Art poems
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Knows how to forget!
© Emily Dickinson
Knows how to forget!
But could It teach it?
Easiest of Arts, they say
When one learn how
Empty my Heart, of Thee --
© Emily Dickinson
Empty my Heart, of Thee --
Its single Artery --
Begin, and leave Thee out --
Simply Extinction's Date --
Dying! To be afraid of thee
© Emily Dickinson
Dying! To be afraid of thee
One must to thine Artillery
Have left exposed a Friend --
Than thine old Arrow is a Shot
Delivered straighter to the Heart
The leaving Love behind.
Bereaved of all, I went abroad --
© Emily Dickinson
Bereaved of all, I went abroad --
No less bereaved was I
Upon a New Peninsula --
The Grave preceded me --
Artists wrestled here!
© Emily Dickinson
Artists wrestled here!
Lo, a tint Cashmere!
Lo, a Rose!
Student of the Year!
For the easel here
Say Repose!
Alone and in a Circumstance
© Emily Dickinson
Alone and in a Circumstance
Reluctant to be told
A spider on my reticence
Assiduously crawled
The Spider as an Artist
© Emily Dickinson
The Spider as an Artist
Has never been employed --
Though his surpassing Merit
Is freely certified
The name -- of it -- is "Autumn" --
© Emily Dickinson
The name -- of it -- is "Autumn" --
The hue -- of it -- is Blood --
An Artery -- upon the Hill --
A Vein -- along the Road --
Not to discover weakness is
© Emily Dickinson
Not to discover weakness is
The Artifice of strength --
Impregnability inheres
As much through Consciousness
My Soul -- accused me -- And I quailed --
© Emily Dickinson
My Soul -- accused me -- And I quailed --
As Tongue of Diamond had reviled
All else accused me -- and I smiled --
My Soul -- that Morning -- was My friend --
Dew -- is the Freshet in the Grass --
© Emily Dickinson
Dew -- is the Freshet in the Grass --
'Tis many a tiny Mill
Turns unperceived beneath our feet
And Artisan lies still --
It sifts from Leaden Sieves
© Emily Dickinson
It sifts from Leaden Sieves --
It powders all the Wood.
It fills with Alabaster Wool
The Wrinkles of the Road --
The Animals
© Edwin Muir
They do not live in the world,
Are not in time and space.
From birth to death hurled
No word do they have, not one
To plant a foot upon,
Were never in any place.
The Satrapy
© Constantine Cavafy
What a misfortune, although you are made
for fine and great works
this unjust fate of yours always
denies you encouragement and success;
Canto XIII
© Ezra Pound
And they said: If a man commit murder
Should his father protect him, and hide him?
And Kung said:
He should hide him.
Nimmo
© Edwin Arlington Robinson
Since you remember Nimmo, and arrive
At such a false and florid and far drawn
Confusion of odd nonsense, I connive
No longer, though I may have led you on.
Rembrandt to Rembrandt
© Edwin Arlington Robinson
(AMSTERDAM, 1645)
And there you are again, now as you are.
Observe yourself as you discern yourself
In your discredited ascendency;
Two Gardens in Linndale
© Edwin Arlington Robinson
Two brothers, Oakes and Oliver,
Two gentle men as ever were,
Would roam no longer, but abide
In Linndale, where their fathers died,
And each would be a gardener.
Merlin
© Edwin Arlington Robinson
Gawaine, Gawaine, what look ye for to see,
So far beyond the faint edge of the world?
Dye look to see the lady Vivian,
Pursued by divers ominous vile demons
The Deserted Village
© Oliver Goldsmith
Ill fares the land, to hastening ills a prey,
Where wealth accumulates, and men decay:
Princes and lords may flourish, or may fade;
A breath can make them, as a breath has made;
But a bold peasantry, their country's pride,
When once destroyed can never be supplied.
