Time poems
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Elegy for a Soldier
© Marilyn Hacker
You, who stood alone in the tall bay window
of a Brooklyn brownstone, conjuring morning
with free-flying words, knew the power, terror
in words, in flying;
Ode XVIII: To The Right Honourable Francis Earl Of Huntington
© Mark Akenside
I. 2.
Nor less prevailing is their charm
The vengeful bosom to disarm;
To melt the proud with human woe,
And prompt unwilling tears to flow.
The Unquiet Grave
© Pierre Reverdy
The wind doth blow today, my love,
And a few small drops of rain;
I never had but one true-love,
In cold grave she was lain.
February
© Margaret Atwood
Winter. Time to eat fat
and watch hockey. In the pewter mornings, the cat,
Marenghi
© Percy Bysshe Shelley
II.
A massy tower yet overhangs the town,
A scattered group of ruined dwellings now...
The Hut by the Black Swamp
© Henry Kendall
Now comes the fierce north-easter, bound
About with clouds and racks of rain,
And dry, dead leaves go whirling round
In rings of dust, and sigh like pain
Across the plain.
When Sue Wears Red
© Langston Hughes
When Susanna Jones wears red
her face is like an ancient cameo
Turned brown by the ages.
Come with a blast of trumphets, Jesus!
Steadfast
© George MacDonald
Here stands a giant stone from whose far top
Comes down the sounding water: let me gaze
These Lacustrine Cities
© John Ashbery
These lacustrine cities grew out of loathing
Into something forgetful, although angry with history.
They are the product of an idea: that man is horrible, for instance,
Though this is only one example.
Cleopatra.
© Robert Crawford
The asp, her baby, on her breast,
She falls asleep,
Ever, like Antony, to rest
While Nile shall keep
Hymn to Life
© James Schuyler
The wind rests its cheek upon the ground and feels the cool damp
And lifts its head with twigs and small dead blades of grass
The Prayer Of Nature
© George Gordon Byron
Father of Light! great God of Heaven!
Hear'st thou the accents of despair?
Can guilt like man's be e'er forgiven?
Can vice atone for crimes by prayer?
To Sir Henry Cary
© Benjamin Jonson
That neither fame nor love might wanting be
To greatness, Cary, I sing that and thee;
A Lesson In Humility
© Wilfrid Scawen Blunt
Where is thy greater virtue? Thinkest thou sin
Is but crime's record on the judgment seat?
Or must thou wait for death to be bowed down?
Oh for a righteous reading which should join
Thy deeds together in an accusing sheet,
And leave thee if thou couldst, to face men's frown!
Lichen Glows in the Moonlight
© John Kinsella
Lichen glows in the moonlight
so fierce only cloud blocking
the moon brings relief. Then passed by,
recharged it leaps up off rocks
February Evening in New York
© Denise Levertov
As the stores close, a winter light
opens air to iris blue,
Outlook
© Archibald Lampman
Not to be conquered by these headlong days,
But to stand free: to keep the mind at brood
On life's deep meaning, nature's altitude
Of loveliness, and time's mysterious ways;
Young Couple
© Arthur Rimbaud
The room is open to the turquoise blue sky;
no room here: boxes and bins!
Outside the wall is overgrown with birthwort
where the brownies' gums buzz.
