Life poems
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Afterwards by David Baker: American Life in Poetry #133 Ted Kooser, U.S. Poet Laureate 2004-2006
© Ted Kooser
It may be that we are most alone when attending funerals, at least that's how it seems to me. By alone I mean that even among throngs of mourners we pull back within ourselves and peer out at life as if through a window. David Baker, an Ohio poet, offers us a picture of a funeral that could be anybody's.
Afterwards
A short ride in the van, then the eight of us
there in the heatâwhite shirtsleeves sticking,
the women's gloves offâfanning our faces.
The workers had set up a big blue tent
Metamorphoses: Book The Fifth
© Ovid
The End of the Fifth Book.
Translated into English verse under the direction of
Sir Samuel Garth by John Dryden, Alexander Pope, Joseph Addison,
William Congreve and other eminent hands
AN ELEGY Occasioned by the losse of the most incomparable Lady Stanhope, daughter to the Earl of Nor
© Henry King
Lightned by that dimme Torch our sorrow bears
We sadly trace thy Coffin with our tears;
And though the Ceremonious Rites are past
Since thy fair body into earth was cast;
Welcome, May
© Denis Florence MacCarthy
Welcome, May! welcome, May!
Thou hast been too long away,
All the widow'd wintry hours
Wept for thee, gentle May;
But the fault was only ours-
We were sad when thou wert gay!
Despair
© Samuel Taylor Coleridge
I have experienc'd
The worst, the World can wreak on me--the worst
That can make Life indifferent, yet disturb
With whisper'd Discontents the dying prayer--
The Vanguard [11]
© Henry Lawson
The cities were silent, the people were glum,
No sound of a bugle, no tap of a drum;
Our enemies mighty and Parliaments sour,
Our Lands lovers few, and no Man of the Hour.
The Girl turned her nose up (maybe twas before),
And they voted us Cracked when we marched to the war.
The Corduroy Road
© William Henry Drummond
De corduroy road go bompety bomp,
De corduroy road go jompety jomp,
An' he' s takin'beeg chances upset hees load
De horse dat 'll trot on de corduroy road.
"I must be dreaming through the days"
© Lesbia Harford
I must be dreaming through the days
And see the world with childish eyes
If I'd go singing all my life
And my songs be wise
All That Matters
© Edgar Albert Guest
When all that matters shall be written down
And the long record of our years is told,
Perkin Warbeck
© Lord Alfred Douglas
At Turney in Flanders I was born
Fore-doomed to splendour and sorrow,
For I was a king when they cut the corn,
And they strangle me to-morrow.
Poem To The Mysterious Woman
© Robert Desnos
I have dreamed of you so much that you are no longer real.
Is there still time for me to reach your breathing body, to kiss your mouth and make
your dear voice come alive again?
Rubaiyat 15
© Shams al-Din Hafiz
Spend time with wine by a stream,
And let sorrows away stream.
My life, like a rose, is but few days;
Youthful and joyous live this dream.
The Vision Of St. Peter
© John Hay
To Peter by night the faithfullest came
And said, "We appeal to thee!
The life of the Church is in thy life;
We pray thee to rise and flee.
Samadhi
© Paramahansa Yogananda
Vanished are the veils of light and shade,
Lifted the vapors of sorrow,
The Cruel Falcon
© Robinson Jeffers
Contemplation would make a good life, keep it strict, only
The eyes of a desert skull drinking the sun,
The Vindictive
© Alfred Noyes
How should we praise those lads of the old Vindictive
Who looked Death straight in the eyes,
Till his gaze fell,
In those red gates of hell?
What Is Success?
© Edgar Albert Guest
Success is being friendly when another needs a friend;
It's in the cheery words you speak, and in the coins you lend;
Success is not alone in skill and deeds of daring great;
It's in the roses that you plant beside your garden gate.
Winter Hue's Recalled
© Archibald Lampman
Life is not all for effort: there are hours,
When fancy breaks from the exacting will,
Palmyra (1st Edition)
© Thomas Love Peacock
--anankta ton pantôn huperbal-
lonta chronon makarôn.
Pindar. Hymn. frag. 33
