Favorite Poems/Poets

[1918me]

Walt Whitman, Edgar Allen Poe, Robert Frost, and Emily Dickinson have always been my favorite poets, although it would be hard to narrow down which specific poems are my favorite. Of course, I'll always be fond of The Raven and Song of Myself.

[Sci-2]

The man in the mask swings a sword of bright stars

The cloud of his breath is the shroud of the earth.

But the man in the robe from a book reads our fears,

And ticks off the minutes from death until birth.

The woman in white is the mother of hope,

And the twin doves of peace rest on her twin breasts.

But the woman in black, with a knife and a rope,

Is the watcher at gateway,

the guardian of ghosts.

— Henry Treece

(Courtesy of Gaiman's Brief Lives)

[Angalin]

The Peace of Wild Things

When despair for the world grows in me

and I wake in the night at the least sound

in fear of what my life and my children's lives may be,

I go and lie down where the wood drake

rests in his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds.

I come into the peace of wild things

who do not tax their lives with forethought

of grief. I come into the presence of still water.

... And I feel above me the day-blind stars

waiting with their light. For a time

I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.

— Wendell Berry

I like pretty much anything this guy writes, but this is my favorite poem.

For some reason I thought I'd quoted that one already, but guess not. :)

Here's a performance poem by Tanya Davis,

; I just bought her book with it in today.

[Sci-2]

eta: formatting

A Lemon by Pablo Neruda

Out of lemon flowers

loosed

on the moonlight, love's

lashed and insatiable

essences,

sodden with fragrance,

the lemon tree's yellow

emerges,

the lemons

move down

from the tree's planetarium

Delicate merchandise!

The harbors are big with it-

bazaars

for the light and the

barbarous gold.

We open

the halves

of a miracle,

and a clotting of acids

brims

into the starry

divisions:

creation's

original juices,

irreducible, changeless,

alive:

so the freshness lives on

in a lemon,

in the sweet-smelling house of the rind,

the proportions, arcane and acerb.

Cutting the lemon

the knife

leaves a little cathedral:

alcoves unguessed by the eye

that open acidulous glass

to the light; topazes

riding the droplets,

altars,

aromatic facades.

So, while the hand

holds the cut of the lemon,

half a world

on a trencher,

the gold of the universe

wells

to your touch:

a cup yellow

with miracles,

a breast and a nipple

perfuming the earth;

a flashing made fruitage,

the diminutive fire of a planet.

[Sci-2]

eta: formatting again

‘In the wave-strike over unquiet stones’ by Pablo Neruda

In the wave-strike over unquiet stones

the brightness bursts and bears the rose

and the ring of water contracts to a cluster

to one drop of azure brine that falls.

O magnolia radiance breaking in spume,

magnetic voyager whose death flowers

and returns, eternal, to being and nothingness:

shattered brine, dazzling leap of the ocean.

Merged, you and I, my love, seal the silence

while the sea destroys its continual forms,

collapses its turrets of wildness and whiteness,

because in the weft of those unseen garments

of headlong water, and perpetual sand,

we bear the sole, relentless tenderness.

[mythsandstuff]

While we're on Neruda - "Ode to Tomatoes" is my favorite of his:

The street

filled with tomatoes,

midday,

summer,

light is

halved

like

a

tomato,

its juice

runs

through the streets.

In December,

unabated,

the tomato

invades

the kitchen,

it enters at lunchtime,

takes

its ease

on countertops,

among glasses,

butter dishes,

blue saltcellars.

It sheds

its own light,

benign majesty.

Unfortunately, we must

murder it:

the knife

sinks

into living flesh,

red

viscera

a cool

sun,

profound,

inexhaustible,

populates the salads

of Chile,

happily, it is wed

to the clear onion,

and to celebrate the union

we

pour

oil,

essential

child of the olive,

onto its halved hemispheres,

pepper

adds

its fragrance,

salt, its magnetism;

it is the wedding

of the day,

parsley

hoists

its flag,

potatoes

bubble vigorously,

the aroma

of the roast

knocks

at the door,

it's time!

come on!

and, on

the table, at the midpoint

of summer,

the tomato,

star of earth, recurrent

and fertile

star,

displays

its convolutions,

its canals,

its remarkable amplitude

and abundance,

no pit,

no husk,

no leaves or thorns,

the tomato offers

its gift

of fiery color

and cool completeness.

[Sci-2]

Canto XII from The Heights of Macchu Picchu

by

Pablo Neruda

Arise to birth with me, my brother.

Give me your hand out of the depths

sown by your sorrows.

You will not return from these stone fastnesses.

You will not emerge from subterranean time.

Your rasping voice will not come back,

nor your pierced eyes rise from their sockets.

Look at me from the depths of the earth,

tiller of fields, weaver, reticent shepherd,

groom of totemic guanacos,

mason high on your treacherous scaffolding,

iceman of Andean tears,

jeweler with crushed fingers,

farmer anxious among his seedlings,

potter wasted among his clays--

bring to the cup of this new life

your ancient buried sorrows.

Show me your blood and your furrow;

say to me: here I was scourged

because a gem was dull or because the earth

failed to give up in time its tithe of corn or stone.

Point out to me the rock on which you stumbled,

the wood they used to crucify your body.

Strike the old flints

to kindle ancient lamps, light up the whips

glued to your wounds throughout the centuries

and light the axes gleaming with your blood.

I come to speak for your dead mouths.

Throughout the earth

let dead lips congregate,

out of the depths spin this long night to me

as if I rode at anchor here with you.

And tell me everything, tell chain by chain,

and link by link, and step by step;

sharpen the knives you kept hidden away,

thrust them into my breast, into my hands,

like a torrent of sunbursts,

an Amazon of buried jaguars,

and leave me cry: hours, days and years,

blind ages, stellar centuries.

And give me silence, give me water, hope.

Give me the struggle, the iron, the volcanoes.

Let bodies cling like magnets to my body.

Come quickly to my veins and to my mouth.

Speak through my speech, and through my blood.

[Sci-2]

eta: formatting

Any sunset, look at him: standing there,

like between his legs there's a horse

somehow, on either side of it a saddlebag

of loss, a pack of sorrow, and him Kid

Compromise his very own shoot-'em-up,

'tilt to the brim of his hat self, smirk to match,

all-for-love-if-it's-gotta-come-to-that half

swagger,

half unintentional, I think, sashay.

The silver spurs at his ankles where maybe

the wings would be, if the gods still existed,

catch the light, lose it, as he stands in place,

scraping the dirt with his boots: lines, circles

that stop short, shapes that mean nothing—

no bull, not like that, but scraping shyly, like

a man who's forgotten that part of himself,

keeps forgetting, because what the fuck?

As he takes his hat off; as he lifts his head up

like if right now he could be any animal he'd

choose coyote; as all the usual sunset colors

break over his face,

he starts up singing again,

same as every night, same song: loneliness

by starlight, miles to go, lay me down by

the cool etc.—that kind of song, the kind

you'll have heard before, sure, somewhere,

but where was that,

the singer turning this

and that way, as if watching the song itself—

—the words to the song—leave him, as he

lets each go, the wind carrying most of it,

some of the words, falling, settling into

instead that larger darkness, where the smaller

darknesses that our lives were lie softly down.

"Riding Westward" by Carl Phillips

[Sci-2]

When the world arises in me,

It is just an illusion:

Water shimmering in the sun,

A vein of silver in mother-of-pearl,

A serpent in a strand of rope.

From me the world streams out

And in me it dissolves,

As a bracelet melts into gold,

A pot crumbles into clay,

A wave subsides into water.

- Ashtavakra Gita 2: 9-10

[Angalin]

I read this in a children's anthology of poetry and it stuck with me.

Five Ways To Kill A Man

There are many cumbersome ways to kill a man.

You can make him carry a plank of wood

to the top of a hill and nail him to it. To do this

properly you require a crowd of people

wearing sandals, a cock that crows, a cloak

to dissect, a sponge, some vinegar and one

man to hammer the nails home.

Or you can take a length of steel,

shaped and chased in a traditional way,

and attempt to pierce the metal cage he wears.

But for this you need white horses,

English trees, men with bows and arrows,

at least two flags, a prince, and a

castle to hold your banquet in.

Dispensing with nobility, you may, if the wind

allows, blow gas at him. But then you need

a mile of mud sliced through with ditches,

not to mention black boots, bomb craters,

more mud, a plague of rats, a dozen songs

and some round hats made of steel.

In an age of aeroplanes, you may fly

miles above your victim and dispose of him by

pressing one small switch. All you then

require is an ocean to separate you, two

systems of government, a nation's scientists,

several factories, a psychopath and

land that no-one needs for several years.

These are, as I began, cumbersome ways

to kill a man. Simpler, direct, and much more neat

is to see that he is living somewhere in the middle

of the twentieth century, and leave him there.

- Edwin Brock

(eta: first published in ~1963)

[Jolene Brown]

Am I getting old when I say that seems a bit dark for an anthology of children's poetry?

[Angalin]

Now that I think about it, it mightn't have been aimed at children: definitely not young children, but certainly older ones and teens. It's a great collection, The Dragon Book of Verse, and was used in various secondary schools.

[Grimnir]

When the true poet comes, how shall we know him -

By what clear token, - manners, language, dress?

Or shall a voice from Heaven speak and show him:

Him the swift healer of the Earth's distress!

Tell us that when the long-expected comes

At last, with mirth and melody and singing,

We him may greet with banners, beat of drums,

Welcome of men and maids, and joy-bells ringing;

And, for this poet of ours,

Laurels and flowers.

Thus shall ye know him - this shall be his token:

Manners like other men, an unstrange gear;

His speech not musical, but harsh and broken

Shall sound at first, each line a driven spear;

For he shall sing as in the centuries olden,

Before mankind its earliest fire forgot;

Yet whoso listens long hears music golden.

How shall ye know him? ye shall know him not

Till ended hate and scorn,

To the grave he's borne.

Richard Watson Gilder

-form 'The Century Magazine', November 1881

[Sci-2]

For My Young Friends Who Are Afraid

There is a country to cross you will

find in the corner of your eye, in

the quick slip of your foot--air far

down, a snap that might have caught.

And maybe for you, for me, a high, passing

voice that finds its way by being

afraid. That country is there, for us,

carried as it is crossed. What you fear

will not go away: it will take you into

yourself and bless you and keep you.

That's the world, and we all live there.

William Stafford

[Sci-2]

"Indeed in blithe,

Uncaring bliss

The Fool steps o'er a precipice

As if he trusts the winds so chill,

To bear him where-soe'er they will.

Thus any venture is begun

This reckless step from nought to one

It's magic's foremost trick, I guess,

How something comes from nothingness.

Like rabbits from an empty hat,

Or thoughts from nowhere, just like that!

From whence were space and time deployed,

It not this empty quantum void?

Was matter pushed, or did it fall,

Being out of Naught-at-All?

What magic shaped the way things fell?

The Fool smiles, knows, but does not tell."

-Promethea #12

[Sci-2]

eta: formatting

Black men go to Aspen

and rent colorful chalets.

Giggle at the questions

their mere presence seems to raise.

Get taken for men

we don't resemble in the least.

"Are you ... ?" "No."

It's a winter wonderland

in the belly of the beast.

And black men ski.

Black men ski.

Black men send back sushi

with a scorned Yakuza's flair.

We make postmodern art

with bacon grease

and hot combed hair.

We secretly play Beethoven

inside our bassmobiles.

We can tell you how cool looks

but cannot show you how it feels

when black men ski.

When black men ski.

Black men now are students

of gay sensibility.

We wear ironic T-shirts

drenched in code unknown to thee.

We get baptized in Walden Pond

amongst a searing mob

because the cleansing blood of Jesus

could not do a thorough job.

Black men ski.

Black men ski.

Chinese guys can jump real high

and Germans cook soul food.

White boys rap and hippies nap

their dreads up to look rude.

Jazz is now suburban

it's Marsalisly clean.

And now we've got Viagra

everyone's a sex machine.

So black men ski.

What else can we do?

Black men ski.

Black men ski.

Black men ski.

Some kids I'll describe as friends

say I am race-obsessed.

The luxury of your opinion

shows that you are blessed.

See, I have poems about sunsets

flowers and the rain.

I've read them to policemen

but it was all in vain.

So black men ski.

Black men ski ... elegantly.

Black men ski.

Black men ski.

[Sci-2]

"Oh, the gentlemen are talking and the midnight moon is on the riverside

They’re drinking up and walking and it is time for me to slide

I live in another world where life and death are memorized

Where the earth is strung with lovers’ pearls and all I see are dark eyes

A cock is crowing far away and another soldier’s deep in prayer

Some mother’s child has gone astray, she can’t find him anywhere

But I can hear another drum beating for the dead that rise

Whom nature’s beast fears as they come and all I see are dark eyes

They tell me to be discreet for all intended purposes,

They tell me revenge is sweet and from where they stand, I’m sure it is.

But I feel nothing for their game where beauty goes unrecognized,

All I feel is heat and flame and all I see are dark eyes.

Oh, the French girl, she’s in paradise and a drunken man is at the wheel

Hunger pays a heavy price to the falling gods of speed and steel

Oh, time is short and the days are sweet and passion rules the arrow that flies

A million faces at my feet but all I see are dark eyes"

-Dylan's Dark Eyes

[Sci-2]

Lucille Clifton (who is awesome, met her at Bryn Mawr):

"Love rejected

hurts so much more

than Love rejecting;

they act like they don't love their country

No

what it is

is they found out

their country don't love them."

"Calming Kali

Be quiet awful woman,

lonely as hell,

and i will comfort you

when i can

and give you my bones

and my blood to feed on.

gently gently now

awful woman

i know i am your sister."

[Sci-2]

My entrance into the world of so-called "social problems"

Must be with quiet laughter, or not at all.

The hollow men of anger and bitterness

The bountiful ladies of righteous degradation

All must be left to a bygone age.

And the purpose of history is to provide a receptacle

For all those myths and oddments

Which oddly we have acquired

And from which we would become unburdened

To create a newer world

To transform the future into the present.

We have no need of false revolutions

In a world where categories tend to tyrannize our minds

And hang our wills up on narrow pegs.

It is well at every given moment to seek the limits in our lives.

And once those limits are understood

To understand that limitations no longer exist.

Earth could be fair. And you and I must be free

Not to save the world in a glorious crusade

Not to kill ourselves with a nameless gnawing pain

But to practice with all the skill of our being

The art of making possible.

-Nancy Scheibner

[Jolene Brown]

Lovely short poems by Bill Knott:

Death

Going to sleep, I cross my hands on my chest.

They will place my hands like this.

It will look as though I am flying into myself.

Advice from the Experts

I lay down in the empty street and parked

My feet against the gutter's curb while from

The building above a bunch of gawkers perched

Along its ledge urged me don't, don't jump

Ancient Measures

As much as someone could plow in one day

They called an acre;

As much as a person could die in one instant

A lifetime--