En.Citatepedia^®.ro

Joseph

If the stars fell; night's nameless dreams
Of bliss and blasphemy came true,
If skies were green and snow were gold,
And you loved me as I love you;

O long light hands and curled brown hair,
And eyes where sits a naked soul;
Dare I even then draw near and burn
My fingers in the aureole?

Yes, in the one wise foolish hour
God gives this strange strength to a man.
He can demand, though not deserve,
Where ask he cannot, seize he can.

But once the blood's wild wedding o'er,
Were not dread his, half dark desire,
To see the Christ-child in the cot,
The Virgin Mary by the fire?

poem by G.K. Chesterton from The Wild Knight and Other Poems (1900)
Submitted by Veronica Serbanoiu
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A Christmas Carol

The Christ-child lay on Mary's lap,
His hair was like a light.
(O weary, weary were the world,
But here is all aright.)

The Christ-child lay on Mary's breast,
His hair was like a star.
(O stern and cunning are the kings,
But here the true hearts are.)

The Christ-child lay on Mary's heart,
His hair was like a fire.
(O weary, weary is the world,
But here the world's desire.)

The Christ-child stood at Mary's knee,
His hair was like a crown,
And all the flowers looked up at him.
And all the stars looked down.

poem by G.K. Chesterton from The Wild Knight and Other Poems (1900)
Submitted by Veronica Serbanoiu
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Seasons of My Love

I loved a maid as fair as summer, with sunrise in her hair
There lived no other in the world could in my heart compare
Her eyes were stars of midnight bliss, her laugh a meadow breeze
I would have done all that she asked, so quick was I to please

I loved a maid as red as autumn, with sunset in her hair
Embraced in velvet lullabies, such sweetness did we share
We were all we ever had but we were wild and free
And in the lands you would not find a soul as lark as me

I loved a maid as white as winter, with snowflakes in her hair
The seasons of our love had both a beauty and despair
Two hearts that beat as one were we, our song was meant to be
And in the skies you would not find a dove as spry as she

I loved a maid as bright as spring, with blossoms in her hair
I loved her fierce, I loved her true, we were doomed; we did not care
The hands of time would take from me, even she was not to spare
In the whispers of my dreams, I still see my maiden fair

poem by Leonard Snow
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The Ballad of God-Makers

A bird flew out at the break of day
From the nest where it had curled,
And ere the eve the bird had set
Fear on the kings of the world.

The first tree it lit upon
Was green with leaves unshed;
The second tree it lit upon
Was red with apples red;

The third tree it lit upon
Was barren and was brown,
Save for a dead man nailed thereon
On a hill above a town.

That right the kings of the earth were gay
And filled the cup and can;
Last night the kings of the earth were chill
For dread of a naked man.

'If he speak two more words,' they said,
'The slave is more than the free;
If he speak three more words,' they said,
'The stars are under the sea.'

Said the King of the East to the King of the West,
I wot his frown was set,
'Lo; let us slay him and make him as dung,
It is well that the world forget.'

Said the King of the West to the King of the East,
I wot his smile was dread,
'Nay, let us slay him and make him a god,
It is well that our god be dead.'

They set the young man on a hill,
They nailed him to a rod;
And there in darkness and in blood
They made themselves a god.

And the mightiest word was left unsaid,
And the world had never a mark,
And the strongest man of the sons of men
Went dumb into the dark.

Then hymns and harps of praise they brought,
Incense and gold and myrrh,
And they thronged above the seraphim,
The poor dead carpenter.

'Thou art the prince of all,' they sang,
'Ocean and earth and air.'
Then the bird flew on to the cruel cross,
And hid in the dead man's hair.

'Thou art the sun of the world,' they cried,
'Speak if our prayers be heard.'
And the brown bird stirred in the dead man's hair,
And it seemed that the dead man stirred.

Then a shriek went up like the world's last cry
From all nations under heaven,
And a master fell before a slave
And begged to be forgiven.

They cowered, for dread in his wakened eyes
The ancient wrath to see;
And the bird flew out of the dead Christ's hair,
And lit on a lemon-tree.

poem by G.K. Chesterton from The Wild Knight and Other Poems (1900)
Submitted by Veronica Serbanoiu
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The Ballad of God-Makers

A bird flew out at the break of day
From the nest where it had curled,
And ere the eve the bird had set
Fear on the kings of the world.

The first tree it lit upon
Was green with leaves unshed;
The second tree it lit upon
Was red with apples red;

The third tree it lit upon
Was barren and was brown,
Save for a dead man nailed thereon
On a hill above a town.

That night the kings of the earth were gay
And filled the cup and can;
Last night the kings of the earth were chill
For dread of a naked man.

‘If he speak two more words,' they said,
‘The slave is more than the free;
If he speak three more words,' they said,
‘The stars are under the sea.'

Said the King of the East to the King of the West,
I wot his frown was set,
‘Lo, let us slay him and make him as dung,
It is well that the world forget.'

Said the King of the West to the King of the East,
I wot his smile was dread,
‘Nay, let us slay him and make him a god,
It is well that our god be dead.'

They set the young man on a hill,
They nailed him to a rod;
And there in darkness and in blood
They made themselves a god.

And the mightiest word was left unsaid,
And the world had never a mark,
And the strongest man of the sons of men
Went dumb into the dark.

Then hymns and harps of praise they brought,
Incense and gold and myrrh,
And they thronged above the seraphim,
The poor dead carpenter.

‘Thou art the prince of all,' they sang,
‘Ocean and earth and air.'
Then the bird flew on to the cruel cross,
And hid in the dead man's hair.

‘Thou art the son of the world.' they cried, `
‘Speak if our prayers be heard.'
And the brown bird stirred in the dead man's hair
And it seemed that the dead man stirred.

Then a shriek went up like the world's last cry
From all nations under heaven,
And a master fell before a slave
And begged to be forgiven.

They cowered, for dread in his wakened eyes
The ancient wrath to see;
And a bird flew out of the dead Christ's hair,
And lit on a lemon tree.

poem by Gilbert Keith Chesterton
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Mary Mary Magdalene

Mary Mary Magdalene,
what do all those stories mean?
Mary, Mary, is it true,
Jesus had a thing for you?

Mary, Mary – He lay with you?
Mary, Mary, tell me true
Mary, Mary, red hair wild,
did He leave you great with child?

Mary, was your love so steady,
that you had had His kids already?
Mary, Mary, at the Cross,
did it feel a gain or loss?

Mary, Mary – on that third day,
what was it like with the stone rolled away?
Mary, Mary, running there with love,
what did you think when He rose above?

Mary, Mary – what was it like, after?
Were there tears or joyful laughter?
Mary, Mary – the kids you had –
did they turn out like their Dad?

Mary, Mary, whore redeemed,
did it work out like you dreamed?
Mary, Mary – your afterlife –
was it mostly love, or mostly strife?

Mary, Mary, were you worshipped or despised
As Mary’s daughter-in-law, Mrs. Christ?
Mary, Mary, did you stay,
or feel you had to take the kids away?

Mary, Mary, with so much love,
did you, too, rise to heaven above?
Mary, Mary, in the sky,
all we ask are the reasons why…

Mary, Mary Magdalene,
What is really true? What does it really mean?

poem by Michael Shepherd
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A Christmas Carol

THREE DAMSELS in the queen’s chamber,
The queen’s mouth was most fair;
She spake a word of God’s mother
As the combs went in her hair.
Mary that is of might,
Bring us to thy Son’s sight.

They held the gold combs out from her,
A span’s length off her head;
She sang this song of God’s mother
And of her bearing-bed.
Mary most full of grace,
Bring us to thy Son’s face.

When she sat at Joseph’s hand,
She looked against her side;
And either way from the short silk band
Her girdle was all wried.
Mary that all good may,
Bring us to thy Son’s way.

Mary had three women for her bed,
The twain were maidens clean;
The first of them had white and red,
The third had riven green.
Mary that is so sweet,
Bring us to thy Son’s feet.

She had three women for her hair,
Two were gloved soft and shod;
The third had feet and fingers bare,
She was the likest God.
Mary that wieldeth land,
Bring us to thy Son’s hand.

She had three women for her ease,
The twain were good women:
The first two were the two Maries,
The third was Magdalen.
Mary that perfect is,
Bring us to thy Son’s kiss.

Joseph had three workmen in his stall,
To serve him well upon;
The first of them were Peter and Paul,
The third of them was John.
Mary, God’s handmaiden,
Bring us to thy Son’s ken.

“If your child be none other man’s,
But if it be very mine,
The bedstead shall be gold two spans,
The bedfoot silver fine.”
Mary that made God mirth,
Bring us to thy Son’s birth.

“If the child be some other man’s,
And if it be none of mine,
The manger shall be straw two spans,
Betwixen kine and kine.”
Mary that made sin cease,
Bring us to thy Son’s peace.

Christ was born upon this wise,
It fell on such a night,
Neither with sounds of psalteries,
Nor with fire for light.
Mary that is God’s spouse,
Bring us to thy Son’s house.

The star came out upon the east
With a great sound and sweet:
Kings gave gold to make him feast
And myrrh for him to eat.
Mary, of thy sweet mood,
Bring us to thy Son’s good.

He had two handmaids at his head,
One handmaid at his feet;
The twain of them were fair and red,
The third one was right sweet.
Mary that is most wise,
Bring us to thy Son’s eyes. Amen.

poem by Algernon Charles Swinburne
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Earth-Visitors

(To N.L.)
THERE were strange riders once, came gusting down
Cloaked in dark furs, with faces grave and sweet,
And white as air. None knew them, they were strangers—
Princes gone feasting, barons with gipsy eyes
And names that rang like viols—perchance, who knows,
Kings of old Tartary, forgotten, swept from Asia,
Blown on raven chargers across the world,
For ever smiling sadly in their beards
And stamping abruptly into courtyards at midnight.
Post-boys would run, lanterns hang frostily, horses fume,
The strangers wake the Inn. Men, staring outside
Past watery glass, thick panes, could watch them eat,
Dyed with gold vapours in the candleflame,
Clapping their gloves, and stuck with crusted stones,
Their garments foreign, their talk a strange tongue,
But sweet as pineapple—it was Archdukes, they must be.
In daylight, nothing; only their prints remained
Bitten in snow. They'd gone, no one knew where,
Or when, or by what road—no one could guess—
None but some sleepy girls, half tangled in dreams,
Mixing up miracle and desire; laughing, at first,
Then staring with bright eyes at their beds, opening their lips,
Plucking a crushed gold feather in their fingers,
And laughing again, eyes closed. But one remembered,
Between strange kisses and cambric, in the dark,
That unearthly beard had lifted. . . . 'Your name, child?'
'Sophia, sir—and what to call your Grace?'
Like a bubble of gilt, he had laughed 'Mercury!'
It is long now since great daemons walked on earth,
Staining with wild radiance a country bed,
And leaving only a confusion of sharp dreams
To vex a farm-girl—that, and perhaps a feather,
Some thread of the Cloth of Gold, a scale of metal,
Caught in her hair. The unpastured Gods have gone,
They are above those fiery-coasted clouds
Floating like fins of stone in the burnt air,
And earth is only a troubled thought to them
That sometimes drifts like wind across the bodies
Of the sky's women.
There is one yet comes knocking in the night,
The drums of sweet conspiracy on the pane,
When darkness has arched his hands over the bush
And Springwood steams with dew, and the stars look down
On that one lonely chamber. . . .
She is there suddenly, lit by no torch or moon,
But by the shining of her naked body.
Her breasts are berries broken in snow; her hair
Blows in a gold rain over and over them.
She flings her kisses like warm guineas of love,
And when she walks, the stars walk with her above.
She knocks. The door swings open, shuts again.
'Your name, child?'
A thousand birds cry 'Venus!'

poem by Kenneth Slessor
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Stars

(For the Rev. James J. Daly, S. J.)

Bright stars, yellow stars, flashing through the air,
Are you errant strands of Lady Mary's hair?
As she slits the cloudy veil and bends down through,
Do you fall across her cheeks and over heaven too?

Gay stars, little stars, you are little eyes,
Eyes of baby angels playing in the skies.
Now and then a winged child turns his merry face
Down toward the spinning world -- what a funny place!

Jesus Christ came from the Cross (Christ receive my soul!)
In each perfect hand and foot there was a bloody hole.
Four great iron spikes there were, red and never dry,
Michael plucked them from the Cross and set them in the sky.

Christ's Troop, Mary's Guard, God's own men,
Draw your swords and strike at Hell and strike again.
Every steel-born spark that flies where God's battles are,
Flashes past the face of God, and is a star.

poem by Joyce Kilmer
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Oh! Lisa With These Lovely Eyes

Lisa with the dark brown eyes
So please tell my soul to sympathize,
We shall cry forever in overcast skies
Lisa with the dark brown eyes,

Lisa with the dark brown eyes
Heartbroken heart spoken, not taken back
To change a mind so is lifes dream
Lisa with the dark brown eyed

Lisa with the dark brown eyes
That blends your butter scotch face insight
Smiles which brings sparkles to my mind
Lisa with the dark brown eyes

Lisa with the dark brown eyes
Many pre thoughts of your strays hypnotize
French, African, English culture dies
Lisa with the dark brown eyes

Lisa with the dark brown eyes
She dabbles her life in fiction trash
her soul with curious follies
Lisa with the dark brown eyes

Lisa with the dark brown eyes
Loneliness, has come far a sad. sad day
Emptiness in your mind and heart pay
Lisa with the dark brown eyes

Lisa with the dark, dark, brown eyes
You walk the world in beauty forgotten
They speak about you something forbidden
Lisa with the dark, dark, brown eyes

Lisa with the dark, dark, brown eyes
Your body your mind so whole same so
Your gave birth and I wish I could understand, understand
Lisa with the dark dark raven eyes

Lisa with the dark dark brown eyes
Curiosity is so special time flies, my sighs
Persuaded a fool to be wise, so wise how wise
Lisa with the dark dark brown eyes.

poem by Klayne Mario Burton
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Leda

Do you remember, Leda?

There are those who love, to whom Love brings
Great gladness: such things have not I.
Love looks and has no mercy, brings
Long doom to others. Such was I.
Heart breaking hand upon the lute
Long last made musical by you?
Sharp bird-beak in the swelling fruit,
Or raise the eyelids of these flowers?

I dare not watch that hidden pool,
Nor see the wild bird's sudden wing
Lifting the wide, brown shaken pool,
But round me falls that secret wing,
And in that sharp, perverse, sweet pain
That is half-terror and half-bliss
My withered hands are curled on pain
That were so wide once, after bliss.
And gold is springing in my hair
As my thought spring and flower with it,
Though I sit hid in my grey hair,
Without love or the pain of it.

Yet, oh my Swan, if love have wings,
As the gods tell us, you were love
Who took and broke me with those wings.
I, weak, and being far gone in love
Let blushless things be breathed and done-
Things flowered out now in bitter fruit
That once done are no more undone
Than last year's frost and last year's fruit.

For what has come of love and me
Who knew the first joy that loving is?
Where has love led and beckoned me
But to the end where nothing is?
I have seen my blood beat out again
Red in the hands of all my line,
My sin has swelled and flowered again
Corrupt and fierce through Sparta's line.
Bred through me-bred through delicate hands
And wandering eyes and wanton lips,
Sighing after strange flesh as sighed these lips,

Straying after new sin as strayed these hands.
Mother of Helen! She whose breasts
To new desires unshaped the world;
Above Troy's summit towered these breasts
Helen who wantoned with the world!
Helen is dead (she had love enough
To mock at doom and laugh at shrine)
And Clytemnestra, quiet enough
To-night beneath Apollo's shrine.
And I am left, the source, the spring
Of all their madness. They are dead
While I still sit here, the old spring
That fouled them flows above the dead.

But I have paid. I have borne enough.
I am very old in love and woe.
For all souls these things are enough-
Who have known love are the friends of woe.
There those who love, and who escape,
There are those who love and do not die.
I loved, and there was no escape,
Long since I died and daily die.
And death alone makes hate and love
Friends with each other and with sleep . . .
All's quiet here that once was love,
This that is left belongs to sleep.

poem by Muriel Stuart
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Feast Of The Assumption

Dark! Dark! Dark!
The sun is set; the day is dead:
Thy Feast has fled;
My eyes are wet with tears unshed;
I bow my head;
Where the star-fringed shadows softly sway
I bend my knee,
And, like a homesick child, I pray,
Mary, to thee.

Dark! Dark! Dark!
And, all the day -- since white-robed priest
In farthest East,
In dawn's first ray -- began the Feast,
I -- I the least --
Thy least, and last, and lowest child,
I called on thee!
Virgin! didst hear? my words were wild;
Didst think of me?

Dark! Dark! Dark!
Alas! and no! The angels bright,
With wings as white
As a dream of snow in love and light,
Flashed on thy sight;
They shone like stars around thee, Queen!
I knelt afar --
A shadow only dims the scene
Where shines a star!

Dark! Dark! Dark!
And all day long, beyond the sky,
Sweet, pure, and high,
The angel's song swept sounding by
Triumphantly;
And when such music filled thy ear,
Rose round thy throne,
How could I hope that thou wouldst hear
My far, faint moan?

Dark! Dark! Dark!
And all day long, where altars stand,
Or poor or grand,
A countless throng from every land,
With lifted hand,
Winged hymns to thee from sorrow's vale
In glad acclaim;
How couldst thou hear my lone lips wail
Thy sweet, pure name?

Dark! Dark! Dark!
Alas! and no! Thou didst not hear
Nor bend thy ear,
To prayer of woe as mine so drear;
For hearts more dear
Hid me from hearing and from sight
This bright Feast-day;
Wilt hear me, Mother, if in its night
I kneel and pray?

Dark! Dark! Dark!
The sun is set, the day is dead;
Thy Feast hath fled;
My eyes are wet with the tears I shed;
I bow my head;
Angels and altars hailed thee, Queen,
All day; ah! be
To-night what thou hast ever been --
A mother to me!

Dark! Dark! Dark!
Thy queenly crown in angels' sight
Is fair and bright;
Ah! lay it down; for, oh! to-night
Its jeweled light
Shines not as the tender love-light shines,
O Mary! mild,
In the mother's eyes, whose pure heart pines
For poor, lost child!

Dark! Dark! Dark!
Sceptre in hand, thou dost hold sway
Fore'er and aye
In angel-land; but, fair Queen! pray
Lay it away.
Let thy sceptre wave in the realms above
Where angels are;
But, Mother! fold in thine arms of love
Thy child afar!

Dark! Dark! Dark!
Mary, I call! Wilt hear the prayer
My poor lips dare?
Yea! be to all a Queen most fair,
Crown, sceptre, bear!
But look on me with a mother's eyes
From heaven's bliss;
And waft to me from the starry skies
A mother's kiss!

Dark! Dark! Dark!
The sun is set; the day is dead;
Her Feast has fled;
Can she forget the sweet blood shed,
The last words said
That evening -- 'Woman! behold thy Son!
Oh! priceless right,
Of all His children! The last, least one,
Is heard to-night.

poem by Abram Joseph Ryan
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Eyes of a child

Eyes of a child
Such gems in stones
Staring you close
Still as blue sky
They don't lie
Their sun is shining
While you are crying

Eyes of a child
Day or night
I got no light
Free as a child
I can be wild
Eyes of a child

Let them go, into the snow
Without your grace
There's a lot more to know
Just glance over their face

It's the eye of a child
Free and wild

Child don't think too much
Ain't no worry as such
Joy driven life they live
Half-a-soul they give

It's the eyes of a child
Free and wild

Save me child
Save me child
Set me free and wild
Eyes of my child

poem by Siddharth Shah
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Comfortable Light

Most comfortable Light,
Light of the small lamp burning up the night,
With dawn enleagued against the beaten dark;
Pure golden perfect spark;

Or sudden wind-bright flame,
That but the strong-handed wind can urge or tame;
Chill loveliest light the kneeling clouds between,
Silverly serene;

Comfort of happy light,
That mouse-like leaps amid brown leaves, cheating sight;
Clear naked stars, burning with swift intense
Earthward intelligence;--

Sensitive, single
Points in the dark inane that purely tingle
With eager fire, pouring night's circles through
Their living blue;

Dark light still waters hold;
Broad silver moonpath trodden into gold:
Candle-flame glittering through the traveller's night--
Most comfortable light....

And lovelier, the eye
Where light from darkness shines unfathomably,
Light secret, clear, shallow, profound, known, strange,
Constant alone in change:--

Not that wild light that turns
Hunted from dying eyes when the last fire burns;
O, not that bitter light of wounded things,
When bony anguish springs

Sudden, intolerable;
Nor light of mad eyes gleaming up from hell....
Come not again, wild light! Shine not again,
Hill-flare of pain!

But thou, most holy light....
Not the noon blaze that stings, too fiercely bright,
Not that unwinking stare of shameless day;
But thou, the gray,

Nun-like and silent, still,
Fine-breathed on many an eastern bare green hill;
Keen light of gray eyes, cool rain, and stern spears;
Sad light, but not to tears:--

--O, comfort thou of eyes
Watching expectant from chill northern skies,
Excellent joy for lids heavy with night--
Strange with delight!

poem by John Freeman
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Your Hair

Your hair, a city of chestnut brown
With locks resilient like hands, steady ambidextrous hands
And the chamomile bliss and breeze in the land,
Subtly sit like an orphaned child

Your hair, and the enticing air
Twisted and curled, devoured by a cicada
With pointed antenna beaming forward
Quantum leaps and celestial bodies reunited

Your hair, of soft and cozy feel
Buried me underneath the aroma
Of coffee-laced and inebriated mornings,
In the strands of the rays of the Sun,

Hanging by a thread,
Dwindling by the street lamps that flicker -
Ensconced in the premise of the night
And the eyes resembling a masked crescent moon

Then it should appear to me,
Like a fire and a name emblazoned on pavements
Talking like puppets and mannequins
With shunned eyes and stationary stances

Your hair, not that I know of -
The surreal and bizarre complex
Of the strands and locks that entwine
With fate and time, leaving me dismantled

I feel naked underneath your hair,
And over your lips, your lips of iridescence
My soul, lit like fireworks in high spirits
My oh my, do I wish to be buried underneath your hair

If I couldn't see you, like time eschewing the breath
Of sunshine's mouth, and the prying moon
Then I shall think of your hair and not your feet
For it is in your hair, have I found divine solace

And when I run my hands and caress thy chestnut brown
Of a hair so delighted by the chandeliers and lamps,
I feel my soul runaway in the impasse, the opaque tunnel
Your hair not of the arbitrator, not the trivial, but the certain

Your hair of enthralling fragrance and glowing with poise
Like stellar eyes in the dead azure, not resurrected
I long for your hair, and for your soul, like water flowing endlessly
And perhaps my love for you, on a mountainside streaming like a river.

poem by Windsor Guadalupe Jr
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Failure

THE BOY went out from the ranges grim,
And the breath of the mountains went with him;
With a song in his heart and a smile on his face,
And a light in his eyes for a foremost place:
And the good green earth, and the salt sea spray,
And the soft blue skies, they were his that day;
And, like Eden, ringed with a golden fire—
Afar rose the Land of His Heart’s Desire.
The boy went down to the city’s strife,
And his face was lost in the surge of life;
But a Power that he did not understand
Had nerved his brain and his fighting hand.
And he strove and failed, and he rose and won—
And he failed again ere the fight was done;
But he battled on when the days were dire
To win to the Land of His Heart’s Desire.

And there, in the heart of the stress and din,
’Mid want and labour and wealth and sin,
The strong man struggled with shining eyes,
And forced a passage, and grasped the prize.
And he cried to the Power who had lent the fire:
“Lo! Fame is the Land of My Heart’s Desire!
Give the cup to me with a beaded brim.”
And the Power that he knew not gave it him.

But the air is keen on the Cliffs of Fame,
And the shafts that fly have a deadly aim!
With a foothold scarce, and a sleepless dread
For the gulfs below and the heights o’erhead,
He cried to the Power who had steeled his hand:
“I am outcast yet from my Fairyland!
For Fame is a land where no strength may tire,
But Love is the Land of My Heart’s Desire!”

Then there came to the man all his dream of Love,
With the brow of snow and the eyes of a dove,
With the glint of the sun on her wavy hair,
And her soul as pure as her face was fair.
Like a living lily to him she came,
Till his eyes were wet and his soul was flame,
And she called to him, with an outstretched hand,
And they entered into the Promised Land.

But there came a day when he asked his soul,
“Is this the land, and is this the goal?”
In his heart there lay what his lips denied—
The pang of a hunger unsatisfied.
“For Fame,” he said, “and for Love I wrought;
They are not the things that I should have sought:
’Tis to boundless power that my dreams aspire—
And Wealth is the Land of My Heart’s Desire!”

Then the Power that he did not understand
Gave him ships and houses and gold and land,
And the man’s power grew with each passing year;
But his thoughts were vexed with a sleepless fear,
And his hair grew gray with the iron strain
Of the dread of loss and the lust of gain,
And he bowed his head on his hands and said.
“All things are mine, but my heart is dead!”

And he thought of the boy from the ranges grim
With the breath of the mountains over him,
With a song in his heart and a smile on his face,
And a light in his eyes for a foremost place,
And the good green earth and the salt sea spray,
And the soft blue skies that were his that day,
When, like Eden, ringed with a golden fire,
Afar rose the Land of His Heart’s Desire.

Then clear on his startled ear there fell
A voice like the sound of a silver bell:
“To each is the work that he best can do,
But you turned from the work when it called to you.
And you sought instead for the vulgar praise,
For the lips of love, and for prosperous days.
And with all that the world can give you here,
You have lost the thing that you hold most dear.
For who hears the word that the Gods inspire—
In his work finds the Land of His Heart’s Desire.”

poem by George Essex Evans
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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Insomnia

Thin are the night-skirts left behind
By daybreak hours that onward creep,
And thin, alas! the shred of sleep
That wavers with the spirit's wind:
But in half-dreams that shift and roll
And still remember and forget,
My soul this hour has drawn your soul
A little nearer yet.

Our lives, most dear, are never near,
Our thoughts are never far apart,
Though all that draws us heart to heart
Seems fainter now and now more clear.
To-night Love claims his full control,
And with desire and with regret
My soul this hour has drawn your soul
A little nearer yet.

Is there a home where heavy earth
Melts to bright air that breathes no pain,
Where water leaves no thirst again
And springing fire is Love's new birth?
If faith long bound to one true goal
May there at length its hope beget,
My soul that hour shall draw your soul
For ever nearer yet.

poem by Dante Gabriel Rossetti
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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The Night Journey

Hands and lit faces eddy to a line;
The dazed last minutes click; the clamour dies.
Beyond the great-swung arc o' the roof, divine,
Night, smoky-scarv'd, with thousand coloured eyes

Glares the imperious mystery of the way.
Thirsty for dark, you feel the long-limbed train
Throb, stretch, thrill motion, slide, pull out and sway,
Strain for the far, pause, draw to strength again. . . .

As a man, caught by some great hour, will rise,
Slow-limbed, to meet the light or find his love;
And, breathing long, with staring sightless eyes,
Hands out, head back, agape and silent, move

Sure as a flood, smooth as a vast wind blowing;
And, gathering power and purpose as he goes,
Unstumbling, unreluctant, strong, unknowing,
Borne by a will not his, that lifts, that grows,

Sweep out to darkness, triumphing in his goal,
Out of the fire, out of the little room. . . .
- There is an end appointed, O my soul!
Crimson and green the signals burn; the gloom

Is hung with steam's far-blowing livid streamers.
Lost into God, as lights in light, we fly,
Grown one with will, end-drunken huddled dreamers.
The white lights roar. The sounds of the world die.

And lips and laughter are forgotten things.
Speed sharpens; grows. Into the night, and on,
The strength and splendour of our purpose swings.
The lamps fade; and the stars. We are alone.

poem by Rupert Brooke (1913)
Submitted by Veronica Serbanoiu
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Night Journey, The

Hands and lit faces eddy to a line;
The dazed last minutes click; the clamour dies.
Beyond the great-swung arc o' the roof, divine,
Night, smoky-scarv'd, with thousand coloured eyes

Glares the imperious mystery of the way.
Thirsty for dark, you feel the long-limbed train
Throb, stretch, thrill motion, slide, pull out and sway,
Strain for the far, pause, draw to strength again. . . .

As a man, caught by some great hour, will rise,
Slow-limbed, to meet the light or find his love;
And, breathing long, with staring sightless eyes,
Hands out, head back, agape and silent, move

Sure as a flood, smooth as a vast wind blowing;
And, gathering power and purpose as he goes,
Unstumbling, unreluctant, strong, unknowing,
Borne by a will not his, that lifts, that grows,

Sweep out to darkness, triumphing in his goal,
Out of the fire, out of the little room. . . .
-- There is an end appointed, O my soul!
Crimson and green the signals burn; the gloom

Is hung with steam's far-blowing livid streamers.
Lost into God, as lights in light, we fly,
Grown one with will, end-drunken huddled dreamers.
The white lights roar. The sounds of the world die.

And lips and laughter are forgotten things.
Speed sharpens; grows. Into the night, and on,
The strength and splendour of our purpose swings.
The lamps fade; and the stars. We are alone.

poem by Rupert Brooke
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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Mater Dolorosa

Who is this that sits by the way, by the wild wayside,
In a rent stained raiment, the robe of a cast-off bride,
In the dust, in the rainfall sitting, with soiled feet bare,
With the night for a garment upon her, with torn wet hair?
She is fairer of face than the daughters of men, and her eyes,
Worn through with her tears, are deep as the depth of skies.

This is she for whose sake being fallen, for whose abject sake,
Earth groans in the blackness of darkness, and men's hearts break.
This is she for whose love, having seen her, the men that were
Poured life out as water, and shed their souls upon air.
This is she for whose glory their years were counted as foam;
Whose face was a light upon Greece, was a fire upon Rome.

Is it now not surely a vain thing, a foolish and vain,
To sit down by her, mourn to her, serve her, partake in the pain?
She is grey with the dust of time on his manifold ways,
Where her faint feet stumble and falter through year-long days.
Shall she help us at all, O fools, give fruit or give fame,
Who herself is a name despised, a rejected name?

We have not served her for guerdon. If any do so,
That his mouth may be sweet with such honey, we care not to know.
We have drunk from a wine-unsweetened, a perilous cup,
A draught very bitter. The kings of the earth stood up,
And the rulers took counsel together, to smite her and slay;
And the blood of her wounds is given us to drink today.

Can these bones live? or the leaves that are dead leaves bud?
Or the dead blood drawn from her veins be in your veins blood?
Will ye gather up water again that was drawn and shed?
In the blood is the life of the veins, and her veins are dead.
For the lives that are over are over, and past things past;
She had her day, and it is not; was first, and is last.

Is it nothing unto you then, all ye that pass by,
If her breath be left in her lips, if she live now or die?
Behold now, O people, and say if she be not fair,
Whom your fathers followed to find her, with praise and prayer,
And rejoiced, having found her, though roof they had none nor bread;
But ye care not; what is it to you if her day be dead?

It was well with our fathers; their sound was in all men's lands;
There was fire in their hearts, and the hunger of fight in their
hands.
Naked and strong they went forth in her strength like flame,
For her love's and her name's sake of old, her republican name.
But their children, by kings made quiet, by priests made wise,
Love better the heat of their hearths than the light of her eyes.

Are they children of these thy children indeed, who have sold,
O golden goddess, the light of thy face for gold?
Are they sons indeed of the sons of thy dayspring of hope,
Whose lives are in fief of an emperor, whose souls of a Pope?
Hide then thine head, O beloved; thy time is done;
Thy kingdom is broken in heaven, and blind thy sun.

What sleep is upon you, to dream she indeed shall rise,
When the hopes are dead in her heart as the tears in her eyes?
If ye sing of her dead, will she stir? if ye weep for her, weep?
Come away now, leave her; what hath she to do but sleep?
But ye that mourn are alive, and have years to be;
And life is good, and the world is wiser than we.

Yea, wise is the world and mighty, with years to give,
And years to promise; but how long now shall it live?
And foolish and poor is faith, and her ways are bare,
Till she find the way of the sun, and the morning air.
In that hour shall this dead face shine as the face of the sun,
And the soul of man and her soul and the world's be one.

poem by Algernon Charles Swinburne
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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The Tiger

Tyger! Tyger! burning bright
In the forest of the night
What immortal hand or eye
Could frame thy fearful symmetry?

In what distant deeps or skies
Burnt the fire of thine eyes?
On what wings dare he aspire?
What the hand dare seize the fire?

And What shoulder, and what art,
Could twist the sinews of thy heart?
And when thy heart began to beat,
What dread hand? and what dread feet?

What the hammer? what the chain?
In what furnace was thy brain?
What the anvil? what dread grasp
Dare its deadly terrors clasp?

When the stars threw down their spears,
And watered heaven with their tears,
Did he smile his work to see?
Did he who made the lamb make thee?

Tyger! Tyger! burning bright
In the forests of the night,
What immortal hand or eye
Dare frame thy fearful symmetry?

poem by William Blake
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