Dreams poems
/ page 124 of 232 /
You Also, Nightingale
© Reginald Shepherd
Petrarch dreams of pebbles
on the tongue, he loves me
at a distance, black polished stone
skipping the lake that swallows
Paradise Lost: Book I
© Patrick Kavanagh
So spake th' apostate Angel, though in pain,
Vaunting aloud, but rack'd with deep despair.
And him thus answer'd soon his bold compeer:
At the Grave of My Guardian Angel: St. Louis Cemetery, New Orleans
© Larry Levis
I should rush out to my office & eat a small, freckled apple leftover
From 1970 & entirely wizened & rotted by sunlight now,
Then lay my head on my desk & dream again of horses grazing, riderless & still saddled,
Under the smog of the freeway cloverleaf & within earshot of the music waltzing with itself out
Of the topless bars & laundromats of East L.A.
Stanzas ["Oh, come to me in dreams, my love!"]
© Harriet Beecher Stowe
Oh, come to me in dreams, my love!
I will not ask a dearer bliss;
Come with the starry beams, my love,
And press mine eyelids with thy kiss.
The Rime of the Ancient Mariner (text of 1834)
© Samuel Taylor Coleridge
How a Ship having passed the Line was driven by storms to the cold Country towards the South Pole; and how from thence she made her course to the tropical Latitude of the Great Pacific Ocean; and of the strange things that befell; and in what manner the Ancyent Marinere came back to his own Country.
PART I
It is an ancient Mariner,
And he stoppeth one of three.
'By thy long grey beard and glittering eye,
Now wherefore stopp'st thou me?
Snow-Bound: A Winter Idyl
© John Greenleaf Whittier
To the Memory of the Household It Describes
This Poem is Dedicated by the Author
My Erotic Double
© John Ashbery
I said it but I can hide it. But I choose not to.
Thank you. You are a very pleasant person.
Thank you. You are too.
Nox Borealis
© Louis Zukofsky
If Socrates drank his portion of hemlock willingly,
if the Appalachians have endured unending ages of erosion,
if the wind can learn to read our minds
and moonlight moonlight as a master pickpocket,
surely we can contend with contentment as our commission.
Sisters in Arms
© Elizabeth Daryush
Keys jingle in the door ajar threatening
whatever is coming belongs here
I reach for your sweetness
but silence explodes like a pregnant belly
into my face
a vomit of nevers.
Invocation
© Denise Levertov
Silent, about-to-be-parted-from house.
Wood creaking, trying to sigh, impatient.
Clicking of squirrel-teeth in the attic.
Denuded beds, couches stripped of serapes.
Firstlings
© Louise Imogen Guiney
(January 7, 1915)
In the dregs of the year, all steam and rain,
In the timid time of the heart again,
When indecision is bold and thorough,
And action dreams of a dawn in vain,
Parable of the Hostages
© Louise Gluck
The Greeks are sitting on the beach
wondering what to do when the war ends. No one
The South
© Emma Lazarus
Night, and beneath star-blazoned summer skies
Behold the Spirit of the musky South,
A creole with still-burning, languid eyes,
Voluptuous limbs and incense-breathing mouth:
Swathed in spun gauze is she,
From fibres of her own anana tree.
The Ragpickers' Wine
© Charles Baudelaire
In the muddy maze of some old neighborhood,
Often, where the street lamp gleams like blood,
As the wind whips the flame, rattles the glass,
Where human beings ferment in a stormy mass,
from Mercian Hymns
© Geoffrey Hill
I
King of the perennial holly-groves, the riven sandstone: overlord of the M5: architect of the historic rampart and ditch, the citadel at Tamworth, the summer hermitage in Holy Cross: guardian of the Welsh Bridge and the Iron Bridge: contractor to the desirable new estates: saltmaster: moneychanger: commissioner for oaths: martyrologist: the friend of Charlemagne.
The Long Shadow of Lincoln: A Litany
© Carl Sandburg
(We can succeed only by concert. . . . The dogmas of the quiet past are inadequate to the stormy present. The occasion is piled high with difficulty, and we must rise with the occasion. As our case is new so we must think anew and act anew. We must disenthrall ourselves. . . . December 1, 1862. The President’s Message to Congress.)
Be sad, be cool, be kind,
remembering those now dreamdust
hallowed in the ruts and gullies,
solemn bones under the smooth blue sea,
faces warblown in a falling rain.
