upon violent requital, only to remain is the void, the vacant darkness
is the harbinger that Corbenik is to appear.

----Emma Wielant