Anniversary poems
/ page 1 of 5 /White Flock
© Anna Akhmatova
Copyright Anna Akhmatova
Copyright English translation by Ilya Shambat (ilya_shambat@yahoo.com)
Origin: http://www.geocities.com/ilya_shambat/akhmatova.html
Homer And Laertes
© Walter Savage Landor
Laertes: Gods help thee! and restore to thee thy sight!
My good old guest, I am more old than thou,
Yet have outlived by many years my son
Odysseus and the chaste Penelope.
A Poem Served To Order
© Oliver Wendell Holmes
THE Caliph ordered up his cook,
And, scowling with a fearful look
That meant,--We stand no gammon,--
"To-morrow, just at two," he said,
"Hassan, our cook, will lose his head,
Or serve us up a salmon."
Hymn For The Two Hundredth Anniversary Of Kings Chapel
© Oliver Wendell Holmes
O'ERSHADOWED by the walls that climb,
Piled up in air by living hands,
A rock amid the waves of time,
Our gray old house of worship stands.
Poem At The Centennial Anniversary Dinner Of The Massachusetts Medical Society
© Oliver Wendell Holmes
Each has his gifts, his losses and his gains,
Each his own share of pleasures and of pains;
No life-long aim with steadfast eye pursued
Finds a smooth pathway all with roses strewed;
Trouble belongs to man of woman born,--
Tread where he may, his foot will find its thorn.
Under The Old Elm
© James Russell Lowell
Placid completeness, life without a fall
From faith or highest aims, truth's breachless wall,
Surely if any fame can bear the touch,
His will say 'Here!' at the last trumpet's call,
The unexpressive man whose life expressed so much.
Ode
© Paul Hamilton Hayne
Delivered on the first anniversary of the Carolina Art Association, Feb. 10, 1856.
THERE are two worlds wherein our souls may dwell,
With discord, or ethereal music fraught,
One the loud mart wherein men buy and sell
The Little Left Hand - Act II
© Wilfrid Scawen Blunt
Lady Marian. Send
For others then. I see a girl at the street's end
Selling some mignonette. What do you say?
(Putting on a bow.) This bow,
Is it too bright for the rest?
An Anniversary
© Paul Hamilton Hayne
O LOVE, it is our wedding day!
This morn,--how swift the seasons flee!--
A virgin morn of cloudless May,
You gave your loyal hand to me,
Your dainty hand, clasped sweet and sure
As Love's sweet self, for evermore!
Spirit Of The Everlasting Boy
© Henry Van Dyke
ODE FOR THE HUNDREDTH ANNIVERSARY OF LAWRENCEVILLE SCHOOL
June 11, 1910
Italy : 29. Montorio
© Samuel Rogers
Generous, and ardent, and as romantic as he could be,
Montorio was in his earliest youth, when, on a summer-
evening, not many years ago, he arrived at the Baths of
* * *. With a heavy heart, and with many a blessing on
Father, Father Abraham
© James Weldon Johnson
Father, Father Abraham,
Today look on us from above;
On us, the offspring of thy faith,
The children of thy Christ-like love.
On Our Eleventh Anniversary by Susan Browne : American Life in Poetry #214 Ted Kooser, U.S. Poet La
© Ted Kooser
Sometimes I wonder at my wife's forbearance. She's heard me tell the same stories dozens of times, and she still politely laughs when she should. Here's a poem by Susan Browne, of California, that treats an oft-told story with great tenderness.
On Our Eleventh Anniversary
You're telling that story again about your childhood,
On The 100th Anniversary Of Anna Akhmatova
© Joseph Brodsky
The fire and the page, the hewed hairs and the swords,
The grains and the millstone, the whispers and the clatter --
God saves all that -- especially the words
Of love and pity, as His only way to utter.
In Hospital
© Robert Laurence Binyon
I
Nothing of itself is in the still'd mind, only
A still submission to each exterior image,
Still as a pool, accepting trees and sky,
Chamber Music
© John Jay Chapman
SILENCE: the sunset gilds the frozen ground,
But here within all's curtained; stands are set
In the wide salon where gilt chairs abound,
And eager listeners wait. The band is met
Whose tuning sheds a cheerful hum around:
Prophetic notes! The tapers brighten at the sound.
An Anniversary
© Ada Cambridge
AS flower to sun its drop of dew
Gives from its crystal cup,
So I, as morning gift to you,
This poor verse offer up.
II.
The Ploughman
© Oliver Wendell Holmes
CLEAR the brown path, to meet his coulter's gleam!
Lo! on he comes, behind his smoking team,
With toil's bright dew-drops on his sunburnt brow,
The lord of earth, the hero of the plough!
Christmas Folk-Song
© Duncan Campbell Scott
Those who die on Christmas Day
(I heard the triumphant Seraph say)