Good poems
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Dream Song 39: Goodbye, sir, & fare well. You're in the clear
© John Berryman
Goodbye, sir, & fare well. You're in the clear.
'Nobody' (Mark says you said) 'is ever found out.'
I figure you were right,
having as Henry got away with murder
for long. Some jarred clock tell me it's late,
not for you who went straight
Solitaire
© Amy Lowell
WHEN night drifts along the streets of the city,
And sifts down between the uneven roofs,
Sonnet 117 - All we were going strong
© John Berryman
The weather's changing. This morning was cold,
as I made for the grove, without expectation,
some hundred Sonnets in my pocket, old,
to read her if she came. Presently the sun
yellowed the pines & my lady came not
in blue jeans & a sweater. I sat down & wrote.
Roan Stallion
© Robinson Jeffers
She rose at length, she unknotted the halter; she walked and led
the stallion; two figures, woman and stallion,
Came down the silent emptiness of the dome of the hill, under
the cataract of the moonlight.
Sonnet 115 - All we were going strong last night this time
© John Berryman
The weather's changing. This morning was cold,
as I made for the grove, without expectation,
some hundred Sonnets in my pocket, old,
to read her if she came. Presently the sun
yellowed the pines & my lady came not
in blue jeans & a sweater. I sat down & wrote.
Dream Song 112: My framework is broken, I am coming to an end
© John Berryman
My framework is broken, I am coming to an end,
God send it soon. When I had most to say
my tongue clung to the roof
I mean of my mouth. It is my Lady's birthday
which must be honoured, and has been. God send
it soon.
Dream Song 20: The Secret of the Wisdom
© John Berryman
When worst got things, how was you? Steady on?
Wheedling, or shockt her &
you have been bad to your friend,
whom not you writing to. You have not listened.
A pelican of lies
you loosed: where are you?
Dream Song 128: A hemorrhage of his left ear of Good Friday
© John Berryman
A hemorrhage of his left ear of Good Fridayâ
so help me Jesusâthen made funny too
the other, further one.
There must have been a bit. Sheets scrubbed away
soon all but three nails. Doctors in this city O
will not (his wife cried) come.
Genesis BK XIII
© Caedmon
The sleep of death and fiends' seduction; death and hell and
exile and damnation - these were the fatal fruit whereon they
feasted. And when the apple worked within him and touched his
heart, then laughed aloud the evilhearted fiend, capered about,
and gave thanks to his lord for both:
The Cloud's Swan-Song
© Francis Thompson
There is a parable in the pathless cloud,
There's prophecy in heaven,--they did not lie,
The Chaldee shepherds; seal-ed from the proud,
To cheer the weighted heart that mates the seeing eye.
The Virgin Martyr
© Ada Cambridge
Every wild she-bird has nest and mate in the warm April weather,
But a captive woman, made for love - no mate, no nest has she.
In the spring of young desire, young men and maids are wed together,
And the happy mothers flaunt their bliss for all the world to see:
Nature's sacramental feast for these - an empty board for me.
Poemes Saturniens - Prologue
© Paul Verlaine
The Sages of old time, well worth our own,
Believed--and it has been disproved by none--
To All and Everything
© Vladimir Mayakovsky
Above the capitals madness
I raised my face,
stern as the faces of ancient icons.
Sorrow-rent,
on your body as on a death-bed, its days
my heart ended.
Spring - The First Pastoral ; or Damon
© Alexander Pope
Daphnis.
O Love! for Sylvia let me gain the prize,
And make my tongue victorious as her eyes;
No lambs or sheep for victims I'll impart,
Thy victim, Love, shall be the shepherd's heart.
The Immoral Proposition
© Robert Creeley
If you never do anything for anyone else
you are spared the tragedy of human relation-
Notes To Be Left In A Cornerstone
© Stephen Vincent Benet
So, always, there were the streets and the high, clear light
And it was a crowded island and a great city;
They built high up in the air.
Brass Kaleidoscope
© Dale Harcombe
I had a kaleidoscope once.
Sometimes
I still see oblique patterns.
XIII: Epistle: To Katherine, Lady Aubigny
© Benjamin Jonson
'Tis growne almost a danger to speake true
Of any good minde, now: There are so few.
The Return of Frankenstein
© Edward Field
He didn't die in the whirlpool by the mill
where he had fallen in after a wild chase
by all the people of the town.
