Her Face And Brow
Ah, help me! but her face and brow
Are lovelier than lilies are
Beneath the light of moon and star
That smile as they are smiling now--
White lilies in a pallid swoon
Of sweetest white beneath the moon--
White lilies, in a flood of bright
Pure lucidness of liquid light
Cascading down some plenilune,
When all the azure overhead
Blooms like a dazzling daisy-bed.--
So luminous her face and brow,
The luster of their glory, shed
In memory, even, blinds me now.
poem by James Whitcomb Riley
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Related quotes
River Lilies
Saw a boy three lilies white,
Lilies in the river,
Half heart-open to the light,
Full of golden arrows bright,
Each a silver quiver.
Lilies, lilies, lilies white,
Lilies in the river.
Said the boy, “I’ll pluck you there,
Lilies in the river!”
Said the lilies, “If you dare
You shall drown, or homeward fare
Dripping and a-shiver!”
Lilies, lilies, lilies white,
Lilies in the river.
Wilful still the boy would clasp
Lilies in the river;
Tumbled in ere he could grasp,
Scrambled out with puff and gasp,
Plucked no lilies ever.
Lilies, lilies, lilies white,
Lilies in the river.
poem by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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The New Moon
What have you got in your knapsack fair,
White moon, bright moon, pearling the air,
Spinning your bobbins and fabrics free,
Fleet moon, sweet moon, in to the sea?
Turquoise and beryl and rings of gold,
Clear moon, dear moon, ne’er to be sold?
Roses and lilies, romance and love,
Still moon, chill moon, swinging above?
Slender your feet as a white birds throat,
High moon, shy moon, drifting your boat
Into the murk of the world awhile,
Slim moon, dim moon, adding a smile.
Tender your eyes as a maiden’s kiss,
Fine moon, wine moon, no one knows this,
Under the spell of your witchery,
Dream moon, cream moon, first he kissed me.
poem by Zora Bernice May Cross
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The Firefly's Fascination
On the flight of the moon to aflame the night,
A firefly's looking up to the light he much adored,
Seem a light of a firefly that he's longing for.
Her brilliant dancing fire,
The endless flashes of light,
Her dazzling face he desire
It was so bright,
so bright.
All he did by night was to look above
He never let his light fade just awhile,
He hopes to be noticed by her love,
Just see his light, then shine and smile.
The luminous rays of the skies,
The beautiful stars at night,
Her shining diamond eyes
It was so bright,
so bright.
Nights and more nights had passed,
All he did by night was to look above
The firefly's light was fading too fast
When he see the truth about his love
The dazzling light did shine no more
The brilliant fire slowly died by night
The luminous sky sings its last roar
The dying light,
fading light.
On the shine of the sun to aflame the day,
A firefly's looking down to shed his tears
when he learned that the one he love
Was nothing but far away star.
poem by Raymond Cabrera
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If I could raise my hand... [Să pot întinde mâna...]
If I could raise my hand to gently touch your brow
The hair strands lying there I'd put aside right now,
I'd make it clear and pure as lilies white, sublime,
An icon of sweet love to worship all the time.
But like an evening star you sparkle far away
And just for a short while from there you come my way,
Then vanish in thin air; however, in my mind
I worship every day your vision dear and kind.
poem by Veronica Micle, translated by Octavian Cocoş
Submitted by anonym
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Fragment
Moon of leaves,
Moon of the falling leaves,
To you I bring the slippers
of the sun.
That you may dance upon the
floor of sun,
My lady carries sun within her eyes.
Moon of the Unrevealed,
Moon of the gold-encrusted shield,
To you I bring the fragment
of my prayer.
Moon of the crinkled hair,
Tell me, will my lady yield
Eyes and mouth and breasts unsealed?
Will my lady yield?
Moon of the yellow streaked with red,
Moon that the sun would lead to bed,
Moon with the death's head
More than dead,
Why do you frighten the Goddess of Love,
Whose frail white fingers are moving above
The lover's white body lost in his love?
Moon, you are more than dead.
Moon of the ermine loist in the snow,
Moon of the frozen furbelow,
Moon of the nothingness here below,
Moon, you must go.
It is the Sun that tells you so-
Moon, you must go.
And I was dark beneath the moon,
And you were dark beneath the moon,
And we were dark beneath the moon.
Now I am gold beneath the sun,
Now you are gold beneath the sun,
Now we are gold beneath the Sun.
poem by Harry Crosby
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The Lily In Your Mind (for Susan)
be thankful that it was quick
love suddenly skinned out from your bosom
like a vaccine injection
and then you realize everything is gone
like a wink and then
what you see is an empty room a bed without a shadow
of a man against the moon on an open window
i do not send flowers nor cards
they cannot help drown the grief
i leave you alone with the memories of the lilies
white lilies and soft winds caressing your hair one night
sleep now Susan, dream some more, do not wake up early
tomorrow comes and you must know another name
soon.
poem by Ric S. Bastasa
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A Calendar of Sonnets: July
Some flowers are withered and some joys have died;
The garden reeks with an East Indian scent
From beds where gillyflowers stand weak and spent;
The white heat pales the skies from side to side;
But in still lakes and rivers, cool, content,
Like starry blooms on a new firmament,
White lilies float and regally abide.
In vain the cruel skies their hot rays shed;
The lily does not feel their brazen glare.
In vain the pallid clouds refuse to share
Their dews, the lily feels no thirst, no dread.
Unharmed she lifts her queenly face and head;
She drinks of living waters and keeps fair.
poem by Helen Hunt Jackson
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Down Stream
BETWEEN Holmscote and Hurstcote
The river-reaches wind,
The whispering trees accept the breeze,
The ripple's cool and kind;
With love low-whispered 'twixt the shores,
With rippling laughters gay,
With white arms bared to ply the oars,
On last year's first of May.
Between Holmscote and Hurstcote
The river's brimmed with rain,
Through close-met banks and parted banks
Now near, now far again:
With parting tears caressed to smiles,
With meeting promised soon,
With every sweet vow that beguiles,
On last year's first of June.
Between Holmscote and Hurstcote
The river's flecked with foam,
'Neath shuddering clouds that hang in shrouds
And lost winds wild for home:
With infant wailings at the breast,
With homeless steps astray,
With wanderings shuddering tow'rds one rest
On this year's first of May.
Between Holmscote and Hurstcote
The summer river flows
With doubled flight of moons by night
And lilies' deep repose:
With lo! beneath the moon's white stare
A white face not the moon,
With lilies meshed in tangled hair,
On this year's first of June.
Between Holmscote and Hurstcote
A troth was given and riven,
From heart's trust grew one life to two,
Two lost lives cry to Heaven:
With banks spread calm to meet the sky,
With meadows newly mowed,
The harvest-paths of glad July,
The sweet school-children's road.
poem by Dante Gabriel Rossetti
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Marriage Song
Fair is my dove, my loved one,
None can with her compare:
Yea, comely as Jerusalem,
Like unto Tirzah fair.
Shall she in tents unstable
A wanderer abide,
While in my heart awaits her
A dwelling deep and wide?
The magic of her beauty
Has stolen my heart away:
Not Egypt's wise enchanters
Held half such wondrous sway.
Even as the changing opal
In varying luster glows,
Her face at every moment
New charms and sweetness shows.
White lilies and red roses
There blossom on one stem:
Her lips of crimson berries
Tempt mine to gather them.
By dusky tresses shaded
Her brow gleams fair and pale,
Like to the sun at twilight,
Behind a cloudy veil.
Her beauty shames the day-star,
And makes the darkness light:
Day in her radiant presence
Grows seven times more bright.
This is a lonely lover!
Come, fair one, to his side,
That happy be together
The bridegroom and the bride!
The hour of love approaches
That shall make one of twain:
Soon may be thus united
All Israel's hosts again!
poem by Yehudah HaLevi
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Water Lilies
I gathered them—the lilies pure and pale,
The golden-hearted lilies, virgin fair,
And in a vase of crystal, placed them where
Their perfumes might unceasingly exhale.
High in my lonely tent above the swale,
Above the shimmering mere and blossoms there,
I solaced with their sweetness my despair,
And fed with dews their beauteous petals frail.
But when the aspens felt the evening breeze,
And shadows 'gan across the lake to creep,
When hermit-thrushes to the Oreades
Sang vesper orisons, from cloisters deep,—
My lilies, lulled by native sympathies,
Upfolded their white leaves and fell asleep.
poem by Florence Earle Coates from Poems (1898)
Submitted by Veronica Serbanoiu
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In My Childhood Days I Pick Lilies In The Marsh
In my childhood days I pick lilies in the marsh,
I pick lilies, the most beautiful that I can find
in colours of red, yellow and white
but now a tar road cuts past.
The highway runs almost to eternity,
I wonder where the dilapidation did start
see no coots, plovers calling
broken lies the marshland that I love
and I have to search into the bright blue
to cling to the untouched
while smoke clouds of white, yellow and grey hang
like a blanket that is folding over everything
while wealth increases, nature becomes distorted,
and the plain has offices that is encroaching it.
poem by Gert Strydom
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Fundo
Thou art love's sweet dew which frost mine heart
Dressed in chemise white, love's scintillating tart
My heart blooms into pink lilies fair as thine dew melts
Ores of love from hate for mine heart smelts
Into beautiful, soft, delicate, elegant silk
As pure as light as white as milk
To wrap thee in and love with beauty cherish
In my grasps we melt with love till love doth perish…
poem by Kevin Michael Murphy
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Beauty Is Vain
While roses are so red,
While lilies are so white,
Shall a woman exalt her face
Because it gives delight?
She's not so sweet as a rose,
A lily's straighter than she,
And if she were as red or white
She'd be but one of three.
Whether she flush in love's summer
Or in its winter grow pale,
Whether she flaunt her beauty
Or hide it away in a veil,
Be she red or white,
And stand she erect or bowed,
Time will win the race he runs with her
And hide her away in a shroud.
poem by Christina Georgina Rossetti
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The Lake
Water lilies load all over
The blue lake amid the woods,
That imparts, while in white circles
Startling, to a boat its moods.
And along the strands I‘m passing
Listening, waiting, in unrest,
That she from the reeds may issue
And fall, gently, on my breast;
That we may jump in the little
Boat, while water‘s voices whelm
All our feelings; that enchanted
I may drop my oars and helm;
That all charmed we may be floating
While moon‘s kindly light surrounds
Us, winds cause the reeds to rustle
And the waving water sounds.
But she does not come; abandoned,
Vainly I endure and sigh
Lonely, as the water lilies
On the blue lake ever lie.
poem by Mihai Eminescu from Poems (Poesii) (September 1876), translated by Dimitrie Cuclin
Submitted by Dan Costinaş
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In the White
In the white, early morning
I hang my face
over her head
and kiss the flesh above her brow.
I hang my neck, a bow in the air
and kiss the tiny, tickling hairs above her brow.
In the white light of morning
I hang myself over her
and kiss the flesh of her skull
Her white skull
sleeps in the early morning as I hang myself
to kiss her.
I hang myself to kiss her
as she sleeps in the white, early morning.
She does not wake to my touch.
I hang myself above her
on the white bow
of early morning.
She does not wake to my hanging.
The window is cracked and taped.
The outside air is cold, forceful.
I bend myself
above her sleeping body
to kiss her, gently on the brow.
To kiss her gently on the brow
I hang myself.
poem by Chavisa Woods
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The Lost Embassy
THE lilies lean to the white, white rose,
The sweet limes send to the blossomed trees,
Soft kisses borne by the golden bees--
And all the world is alive, awake,
And glad to the heart for the summer's sake.
From her tower window the Princess leant,
Where the white light butterflies came and went;
She dropped soft kisses by twos and threes:
'White butterflies mine, will you carry these
To my Prince in prison? for they, who knows,
May break the spell that has held him close
And wake him and win him to stand up free
And laugh--in the sun--with me!'
White lilies, gold in the golden sun,
White Princess, gold in your golden gown--
Far off lies the sad, enchanted town!
Bright wings, light wings, white wings that tire,
Though they carry the flower of the heart's desire--
Will you trust to these, too white, too slight
To bring back the fruit of heart's delight?
All round and about the spell-bound town
The ways are dusty, the woods are brown;
There are no green coverts, no welcoming flowers
For little weary butterfly wings,
No dew, no lilies, no glad live things.
'Neath the sky of steel and the brazen sun
White wings, kiss-laden, dropped one by one:
By twos and threes they dropped by the way,
And only one reached the grim, gray tower
Where, witched from his kingdom, the poor Prince lay--
One poor tired butterfly, smirched and gray
With the dust of the town and the weary way,
And it lit on the Prince's hand and died.
'Bright wings, light wings, white wings,' he cried
'You, only you, might have lived and borne
My prayer to my love in her tower forlorn,
And brought back the kiss that could set me free--
She might have broken the spell that lies
On my foolish heart and my foolish eyes--
But no live butterflies come my way!'
The winds are cold and the skies are gray,
And all the lilies died yesterday;
The Princess leans from her steel-wrought tower
To watch for her butterflies hour by hour.
Poor little Princess, you watch in vain!
Butterflies die where the green wood browns,
And kisses sent to enchanted towns
Never come home again.
poem by Edith Nesbit
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Portraits
I
MOTHER
I
Your love was like moonlight turning harsh things to beauty, so that little wry souls reflecting each other obliquely as in cracked mirrors… beheld in your luminous spirit their own reflection, transfigured as in a shining stream, and loved you for what they are not.
You are less an image in my mind than a luster I see you in gleams pale as star-light on a gray wall… evanescent as the reflection of a white swan shimmering in broken water.
II
(To E. S.)
You inevitable,
Unwieldy with enormous births,
Lying on your back, eyes open, sucking down stars,
Or you kissing and picking over fresh deaths…
Filth… worms… flowers…
Green and succulent pods…
Tremulous gestation
Of dark water germinal with lilies…
All in you from the beginning…
Nothing buried or thrown away…
Only the moon like a white sheet
Spread over the dead you carry.
III
(To H.)
Speeding gull
Passing under a cloud
Caught on his white back
You… drop of crystal rain.
Now you gleam softly triumphant
Folding immensities of light.
IV
(To O. F. T.)
You have always gotten up after blows
And smiled… and shaken off the dust…
Only you could not shake the darkness
From off the bruised brown of your eyes.
V
(To E. A. R.)
Centuries shall not deflect nor many suns absorb your stream, flowing immune and cold between the banks of snow. Nor any wind carry the dust of cities to your high waters that arise out of the peaks and return again into the mountain and never descend.
poem by Lola Ridge
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The White Lily
By the river bank
The frogs croak and caress
Hoping along the river bank
From here to there
At a distant
The swallows twitter with fondness
The lilies rupture with the morning sun
The water reeds sway
As the wind blows along
The river bank
But yet....i feel lost
In this scenery of dexteric desires
I feel caught in lifes pedestals
Tender steps i make....
Along the river bank...
Lilies..
The white lily...
That symbolise
The purity of those souls
Enmeshed in lovesframe
The white lily
That symbolise
The fire that burns within circles
The white lily that symbolises
Long lost desires
Re-invented and rejuvenated
In this river of dexteric desires
The white lily
So white...so pure...
By the river bank
I watch the white lily float and dance
Along the river waters
Their is tenderness in the river
The fishes swim with tenderness
The waters flowing
With a lovers moan
Rythmic drums can be heard from afar
Magic everywhere
I sit and stare at the white lily
With a longing yen....
By the river bank.
poem by Jack Shaka
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Moonlight Sestina
While reading Li Po, I fall
Asleep, and dream of the moon
My body lies on white
Cool sheets, flooded in a pool
Of moonlight. Lost in a dream
I lie in light, floating.
Like a full moon floating
On waves, I feel the fall
And rise, the tide of these dream
Currents. Closer, the moon
Approaches to my pool
Of flesh, shining me white.
From the glare of waxing white,
Gauze curtains – breeze floating -
Shield this rippling pool,
Become a waterfall,
And break the mirror moon-
Light through wet prisms, I dream.
Is this Shechinah? my dream
Self asks. At once the cold white
Chills me to ice. The moon
Swells until it's a floating
City, waiting to fall -
Atlantis – in the pool.
I yearn to be that pool
Skin, transparent as dream.
Instead I fear the moon fall:
I cannot part the white
Sea of thighs, Still floating
Whole, I cry to the moon:
“I am not ready, Moon”
Silence shimmers my pool,
But brightness fades, Floating
Away. Then from the dream
I emerge, weeping white
Tears that shine like star-fall.
Li Po's moon plunge sank dream
Deep. Whirlpool of lunar white
Drowns us; floating, we fall.
poem by Lillian Susan Thomas
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Sonnet Of Motherhood X
I walked among the flowers that bend their heads
Low to the earth and back again to light,
Hearing them prattle of their blue and white—
Violet and jasmine in the bordered beds.
They whispered them of every wing that weds
388ഊFragrance to fragrance in the dusky night;
And, seeing them, I knew another sight,
And saw them bowing where all Beauty spreads.
I touched each petal with the sunbeams flaked—
Roses and pansies of the early morn,
Lilies that lilted of the moon’s light grace,
And left them hushed when all my joy was slaked;
For in the garden of my soul, God-born,
Each flower made beauty for my child’s soft face.
poem by Zora Bernice May Cross
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