Pet poems
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The Peacock at Alderton
© Geoffrey Hill
Nothing to tell why I cannot write
in re Nobody; nobody to narrate this
Tender Only to One
© Stevie Smith
Tender only to one
Tender and true
The petals swing
To my fingering
Is it you, or you, or you?
Trying to Name What Doesn’t Change
© Naomi Shihab Nye
Roselva says the only thing that doesn’t change
is train tracks. She’s sure of it.
The train changes, or the weeds that grow up spidery
by the side, but not the tracks.
I’ve watched one for three years, she says,
and it doesn’t curve, doesn’t break, doesn’t grow.
Rivers and Mountains
© John Ashbery
On the secret map the assassins
Cloistered, the Moon River was marked
The Children of Stare
© Walter de la Mare
Winter is fallen early
On the house of Stare;
Birds in reverberating flocks
Haunt its ancestral box;
Bright are the plenteous berries
In clusters in the air.
The Cave Painters
© Eamon Grennan
Holding only a handful of rushlight
they pressed deeper into the dark, at a crouch
"I loved you first: but afterwards your love"
© Christina Georgina Rossetti
Poca favilla gran fiamma seconda. Dante
Ogni altra cosa, ogni pensier va fore,
Paradise Lost: Book X
© Patrick Kavanagh
So having said, he thus to Eve in few:
"Say, Woman, what is this which thou hast done?"
To whom sad Eve, with shame nigh overwhelm'd,
Confessing soon, yet not before her Judge
Bold or loquacious, thus abash'd replied,
"The Serpent me beguil'd, and I did eat."
"I wish I could remember that first day"
© Christina Georgina Rossetti
Era gia lora che volge il desio. Dante
Ricorro al tempo chio vi vidi prima. Petrarca
Chomei at Toyama
© Ted Hughes
Swirl sleeping in the waterfall!
On motionless pools scum appearing
disappearing!
Song of the Two Crows
© Hayden Carruth
I sing of Morrisville
(if you call this cry
a song). I
(if you call this painful
St. Agnes' Eve
© Kenneth Fearing
The dramatis personae include a fly-specked Monday evening,
A cigar store with stagnant windows,
Symphony of a Mexican Garden
© Grace Hazard Conkling
But all across the trudging ragged chords
That are the tangled grasses in the heat,
The mariposa lilies fluttering
Like trills upon some archangelic flute,
To a Lady that Desired I Would Love Her
© Thomas Carew
Now you have freely given me leave to love,
What will you do?
Shall I your mirth, or passion move,
When I begin to woo;
Will you torment, or scorn, or love me too?
Mountains O' Mourne
© William Percy French
Oh Mary, this Londons a wonderful sight,
With people here workin by day and by night.
Etiquette
© William Schwenck Gilbert
The BALLYSHANNON foundered off the coast of Cariboo,
And down in fathoms many went the captain and the crew;
Down went the owners - greedy men whom hope of gain allured:
Oh, dry the starting tear, for they were heavily insured.
The Archbishop And Gil Blas
© Oliver Wendell Holmes
I DON'T think I feel much older; I'm aware I'm rather gray,
But so are many young folks; I meet 'em every day.
I confess I 'm more particular in what I eat and drink,
But one's taste improves with culture; that is all it means, I think.
Praeludium
© Benjamin Jonson
And must I sing? What subject shall I choose!
Or whose great name in poets' heaven use,
For the more countenance to my active muse?
A Baroque Wall-Fountain in the Villa Sciarra
© Lola Ridge
for Dore and Adja
Under the bronze crown
Too big for the head of the stone cherub whose feet
A serpent has begun to eat,
Sweet water brims a cockle and braids down
