Autumn Even-Song
The long cloud edged with streaming grey
Soars from the West;
The red leaf mounts with it away,
Showing the nest
A blot among the branches bare:
There is a cry of outcasts in the air.
Swift little breezes, darting chill,
Pant down the lake;
A crow flies from the yellow hill,
And in its wake
A baffled line of labouring rooks:
Steel-surfaced to the light the river looks.
Pale on the panes of the old hall
Gleams the lone space
Between the sunset and the squall;
And on its face
Mournfully glimmers to the last:
Great oaks grow mighty minstrels in the blast.
Pale the rain-rutted roadways shine
In the green light
Behind the cedar and the pine:
Come, thundering night!
Blacken broad earth with hoards of storm:
For me yon valley-cottage beckons warm.
poem by George Meredith
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God Help our Men at Sea
The wild night comes like an owl to its lair,
The black clouds follow fast,
And the sun-gleams die, and the lightnings glare,
And the ships go heaving past, past, past -
The ships go heaving past!
Bar the doors, and higher, higher
Pile the faggots on the fire:
Now abroad, by many a light,
Empty seats there are to-night -
Empty seats that none may fill,
For the storm grows louder still:
How it surges and swells through the gorges and dells,
Under the ledges and over the lea,
Where a watery sound goeth moaning around -
God help our men at sea!
Oh! never a tempest blew on the shore
But that some heart did moan
For a darling voice it would hear no more
And a face that had left it lone, lone, lone -
A face that had left it lone!
I am watching by a pane
Darkened with the gusty rain,
Watching, through a mist of tears,
Sad with thoughts of other years,
For a brother I did miss
In a stormy time like this.
Ah! the torrent howls past, like a fiend on the blast,
Under the ledges and over the lea;
And the pent waters gleam, and the wild surges scream -
God help our men at sea!
Ah, Lord! they may grope through the dark to find
Thy hand within the gale;
And cries may rise on the wings of the wind
From mariners weary and pale, pale, pale -
From mariners weary and pale!
'Tis a fearful thing to know,
While the storm-winds loudly blow,
That a man can sometimes come
Too near to his father's home;
So that he shall kneel and say,
'Lord, I would be far away!'
Ho! the hurricanes roar round a dangerous shore,
Under the ledges and over the lea;
And there twinkles a light on the billows so white -
God help our men at sea!
poem by Henry Kendall
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New Life, New Love
The breezes blow on the river below,
And the fleecy clouds float high,
And I mark how the dark green gum trees match
The bright blue dome of the sky.
The rain has been, and the grass is green
Where the slopes were bare and brown,
And I see the things that I used to see
In the days ere my head went down.
I have found a light in my long dark night,
Brighter than stars or moon;
I have lost the fear of the sunset drear,
And the sadness of afternoon.
Here let us stand while I hold your hand,
Where the light’s on your golden head—
Oh! I feel the thrill that I used to feel
In the days ere my heart was dead.
The storm’s gone by, but my lips are dry
And the old wrong rankles yet—
Sweetheart or wife, I must take new life
From your red lips warm and wet!
So let it be, you may cling to me,
There is nothing on earth to dread,
For I’ll be the man that I used to be
In the days ere my heart was dead!
poem by Henry Lawson
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A Park in Paris
Grey skies, grey water
in canals.
Bare branches turning
the barest of green
and pink-
Chase the pigeons children,
while the old people watch,
seated in their wicker chairs.
Bicycles, carts,
and unleashed dogs,
birds
I cannot name
above toothy rowhouses
leaning into one another-
Warm breezes,
light rain-
Spring in the park.
(Paris, March 2008)
poem by Ayn Timmerman
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The Dark Stag
1 A startled stag, the blue-grey Night,
2 Leaps down beyond black pines.
3 Behind--a length of yellow light--
4 The hunter's arrow shines:
5 His moccasins are stained with red,
6 He bends upon his knee,
7 From covering peaks his shafts are sped,
8 The blue mists plume his mighty head,--
9 Well may the swift Night flee!
10 The pale, pale Moon, a snow-white doe,
11 Bounds by his dappled flank:
12 They beat the stars down as they go,
13 Like wood-bells growing rank.
14 The winds lift dewlaps from the ground,
15 Leap from the quaking reeds;
16 Their hoarse bays shake the forests round,
17 With keen cries on the track they bound,--
18 Swift, swift the dark stag speeds!
19 Away! his white doe, far behind,
20 Lies wounded on the plain;
21 Yells at his flank the nimblest wind,
22 His large tears fall in rain;
23 Like lily-pads, small clouds grow white
24 About his darkling way;
25 From his bald nest upon the height
26 The red-eyed eagle sees his flight;
27 He falters, turns, the antlered Night,--
28 The dark stag stands at bay!
29 His feet are in the waves of space;
30 His antlers broad and dun
31 He lowers; he turns his velvet face
32 To front the hunter, Sun;
33 He stamps the lilied clouds, and high
34 His branches fill the west.
35 The lean stork sails across the sky,
36 The shy loon shrieks to see him die,
37 The winds leap at his breast.
38 Roar the rent lakes as thro' the wave
39 Their silver warriors plunge,
40 As vaults from core of crystal cave
41 The strong, fierce muskallunge;
42 Red torches of the sumach glare,
43 Fall's council-fires are lit;
44 The bittern, squaw-like, scolds the air;
45 The wild duck splashes loudly where
46 The rustling rice-spears knit.
47 Shaft after shaft the red Sun speeds:
48 Rent the stag's dappled side,
49 His breast, fanged by the shrill winds, bleeds,
50 He staggers on the tide;
51 He feels the hungry waves of space
52 Rush at him high and blue;
53 Their white spray smites his dusky face,
54 Swifter the Sun's fierce arrows race
55 And pierce his stout heart thro'.
56 His antlers fall; once more he spurns
57 The hoarse hounds of the day;
58 His blood upon the crisp blue burns,
59 Reddens the mounting spray;
60 His branches smite the wave--with cries
61 The loud winds pause and flag--
62 He sinks in space--red glow the skies,
63 The brown earth crimsons as he dies,
64 The strong and dusky stag.
poem by Isabella Valancy Crawford
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After Rain
The rain of a night and a day and a night
Stops at the light
Of this pale choked day. The peering sun
Sees what has been done.
The road under the trees has a border new
of purple hue
Inside the border of bright thin grass:
For all that has
Been left by November of leaves is torn
From hazel and thorn
And the greater trees. Throughout the copse
No dead leaf drops
On grey grass, green moss, burnt-orange fern,
At the wind's return:
The leaflets out of the ash-tree shed
Are thinly spread
In the road, like little black fish, inlaid,
As if they played.
What hangs from the myriad branches down there
So hard and bare
Is twelve yellow apples lovely to see
On one crab-tree.
And on each twig of every tree in the dell
Uncountable
Crystals both dark and bright of the the rain
That begins again.
poem by Edward Thomas
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Sunset Red And Pale Moonlight
We gave the day up to a back road
and let it take us out of town
to a spot down the river
to watch the sun go down
(Bridge) we must have sat and talked for hours
not giving in to the night
and that day i saw the sunset in a whole new light
(chorus) Now the stars came out liek dimonds
on a deep blue satin sky
he said from where he stood
Honey you sure look good
In sunset red and pale moonlight
later we pulled out a blanket
when we felt the evening chill
Oh and he wrapped his arms around me
thats when time stood still
(Chorus)
(Chorus)
In sunset red and pale moonlight
song performed by by Pam Tillis
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Sunset
From this windy bridge at rest,
In some former curious hour,
We have watched the city's hue,
All along the orange west,
Cupola and pointed tower,
Darken into solid blue.
Tho' the biting north wind breaks
Full across this drifted hold,
Let us stand with iced cheeks
Watching westward as of old;
Past the violet mountain-head
To the farthest fringe of pine,
Where far off the purple-red
Narrows to a dusky line,
And the last pale splendours die
Slowly from the olive sky;
Till the thin clouds wear away
Into threads of purple-gray,
And the sudden stars between
Brighten in the pallid green;
Till above the spacious east,
Slow returned one by one,
Like pale prisoners released
From the dungeons of the sun,
Capella and her train appear
In the glittering Charioteer;
Till the rounded moon shall grow
Great above the eastern snow,
Shining into burnished gold;
And the silver earth outrolled,
In the misty yellow light,
Shall take on the width of night.
poem by Archibald Lampman
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The Lakeside
The shadows round the inland sea
Are deepening into night;
Slow up the slopes of Ossipee
They chase the lessening light.
Tired of the long day's blinding heat,
I rest my languid eye,
Lake of the Hills! where, cool and sweet,
Thy sunset waters lie!
Along the sky, in wavy lines,
O'er isle and reach and bay,
Green-belted with eternal pines,
The mountains stretch away.
Below, the maple masses sleep
Where shore with water blends,
While midway on the tranquil deep
The evening light descends.
So seemed it when yon hill's red crown,
Of old, the Indian trod,
And, through the sunset air, looked down
Upon the Smile of God.
To him of light and shade the laws
No forest skeptic taught;
Their living and eternal Cause
His truer instinct sought.
He saw these mountains in the light
Which now across them shines;
This lake, in summer sunset bright,
Walled round with sombering pines.
God near him seemed; from earth and skies
His loving voice he beard,
As, face to face, in Paradise,
Man stood before the Lord.
Thanks, O our Father! that, like him,
Thy tender love I see,
In radiant hill and woodland dim,
And tinted sunset sea.
For not in mockery dost Thou fill
Our earth with light and grace;
Thou hid'st no dark and cruel will
Behind Thy smiling face!
poem by John Greenleaf Whittier
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You, Andrew Marvell
And here face down beneath the sun
And here upon earth's noonward height
To feel the always coming on
The always rising of the night:
To feel creep up the curving east
The earthy chill of dusk and slow
Upon those under lands the vast
And ever climbing shadow grow
And strange at Ecbatan the trees
Take leaf by leaf the evening strange
The flooding dark about their knees
The mountains over Persia change
And now at Kermanshah the gate
Dark empty and the withered grass
And through the twilight now the late
Few travelers in the westward pass
And Baghdad darken and the bridge
Across the silent river gone
And through Arabia the edge
Of evening widen and steal on
And deepen on Palmyra's street
The wheel rut in the ruined stone
And Lebanon fade out and Crete
high through the clouds and overblown
And over Sicily the air
Still flashing with the landward gulls
And loom and slowly disappear
The sails above the shadowy hulls
And Spain go under and the shore
Of Africa the gilded sand
And evening vanish and no more
The low pale light across that land
Nor now the long light on the sea:
And here face downward in the sun
To feel how swift how secretly
The shadow of the night comes on...
poem by Archibald MacLeish
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Canto XLIX: For the Seven Lakes
For the seven lakes, and by no man these verses:
Rain; empty river; a voyage,
Fire from frozen cloud, heavy rain in the twilight
Under the cabin roof was one lantern.
The reeds are heavy; bent;
and the bamboos speak as if weeping.
Autumn moon; hills rise about lakes
against sunset
Evening is like a curtain of cloud,
a blurr above ripples; and through it
sharp long spikes of the cinnamon,
a cold tune amid reeds.
Behind hill the monk's bell
borne on the wind.
Sail passed here in April; may return in October
Boat fades in silver; slowly;
Sun blaze alone on the river.
Where wine flag catches the sunset
Sparse chimneys smoke in the cross light
Comes then snow scur on the river
And a world is covered with jade
Small boat floats like a lanthorn,
The flowing water closts as with cold. And at San Yin
they are a people of leisure.
Wild geese swoop to the sand-bar,
Clouds gather about the hole of the window
Broad water; geese line out with the autumn
Rooks clatter over the fishermen's lanthorns,
A light moves on the north sky line;
where the young boys prod stones for shrimp.
In seventeen hundred came Tsing to these hill lakes.
A light moves on the South sky line.
State by creating riches shd. thereby get into debt?
This is infamy; this is Geryon.
This canal goes still to TenShi
Though the old king built it for pleasure
K E I M E N R A N K E I
K I U M A N M A N K E I
JITSU GETSU K O K W A
T A N FUKU T A N K A I
Sun up; work
sundown; to rest
dig well and drink of the water
dig field; eat of the grain
Imperial power is? and to us what is it?
The fourth; the dimension of stillness.
And the power over wild beasts.
poem by Ezra Pound
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Canto 49
For the seven lakes, and by no man these verses:
Rain; empty river; a voyage,
Fire from frozen cloud, heavy rain in the twilight
Under the cabin roof was one lantern.
The reeds are heavy; bent;
and the bamboos speak as if weeping.
Autumn moon; hills rise about lakes
against sunset
Evening is like a curtain of cloud,
a blurr above ripples; and through it
sharp long spikes of the cinnamon,
a cold tune amid reeds.
Behind hill the monk's bell
borne on the wind.
Sail passed here in April; may return in October
Boat fades in silver; slowly;
Sun blaze alone on the river.
Where wine flag catches the sunset
Sparse chimneys smoke in the cross light
Comes then snow scur on the river
And a world is covered with jade
Small boat floats like a lanthorn,
The flowing water closts as with cold. And at San Yin
they are a people of leisure.
Wild geese swoop to the sand-bar,
Clouds gather about the hole of the window
Broad water; geese line out with the autumn
Rooks clatter over the fishermen's lanthorns,
A light moves on the north sky line;
where the young boys prod stones for shrimp.
In seventeen hundred came Tsing to these hill lakes.
A light moves on the South sky line.
State by creating riches shd. thereby get into debt?
Thsi is infamy; this is Geryon.
This canal goes still to TenShi
Though the old king built it for pleasure
K E I M E N R A N K E I
K I U M A N M A N K E I
JITSU GETSU K O K W A
T A N FUKU T A N K A I
Sun up; work
sundown; to rest
dig well and drink of the water
dig field; eat of the grain
Imperial power is? and to us what is it?
The fourth; the dimension of stillness.
And the power over wild beasts.
poem by Ezra Pound
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Storm On Lake Asquam
A cloud, like that the old-time Hebrew saw
On Carmel prophesying rain, began
To lift itself o'er wooded Cardigan,
Growing and blackening. Suddenly, a flaw
Of chill wind menaced; then a strong blast beat
Down the long valley's murmuring pines, and woke
The noon-dream of the sleeping lake, and broke
Its smooth steel mirror at the mountains' feet.
Thunderous and vast, a fire-veined darkness swept
Over the rough pine-bearded Asquam range;
A wraith of tempest, wonderful and strange,
From peak to peak the cloudy giant stepped.
One moment, as if challenging the storm,
Chocorua's tall, defiant sentinel
Looked from his watch-tower; then the shadow fell,
And the wild rain-drift blotted out his form.
And over all the still unhidden sun,
Weaving its light through slant-blown veils of rain,
Smiled on the trouble, as hope smiles on pain;
And, when the tumult and the strife were done,
With one foot on the lake and one on land,
Framing within his crescent's tinted streak
A far-off picture of the Melvin peak,
Spent broken clouds the rainbow's angel spanned.
poem by John Greenleaf Whittier
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Sunset Red & Pale Moonlight
(kim richey)
We gave the day up to a back road
And let it take us out of town
To a spot down by the river
To watch the sun go down
We must have sat and talked for hours
Not giving in to the night
And that day I saw the sunset
In a whole new light
Now the stars came out like diamonds
On a deep blue satin sky
He said from where he stood
Honey you sure look good
In sunset red and pale moonlight
Later we pulled out the blanket
When we felt the evening chill
Oh and he wrapped his arms around me
Thats when time stood still
Now the stars came out like diamonds
On a deep blue satin sky
He said from where he stood
Honey you sure look good
In sunset red and pale moonlight
Now the stars came out like diamonds
On a deep blue satin sky
He said from where he stood
Honey you sure look good
In sunset red and pale moonlight
In sunset red and pale moonlight
song performed by by Pam Tillis
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Through The Wood
THROUGH the wood, the green wood, the wet wood, the light wood,
Love and I went maying a thousand lives ago;
Shafts of golden sunlight had made a golden bright wood
In my heart reflected, because I loved you so.
Through the wood, the chill wood, the brown wood, the bare wood,
I alone went lonely no later than last year,
What had thinned the branches, and wrecked my dear and fair wood,
Killed the pale wild roses and left the rose-thorns sere?
Through the wood, the dead wood, the sad wood, the lone wood,
Winds of winter shiver through lichens old and grey,
You ride past forgetting the wood that was our own wood
All our own--and withered as ever a flower of May.
poem by Edith Nesbit
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One for Sorrow; Two for Joy
Good morning Mr Magpie
alone again, like me
I greet you then I bless myself
and hope that I shall see
your lady busy in the trees
up here in Jagger Green.
The wind is soft and urgent
on the pale green Yorkshire hills
rooks fuss in high bare branches
looking down on silent mills
and the magpie is a single bird
up here in Jagger Green.
I watched him as he rested
in the Mayday morning light
then hard and low and straight there came
another flash of black and white
and the sun is like a woman's kiss
up here in Jagger Green.
poem by Hugh Mitchell
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Black Crow
He sees the stormy anger of the world
And wants no part of it at all
And as the weeping leaves of autumn curl
He feels the savage winter call
See far below the dust of conflict settles on the hill
Where there was no escape before
And as he spreads his wings and soars up to another level
He brings the icy prophecies of war
Black crow, black crow, tell me where you really go
When you fly into the sunset, high in evening sky,
Black crow, black crow, tell me what you really know
Will we flourish in this hurricane, or will we fall and die?
While children lose their souls and so much more
To ragged armies of the field
A vicious fanfare cries appeasing hungry savages
To trigger that their fate is surely sealed
I wonder where that black crow sleeps as day beckons the night
Or if he even sleeps at all
I wonder what he thinks of all the human traffic far below
Thats struggled on the road so, so long
Tell me black crow, black crow (solely? ) you pass above
Understanding everything but you know nothing at all
Black crow black crow, tell me what you really know
Do you understand the pain that we feel down here at all
song performed by by Jamiroquai
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Sonnet LIII: Without Her
What of her glass without her? The blank grey
There where the pool is blind of the moon's face.
Her dress without her? The tossed empty space
Of cloud-rack whence the moon has passed away.
Her paths without her? Day's appointed sway
Usurped by desolate night. Her pillowed place
Without her? Tears, ah me! for love's good grace,
And cold forgetfulness of night or day.
What of the heart without her? Nay, poor heart,
Of thee what word remains ere speech be still?
A wayfarer by barren ways and chill,
Steep ways and weary, without her thou art,
Where the long cloud, the long wood's counterpart,
Sheds doubled darkness up the labouring hill.
poem by Dante Gabriel Rossetti
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Best Part
Best part of the life is youth
I don't know how far is the truth?
But certainly it is fact and enterprising
Life itself is on move and surprising
You prefer to see all green
Expect no loss and only win
You are on move and thrust is motto
You love all girls and their photos
As tree looks decorative with green leaf
Life too as at its peak but to remain brief
Any time that saga may be over
With bare branches and no possible cover
What to expect and what not to grab?
Everything is at feet with no restriction or cap
Down to earth is your approach and goal within sight
World belongs to you whether you are wrong or right
Seize the opportunity and strike at its root
Fine the target and precisely shoot
Time may not wait for any laxity on your part
Have it in your hand and look damn smart
So to say green represents dedication
Building strong and viable relation
No hasty move even with little excitation
But alas! Time moves on gradually with rotation
Leaf may turn yellow and look very pale
All ideas may stagnate and face may turn pale
This may come soon before ground is lost
Try hard for enough gain before it blows with high cost
If you act sensible when river is in spate
There won't be any problem to relate
Timely help may control the situation
Life may then have no problem with it continuation
poem by Hasmukh Amathalal
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The Hill-Top
The burly driver at my side,
We slowly climbed the hill,
Whose summit, in the hot noontide,
Seemed rising, rising still.
At last, our short noon-shadows bid
The top-stone, bare and brown,
From whence, like Gizeh's pyramid,
The rough mass slanted down.
I felt the cool breath of the North;
Between me and the sun,
O'er deep, still lake, and ridgy earth,
I saw the cloud-shades run.
Before me, stretched for glistening miles,
Lay mountain-girdled Squam;
Like green-winged birds, the leafy isles
Upon its bosom swam.
And, glimmering through the sun-haze warm,
Far as the eye could roam,
Dark billows of an earthquake storm
Beflecked with clouds like foam,
Their vales in misty shadow deep,
Their rugged peaks in shine,
I saw the mountain ranges sweep
The horizon's northern line.
There towered Chocorua's peak; and west,
Moosehillock's woods were seem,
With many a nameless slide-scarred crest
And pine-dark gorge between.
Beyond them, like a sun-rimmed cloud,
The great Notch mountains shone,
Watched over by the solemn-browed
And awful face of stone!
'A good look-off!' the driver spake;
'About this time, last year,
I drove a party to the Lake,
And stopped, at evening, here.
'T was duskish down below; but all
These hills stood in the sun,
Till, dipped behind yon purple wall,
He left them, one by one.
'A lady, who, from Thornton hill,
Had held her place outside,
And, as a pleasant woman will,
Had cheered the long, dull ride,
Besought me, with so sweet a smile,
That--though I hate delays--
I could not choose but rest awhile,--
(These women have such ways!)
'On yonder mossy ledge she sat,
Her sketch upon her knees,
A stray brown lock beneath her hat
Unrolling in the breeze;
Her sweet face, in the sunset light
Upraised and glorified,--
I never saw a prettier sight
In all my mountain ride.
'As good as fair; it seemed her joy
To comfort and to give;
My poor, sick wife, and cripple boy,
Will bless her while they live!'
The tremor in the driver's tone
His manhood did not shame
'I dare say, sir, you may have known'--
He named a well-known name.
Then sank the pyramidal mounds,
The blue lake fled away;
For mountain-scope a parlor's bounds,
A lighted hearth for day!
From lonely years and weary miles
The shadows fell apart;
Kind voices cheered, sweet human smiles
Shone warm into my heart.
We journeyed on; but earth and sky
Had power to charm no more;
Still dreamed my inward-turning eye
The dream of memory o'er.
Ah! human kindness, human love,--
To few who seek denied;
Too late we learn to prize above
The whole round world beside!
poem by John Greenleaf Whittier
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Light Beckons Her
LIGHT BECKONS HER
Light beckons her
She that travailed much
Light beckons her
She that tasted life’s test in earnest
Light beckons her
She that suffered much in her years
Light beckons her
She that passed her test in flying colours
Light beckons her
She that claims all my heart’s honours
Light beckons her
She that travailed much now has repose
Light beckons her
See how the angels cuddle her in warm embrace
Light beckons her
Now rest is yours! Rest Caroline! Rest Adelanke!
For Light beckons you!
No noise with light but silence, sweet silence.
Therefore enjoy your rest, Adelanke
As Light beckons you!
Jude Adebosoye Ogunade
This poem was written on hearing the death of my mother.
poem by Jude Ogunade
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