Always The Mob
Jesus emptied the devils of one man into forty hogs and the hogs took the edge of a high rock and dropped off and down into the sea: a mob.
The sheep on the hills of Australia, blundering fourfooted in the sunset mist to the dark, they go one way, they hunt one sleep, they find one pocket of grass for all.
Karnak? Pyramids? Sphinx paws tall as a coolie? Tombs kept for kings and sacred cows? A mob.
Young roast pigs and naked dancing girls of Belshazzar, the room where a thousand sat guzzling when a hand wrote: Mene, mene, tekel, upharsin? A mob.
The honeycomb of green that won the sun as the Hanging Gardens of Nineveh, flew to its shape at the hands of a mob that followed the fingers of Nebuchadnezzar: a mob of one hand and one plan.
Stones of a circle of hills at Athens, staircases of a mountain in Peru, scattered clans of marble dragons in China: each a mob on the rim of a sunrise: hammers and wagons have them now.
Locks and gates of Panama? The Union Pacific crossing deserts and tunneling mountains? The Woolworth on land and the Titanic at sea? Lighthouses blinking a coast line from Labrador to Key West? Pig iron bars piled on a barge whistling in a fog off Sheboygan? A mob: hammers and wagons have them to-morrow.
The mob? A typhoon tearing loose an island from thousand-year moorings and bastions, shooting a volcanic ash with a fire tongue that licks up cities and peoples. Layers of worms eating rocks and forming loam and valley floors for potatoes, wheat, watermelons.
The mob? A jag of lightning, a geyser, a gravel mass loosening…
The mob … kills or builds … the mob is Attila or Ghengis Khan, the mob is Napoleon, Lincoln.
I am born in the mob—I die in the mob—the same goes for you—I don’t care who you are.
I cross the sheets of fire in No Man’s land for you, my brother—I slip a steel tooth into your throat, you my brother—I die for you and I kill you—It is a twisted and gnarled thing, a crimson wool:
One more arch of stars,
In the night of our mist,
In the night of our tears.
poem by Carl Sandburg
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
Related quotes
A Fish For Two
The queen mother came in to see the king,
'Mene, Mene, Tekel, Upharsin'! !
And i met her and spoke with her,
But at dinner was a fish for two;
And i sat down to watch them eat.
poem by Edward Kofi Louis
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
Oahu
Here on this island, summer never sleeps.
In the green valleys, smoke in cane-time drifts
With mist—frail tide that laps the chasmed deeps
Between the steep clean hills as the sea-tide
Once washed the silent hidden hollow rifts
And unseen valleys of its unborn bride.
Sea-bride, child of earth’s red molten womb,
Daughter of fire and chaos long since sleeping,
Who were the people that made your green hills bloom?
Wedded to the seas they were, like you;
From the dark sea, while you your watch were keeping,
They came to make their destined rendezvous.
The broad bare feet step forth on virgin sand,
And eyes raise to the green eternal hills:
Gray mist, green hills and fertile red-clay land,
Alone no more. The carefree caroling laughter
Drifts inland, where valley mist distills
The songs that shall be sung forever after.
poem by S.J. Fulton
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
Go, Tell It On The Mountain
Go, tell it on the mountain
Over the hills and everywhere
Go, tell it on the mountain
Our jesus christ is born
When I was just a learner
I sought by night and day
To have the good lord help me
To guide me on my way
For I am like a shepherd
My hopes and faith to guard
Each day I find the answer
And love is my reward
Go, tell it on the mountain
Over the hills and everywhere
Go, tell it on the mountain
Our jesus christ is born
The shepherds kept their watching
Oer silent flocks by night
When lo! throughout the heavens
There shone a holy light
The shepherds feared and trembled
When high above the earth
Rang out an angels chorus
To hail our saviors birth
Go, tell it on the mountain
Over the hills and everywhere
Go, tell it on the mountain
Our jesus christ is born
Go, tell it on the mountain
Over the hills and everywhere
Go, tell it on the mountain
Our jesus christ is born
Our jesus, jesus christ is born
That jesus christ is born
Go and tell, tell it on the mountain
That jesus christ, christ is born
song performed by by Diana Ross
Submitted by Lucian Velea
Vote! | Copy!
The Drover Of The Stars
IT is little I care for earth's kings,
Its emperors, sultans and czars,
As I lie in the darkness and dream
All alone with my sheep and the stars.
For as dust of the moment are they,
Now agleam and now still on earth's breast;
But the stars, spreading wide in the night,
Travel on, ever on to the west.
My sheep, snugly camped in the dark,
Misty-white with the pale grasses blend;
But where is the camp of the stars?
And whither, O Night, do they wend?
Through leagues of dry distance we came,
Where dust-wreaths, wind-woven, upcurled,
Since Dawn dropped the rails of the east
And let the Day into our world.
Slow-moving we travelled the plains,
Trudging on through the sun and the wind,
Till Day galloped out of the west,
And Night set the sliprails behind.
And now, by my camp-fire alone,
A tryst with pale Wonder I keep —
That mystical Lady of Dreams,
Whose hour is the sleep-of-the-sheep.
Foot-tired in the grasses they lie,
Mist-pale in the darkness, and dumb;
Yet who was it mustered the stars,
And whence and what leagues have they come?
Who keeps them from straying apart?
Who urges them straight on their route?
No answer — none tell me; and lo!
The Night, though it listen, is mute!
Watch 'neath the stars of the Cross,
Orion, and Venus and Mars;
I am but a drover of sheep —
But who is the Drover of Stars?
poem by Roderic Quinn
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
Night Journey
Now as the train bears west,
Its rhythm rocks the earth,
And from my Pullman berth
I stare into the night
While others take their rest.
Bridges of iron lace,
A suddenness of trees,
A lap of mountain mist
All cross my line of sight,
Then a bleak wasted place,
And a lake below my knees.
Full on my neck I feel
The straining at a curve;
My muscles move with steel,
I wake in every nerve.
I watch a beacon swing
From dark to blazing bright;
We thunder through ravines
And gullies washed with light.
Beyond the mountain pass
Mist deepens on the pane;
We rush into a rain
That rattles double glass.
Wheels shake the roadbed stone,
The pistons jerk and shove,
I stay up half the night
To see the land I love.
poem by Theodore Roethke
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
Going Home
UNDER the young moon's slender shield
With the wind's cool lips on mine,
I went home from the Rabitty Field
As the clocks were striking nine.
The yews were dark in the level light,
The thorn-trees dropped with gold,
And a partridge called where the dew was white
In the grass on the edge of the fold.
O, had your hand been in my hand
As the long chalk-road I trod,
The green hills of the lovely land
Had seemed the hills of God.
poem by Marjorie Lowry Christie Pickthall
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
Improved Farm Land
Tall timber stood here once, hee on a corn belt farm along the Monon.
Here the roots of a half-mile of trees dug their runners deep in the loam for a grip and a hold against wind storms.
Then the axemen came and the chips flew to the zing of steel and handle--the lank railsplitters cut the big ones first, the beeches and the oaks, then the brush.
Dynamite, wagons, and horses took the stumps--the plows sunk their teeth in--now it is first class corn land--omproved property--and the hogs grunt over the fodder crops.
It would come hard now for this half mile of improved farm land along the Monon corn belt, on a piece of Grand Prarie, to remember once it had a great singing family of trees.
poem by Carl Sandburg
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
Jesus At Midnight
Jesus walks at Sunrise,
I wrote that once before
Through the clouds in his shroud
With tears, in his eyes.
For He stands, still searching
For the beauty that He made
But now it is gone, forever gone
For now it is Mans waste.
Jesus walks at Sunrise,
To survey the things He knew
But gone are the trees,
And the grass so green
And the peace, that once did soothe;
For the beautiful land that GOD made
It has all been erased,
And the sky above, which flew his dove
Is now filled, with Mans waste.
Jesus walks at Sunrise,
I wrote that once before
As though to be proud,
Of the beauty he brought out
As creator, and maker of our World.
He came to see His mountains
And His rivers and oceans so blue
The land so green, and air so clean
And watch the Eagles as they flew.
Jesus walks at Sunrise,
I wonder what does He see
The hate all around, and Mans ugly sound
From all of mans own disease.
But now Jesus's beauty is gone
Revealed through GOD's own sunlight,
And that I won't deny
And a tear for man I will cry,
For now Jesus, walks at midnight.
Randy L. McClave
poem by Randy McClave
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
Fly
Spread your wings, flyin over frozen mountains, crystal rivers, and geyser fountains,
Driftin above China's mystic forests, float with the breeze across seas to shore,
Deserts, cactus, and tumbleweeds,
Irish meadows, and fields of green,
Glide through cities of brick and stone, broken arrows of ancient Rome,
Come on and fly with me
Come on and fly with me
Come on and fly with me
Come on and fly with me
Come on and fly with me
Want you to fly with me
Come on and fly with me
Come on and fly with me
Haunted woodlands, forbidden trails,
Dust devils, caves, and OK Corrals,
Through castle halls, under water falls, pyramids crumble when nature calls,
Sky were blue become black with stars, lighting bugs kept within jars,
Sand moves quickly through the hour glass,
Wings spread, we can all fly at last,
Everybody come and fly away,
You must believe that you can fly away,
Spread your wings and come and fly away,
Just believe and you will fly away,
Rock will melt, coal crystalize, clouds with skylines materialize,
Wings spread take flights over northern lights,
Wolves howl over blood red moonlit nights,
Kings and queens within our dreams, the sky rains diamonds a ruby ring,
Oceans, rivers, lakes, and ponds, lions, in the cold brr's along,
Come on and fly with me
Come on and fly with me
Come on and fly with me
Come on and fly with me
Come on and fly with me
Want you to fly with me
Come on and fly with me
Come on and fly with me
Muslims travle to the land of Mecca,
Atlantis, hidden deep under forever, Iceland golden tombs of pharoah kings,
Rainbows sprinkling diamond rings, voices cryin out echo carries,
Angels dance with the cryptic fairies,
Gates of a
song performed by by Zug Izland
Submitted by Lucian Velea
Vote! | Copy!
The Fishermen
HURRAH! the seaward breezes
Sweep down the bay amain;
Heave up, my lads, the anchor!
Run up the sail again!
Leave to the lubber landsmen
The rail-car and the steed;
The stars of heaven shall guide us,
The breath of heaven shall speed.
From the hill-top looks the steeple,
And the lighthouse from the sand;
And the scattered pines are waving
Their farewell from the land.
One glance, my lads, behind us,
For the homes we leave one sigh,
Ere we take the change and chances
Of the ocean and the sky.
Now, brothers, for the icebergs
Of frozen Labrador,
Floating spectral in the moonshine,
Along the low, black shore!
Where like snow the gannet's feathers
On Brador's rocks are shed,
And the noisy murr are flying,
Like black scuds, overhead;
Where in mist the rock is hiding,
And the sharp reef lurks below,
And the white squall smites in summer,
And the autumn tempests blow;
Where, through gray and rolling vapor,
From evening unto morn,
A thousand, boats are hailing,
Horn answering unto horn.
Hurrah! for the Red Island,
With the white cross on its crown!
Hurrah! for Meccatina,
And its mountains bare and brown!
Where the Caribou's tall antlers
O'er the dwarf-wood freely toss,
And the footstep of the Mickmack
Has no sound upon the moss.
There we'll drop our lines, and gather
Old Ocean's treasures in,
Where'er the mottled mackerel
Turns up a steel-dark fin.
The sea's our field of harvest,
Its scaly tribes our grain;
We'll reap the teeming waters
As at home they reap the plain!
Our wet hands spread the carpet,
And light the hearth of home;
From our fish, as in the old time,
The silver coin shall come.
As the demon fled the chamber
Where the fish of Tobit lay,
So ours from all our dwellings
Shall frighten Want away.
Though the mist upon our jackets
In the bitter air congeals,
And our lines wind stiff and slowly
From off the frozen reels;
Though the fog be dark around us,
And the storm blow high and loud,
We will whistle down the wild wind,
And laugh beneath the cloud!
In the darkness as in daylight,
On the water as on land,
God's eye is looking on us,
And beneath us is His hand!
Death will find us soon or later,
On the deck or in the cot;
And we cannot meet him better
Than in working out our lot.
Hurrah! hurrah! the west-wind
Comes freshening down the bay,
The rising sails are filling;
Give way, my lads, give way!
Leave the coward landsman clinging
To the dull earth, like a weed;
The stars of heaven shall guide us,
The breath of heaven shall speed!
poem by John Greenleaf Whittier
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
Hawaiian
SANDALWOOD, you say, and in your thoughts it chimes
With Tyre and Solomon; to me it rhymes
With places bare upon Pacific mountains,
With spaces empty in the minds of men.
Sandalwood!
The Kings of Hawaii call out their men,
The men go up the mountains in files;
Hands that knew only the stone axe now wield the iron axe:
The sandalwood trees go down.
More sandalwood is called for:
The men who hunt the whale will buy sandalwood;
The Kings would change canoes for ships.
Men come down from the mountains carrying sandalwood on their backs;
More and more men are levied;
They go up the mountains in files; they leave their taropatches so that famine comes down on the land.
But this sandalwood grows upon other trees, a parasite;
It needs a growing thing to grow upon;
Its seed and its soil are not enough for it!
Too greedy are the Kings;
Too eager are the men who hunt the whale to sail to
Canton with fragrant wood to make shrines for the
Buddhas;
Too sharp is the iron axe!
Nothing will ever bring together again
The spores and the alien sap that nourished them,
The trees and the trees they would plant themselves
upon:
Like the myths of peoples,
Like the faiths of peoples,
Like the speech of peoples,
Like the ancient creation chants,
The sandalwood is gone!
A fragrance in shrines
But the trees will never live again!
poem by Padraic Colum
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
Solve Et Coagula
Fire, fire
I dissolve and solidify,
Destroy to recreate,
Disassemble to assemble something pure,
Our rubic sol-ve-et-co-ag-u-la
Kill to be born again, cycled a thousand times
Fire, planetary alchemy,
Fire, the time is here now
Fire, four corners to rise
Fire rise!
Fire, theres always loss within,
Fire, the cleansing its time
Fire, shooting arrows to the sky
Fire
I construct a new institution
Not out of bricks, iron, cement, concrete
Or steel
Our rubic sol-ve-et-co-ag-u-la
Distill to purify,
Weve done it a thousand times
Fire, planetary alchemy,
Fire, the time is here now
Fire, four corners to rise
Fire rise!
Fire, theres always loss within,
Fire, the cleansing its time
Fire, shooting arrows to the sky
Fire
Burn, bleed all the lives of life, ascend to
The sky
Burn, all the martyrs
Fire, planetary alchemy,
Fire, the time is here now
Fire, four corners to rise
Fire rise!
Fire, theres always loss within,
Fire, the cleansing its time
Fire, shooting arrows to the sky
Fire
song performed by by Mudvayne
Submitted by Lucian Velea
Vote! | Copy!
Heartland
See the sunrise over her skin
Dont change it
See the sunrise over her skin
Dawn changes everything
And the delta sun burns bright and violet
Mississippi and the cotton wool heat
Sixty-six the highway that speaks
Of deserts dry
Of cold grey valleys
Of golden sunny heights
Of bright shining cities
In this heartland
In this heartland
In this heartland
Heaven knows this is a heartland
See the sunrise over her skin
She feels like water on my hand
Freeway like a river cuts through this land
Into the side of love
Like a burning spear
And the poison rain
Brings a flood of fear
Through the ghost-ranch hills
Death valley waters
In the towers of steel
Belief goes on and on
In this heartland
In this heartland
In this heartland
Heaven knows this is a heartland
song performed by by U2
Submitted by Lucian Velea
Vote! | Copy!
The Secret Key
There is a magic kingdom of strange powers,
Thought-hidden, lit by other stars than ours;
And, when a wanderer through its mazes brings
Word of things seen, men say: “A poet sings.”
Its gates are guarded in a sterile land—
Mountain and deep morass, and shifting sand;
Storm-barred are they, and may not opened be
Save by the hand that finds the secret key.
That key, some say, lies in the sunset glow,
Or the white arc of dawn, or where the flow
Of some lone river stems the shoreward wave
In shuddering silver on its ocean grave.
Some say that when the wind wars with the sea,
In that stern music, one may find the key;
Or, in green glooms of forests, where the pine
Uplifts her spear amid great wreaths of vine;
Or, where the streaming mist’s white rollers climb
The dark ravine and precipice sublime—
A filmy sea that twines and intertwines
Wreathes the low hills, and veils the mighty lines
Of sovran mountains, crimsoned and aglow
In crystal pomp, crested with jewelled snow;
But still, with souls afire, men seek that land,
And die in deep morass and shifting sand.
To those alone its iron gates are free,
Who find, within their hearts, the secret key;
For Earth, with all the colour of her day,
Is not their country—that lies far away.
poem by George Essex Evans
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
Baltic Fog Notes
Seven days all fog, all mist, and the turbines pounding through high seas.
I was a plaything, a rat’s neck in the teeth of a scuffling mastiff.
Fog and fog and no stars, sun, moon.
Then an afternoon in fjords, low-lying lands scrawled in granite languages on a gray sky,
A night harbor, blue dusk mountain shoulders against a night sky,
And a circle of lights blinking: Ninety thousand people here.
Among the Wednesday night thousands in goloshes and coats slickered for rain,
I learned how hungry I was for streets and people.
I would rather be water than anything else.
I saw a drive of salt fog and mist in the North Atlantic and an iceberg dusky as a cloud in the gray of morning.
And I saw the dream pools of fjords in Norway … and the scarf of dancing water on the rocks and over the edges of mountain shelves.
Bury me in a mountain graveyard in Norway.
Three tongues of water sing around it with snow from the mountains.
Bury me in the North Atlantic.
A fog there from Iceland will be a murmur in gray over me and a long deep wind sob always.
Bury me in an Illinois cornfield.
The blizzards loosen their pipe organ voluntaries in winter stubble and the spring rains and the fall rains bring letters from the sea.
poem by Carl Sandburg
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
The Poor Girl's Meditation
I AM sitting here
Since the moon rose in the night,
Kindling a fire,
And striving to keep it alight;
The folk of the house are lying
In slumber deep;
The geese will be gabbling soon:
The whole of the land is asleep.
May I never leave this world
Until my ill-luck is gone;
Till I have cows and sheep,
And the lad that I love for my own;
I would not think it long,
The night I would lie at his breast,
And the daughters of spite, after that,
Might say the thing they liked best.
Love takes the place of hate,
If a girl have beauty at all:
On a bed that was narrow and high,
A three-month I lay by the wall:
When I bethought on the lad
That I left on the brow of the hill,
I wept from dark until dark,
And my cheeks have the tear-tracks still.
And, O young lad that I love,
I am no mark for your scorn;
All you can say of me is
Undowered I was born:
And if I've no fortune in hand,
Nor cattle and sheep of my own,
This I can say, O lad,
I am fitted to lie my lone!
poem by Padraic Colum
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
Legion
With this man the demons had their way
among the tombs during night and day.
Men chained him attempting to subdue
and prevent what those demons made him do.
Ashamed he cut himself when so distressed
then he ran to Jesus this man possessed.
'Legion, Come out of him' the Master said
and at the Lords command the demons fled.
They had to obey for He was Divine
and fled to the hills entering the swine
The two thousand pigs ran down the bank
falling into the sea they drowned and sank.
The Demons were gone this man was made whole
no more in chains and agony of soul.
So he begged to go with Jesus on His way
But the Lord had a plan for him that day.
Then all dressed and in his right mind went he
through the ten cities giving testimony.
saying 'I came to Jesus all possessed
and now with His righteousness I'm dressed'
To be clothed and possess our right mind
is now possible when Jesus we find.
Let's run to Jesus just as this man did
and from all our demons we will be rid.
Based on the account recorded in Mark 5: 1-13
Listening To Agujetas
Sing, old man, those true songs of fire,
Songs that were too old for this air
Before you yourself were ever born.
Hammer those words against the night
As, once, you struck at the forge,
Feeling the sting of sparks
Cry out in triumph from its fierce iron.
Let the feet of the dancers play them too,
Your anguished words, your dark-throated songs:
Hammers against the fire within,
Fire against night, night against despair.
poem by Richard Lord
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
Cabinessence
Light the lamp and fire mellow,
Cabin essence timely hello,
Welcomes the time for a change.
Lost and found, you still remain there.
Youll find a meadow filled with grain there.
Ill give you a home on the range.
Who ran the iron horse?
Who ran the iron horse?
Who ran the iron horse?
Who ran the iron horse?
Who ran the iron horse?
Who ran the iron horse?
Who ran the iron horse?
Who ran the iron horse?
Who ran the iron horse?
Who ran the iron horse?
I want to watch you windblown facing
Waves of wheat for your embracing.
Folks sing a song of the grange.
Nestle in a kiss below there.
The constellations ebb and flow there.
And witness our home on the range.
Who ran the iron horse?
(truck driving man do what you can)
Who ran the iron horse?
(high-tail your load off the road)
Who ran the iron horse?
(out of night-life-its a gas man)
Who ran the iron horse?
(I dont believe I gotta grieve)
Who ran the iron horse?
(in and out of luck)
Who ran the iron horse?
(with a buck and a booth)
Who ran the iron horse?
(catchin on to the truth)
Who ran the iron horse?
(in the vast past, the last gasp)
Who ran the iron horse?
(in the land, in the dust, trust that you must)
Who ran the iron horse?
(catch as catch can)
Have you seen the grand coolie workin on the railroad?
Have you seen the grand coolie workin on the railroad?
Have you seen the grand coolie workin on the railroad?
Over and over,
The crow cries uncover the cornfield.
Over and over,
The thresher and hover the wheat field.
Over and over,
The crow cries uncover the cornfield.
Over and over,
The thresher and hover the wheat field.
Over and over,
The crow cries uncover the cornfield.
Over and over,
The thresher and hover the wheat field.
song performed by by Beach Boys
Submitted by Lucian Velea
Vote! | Copy!
Stonehaven Sunset
This song appears on three albums, and was first released on the flower that shattered the stone album, and has also been released on the stonehaven sunrise and the john denver collection - caly
Lbums.
Stonehaven sunset the waters on fire
My true love of singing, we kiss and conspire
Sing a song for the ocean a song for the sky
A song for tomorrow love sweet by and by
For the child who is coming and for dreams that come true
Sing a song for each other for me and for you
Sing a song for all lovers all the stars in the skies
Sing of stonehaven water home, stonehaven sunrise
Stonehaven sunset the deserts on fire
Christ on the cross again burns with desire
They are shooting at random though they aim at us all
Its the children who rise up and children who fall
All the angels are weeping the sweetest of tears
Fall like rivers of mercy to wash all our fears
Sing a song for old glory and a future that dies
Sing of stonehaven desert home, stonehaven sunrise
Stonehaven sunset the citys on fire
The soldiers just smile and say this guns for hire
Give in to the beast boy give in to the thrill
Its just human nature to hunt and to kill
We all die together and yet somehow alone
Just together we have memories and many are gone
Singing songs for old soldiers a chorus of sighs
Sing of stonehaven city home, stonehaven sunrise
Stonehaven sunset the mountains on fire
My spirit is lifted, rising higher and higher
All the prophets are laughing they say we told you so
Its one thing to play guessing games, another to know
For the needs of many are the sins of a few
And the day is forthcoming when accounting is due
Sing a song for sweet justice with a fire in her eyes
Sing of stonehaven mountain home, stonehaven sunrise
Stonehaven sunset the waters on fire
My true love of singing, we kiss and conspire
Sing a song for the ocean a song for the sky
A song for tomorrow love sweet by and by
For the child who is coming and for dreams that come true
Sing a song for each other for me and for you
Sing a song for all lovers all the stars in the skies
Sing of stonehaven water home, stonehaven sunrise
Words and music by john denver
song performed by by John Denver
Submitted by Lucian Velea
Vote! | Copy!