War poems
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Hermann And Dorothea - VI. Klio
© Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
Thus the magistrate spoke. The others departed and thanked him,
And the pastor produced a gold piece (the silver his purse held
He some hours before had with genuine kindness expended
When he saw the fugitives passing in sorrowful masses).
A Rocking Hymn
© George Wither
Sweet baby, sleep! what ails my dear,
What ails my darling thus to cry?
Be still, my child, and lend thine ear
To hear me sing thy lullaby.
My pretty lamb, forbear to weep;
Be still, my dear; sweet baby, sleep.
When We Two Parted
© Lord Byron
When we two parted
In silence and tears,
Half broken-hearted,
To sever for years,
Virtue is Its Own Reward
© Harry Graham
Virtue its own reward? Alas!
And what a poor one as a rule!
Be Virtuous and Life will pass
Like one long term of Sunday-School.
(No prospect, truly, could one find
More unalluring to the mind.)
Simon Wiesenthal: Survivors Burden
© Sharon Esther Lampert
After six million Jews were silenced:
Simon speaks above a hush.
Simon speaks above a whisper.
Simon speaks above an earshot.
Simon speaks out loud above the deafening scream of EVIL.
When We Were Kids
© Edgar Albert Guest
WHEN we wuz kids together, an' we didn't have a care,
In the lazy days of summer, when our feet wuz allus bare,
Stratton Water
© Dante Gabriel Rossetti
O HAVE you seen the Stratton flood
That's great with rain to-day?
Fiordispina
© Percy Bysshe Shelley
Lie there; sleep awhile in your own dew,
Ye faint-eyed children of the ... Hours,
Fiordispina said, and threw the flowers
Which she had from the breathing--
My Man
© Sharon Esther Lampert
My Man is passionate and strong, all through
the night, I know his emotional,
spiritual, and physical being; I feel
the breadth and depth of his masculinity.
The Ram
© Franz Werfel
You've inherited the great ram's features,
The black-wooled one that bred with Jacob's herds.
You found yourself enough in the desert,
On the thistleweed that bent in the wind.
Lee
© Stephen Vincent Benet
The army was asleep as armies sleep.
War lying on a casual sheaf peace
For a brief moment, and yet with armor on,
And yet in the cild's deep sleep, and yet so still.
Even the sentries seemed to walk their posts
With a ghost footfall that could match that night.
The Two Armies
© Wilcox Ella Wheeler
Once over the ocean in distant lands,
In an age long past, were two hostile bands-
Two armies of men, both brave, both strong,
And their hearts beat high as they marched along
To fight the battle of right and wrong.
Transformation
© Wilcox Ella Wheeler
She waited in a rose-hued room;
A wanton-hearted creature she,
But beautiful and bright to see
As some great orchid just in bloom.
When It's Over
© Max Plowman
"Young soldier, what will you be At the day's end?"
"Tired's what I'll be. I shall lie on the beach
Of a shore where the rippling waves just sigh,
And listen and dream and sleep and lie
Forgetting what I've had to learn and teach
And attack and defend."
After the Interval
© Boris Pasternak
About three months ago, when first
Upon our open, unprotected
And freezing garden snowstorms burst
In sudden fury, I reflected
