Hope poems
/ page 398 of 439 /
The Gift
© Rabindranath Tagore
I want to give you something, my child, for we are drifting in the
stream of the world.
Our lives will be carried apart, and our love forgotten.
But I am not so foolish as to hope that I could buy your heart
The Gardener XVI: Hands Cling to Eyes
© Rabindranath Tagore
Hands cling to hands and eyes linger
on eyes: thus begins the record of our
hearts.
It is the moonlit night of March;
The Gardener XLII: O Mad, Superbly Drunk
© Rabindranath Tagore
O mad, superbly drunk;
If you kick open your doors and
play the fool in public;
If you empty your bag in a night,
The Beginning
© Rabindranath Tagore
"Where have I come from, where did you pick me up?" the baby asked
its mother.
She answered, half crying, half laughing, and clasping the
baby to her breast-
Song Unsung
© Rabindranath Tagore
The song that I came to sing remains unsung to this day. I have spent my days in stringing and in unstringing my instrument. The time has not come true, the words have not been rightly set;
only there is the agony of wishing in my heart. The blossom has not opened; only the wind is sighing by. I have not seen his face, nor have I listened to his voice;
only I have heard his gentle footsteps from the road before my house. The livelong day has passed in spreading his seat on the floor;
but the lamp has not been lit and I cannot ask him into my house. I live in the hope of meeting with him; but this meeting is not yet.
Paper Boats
© Rabindranath Tagore
Day by day I float my paper boats one by one down the running
stream.
In bid black letters I write my name on them and the name of
the village where I live.
Maya
© Rabindranath Tagore
That I should make much of myself and turn it on all sides,
thus casting colored shadows on thy radiance
---such is thy Maya.
Lover's Gifts XLII: Are You a Mere Picture
© Rabindranath Tagore
Are you a mere picture, and not as true as those stars, true as
this dust? They throb with the pulse of things, but you are
immensely aloof in your stillness, painted form.
The day was when you walked with me, your breath warm, your
Lover's Gifts XL: A Message Came
© Rabindranath Tagore
A message came from my youth of vanished days, saying, " I wait for
you among the quivering of unborn May, where smiles ripen for tears
and hours ache with songs unsung."
It says, "Come to me across the worn-out track of age, through
Brink Of Eternity
© Rabindranath Tagore
In desperate hope I go and search for her
in all the corners of my room;
I find her not.
To the Moon
© Giacomo Leopardi
Oh gracious moon, now as the year turns,
I remember how, heavy with sorrow,
I climbed this hill to gaze on you,
And then as now you hung above those trees
To Silvia
© Giacomo Leopardi
Silvia, do you remember
the moments, in your mortal life,
when beauty still shone
in your sidelong, laughing eyes,
Municipal Gum
© Oodgeroo Noonuccal
Gumtree in the city street,
Hard bitumen around your feet,
Rather you should be
In the cool world of leafy forest halls
To Thos. Floyd
© Robert Seymour Bridges
How fares it, friend, since I by Fate annoy'd
Left the old home in need of livelier play
For body and mind? How fare, this many a day,
The stubborn thews and ageless heart of Floyd?
To the United States of America
© Robert Seymour Bridges
Sure is our hope since he who led your nation
Spake for mankind, and ye arose in awe
Of that high call to work the world's salvation;
Clearing your minds of all estrangling blindness
In the vision of Beauty and the Spirit's law,
Freedom and Honour and sweet Lovingkindness.
The Growth of Love
© Robert Seymour Bridges
So in despite of sorrow lately learn'd
I still hold true to truth since thou art true,
Nor wail the woe which thou to joy hast turn'd
Nor come the heavenly sun and bathing blue
To my life's need more splendid and unearn'd
Than hath thy gift outmatch'd desire and due.
Pater Filio
© Robert Seymour Bridges
Sense with keenest edge unusèd,
Yet unsteel'd by scathing fire;
Lovely feet as yet unbruisèd
On the ways of dark desire;
Sweetest hope that lookest smiling
O'er the wilderness defiling!
On a Dead Child
© Robert Seymour Bridges
Perfect little body, without fault or stain on thee,
With promise of strength and manhood full and fair!
Though cold and stark and bare,
The bloom and the charm of life doth awhile remain on thee.
Nightingales
© Robert Seymour Bridges
Beautiful must be the mountains whence ye come,
And bright in the fruitful valleys the streams, wherefrom
Ye learn your song:
Where are those starry woods? O might I wander there,
Among the flowers, which in that heavenly air
Bloom the year long!
Awake, My Heart
© Robert Seymour Bridges
The darkness silvers away, the morn doth break,
It leaps in the sky: unrisen lustres slake
The o'ertaken moon. Awake, O heart, awake!
