John Wasson
Oh! the dew-wet grass of the meadow in North Carolina
Through which Rebecca followed me wailing, wailing,
One child in her arms, and three that ran along wailing,
Lengthening out the farewell to me off to the war with the British,
And then the long, hard years down to the day of Yorktown.
And then my search for Rebecca,
Finding her at last in Virginia,
Two children dead in the meanwhile.
We went by oxen to Tennessee,
Thence after years to Illinois,
At last to Spoon River.
We cut the buffalo grass,
We felled the forests,
We built the school houses, built the bridges,
Leveled the roads and tilled the fields
Alone with poverty, scourges, death-
If Harry Wilmans who fought the Filipinos
Is to have a flag on his grave
Take it from mine!
poem by Edgar Lee Masters
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Related quotes
Backwards Traveller
Hey, did you know that im
Always going back in time
Rhyming slang, auld lang syne my dears
Through the years
I am the backwards traveller
Ancient wool unraveller
Sailng songs, wailing on the moon
And we were sailing songs, wailing on the moon
Wailing on the moon.
song performed by by Paul McCartney
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Ariel
Ariel
Oh troubled world what will be done?
What will happen if Ariel dies?
Will we settle into sleep?
relieved of his bluster and contempt,
spared from his smile which could be
no less sincere.
Will we escape the narrow eyes?
of a man who has never lived
with clean hands.
Will we coast into Bethlehem?
in the middle of Passover
our spirits crushed
by the wailing
of hired mourners
and a dirge of device and reparations.
Will the clanking of armor
ever cease under his dread auspices,
the noise of war and wailing,
of endless speech and curses.
Will the sands accept him?
as he sinks like the corner of a billboard
or a ragged running fence lost in drift.
Will his echo reverberate in stucco houses?
built atop catastrophe and eviction
which may as well have been built of mud
and straw and stand longer
The jagged world of Palestine will not miss him
for they have suffered him.
poem by George Murdock
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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Our village was built on the Ohio River, and was a halting place on this great national road, then the only avenue of traffic between the South and the North.
quote by Rebecca H. Davis
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Rebecca
In my mind , talk about rebecca , suddenly so fine
In my mind , visions of rebecca , suddenly shes mine
All night , seems she put a spell on me , oh yeah
All night , gonna be the death of me
Ill go out and get her
Rebecca , youre dreamin out loud
Rebecca , you got your head in the clouds
Youre savin yourself for someone , rebecca
Hangin on tight , waiting for rebecca , dancin in the dark
Satin and lace , shes so fine and mellow
Creature from the stars
So wrong , runnin with rebecca now , oh yeah
So wrong , gonna be the death of me
Ill go out and get her
Rebecca , youre dreamin out loud
Rebecca , you got your head in the clouds , alright
Youre savin yourself for someone , rebecca
Rebecca , youre runnin away
Rebecca , you cant face the day , alright
Cos you only live for the night
Rebecca , youre always runnin around
(break)
Ooh , talk about rebeccas eyes
Evrything you fantasize
Well, she drag you down to earth
Shes the devil in disguise
Break you down to size
Rebecca , youre dreamin out loud
Rebecca , you got your head in the clouds , alright
Savin yourself for someone
Rebecca , ooh , youre runnin away
Rebecca , you cant face the day , alright
You only live for the night , rebecca
Rebecca , youre dreamin out loud
Rebecca , you got your head in the clouds , alright
Savin yourself for someone , rebecca (fade)
song performed by by Bee Gees
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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The Negro people of America... have cut our forests, tilled our fields, built our railroads, fought our battles, and in all of their trials they have manifested a simple faith, a grateful heart, a cheerful spirit, and an undivided loyalty .
quote by Mordecai Wyatt Johnson
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Cold Air Masses
Your requiem is rising
from a wailing sea.
It blends among inconsolable
gull cries, beyond
your hearing.
Every fluctuating wave
calls to mind your unexpectant
departure, and now there
is no unharboured bird
more destitute
than I.
Your requiem is rising
from a wailing sea,
about to abort your awayness
and skepticism with yet
more in the series
of I-love-you's.
I would make an effort
to summon by sea-bird
back from sunless soaring heights
for your requiem is rising
still from a wailing sea.
reposted 03/05/08
poem by Gregory Wm. Gunn
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Elizabeth Childers
Dust of my dust,
And dust with my dust,
O, child who died as you entered the world,
Dead with my death!
Not knowing Breath, though you tried so hard,
With a heart that beat when you lived with me,
And stopped when you left me for Life.
It is well, my child. For you never traveled
The long, long way that begins with school days,
When little fingers blur under the tears
That fall on the crooked letters.
And the earliest wound, when a little mate
Leaves you alone for another;
And sickness, and the face of Fear by the bed;
The death of a father or mother;
Or shame for them, or poverty;
The maiden sorrow of school days ended;
And eyeless Nature that makes you drink
From the cup of Love, though you know it’s poisoned;
To whom would your flower-face have been lifted?
Botanist, weakling? Cry of what blood to yours?—
Pure or foul, for it makes no matter,
It’s blood that calls to our blood.
And then your children—oh, what might they be?
And what your sorrow? Child! Child!
Death is better than Life!
poem by Edgar Lee Masters from Spoon River Anthology
Submitted by Veronica Serbanoiu
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Loose Change
I built a house of cards
Built a house of rain
Built a house of love
Its hard to build again
Built a road to reason
Built a road to fate
Built a road to the promised land
Right up to the gate
Loose change in my pocket
Future in my hand
Too many distractions
For me to understand
Too many distractions
Got to get back home
Get into something solid
Get out of the zone
Some roads bring renewal
Some roads hide and wait
Some roads promise everything
And steal your fuel away
Loose change in my pocket
Future in my hand
Too many distractions
For me to understand
Some roads I been flyin
Some roads I crashed
Some roads I been sleepin on
Some roads I got back
Some roads I been runnin
Some roads I was stopped
Some roads I been walkin down
Some roads I was lost
song performed by by Neil Young
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Rebecca Wasson
Spring and Summer, Fall and Winter and Spring,
After each other drifting, past my window drifting!
And I lay so many years watching them drift and counting
The years till a terror came in my heart at times,
With the feeling that I had become eternal; at last
My hundredth year was reached! And still I lay
Hearing the tick of the clock, and the low of cattle
And the scream of a jay flying through falling leaves!
Day after day alone in a room of the house
Of a daughter-in-law stricken with age and gray.
And by night, or looking out of the window by day
My thought ran back, it seemed, through infinite time
To North Carolina and all my girlhood days,
And John, my John, away to the war with the British,
And all the children, the deaths, and all the sorrows.
And that stretch of years like a prairie in Illinois
Through which great figures passed like hurrying horsemen,
Washington, Jefferson, Jackson, Webster, Clay.
O beautiful young republic for whom my John and I
Gave all of our strength and love!
And O my John!
Why, when I lay so helpless in bed for years,
Praying for you to come, was your coming delayed?
Seeing that with a cry of rapture, like that I uttered
When you found me in old Virginia after the war,
I cried when I beheld you there by the bed,
As the sun stood low in the west growing smaller and fainter
In the light of your face!
poem by Edgar Lee Masters
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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Godwin James
Harry Wilmans! You who fell in a swamp
Near Manila, following the flag,
You were not wounded by the greatness of a dream,
Or destroyed by ineffectual work,
Or driven to madness by Satanic snags;
You were not torn by aching nerves,
Nor did you carry great wounds to your old age.
You did not starve, for the government fed you.
You did not suffer yet cry "forward"
To an army which you led
Against a foe with mocking smiles,
Sharper than bayonets. You were not smitten down
By invisible bombs. You were not rejected
By those for whom you were defeated.
You did not eat the savorless bread
Which a poor alchemy had made from ideals.
You went to Manila, Harry Wilmans,
While I enlisted in the bedraggled army
Of bright-eyed, divine youths,
Who surged forward, who were driven back and fell,
Sick, broken, crying, shorn of faith,
Following the flag of the Kingdom of Heaven.
You and I, Harry Wilmans, have fallen
In our several ways, not knowing
Good from bad, defeat from victory,
Nor what face it is that smiles
Behind the demoniac mask.
poem by Edgar Lee Masters
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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One President
'What are those, father?' 'Statesmen, my child
Lacrymose, unparliamentary, wild.'
'What are they that way for, father?' 'Last fall,
'Our candidate's better,' they said, 'than all!''
'What did they say he was, father?' 'A man
Built on a straight incorruptible plan-
Believing that none for an office would do
Unless he were honest and capable too.'
'Poor gentlemen-_so_ disappointed!' 'Yes, lad,
That is the feeling that's driving them mad;
They're weeping and wailing and gnashing because
They find that he's all that they said that he was.'
poem by Ambrose Bierce
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The Trapper's Christmas Eve
It's mighty lonesome-like and drear.
Above the Wild the moon rides high,
And shows up sharp and needle-clear
The emptiness of earth and sky;
No happy homes with love a-glow;
No Santa Claus to make believe:
Just snow and snow, and then more snow;
It's Christmas Eve, it's Christmas Eve.
And here am I where all things end,
And Undesirables are hurled;
A poor old man without a friend,
Forgot and dead to all the world;
Clean out of sight and out of mind . . .
Well, maybe it is better so;
We all in life our level find,
And mine, I guess, is pretty low.
Yet as I sit with pipe alight
Beside the cabin-fir
take to-night
The backward trail of fifty year.
The school-house and the Christmas tree;
The children with their cheeks a-glow;
Two bright blue eyes that smile on me . . .
Just half a century ago.
Again (it's maybe forty years),
With faith and trust almost divine,
These same blue eyes, abrim with tears,
Through depths of love look into mine.
A parting, tender, soft and low,
With arms that cling and lips that cleave . . .
Ah me! it's all so long ago,
Yet seems so sweet this Christmas Eve.
Just thirty years ago, again . . .
We say a bitter, last good-bye;
Our lips are white with wrath and pain;
Our little children cling and cry.
Whose was the fault? it matters not,
For man and woman both deceive;
It's buried now and all forgot,
Forgiven, too, this Christmas Eve.
And she (God pity me) is dead;
Our children men and women grown.
I like to think that they are wed,
With little children of their own,
That crowd around their Christmas tree . . .
I would not ever have them grieve,
Or shed a single tear for me,
To mar their joy this Christmas Eve.
Stripped to the buff and gaunt and still
Lies all the land in grim distress.
Like lost soul wailing, long and shrill,
A wolf-howl cleaves the emptiness.
Then hushed as Death is everything.
The moon rides haggard and forlorn . . .
"O hark the herald angels sing!"
God bless all men -- it's Christmas morn.
poem by Robert William Service
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Lines: That time is dead for ever, child!
I.
That time is dead for ever, child!
Drowned, frozen, dead for ever!
We look on the past
And stare aghast
At the spectres wailing, pale and ghast,
Of hopes which thou and I beguiled
To death on life’s dark river.
II.
The stream we gazed on then rolled by;
Its waves are unreturning;
But we yet stand
In a lone land,
Like tombs to mark the memory
Of hopes and fears, which fade and flee
In the light of life’s dim morning.
poem by Percy Bysshe Shelley
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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First Love
I was fifteen, she was eighteen
The prettiest thing I'd ever seen in my life
I loved her at first sight
I found her in Marietta, a town north of Atlanta
I brought her home to see my folks
They loved her too
We were together for a long time
Thought it would be for all time
But things change and rearrange
She had to go
She left me cryin' in '79
An airline pilot, in Carolina
I was a wreck, can't drive a check
It broke my heart
My first love was an older woman
There's been many since
But there'll never be another
Built in 1955, snowshoe white, overdrive
I never should've sold her, I'll always love her
She was mine
Years went by, teardrops dried
I got her back, I was surprised
In '93, a gift to me on Christmas Eve
We were both older, so I restored her
Could've sold her, for a lot more
But I will never she's mine forever
Until I go
My first love was an older woman
There's been many since
But there'll never be another
Built in 1955, snowshoe white, overdrive
I never should've sold her, I'll always love her
She was mine
I'll never sell her she's mine forever
I love her so
song performed by by Alan Jackson
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Murderess
She looked at me, murdered me, roared at me;
It was clear, but she was rather reluctant to repeat.
I was glad to see her after the night,
Her development gained after the dawn.
She was coming towards me as fast as a spirit,
Wailing and echoing, chanting a song of higher horror.
She was like a ghost to me, easier to see than an invisible being
Wailing and chanting with the whole place to ourselves.
I waited for her to leave and give back my life.
poem by Naveed Akram
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They Came From Distant Places
They came from distant places to this far southern shore
The men who built the city at rest forever more
Some of them could not speak the language but they were strong and young
And they were willing workers and their praises ought be sung
The men who built the city their grandchildren old today
They worked hard to support their wives and families from their old homeland far away
They built the factories, homes and railways and they worked hard for their pay
The men who built the city for years with Nature lay
No monument built to them no last post for them played
For the men who built the city there was never a parade
Only their direct descendants would have heard of them by name
To be honest and hard working is never a claim to fame
The men who built the city their praises remain unsung
And today their grandchildren are not what one would call young.
poem by Francis Duggan
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6-11 (true Story)
A softball game,
With two 7th grade teams.
In a open grass field kids play,
In the hot sun.
Along the first base line, were the moms
Cheering their girls on.
It was the top of the 8th inning,
No outs and Centrals down by one.
Junction City is up to bat,
Central out in the field.
It took four pitches to get the batter out.
Gale Anders is up next, strike one.
Turning to terror in the next swing of the bat.
The ball goes flying over the fence,
Missis all the moms, all but one,
Nursing her baby she didn’t see the ball coming.
The ball hits the baby in the head whose life has just begun,
Just three weeks ago ReBecca Purkey was born.
ReBecca’s mom rushes her to the hospital.
Where the doctors told her,
That she could go home after the MRI.
If anything happened within 24 hours call.
They called ReBecca’s mom with the MRI results,
They told her the ball shattered her skull,
Into something like a spider web.
But the skull repairs itself,
So not to be alarmed.
ReBecca lasted 23 hours then,
Her little brain just couldn’t take it anymore,
She started having seizures.
Taking her back to the doctor,
Her mom was scared and,
Didn’t understand what’s wrong with her baby,
That is perfect in every other way.
The doctors said that it’s unlikely,
ReBecca will ever walk, talk, or feed herself,
She will be a veggie.
If this child was to live.
Because she has a traumatic brain injury,
Which lead to the seizures,
And she has epilepsy.
Hard pill to swallow for her family.
One minute this baby was healthy and happy
The next doctors are telling them she will die.
P.S. My name is ReBecca Purkey this is the story of my life. we are not as medically advanced back then as we are today, We didn’t know as much about the brain that is why doctors sent me home. This shows you anyone can overcome anything. I am 18 and have now graduated from high school with a regular diploma and soon go to college, become an Autistic teacher. I will always have a brain injury and epilepsy but that doesn’t stop me from doing anything. I am ReBecca Purkey and this is my story, what’s yours?
poem by Mrs. Cynosure
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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Fire Maple Song
Turn away from the pain you dont want
Turning down to avoid them when they call
Strange words I heard a long long time ago
I wish I could go back to a summer time I knew more than twenty years ago=
Cant lay beneath the sheets we lie underneath the maple tree
Now I cant smile
Lying in the grass with the wind around us as we smile and talk
Listen to your grandma sing those country songs
Shed tell us how the maple turns to fire every four years
Wed sit in the grass all summer just to watch the autumn come around
I cant smile now
I live alone and youre so far away
I call you once a year just around the holiday
I still see you in the night lying above me in the grass
I cant smile
Turn away from the pain you dont want
Turning down to avoid them when they call
I cant believe this letter that says you died
I think Im gonna go back to the old house in north carolina and lay in the backyard
Get drunk and let the leaves just bury me
Bury me
I cant smile
song performed by by Everclear
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Tough Love
Tough love
Rebecca was a horrid child.
Her antics drove her mother wild..
Child experts offered their advice
but seldom came to visit twice.
Although her mother tried her best
Rebecca outdid all the rest.
She was unpleasant rude and crude.
An anti social attitude.
She seldom did as she was told
and thought she had the right to scold.
Her mother’s efforts at control
She seemed to have no other goal.
Than making life a misery
for members of her family.
But then her grandma came to stay.
Rebecca came to rue the day.
Grandma applied psychology
Rebecca placed across her knee
She tanned her little bottom hard.
Grandma had but scant regard.
For what the experts had to say
She raised her kids in the old way.
A firm hand lovingly applied
across Rebecca’s small backside.
Quickly changed her attitude.
Because her Grandma understood.
That little girls should never be
allowed to think that they were free.
To act and speak unpleasantly
without they paid the penalty.
Rebecca very swiftly learned
she got exactly what she earned..
She soon became a paragon.
Her bad behaviour was all gone.
Which demonstrates that Grandma knew
exactly what she had to do.
To make Rebecca toe the line
applied a little discipline.
In her own old fashioned way.
It worked a treat I have to say.
She changed Rebecca’s attitude
and earned her mothers gratitude.
Old fashioned ways had proved the best
to change Rebecca from a pest.
Into a most delightful child.
Although the experts all reviled
her methods. They could not deny
they were effective.I wonder why.
Perhaps they lack experience
as well as simple common sense.
Until they’ve raised a family
I doubt if they will ever see.
That discipline lovingly applied
beats everything which they have tried.
A child must know her boundaries
She cannot do as she pleases.
I think this story serves to show.
Although the experts think they know.
Experience will always win
when teaching children discipline.
20/05/2009
http; // blog.myspace.com/poeticpiers
poem by Ivor Or Ivor.e Hogg
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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Soul's Call
When you wake from troubled slumbers
With a dream-bewildered brain,
And old leaves which no man numbers
Chattering tap against the pane;
And the midnight wind is wailing
Till your very life seems quailing
As the long gusts shudder and sigh:
Know you not that homeless cry
Is my love's, which cannot die,
Wailing through Eternity?
* * * * *
When beside the glowing embers,
Sitting in the twilight lone,
Drop on drop you hear November's
Melancholy monotone,
As the heavy rain comes sweeping,
With a sound of weeping, weeping,
Till your blood is chilled with fears;
Know you not those falling tears,
Flowing fast through years on years,
For my sobs within your ears?
* * * * *
When with dolorous moan the billows
Surge around where, far and wide,
Leagues on leagues of sea-worn hollows
Throb with thunders of the tide,
And the weary waves in breaking
Fill you, thrill you, as with aching
Memories of our love of yore
Where you pace the sounding shore,
Hear you not, through roll and roar,
Soul call soul for evermore?
poem by Mathilde Blind
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