Catharine Livingston
Her little bark on Life's wide Ocean tossed,
In the unequal struggle soon was lost,
Severe its conflict! Much alas it bore,
Then sunk beneath the storm and rose no more.
But when th' Archangels clarion shall sound,
And thunder "LIFE" through all the vast profound,
Her renovated vessel will be seen,
Transcendent floating on the stream!
The joyful ensigns waving in the air!
The tides propitious and the zephyrs fair,
Till safe within the destined Port of Bliss,
The anchor drops in everlasting PEACE.
poem by Major Henry Livingston Jr.
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To the Memory of Sarah Livingston
BEYOND where billows roll or tempests vex
Is gone the gentlest of the gentle sex!
---Her brittle bark on life's wild ocean tost
Unequal to the conflict soon was lost.
Severe her sufferings! much, alas, she bore,
Then sunk beneath the storm & rose no more.
But when th' Archangel's awful trump shall sound
And vibrate life thro all the deep profound
Her renovated vessel will be seen,
Transcendant floating on the silver stream!
All beauteous to behold! serene she glides
Borne on by mildest & propitious tides;
While fanning zephyrs fill her snow white sails
And aid her passage with the friendliest gales
Till safe within the destin'd port of bliss
She furls her sails and moors in endless peace.
poem by Major Henry Livingston Jr.
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Gently on the Stream of Time
Gently on the stream of time,
We are floating day by day,
In life's native boats sublime
We soon anchor in the bay.
We'll soon anchor in the haven,
Where the weary are at rest,
In that blissful port called Heaven,
Where are roaming now the blest.
CHORUS:
Be gentle, time be gentle with us,
While we are on life's troubled stream,
May life's foaming billows o'er us
Break away as day serene.
Gently on the stream of time,
We will swiftly glide along,
Till we reach the realm divine,
Then we'll join the heavenly throng,
Where our friends have gone before us
Waiting on the other shore.
In that home they sing in chorus,
"Welcome home the rich and poor."
Gently on the stream of time,
We shall shortly pass away,
We shall reach the heavenly clime
If God's commands we obey.
Gently on the stream of time
We are going one by one,
Listening to the evening chime
On life's journey going home.
poem by Julia A Moore
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Sonnet V: Nothing But No
Nothing but "No," and "Aye," and "Aye," and "No"?
How falls it out so strangely you reply?
I tell ye, Fair, I'll not be answer'd so,
With this affirming "No," denying "Aye."
I say, "I love," you slightly answer "Aye";
I say, "You love," you pule me out a "No";
I say, "I die," you echo me an "Aye";
"Save me," I cry, you sigh me out a "No";
Must woe and I have nought but "No" and "Aye"?
No I am I, if I no more can have;
Answer no more, with silence make reply,
And let me take myself what I do crave.
Let "No" and "Aye" with I and you be so;
Then answer "No," and "Aye," and "Aye" and "No."
poem by Michael Drayton
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I shall hold you
I shall hold you back
I shall hold you back
As so much is at stake
Life is not simple cake
Whenever you like and take
Life is real
Come near and feel
It will make you fully secured
That is destiny and our future
You are made to feel
Love is divine and felt at will
"How and why" has no scope for doubt
It is all in love and we must talk about
The sky is vast and so is the world
You need to come and set in fold
You are safe with peace in wide arms
Without a single thought of any harm
Never think of running away
You will find no excuses for finding new way
You may try to run away but face high walls
You will look back to hear my sweet calls
"Keya*, Keya* to run away is cowardice
Retreat from commitment and honest promise
Where will you land in this unknown forest?
Will you be there for want of no interest?
I am here and permanently near
Come to me without any fear
I shall hold you till last or forever
Think not of running away ever
You have place to rest on my shoulder
They are well built and little wider
They can take care of your every comfort
Just anchor your ship at lovely port
Love is called love and almost pure
That makes a person very much sure
I, for one, can hardly afford
Your absence so I pray for you to Lord
*Keya is name
poem by Hasmukh Amathalal
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The Three Enemies
THE FLESH
"Sweet, thou art pale."
"More pale to see,
Christ hung upon the cruel tree
And bore His Father's wrath for me."
"Sweet, thou art sad."
"Beneath a rod
More heavy, Christ for my sake trod
The winepress of the wrath of God."
"Sweet, thou art weary."
"Not so Christ:
Whose mighty love of me suffic'd
For Strength, Salvation, Eucharist."
"Sweet, thou art footsore."
"If I bleed,
His feet have bled; yea in my need
His Heart once bled for mine indeed."
THE WORLD
"Sweet, thou art young."
"So He was young
Who for my sake in silence hung
Upon the Cross with Passion wrung."
"Look, thou art fair."
"He was more fair
Than men, Who deign'd for me to wear
A visage marr'd beyond compare."
"And thou hast riches."
"Daily bread:
All else is His: Who, living, dead,
For me lack'd where to lay His Head."
"And life is sweet."
"It was not so
To Him, Whose Cup did overflow
With mine unutterable woe."
THE DEVIL
"Thou drinkest deep."
"When Christ would sup
He drain'd the dregs from out my cup:
So how should I be lifted up?"
"Thou shalt win Glory."
"In the skies,
Lord Jesus, cover up mine eyes
Lest they should look on vanities."
"Thou shalt have Knowledge."
"Helpless dust!
In Thee, O Lord, I put my trust:
Answer Thou for me, Wise and Just."
"And Might."--
"Get thee behind me. Lord,
Who hast redeem'd and not abhorr'd
My soul, oh keep it by Thy Word."
poem by Christina Georgina Rossetti
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The Wreck of the Steamer Storm Queen
Ye landsmen, all pray list to me,
While I relate a terrible tale of the sea,
Concerning the screw steamer "Storm Queen"
Which was wrecked, alas! a most heast-rending scene.
From Sebastopol, with a cargo of grain, she was on her way,
And soon after entering the Bay of Biscay,
On the 21st of December, they experienced a fearful storm
Such as they never experienced since they were born.
The merciless sea was running mountains high,
And to save themselves from a watery grave manfully they did try;
But the vessel became unmanageable, but still they worked away,
And managed to launch two small boats without dismay.
They wrought most manfully and behaved very well,
But a big wave smashed a smell boat before they left the vessel;
Still the Captain, Mr Jaques, and five of the crew
Clung to the "Storm Queen" until she sank beneath the waters blue.
While the sea lashed itself into white foam and loudly did roar,
And with a gurgling sound the big waves covered the vessel o'er;
So perished Captain Jaques and five of the crew
Who stuck to the vessel, as brave sailors would do.
But before the vessel sank a raft was made,
And a few men got on to it who were not afraid;
And oh! it was enough to make one's blood to freeze
To see them jumping off the steamer into the yawning seas.
So they were tossed about on the big billows the whole night,
And beneath the big waves they were engulphed before daylight;
But 22 that reached the boats were saved in all
By the aid of God, on whom they did call.
And on the next morning before daylight
The Norwegian barque "Gulvare" hove in sight;
Then they shouted and pulled towards her with all their might,
While the seas were running high, oh! what a fearful sight.
The poor souls were prevented from getting along side
Of the barque "Gulvare" by the heavy seas and tide;
And as the boats drew near the barque the storm increases
Until the boats struck against her and were dashed to pieces.
It was almost beyond human efforts with the storm to cope
But most fortunately they were hauled on board by a rope,
While the big waves did lash the barque all over,
But by a merciful providence they were landed safely at Dover.
The survivors when rescued were in a destitute state,
But nevertheless they seemed resigned to their fate,
And they thanked God that did them save
Most timely from a cold and watery grave.
And during their stay in Dover they received kind treatment,
For which they, poor creatures, felt very content;
And when they recovered from their ills they met at sea,
The authorities sent them home to their own country.
But as for Captain Jaques, few men like him had been,
Because he couldn't be persuaded to desert the "Storm Queen,"
As he declared he wouldn't leave her whatever did betide;
So the brave hero sank with her beneath the waters wide.
poem by William Topaz McGonagall
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A Change of Menu
Now the new chum loaded his three-nought-three,
It's a small-bore gun, but his hopes were big.
"I am fed to the teeth with old ewe," said he,
"And I might be able to shoot a pig."
And he trusted more to his nose than ear
To give him warning when pigs were near.
Out of his lair in the lignum dark.
Where the wild duck nests and the bilbie digs,
With a whoof and a snort and a kind of bark
There rose the father of all the pigs:
And a tiger would have walked wide of him
As he stropped his tusks on a leaning limb.
Then the new chum's three-nought-three gave tongue
Like a popgun fired in an opera bouffe:
But a pig that was old when the world was young
Is near as possible bullet-proof.
(The more you shoot him the less he dies,
Unless you catch him between the eyes.)
So the new chum saw it was up to him
To become extinct if he stopped to shoot;
So he made a leap for a gidgee limb
While the tusker narrowly missed his boot.
Then he found a fork, where he swayed in air
As he gripped the boughs like a native bear.
The pig sat silent and gaunt and grim
To wait and wait till his foe should fall:
For night and day were the same to him,
And home was any old place at all.
"I must wait," said he, "till this sportsman drops;
I could use his boots for a pair of strops."
The crows that watch from the distant blue
Came down to see what it all might mean;
An eaglehawk and a cockatoo
Bestowed their patronage on the scene.
Till a far-off boundary rider said
"I must have a look -- there is something dead."
Now the new chum sits at his Christmas fare
Of a dried-up chop from a tough old ewe.
Says he, "It's better than native bear
And nearly as tender as kangaroo.
An emu's egg I can masticate,
But pork," says he, "is the thing I hate."
poem by Andrew Barton Paterson
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Tea On The Lawn
It was foretold by sybils three
that in an air crash he would die.
"I'll fool their prophesy," said he;
"You won't get me to go on high.
Howe're the need for haste and speed,
I'll never, never, never fly."
It's true he traveled everywhere,
Afar and near, by land and sea,
Yet he would never go by air
And chance an evil destiny.
Always by ship or rail he went -
For him no sky-plane accident.
Then one day walking on the heath
He watched a pilot chap on high,
And chuckled as he stood beneath
That lad a-looping in the sky.
Feeling so safe and full of glee
Serenely he went home to tea.
With buttered toast he told his wife:
"My dear, you can't say I've been rash;
Three fortune tellers said my life
Would end up in an air-plane crash.
But see! I'm here so safe and sound:
By gad! I'll never leave the ground.
"For me no baptism of air;
It's in my bed I mean to die.
Behold yon crazy fool up there,
A-cutting capers in the sky.
His motor makes a devilish din . . .
Look! Look! He's gone into a spin.
"He's dashing downward - "Oh my God!" . . .
Alas! he never finished tea.
The motor ploughed the garden sod
And in the crash a corpse was he:
Proving that no man can frustrate
The merciless design of Fate.
poem by Robert William Service
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Rhyme-Smith
Oh, I was born a lyric babe
(That last word is a bore -
It's only rhyme is astrolabe,"
Whose meaning I ignore.)
From cradlehood I lisped in numbers,
Made jingles even in my slumbers.
Said Ma: "He'll be a bard, I know it."
Said Pa: "let's hoe he will outgrow it."
Alas! I never did and so
A dreamer and a drone was I,
Who persevered in want and woe
His misery to versify.
Yea, I was doomed to be a failure
(Old Browning rhymes that last with "pale lure"):
And even starving in the gutter,
My macaronics I would utter.
Then in a poor, cheap book I crammed,
And to the public maw I tossed
My bitter Dirges of the Damned,
My Lyrics of the Lost.
"Let carping critic flay and flout
My Ditties of the Down and Out -
"There now," said I, "I've done with verse,
My love, my weakness and my curse."
Then lo! (As I would fain believe,
Before they crown, the fates would shame us)
I went to sleep one bitter eve,
And woke to find that I was famous. . . .
And so the sunny sequels were a
Gay villa on the Riviera,
A bank account, a limousine, a
Life patterned dolce e divina.
Oh, yes, my lyric flight is flighty;
My muse is much more mite than mighty:
But poetry has been my friend,
And rhyming's saved me in the end.
poem by Robert William Service
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Sonnet LIX: As Love and I
As Love and I, late harbor'd in one inn,
With proverbs thus each other entertain:
"In Love there is no lack," thus I begin;
"Fair words make fools," replieth he again;
"Who spares to speak doth spare to speed," quoth I;
"As well," saith he, "too forward as too slow";
"Fortune assists the boldest," I reply;
"A hasty man," quoth he, "ne'er wanted woe";
"Labor is light where Love," quoth I, "doth pay";
Saith he, "Light burden's heavy, if far borne";
Quoth I, "The main lost, cast the bye away";
"You have spun a fair thread," he replies in scorn.
And having thus awhile each other thwarted,
Fools as we met, so fools again we parted.
poem by Michael Drayton
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What is—
215
What is—"Paradise"—
Who live there—
Are they "Farmers"—
Do they "hoe"—
Do they know that this is "Amherst"—
And that I—am coming—too—
Do they wear "new shoes"—in "Eden"—
Is it always pleasant—there—
Won't they scold us—when we're homesick—
Or tell God—how cross we are—
You are sure there's such a person
As "a Father"—in the sky—
So if I get lost—there—ever—
Or do what the Nurse calls "die"—
I shan't walk the "Jasper"—barefoot—
Ransomed folks—won't laugh at me—
Maybe—"Eden" a'n't so lonesome
As New England used to be!
poem by Emily Dickinson
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The End...A Beginning?
The End... A Beginning?
The end...?
Finality a question, summation, premonition.
A state nevermore?
To offer suitable explanation, knowledge or qualifications.
Who might such skills possess?
Scholar, cleric, physician, confidant, Life's companion?
Just who?
The end...?
Is there I ask any definitive arena
this term "The end" reveals?
Must "The end" always reference
sadness or desperation's tears?
Might "The end" be synonymous
with as well, "A beginning"?
Let us consider I submit
another path to journey.
Should incident of termination
plague us.
Allow we the survivors, ponder
a new tack to engage,
to venture.
To displace, gales of depression
from Life's sails. Summon,
calming temperate zephyrs.
As we explore each new
"beginning"
permit fond reverence of that
"end"
with hallowed memory.
To replace "The end" with
a "beginning", will
perpetuate reminders of
loving times.
No longer will "The end..."
darken fond recall.
28Jun12
poem by Kurt Hearth
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The Contented Man
"How good God is to me," he said;
"For have I not a mansion tall,
With trees and lawns of velvet tread,
And happy helpers at my call?
With beauty is my life abrim,
With tranquil hours and dreams apart;
You wonder that I yield to Him
That best of prayers, a grateful heart?"
"How good God is to me," he said;
"For look! though gone is all my wealth,
How sweet it is to earn one's bread
With brawny arms and brimming health.
Oh, now I know the joy of strife!
To sleep so sound, to wake so fit.
Ah yes, how glorious is life!
I thank Him for each day of it."
"How good God is to me," he said;
"Though health and wealth are gone, it's true;
Things might be worse, I might be dead,
And here I'm living, laughing too.
Serene beneath the evening sky
I wait, and every man's my friend;
God's most contented man am I . . .
He keeps me smiling to the End."
poem by Robert William Service
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Glee -- The Ghosts
In life three ghostly friars were we,
And now three friarly ghosts we be.
Around our shadowy table placed,
The spectral bowl before us floats:
With wine that none but ghosts can taste,
We wash our unsubstantial throats.
Three merry ghosts--three merry ghosts--
three merry ghosts are we:
Let the ocean be Port, and we'll think it good sport
To be laid in that Red Sea.
With songs that jovial spectres chaunt,
Our old refectory still we haunt.
The traveller hears our midnight mirth:
"O list!" he cries, "the haunted choir!
"The merriest ghost that walks the earth, "
"Is sure the ghost of a ghostly friar."
Three merry ghosts--three merry ghosts--
three merry ghosts are we:
Let the ocean be Port, and we'll think it good sport
To be laid in that Red Sea.
poem by Thomas Love Peacock
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With a Bouquet of Twelve Roses
I saw Lord Buddha towering by my gate
Saying: "Once more, good youth, I stand and wait."
Saying: "I bring you my fair Law of Peace
And from your withering passion full release;
Release from that white hand that stabbed you so.
The road is calling. With the wind you go,
Forgetting her imperious disdain —
Quenching all memory in the sun and rain."
"Excellent Lord, I come. But first," I said,
"Grant that I bring her these twelve roses red.
Yea, twelve flower kisses for her rose-leaf mouth,
And then indeed I go in bitter drouth
To that far valley where your river flows
In Peace, that once I found in every rose."
poem by Vachel Lindsay
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The Ballad of M. T. Nutt and His Dog
The Honourable M. T. Nutt
About the bush did jog.
Till, passing by a settler's hut,
He stopped and bought a dog.
Then started homewards full of hope,
Alas, that hopes should fail!
The dog pulled back and took the rope
Beneath the horse's tail.
The Horse remarked, "I would be soft
Such liberties to stand!"
"Oh dog," he said, "Go up aloft,
Young man, go on the land!"
poem by Andrew Barton Paterson
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Johanna Sebus
THE DAM BREAKS DOWN, THE ICE-PLAIN GROWLS,
THE FLOODS ARISE, THE WATER HOWLS.
"I'll bear thee, mother, across the swell,
'Tis not yet high, I can wade right well."
"Remember us too! in what danger are we!
Thy fellow-lodger, and children three!
The trembling woman!--Thou'rt going away!"
She bears the mother across the spray.
"Quick! haste to the mound, and awhile there wait,
I'll soon return, and all will be straight.
The mound's close by, and safe from the wet;
But take my goat too, my darling pet!"
THE DAM DISSOLVES, THE ICE-PLAIN GROWLS,
THE FLOODS DASH ON, THE WATER HOWLS.
She places the mother safe on the shore;
Fair Susan then turns tow'rd the flood once more.
"Oh whither? Oh whither? The breadth fast grows,
Both here and there the water o'erflows.
Wilt venture, thou rash one, the billows to brave?"
"THEY SHALL, AND THEY MUST BE PRESERVED FROM THE WAVE!"
THE DAM DISAPPEARS, THE WATER GROWLS,
LIKE OCEAN BILLOWS IT HEAVES AND HOWLS.
Fair Susan returns by the way she had tried,
The waves roar around, but she turns not aside;
She reaches the mound, and the neighbour straight,
But for her and the children, alas, too late!
THE DAM DISAPPEAR'D,--LIKE A SEA IT GROWLS,
ROUND THE HILLOCK IN CIRCLING EDDIES IT HOWLS.
The foaming abyss gapes wide, and whirls round,
The women and children are borne to the ground;
The horn of the goat by one is seized fast,
But, ah, they all must perish at last!
Fair Susan still stands-there, untouch'd by the wave;
The youngest, the noblest, oh, who now will save?
Fair Susan still stands there, as bright as a star,
But, alas! all hope, all assistance is far.
The foaming waters around her roar,
To save her, no bark pushes off from the shore.
Her gaze once again she lifts up to Heaven,
Then gently away by the flood she is driven.
NO DAM, NO PLAIN! TO MARK THE PLACE
SOME STRAGGLING TREES ARE THE ONLY TRACE.
The rushing water the wilderness covers,
Yet Susan's image still o'er it hovers.--
The water sinks, the plains re-appear.
Fair Susan's lamented with many a tear,--
May he who refuses her story to tell,
Be neglected in life and in death as well!
poem by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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The Shag
"What is that great bird, sister, tell me,
Perched high on the top of the crag?"
"'T is the cormorant, dear little brother;
The fishermen call it the shag."
"But what does it there, sister, tell me,
Sitting lonely against the black sky?"
"It has settled to rest, little brother;
It hears the wild gale wailing high."
"But I am afraid of it, sister,
For over the sea and the land
It gazes, so black and so silent!"
"Little brother, hold fast to my hand."
"Oh, what was that, sister? The thunder?
Did the shag bring the storm and the cloud,
The wind and the rain and the lightning?"
"Little brother, the thunder roars loud.
"Run fast, for the rain sweeps the ocean;
Look! over the light-house it streams;
And the lightning leaps red, and above us
The gulls fill the air with their screams."
O'er the beach, o'er the rocks, running swiftly,
The little white cottage they gain;
And safely they watch from the window
The dance and the rush of the rain.
But the shag kept his place on the headland,
And when the brief storm had gone by,
He shook his loose plumes, and they saw him
Rise splendid and strong in the sky.
Clinging fast to the gown of his sister,
The little boy laughed as he flew;
"He is gone with the wind and the lightning!
And -- I am not frightened, -- are you?"
poem by Celia Thaxter
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On a Wet Day
As I walked thinking through a little grove,
Some girls that gathered flowers came passing me,
Saying -- "Look here! look there!" delightedly.
"O here it is!" "What's that?" "A lily? love!"
"And there are violets!"
"Farther for roses! O the lovely pets!
The darling beauties! O the nasty thorn!
Look here, my hand's all torn!"
"What's that that jumps?" "O don't! It's a grasshopper!"
"Come, run! come, run!
Here's bluebells!" "O what fun!"
"Not that way! Stop her!"
"Yes! this way!" Pluck them then!"
"O, I've found mushrooms! O look here!" "O, I'm
Quite sure that farther on we'll get wild thyme."
"O, we shall stay too long; it's going to rain;
There's lightning; O! there's thunder!"
"O shan't we hear the vesper bell? I wonder."
"Why, it's not nones, you silly little thing!
And don't you hear the nightingales that sing --
Fly away, O die away?"
"O, I hear something; hush!"
"Why, where? what is it then?" "Ah! in that bush."
So every girl here knocks it, shakes and shocks it:
Till with the stir they make
Out scurries a great snake.
"O Lord! O me! Alack! Ah me! Alack!"
They scream, and then all run and scream again,
And then in heavy drops comes down the rain.
Each running at the other in a fright,
Each trying to get before the other, and crying,
And flying, and stumbling, tumbling, wrong or right; --
One sets her knee
There where her foot should be;
One has her hands and dress
All smothered up with mud in a fine mess;
And one gets trampled on by two or three.
What's gathered is let fall
About the wood, and not picked up at all.
The wreaths of flowers are scattered on the ground,
And still as, screaming, hustling, without rest,
They run this way and that and round and round,
She thinks herself in luck who runs the best.
I stood quite still to have a perfect view,
And never noticed till I got wet through.
poem by Franco Sacchetti
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The Gardener XXVI: What Comes From Your Willing Hands
"What comes from your willing
hands I take. I beg for nothing
more."
"Yes, yes, I know you, modest
mendicant, you ask for all that one
has."
"If there be a stray flower for me
I will wear it in my heart."
"But if there be thorns?"
"I will endure them."
"Yes, yes, I know you, modest
mendicant, you ask for all that one
has."
"If but once you should raise your
loving eyes to my face it would make
my life sweet beyond death."
"But if there be only cruel
glances?"
"I will keep them piercing my
heart."
"Yes, yes, I know you, modest
mendicant, you ask for all that one
has."
poem by Rabindranath Tagore
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