War poems
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Father and Son
© Stanley Kunitz
Now in the suburbs and the falling light
I followed him, and now down sandy road
Whitter than bone-dust, through the sweet
Curdle of fields, where the plums
The Thought-Fox
© Ted Hughes
I imagine this midnight moment's forest:
Something else is alive
Beside the clock's loneliness
And this blank page where my fingers move.
The Death of Nicou
© Thomas Chatterton
On Tiber's banks, Tiber, whose waters glide
In slow meanders down to Gaigra's side;
And circling all the horrid mountain round,
Rushes impetuous to the deep profound;
Narva and Mored
© Thomas Chatterton
Recite the loves of Narva and Mored
The priest of Chalma's triple idol said.
High from the ground the youthful warriors sprung,
Loud on the concave shell the lances rung:
Heccar and Gaira
© Thomas Chatterton
Where the rough Caigra rolls the surgy wave,
Urging his thunders thro' the echoing cave;
Where the sharp rocks, in distant horror seen,
Drive the white currents thro' the spreading green;
Eclogues
© Thomas Chatterton
Syke Nigel sed, whan from the bluie sea
The upswol sayle dyd daunce before hys eyne;
Swefte as the wishe, hee toe the beeche dyd flee,
And found his fadre steppeynge from the bryne.
Letter thyssen menne, who haveth sprite of loove,
Bethyncke unto hemselves how mote the meetynge proove.
Frederick Douglass
© Paul Laurence Dunbar
A hush is over all the teeming lists,
And there is pause, a breath-space in the strife;
A spirit brave has passed beyond the mists
And vapors that obscure the sun of life.
And Ethiopia, with bosom torn,
Laments the passing of her noblest born.
The Pobble Who Has No Toes
© Edward Lear
The Pobble who has no toes
Had once as many as we;
When they said "Some day you may lose them all;"
He replied "Fish, fiddle-de-dee!"
Centenarians Story, The.
© Walt Whitman
GIVE me your hand, old Revolutionary;
The hill-top is nighbut a few steps, (make room, gentlemen;)
Up the path you have followd me well, spite of your hundred and extra years;
You can walk, old man, though your eyes are almost done;
Artillerymans Vision, The.
© Walt Whitman
WHILE my wife at my side lies slumbering, and the wars are over long,
And my head on the pillow rests at home, and the vacant midnight passes,
And through the stillness, through the dark, I hear, just hear, the breath of my infant,
There in the room, as I wake from sleep, this vision presses upon me:
Song of the Exposition.
© Walt Whitman
1
AFTER all, not to create only, or found only,
But to bring, perhaps from afar, what is already founded,
To give it our own identity, average, limitless, free;
Eidólons.
© Walt Whitman
I MET a Seer,
Passing the hues and objects of the world,
The fields of art and learning, pleasure, sense, To glean Eidólons.
Put in thy chants, said he,
Sing of the Banner at Day-Break.
© Walt Whitman
POET.
O A NEW song, a free song,
Flapping, flapping, flapping, flapping, by sounds, by voices clearer,
By the winds voice and that of the drum,
Apostroph.
© Walt Whitman
O MATER! O fils!
O brood continental!
O flowers of the prairies!
O space boundless! O hum of mighty products!
As a Strong Bird on Pinions Free.
© Walt Whitman
1
AS a strong bird on pinions free,
Joyous, the amplest spaces heavenward cleaving,
Such be the thought Id think to-day of thee, America,
Rise, O Days.
© Walt Whitman
1
RISE, O days, from your fathomless deeps, till you loftier, fiercer sweep!
Long for my soul, hungering gymnastic, I devourd what the earth gave me;
Long I roamd the woods of the northlong I watchd Niagara pouring;
World Below the Brine, The.
© Walt Whitman
THE world below the brine;
Forests at the bottom of the seathe branches and leaves,
Sea-lettuce, vast lichens, strange flowers and seedsthe thick tangle, the openings,
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