Time poems
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The Dirty Old Man
© William Allingham
In a dirty old house lived a Dirty Old Man;
Soap, towels, or brushes were not in his plan.
For forty long years, as the neighbors declared,
His house never once had been cleaned or repaired.
The Shepherd's Calendar - August
© John Clare
Harvest approaches with its bustling day
The wheat tans brown and barley bleaches grey
The Touch
© Anne Sexton
The trouble is
that I'd let my gestures freeze.
The trouble was not
in the kitchen or the tulips
but only in my head, my head.
Jerusalem Delivered - Book 02 - part 06
© Torquato Tasso
LXVI
"True labour in the vineyard of thy Lord,
Rapunzel
© Anne Sexton
As for Mother Gothel,
her heart shrank to the size of a pin,
never again to say: Hold me, my young dear,
hold me,
and only as she dreamed of the yellow hair
did moonlight sift into her mouth.
Oh! Mr. Malthus!
© Stephen Leacock
Turn back to Malthus as he walked o'er English Fields and Downs
And walked at night the crooked Streets of crooked English Towns,
Lifeless, undying, Shade or Man, as one that could not die
A hundred years his Shadow fell, a hundred Years to lie,
The Shadow on the Window Pane when Malthus' Ghost went by.
The Death Baby
© Anne Sexton
I was an ice baby.
I turned to sky blue.
My tears became two glass beads.
My mouth stiffened into a dumb howl.
They say it was a dream
but I remember that hardening.
The Knitters
© Padraic Colum
WATER, I did not seek you,
Water of hollow stone;
I crossed no one's acre to find you
You were where my geese lie down.
At The Sign Of The Skull
© Madison Julius Cawein
_It's "Gallop and go!" and "Slow, now, slow!"
With every man in this life below--
But the things of this world are a fleeting show._
Hurry Up Please It's Time
© Anne Sexton
What is death, I ask.
What is life, you ask.
I give them both my buttocks,
my two wheels rolling off toward Nirvana.
Live
© Anne Sexton
Live or die, but don't poison everything...Well, death's been here
for a long time --
it has a hell of a lot
to do with hell
The Fallen Angels
© Anne Sexton
O fallen angel,
the companion within me,
whisper something holy
before you pinch me
into the grave.
I Remember
© Anne Sexton
By the first of August
the invisible beetles began
to snore and the grass was
as tough as hemp and was
Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs
© Anne Sexton
No matter what life you lead
the virgin is a lovely number:
cheeks as fragile as cigarette paper,
arms and legs made of Limoges,
All My Pretty Ones
© Anne Sexton
These are the snapshots of marriage, stopped in places.
Side by side at the rail toward Nassau now;
here, with the winner's cup at the speedboat races,
here, in tails at the Cotillion, you take a bow,
Briar Rose (Sleeping Beauty)
© Anne Sexton
Consider
a girl who keeps slipping off,
arms limp as old carrots,
into the hypnotist's trance,
Red Roses
© Anne Sexton
He pretends he is her ball.
He tries to fold up and bounce
but he squashes like fruit.
For he loves Blue Lady and the spots
of red roses he gives her
The Addict
© Anne Sexton
Don't they know that I promised to die!
I'm keeping in practice.
I'm merely staying in shape.
The pills are a mother, but better,
every color and as good as sour balls.
I'm on a diet from death.
Cigarettes And Whiskey And Wild, Wild Women
© Anne Sexton
(from a song)Perhaps I was born kneeling,
born coughing on the long winter,
born expecting the kiss of mercy,
born with a passion for quickness
Sylvia's Death
© Anne Sexton
for Sylvia Plath
O Sylvia, Sylvia,
with a dead box of stones and spoons,
with two children, two meteors
