En.Citatepedia^®.ro

In The Prison Pen

1864

Listless he eyes the palisades
And sentries in the glare;
'Tis barren as a pelican-beach
But his world is ended there.

Nothing to do; and vacant hands
Bring on the idiot-pain;
He tries to think--to recollect,
But the blur is on his brain.

Around him swarm the plaining ghosts
Like those on Virgil's shore--
A wilderness of faces dim,
And pale ones gashed and hoar.

A smiting sun. No shed, no tree;
He totters to his lair--
A den that sick hands dug in earth
Ere famine wasted there,

Or, dropping in his place, he swoons,
Walled in by throngs that press,
Till forth from the throngs they bear
him dead--
Dead in his meagreness.

poem by Herman Melville
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Blood on your hands sister

You said you loved him told him you cared
Promised him forever together
Instead you broke his heart into countless pieces
You drew tears of blood from the Prince of hearts
Hurt his pride with your insolent words
Blood on your hands sister
Blood on your hands

I saw the pain in his eyes
I felt the bitter tears that he cried
Kicked a man when he was down
You left him a broken man
Blood on your hands sister
Blood on your hands

From a loving giving sensitive Prince amongst men
You took your pleasure and stifled his laughter
You took your fill and threw him upon the scrapheap
Blood on your hands sister
Blood on your hands

But his precious tears are wasted
Wasted on a dry barren heart like yours
For his heart is alive and flourishing
Whilst yours is dead and lifeless
He is the victor
Whilst you the loser

You may wash your hands of him
But the stains will never fade
Blood on your hands sister
Blood on your hands

poem by Lilac Wine
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With the Tide

Somewhere I read, in an old book whose name
Is gone from me, I read that when the days
Of a man are counted, and his business done,
There comes up the shore at evening, with the tide,
To the place where he sits, a boat—
And in the boat, from the place where he sits, he sees,
Dim in the dusk, dim and yet so familiar,
The faces of his friends long dead; and knows
They come for him, brought in upon the tide,
To take him where men go at set of day.
Then rising, with his hands in theirs, he goes
Between them his last steps, that are the first
Of the new life—and with the ebb they pass,
Their shaken sail grown small upon the moon.
Often I thought of this, and pictured me
How many a man who lives with throngs about him,
Yet straining through the twilight for that boat
Shall scarce make out one figure in the stern,
And that so faint its features shall perplex him
With doubtful memories—and his heart hang back.

But others, rising as they see the sail
Increase upon the sunset, hasten down,
Hands out and eyes elated; for they see
Head over head, crowding from bow to stern,
Repeopling their long loneliness with smiles,
The faces of their friends; and such go forth
Content upon the ebb tide, with safe hearts.

But never to worker summoned when his day was done
Did mounting tide bring in such freight of friends
As stole to you up the white wintry shingle
That night while they that watched you thought you slept.
Softly they came, and beached the boat, and gathered
In the still cove under the icy stars,
Your last-born, and the dear loves of your heart,
And all men that have loved right more than ease,
And honor above honors; all who gave
Free-handed of their best for other men,
And thought their giving taking: they who knew
Man's natural state is effort, up and up—
All these were there, so great a company
Perchance you marvelled, wondering what great ship
Had brought that throng unnumbered to the cove
Where the boys used to beach their light canoe
After old happy picnics—

But these, your friends and children, to whose hands,
Committed, in the silent night you rose
And took your last faint steps—
These led you down, O great American,
Down to the Winter night and the white beach,
And there you saw that the huge hull that waited
Was not as are the boats of the other dead,
Frail craft for a brief passage; no, for this
Was first of a long line of towering transports,
Storm-worn and ocean-weary every one,
The ships you launched, the ships you manned, the ships
That now, returning from their sacred quest
With the thrice-sacred burden of their dead,
Lay waiting there to take you forth with them,
Out with the ebb tide, on some farther quest.

poem by Edith Wharton
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A Dead Leaf

between these two shores
i float like a dead leaf
am not dead either..
if i was i will not feel the pain

budded flowered and became a fruit
on one shore
eaten and as a bare stray seed laid
at the other shore

as a seed i did germinate
the mother root grew into a tree
an off spring flower and fruit came by
all along as a seed i thought i was the tree itself

I NEVER THOUGHT I WILL LOOSE
MY IDENTITY AS A SEED
CAN A TREE SHOW ITS SEED
EVEN IF IT WANTS TO

ALL ALONG...

I thought i was the tree itself
may be i was a part of each part
the stem to hold, the leaf to nourish
till fate wind blew me down as a dead leaf

today as a dead leaf i float
wanting a living from one shore
wanting relationship from the other
as a dead leaf i float..am not dead with pain

ALL ALONG....
I DID THINK I WAS THE TREE ITSELF
BEING JUST A SEED

poem by Samanyan Lakshminarayanan
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The Dead Christ

Take the dead Christ to my chamber,
The Christ I brought from Rome;
Over all the tossing ocean,
He has reached his western home;
Bear him as in procession,
And lay him solemnly
Where, through weary night and morning,
He shall bear me company.

The name I bear is other
Than that I bore by birth,
And I've given life to children
Who'll grow and dwell on earth;
But the time comes swiftly towards me
(Nor do I bid it stay),
When the dead Christ will be more to me
Than all I hold to-day.

Lay the dead Christ beside me,
Oh, press him on my heart,
I would hold him long and painfully
Till the weary tears should start;
Till the divine contagion
Heal me of self and sin,
And the cold weight press wholly down
The pulse that chokes within.

Reproof and frost, they fret me,
Towards the free, the sunny lands,
From the chaos of existence
I stretch these feeble hands;
And, penitential, kneeling,
Pray God would not be wroth,
Who gave not the strength of feeling,
And strength of labor both.

Thou'rt but a wooden carving,
Defaced of worms, and old;
Yet more to me thou couldst not be
Wert thou all wrapt in gold,
Like the gem-bedizened baby
Which, at the Twelth-day noon,
They show from the Ara Coeli's steps,
To a merry dancing tune.

I ask of thee no wonders,
No changing white or red;
I dream not thou art living,
I love and prize thee dead.
That salutary deadness
I seek, through want and pain,
From which God's own high power can bid
Our virtue rise again.

poem by Julia Ward Howe
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In the Wilderness

The sea patrol,
Please bring out the dead in Libya! !
For the hair and the body are like the high-heel girls;
But in the wilderness are they gone too soon,
So try to bring out the dead for burial.

Bombs and bullets of war!
We are still seeing what is going on in Libya! !
But in the wilderness in search of the dead bodies is your mission;
So try to bring our the dead for a peaceful burial.

poem by Edward Kofi Louis
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The Mourners

I look into the aching womb of night;
I look across the mist that masks the dead;
The moon is tired and gives but little light,
The stars have gone to bed.

The earth is sick and seems to breathe with pain;
A lost wind whimpers in a mangled tree;
I do not see the foul, corpse-cluttered plain,
The dead I do not see.

The slain I would not see . . . and so I lift
My eyes from out the shambles where they lie;
When lo! a million woman-faces drift
Like pale leaves through the sky.

The cheeks of some are channelled deep with tears;
But some are tearless, with wild eyes that stare
Into the shadow of the coming years
Of fathomless despair.

And some are young, and some are very old;
And some are rich, some poor beyond belief;
Yet all are strangely like, set in the mould
Of everlasting grief.

They fill the vast of Heaven, face on face;
And then I see one weeping with the rest,
Whose eyes beseech me for a moment's space. . . .
Oh eyes I love the best!

Nay, I but dream. The sky is all forlorn,
And there's the plain of battle writhing red:
God pity them, the women-folk who mourn!
How happy are the dead!

poem by Robert William Service
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A Cry

Oh, there are eyes that he can see,
And hands to make his hands rejoice,
But to my lover I must be
Only a voice.

Oh, there are breasts to bear his head,
And lips whereon his lips can lie,
But I must be till I am dead
Only a cry.

poem by Sara Teasdale
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A Seer

'BELOW there are white-faced throngs,
Their march is a tide coming Higher;
Below there are white-faced throngs,
Their faith is a banner flung higher;
Below there are white-faced throngs,
White swords they have yet, but red songs;
Place and lot they have lost hear you not?
For a dream you once dreamed and forgot!'

'But a dream has a life of its own
The wizard seas it can cross
A dream has a life of its own
It comes like the albatross.
A dream has a life of its own,
From my feet to your feet it has flown
And you, you victorious
That wild, white thing will lose!'

poem by Padraic Colum
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When Earth Quaked

Earth uncovered
Two hundred thousand dead
A woman groaned
Stone slabs crushed her head
These are the times
When God weeps

When the earth quaked
I heard His steps
In my pain
I am filled with anger
My blood curls
As I ponder
How many lives slip
In this quake's blunder
This is how earth rage

I am thankful
For the hands He sent
The press
People from every corner
Friends I never knew
This is how you know
He never sleeps
Many dead
But many spared

So I am not mad
New lives conceived
Still lives to be lived
Two hundred thousand dead
But millions breathe

poem by Buxton Shippy
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Unclean

I am like a pelican of the wilderness: I am
like an owl of the desert. I watch, and am
as a sparrow alone upon the housetop.
Psalm 102

The pelican in scripture is unclean. It pukes dead fish
onto the hatchlings, and it roosts alone, like Satan
on the Tree of Life. Nobody told me. I liked pelicans.
I liked owls, too. I used to lie awake and listen,
wanting to become an owl, to fly, to see through darkness,
turn my head, and look straight back behind me. I was
happy, as kids go, but I did not belong in human form.
Sparrows peck grain from fresh dung. In this world rich
means filthy. Leopardi, in his high Romantic musings
on the sparrow, does not say the poet is a shitbird, just
that, singing by himself, he acts like one, and wishes
he could feel more like one, unashamed to do so. Here,
the preacher (burning in his bones with fever, puking
half-digested fish, and hooting, sleepless in the ruins
like the baleful dead) cries: O Lord, take me not away.

poem by Brooks Haxton
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The Tryst

I raised the veil, I loosed the bands,
I took the dead thing from its place.
Like a warm stream in frozen lands
My lips went wandering on her face,
My hands burnt in her hands.

She could not stay me, being dead;
Her body here was mine to hold.
What if her lips had lost their red?
To me they always tasted cold
With the cold words she said.

Did my breath run along her hair,
And free the pulse, and fire the brain,
My wild blood wake her wild blood there?
Here eyelids lifted wide again
In a blue, sudden stare.

Beneath my fierce, profane caress
The whole white length of body moved;
The drowsy bosom seemed to press
As if against a breast beloved,
Then fail for weariness.

No, not that anguish! Christ forbid
That I should raise such dead! I rose,
Stifled the mouth with lilies, hid
Those eyes, And drew the long hair close,
And shut the coffin lid.

My cold brow on the cold wood laid,
Quiet and close to-night we lie.
No cruel words her lips have said.
I shall not take nor she deny.
The dead is with the dead.

poem by Muriel Stuart
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Satia te Sanguine

IF YOU loved me ever so little,
I could bear the bonds that gall,
I could dream the bonds were brittle;
You do not love me at all.

O beautiful lips, O bosom
More white than the moon’s and warm,
A sterile, a ruinous blossom
Is blown your way in a storm.

As the lost white feverish limbs
Of the Lesbian Sappho, adrift
In foam where the sea-weed swims,
Swam loose for the streams to lift,

My heart swims blind in a sea
That stuns me; swims to and fro,
And gathers to windward and lee
Lamentation, and mourning, and woe.

A broken, an emptied boat,
Sea saps it, winds blow apart,
Sick and adrift and afloat,
The barren waif of a heart.

Where, when the gods would be cruel,
Do they go for a torture? where
Plant thorns, set pain like a jewel?
Ah, not in the flesh, not there!

The racks of earth and the rods
Are weak as foam on the sands;
In the heart is the prey for gods,
Who crucify hearts, not hands.

Mere pangs corrode and consume,
Dead when life dies in the brain;
In the infinite spirit is room
For the pulse of an infinite pain.

I wish you were dead, my dear;
I would give you, had I to give,
Some death too bitter to fear;
It is better to die than live.

I wish you were stricken of thunder
And burnt with a bright flame through,
Consumed and cloven in sunder,
I dead at your feet like you.

If I could but know after all,
I might cease to hunger and ache,
Though your heart were ever so small,
If it were not a stone or a snake.

You are crueller, you that we love,
Than hatred, hunger, or death;
You have eyes and breasts like a dove,
And you kill men’s hearts with a breath.

As plague in a poisonous city
Insults and exults on her dead,
So you, when pallid for pity
Comes love, and fawns to be fed.

As a tame beast writhes and wheedles,
He fawns to be fed with wiles;
You carve him a cross of needles,
And whet them sharp as your smiles.

He is patient of thorn and whip,
He is dumb under axe or dart;
You suck with a sleepy red lip
The wet red wounds in his heart.

You thrill as his pulses dwindle,
You brighten and warm as he bleeds,
With insatiable eyes that kindle
And insatiable mouth that feeds.

Your hands nailed love to the tree,
You stript him, scourged him with rods,
And drowned him deep in the sea
That hides the dead and their gods.

And for all this, die will he not;
There is no man sees him but I;
You came and went and forgot;
I hope he will some day die.

poem by Algernon Charles Swinburne
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Hemorrhage

Hemorrhage (In My Hands)"
memories are just where you laid them
drag the waters 'till the depths give up their dead
what did you expect to find?
was there something you left behind?
don't you remember anything i said when i said
don't fall away, and leave me to myself
don't fall away and leave love bleeding
in my hands, in my hands again
leave love bleeding
in my hands, in my hands
love lies bleeding
oh hold me now i feel contagious
am i the only place that you've left to go
she cries her life is like
some movie black and white
dead actors faking lines
over and over and over again she cries
don't fall away, and leave me to myself
dont fall away, and leave love bleeding
in my hands, in my hands again
leave love bleeding
in my hands, in my hands
love lies bleeding
and i wanted
you turned away
you don't remember, but i do
you never even tried
don't fall away and leave me to myself
don't fall away and leave love bleeding
in my hands, in my hands again
leave love bleeding
in my hands, in my hands
love lies bleeding

song performed by by Fuel
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Love Sonnet 18 Humanity that floods the cobbled street,

Humanity that floods the cobbled street,
Engulfs me to be dragged along with throngs,
Lost among strangers, or what else to meet,
In dearth of friends, my agony prolongs;
As faces pass, like flowers on array,
They burst to colors, each of striking hues,
Exuding scents that in the air would stay,
In mixed fragrance to whose strangeness accrues;
But as my thoughts dwell on your love so fair,
The strangest place torments me all in vain,
Detained to thirst, and yet freed from that lair,
For this crag, seemed that skies portend of rain;
.....When soon the flood of faces would subside,
.....Hope we endure, to take all these in stride.
.
.

poem by Reyvrex Questor Reyes
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Having Lost My Sons, I Confront the Wreckage of the Moon: Christmas, 1960

After dark
Near the South Dakota border,
The moon is out hunting, everywhere,
Delivering fire,
And walking down hallways
Of a diamond.

Behind a tree,
It ights on the ruins
Of a white city
Frost, frost.

Where are they gone
Who lived there?

Bundled away under wings
And dark faces.

I am sick
Of it, and I go on
Living, alone, alone,
Past the charred silos, past the hidden graves
Of Chippewas and Norwegians.

This cold winter
Moon spills the inhuman fire
Of jewels
Into my hands.

Dead riches, dead hands, the moon
Darkens,
And I am lost in the beautiful white ruins
Of America.

poem by James Arlington Wright
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Beach Chairs

Sitting on the beach chairs
watching the setting sun
holding hands and reminiscing
how it all begun

Sitting on the beach chairs
watching the ships out on the sea
holding hands and smiling
together we're meant to be

Sitting on the beach chairs
watching people walking past
holding hands and knowing
that our love will always last

Sitting on the beach chairs
watching the waves along the shore
holding hands we realize
our love is stronger than before

Sitting on the beach chairs
watching the changing tide
holding hands with happiness
to be by each others side

Sitting on the beach chairs
watching the sunrise
holding hands with tears of joy
there are no more good-byes

poem by Joyce Ebrecht
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Lovers On A Beach

Written by ricky & marty wilde
Lovers on a beach
Lovers on a beach
Two naked hands lay on the sand
When all the world was out of reach
Through the shuttered doors
The music filtered through
Playing on a theme that couldnt run
Lovers on a shore
Lovers on a shore
The heavy wine of broken time
But now theyre gone its nothing more
Looking back on days
When summer seemed so long
Now theres only winter nights to come
And oh - sometimes shes missing you
She hears the shore
She feels it more
And out there the waves are breaking
Back here her heart is aching
Lovers on a beach
Lovers on a beach
Two silhouettes were on a shore
But now theyre lost and out of reach
Now on lonely roads
The flashbacks lead to you
Like a faded photograph in time
Oh lovers (lovers, lovers, lovers, lovers...)
And oh just as shes missing you
She hears the shore
She feels it more
And out there the waves are breaking
Back here her heart is aching
Lovers on a beach
Lovers on a beach
Two naked hands theyre on the sand
When all the world was out of reach
Lovers on a beach
Lovers on a beach
Lovers
Lovers
Lovers on a beach
Lovers
Lovers
Lovers

song performed by by Kim Wilde
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Dead In The Wombs

those same children
who died in the waters
that swallowed Atlantis....

those same children,
starving 'neath Africa's sun....
dead from the bombings

in Iraq, Afghanistan, and soon Iran....
their bodies thrown into dumpsters
here in the United States....

dead on the borders,
dead in the oil filled waters,
dead on the cocaine streets,

dead in the prisons...
dead in the colleges,
dead in the unemployment lines....

dead on the picket lines,
dead, handcuffed, and beaten....
dying, and dead, world crazy spinning...

as the 'light of the world'
sputters, and goes out....
dead in the wombs of the

homeless, hopeless, and forgotten...
dead by our hands!

poem by Eric Cockrell
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Tommy's Dead

YOU may give over plough, boys,
You may take the gear to the stead,
All the sweat o' your brow, boys,
Will never get beer and bread.
The seed's waste, I know, boys,
There's not a blade will grow, boys,
'Tis cropped out, I trow, boys,
And Tommy's dead.

Send the colt to fair, boys,
He's going blind, as I said,
My old eyes can't bear, boys,
To see him in the shed;
The cow's dry and spare, boys,
She's neither here nor there, boys,
I doubt she's badly bread;
Stop the mill to-morn, boys,
There'll be no more corn, boys,
Neither white nor red;
There's no sign of grass, boys,
You may sell the goat and the ass, boys,
The land's not what it was, boys,
And the beasts must be fed:
You may turn Peg away, boys,
You may pay off old Ned,
We've had a dull day, boys,
And Tommy's dead.

Move my chair on the floor, boys,
Let me turn my head:
She's standing there in the door, boys,
Your sister Winifred!
Take her away from me, boys,
Your sister Winifred!
Move me round in my place, boys,
Let me turn my head,
Take her away from me, boys,
As she lay on here death-bed,
The bones of her thin face, boys,
As she lay on her death-bed!
I don't know how it be, boys,
When all's done and said,
But I see her looking at me, boys,
Whenever I turn my head;
Out of the big oak tree, boys,
Out of the garden-bed,
And the lily as pale as she, boys,
And the rose that used to be red.

There's something not right, boys,
But I think it's not in my head,
I've kept my precious sight, boys, --
The Lord be hallowéd!
Outside and in
The ground is cold to my tread,
The hills are wizen and thin,
The sky is shrivelled and shred,
The hedges down by the loan
I can count them bone by bone,
The leaves are open and spread,
But I see the teeth of the land,
And hands like a dead man's hand,
And the eyes of a dead man's head.
There's nothing but cinders and sand,
The rat and the mouse have fed,
And the summer's empty and cold;
Over valley and wold
Wherever I turn my head
There's a mildew and a mould,
The sun's going out overhead,
And I'm very old,
And Tommy's dead.

What am I staying for, boys,
You're all born and bred,
'Tis fifty years and more, boys,
Since wife and I were wed,
And she'd gone before, boys,
And Tommy's dead.

She was always sweet, boys,
Upon his curly head,
She knew she'd never see't, boys,
And she stole off to bed;
I've been siting up alone, boys,
For he'd come home, he said,
But it's time I was gone boys,
For Tommy's dead.

Put the shutters up, boys,
Bring out the beer and bread,
Make haste and sup, boys,
For my eyes are heavy as lead:
There's something wrong i' the cup, boys,
There's something ill wi' the bread,
I don't care to sup, boys,
And Tommy's dead.

I'm not right, I doubt, boys,
I've such a sleepy head,
I shall nevermore be stout, boys,
You may carry me to bed.
What are you about, boys?
The prayers are all said,
The fire's raked out, boys,
And Tommy's dead.

The stairs are too steep, boys,
You may carry me to the head,
The night's dark and deep, boys,
Your mother's long in bed,
'Tis time to go to sleep, boys,
And Tommy's dead.

I'm not used to a kiss, boys,
You may shake my hand instead.
All things go amiss, boys,
You may lay me where she is, boys,
And I'll rest my old head:
'Tis a poor world, this, boys,
And Tommy's dead.

poem by Sydney Thompson Dobell
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Cannot Be Fully Contained.....

i have secrets

those valleys and
hills that i love and that
i can exchange
my soul for

those sunsets
that i adore and which

you cannot see
and ever speak

for which my eyes
feast and delight
my hands hold so
dear
like the sun and
winds

too many of them
not one, yet, you can
feel

i am dead
because of those
that you have
never seen
or tasted

and so forgive me
for all those
lies
those excuses

i am alive
in the world of the dead
because
of too much
bliss

my hands even in
thousands
my eyes even in
hundreds
cannot be
fully contained.

poem by Ric S. Bastasa
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