A Roman Aqueduct
THE sun-browned girl, whose limbs recline
When noon her languid hand has laid
Hot on the green flakes of the pine,
Beneath its narrow disk of shade;
As, through the flickering noontide glare,
She gazes on the rainbow chain
Of arches, lifting once in air
The rivers of the Roman's plain;--
Say, does her wandering eye recall
The mountain-current's icy wave,--
Or for the dead one tear let fall,
Whose founts are broken by their grave?
From stone to stone the ivy weaves
Her braided tracery's winding veil,
And lacing stalks and tangled leaves
Nod heavy in the drowsy gale.
And lightly floats the pendent vine,
That swings beneath her slender bow,
Arch answering arch,--whose rounded line
Seems mirrored in the wreath below.
How patient Nature smiles at Fame!
The weeds, that strewed the victor's way,
Feed on his dust to shroud his name,
Green where his proudest towers decay.
See, through that channel, empty now,
The scanty rain its tribute pours,--
Which cooled the lip and laved the brow
Of conquerors from a hundred shores.
Thus bending o'er the nation's bier,
Whose wants the captive earth supplied,
The dew of Memory's passing tear
Falls on the arches of her pride!
poem by Oliver Wendell Holmes
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The Cambridge Churchyard
Our ancient church! its lowly tower,
Beneath the loftier spire,
Is shadowed when the sunset hour
Clothes the tall shaft in fire;
It sinks beyond the distant eye
Long ere the glittering vane,
High wheeling in the western sky,
Has faded o’er the plain.
Like Sentinel and Nun, they keep
Their vigil on the green;
One seems to guard, and one to weep,
The dead that lie between;
And both roll out, so full and near,
Their music’s mingling waves,
They shake the grass, whose pennoned spear
Leans on the narrow graves.
The stranger parts the flaunting weeds,
Whose seeds the winds have strown
So thick, beneath the line he reads,
They shade the sculptured stone;
The child unveils his clustered brow,
And ponders for a while
The graven willow’s pendent bough,
Or rudest cherub’s smile.
But what to them the dirge, the knell?
These were the mourner’s share,—Â
The sullen clang, whose heavy swell
Throbbed through the beating air;
The rattling cord, the rolling stone,
The shelving sand that slid,
And, far beneath, with hollow tone
Rung on the coffin’s lid.
The slumberer’s mound grows fresh and green,
Then slowly disappears;
The mosses creep, the gray stones lean,
Earth hides his date and years;
But, long before the once-loved name
Is sunk or worn away,
No lip the silent dust may claim,
That pressed the breathing clay.
Go where the ancient pathway guides,
See where our sires laid down
Their smiling babes, their cherished brides,
The patriarchs of the town;
Hast thou a tear for buried love?
A sigh for transient power?
All that a century left above,
Go, read it in an hour!
The Indian’s shaft, the Briton’s ball,
The sabre’s thirsting edge,
The hot shell, shattering in its fall,
The bayonet’s rending wedge,—Â
Here scattered death; yet, seek the spot,
No trace thine eye can see,
No altar,—Âand they need it not
Who leave their children free!
Look where the turbid rain-drops stand
In many a chiselled square;
The knightly crest, the shield, the brand
Of honored names were there;—Â
Alas! for every tear is dried
Those blazoned tablets knew,
Save when the icy marble’s side
Drips with the evening dew.
Or gaze upon yon pillared stone,
The empty urn of pride;
There stand the Goblet and the Sun,—Â
What need of more beside?
Where lives the memory of the dead,
Who made their tomb a toy?
Whose ashes press that nameless bed?
Go, ask the village boy!
Lean o’er the slender western wall,
Ye ever-roaming girls;
The breath that bids the blossom fall
May lift your floating curls,
To sweep the simple lines that tell
An exile’s date and doom;
And sigh, for where his daughters dwell,
They wreathe the stranger’s tomb.
And one amid these shades was born,
Beneath this turf who lies,
Once beaming as the summer’s morn,
That closed her gentle eyes;
If sinless angels love as we,
Who stood thy grave beside,
Three seraph welcomes waited thee,
The daughter, sister, bride.
I wandered to thy buried mound
When earth was hid below
The level of the glaring ground,
Choked to its gates with snow,
And when with summer’s flowery waves
The lake of verdure rolled,
As if a Sultan’s white-robed slaves
Had scattered pearls and gold.
Nay, the soft pinions of the air,
That lift this trembling tone,
Its breath of love may almost bear
To kiss thy funeral stone;
And, now thy smiles have passed away,
For all the joy they gave,
May sweetest dews and warmest ray
Lie on thine early grave!
When damps beneath and storms above
Have bowed these fragile towers,
Still o’er the graves yon locust grove
Shall swing its Orient flowers;
And I would ask no mouldering bust,
If e’er this humble line,
Which breathed a sigh o’er other’s dust,
Might call a tear on mine.
poem by Oliver Wendell Holmes
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Autumn: A Dirge
The warm sun is falling, the bleak wind is wailing,
The bare boughs are sighing, the pale flowers are dying,
And the Year
On the earth is her death-bed, in a shroud of leaves dead,
Is lying.
Come, Months, come away,
From November to May,
In your saddest array;
Follow the bier
Of the dead cold Year,
And like dim shadows watch by her sepulchre.
The chill rain is falling, the nipped worm is crawling,
The rivers are swelling, the thunder is knelling
For the Year;
The blithe swallows are flown, and the lizards each gone
To his dwelling.
Come, Months, come away;
Put on white, black and gray;
Let your light sisters play--
Ye, follow the bier
Of the dead cold Year,
And make her grave green with tear on tear.
poem by Percy Bysshe Shelley
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A Stone Birdbath!
A stone birdbath overflowing with snow,
Under an arch of ivy vine
Bright green leaves are long gone
A stone birdbath overflowing with snow!
A bemused bird hovering over–not know
It used to take its fill – devine
A stone birdbath overflowing with snow
Under an arch of ivy branches!
poem by Deva De Silva
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A panorama with arches…
Arches, arches, arches
Arches of lips, palates, eyes, eyebrows
Arches of hearts, minds, kisses,
Indignities, obedience’s,
Arches of dreams, skies, stars, waters
Arched bridges that make me easier to reach you
More quickly than one single arc
Arched of words, that goes so smoothly
When they fly in arch style between us
Arches under sustained bridges of our love
And, I get thirsty oftentimes for them…
Vasil Marku 2012
poem by Vasil Marku
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Noon
Noon! and in the garden bower
The hot air quivers o’er the grass,
The little lake is smooth as glass
And still so heavily the hour
Drags, that scarce the proudest flower
Pressed upon its burning bed
Has strength to lift a languid head:
—Rose and fainting violet
By the water’s margin set
Swoon and sink as they were dead
Though their weary leaves be fed
With the foam-drops of the pool
Where it trembles dark and cool
Wrinkled by the fountain spraying
O’er it. And the honey-bee
Hums his drowsy melody
And wanders in his course a-straying
Through the sweet and tangled glade
With his golden mead o’erladen,
Where beneath the pleasant shade
Of the darkling boughs a maiden
—Milky limb and fiery tress,
All at sweetest random laid—
Slumbers, drunken with the excess
Of the noontide’s loveliness.
poem by Clive Staples Lewis
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Oh! Green, Stay Green!
In the brilliant spectrum of rainbow hues,
Oh, Green! Thou art a ravishing shade.
You glow and fade in distant skies,
You hide beneath the oceans deep,
You make the Earth so cheery to live,
You ward off famine and assure wealth,
You signal movement and ensure health,
You sooth the eyes and cool the hearts.
In the brilliant spectrum of rainbow hues,
Oh, Green! Thou art a ravishing shade.
Green is the garb; God gave the Earth to wear,
Green is the harbinger of blooming spring,
Green – the forests that is home to beasts,
Green – the meadows, where the cattle graze,
Green – the prairies that stretch afar,
Green – the lawns that adorn the homes,
Green – the tuft of grass that grows beneath,
Green – the unripe fruits that hangs from boughs.
In the brilliant spectrum of rainbow hues,
Oh, Green! Thou art a ravishing shade.
But Alas! The Green is fast fading out,
The verdant Earth, turned into an arid stretch,
Life made so horrid for man and beast,
And Nature mourns her doleful plight,
Toil hard to usher the Green again,
Never let the trees fall and rot,
Take from Nature just enough to make you go,
And keep in reserve what is due for the ones to come!
In the brilliant spectrum of rainbow hues,
Oh, Green! Thou art a ravishing shade.
poem by Valsa George
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With the Young Wine
Sun sets purple,
Swallow has already flown far off.
Under arches in the evening
New wine goes round;
Snow falls behind the mountain.
Summer's last green drifts away,
Hunter comes from the forest.
Under arches in the evening
New wine goes round;
Snow falls behind the mountain.
Bat blows around the forehead,
A stranger comes silently.
Under arches in the evening
New wine goes round;
Snow falls behind the mountain.
poem by Georg Trakl
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The Tear
When Friendship or Love
Our sympathies move;
When Truth, in a glance, should appear,
The lips may beguile,
With a dimple or smile,
But the test of affection's a Tear:
Too oft is a smile
But the hypocrite's wile,
To mask detestation, or fear;
Give me the soft sigh,
Whilst the soultelling eye
Is dimm'd, for a time, with a Tear:
Mild Charity's glow,
To us mortals below,
Shows the soul from barbarity clear;
Compassion will melt,
Where this virtue is felt,
And its dew is diffused in a Tear:
The man, doom'd to sail
With the blast of the gale,
Through billows Atlantic to steer,
As he bends o'er the wave
Which may soon be his grave,
The green sparkles bright with a Tear;
The Soldier braves death
For a fanciful wreath
In Glory's romantic career;
But he raises the foe
When in battle laid low,
And bathes every wound with a Tear.
If, with high-bounding pride,
He return to his bride!
Renouncing the gore-crimson'd spear;
All his toils are repaid
When, embracing the maid,
From her eyelid he kisses the Tear.
Sweet scene of my youth!
Seat of Friendship and Truth,
Where Love chas'd each fast-fleeting year
Loth to leave thee, I mourn'd,
For a last look I turn'd,
But thy spire was scarce seen through a Tear:
Though my vows I can pour,
To my Mary no more,
My Mary, to Love once so dear,
In the shade of her bow'r,
I remember the hour,
She rewarded those vows with a Tear.
By another possest,
May she live ever blest!
Her name still my heart must revere:
With a sigh I resign,
What I once thought was mine,
And forgive her deceit with a Tear.
Ye friends of my heart,
Ere from you I depart,
This hope to my breast is most near:
If again we shall meet,
In this rural retreat,
May we meet, as we part, with a Tear.
When my soul wings her flight
To the regions of night,
And my corse shall recline on its bier;
As ye pass by the tomb,
Where my ashes consume,
Oh! moisten their dust with a Tear.
I Dug Beneath the Cypress Shade
I dug, beneath the cypress shade,
What well might seem an elfin's grave;
And every pledge in earth I laid,
That erst thy false affection gave.
I pressed them down the sod beneath;
I placed one mossy stone above;
And twined the rose's fading wreath
Around the sepulchre of love.
Frail as thy love, the flowers were dead,
Ere yet the evening sun was set:
But years shall see the cypress spread,
Immutable as my regret.
poem by Thomas Love Peacock
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The Old Burying-Ground
Our vales are sweet with fern and rose,
Our hills are maple-crowned;
But not from them our fathers chose
The village burying-ground.
The dreariest spot in all the land
To Death they set apart;
With scanty grace from Nature's hand,
And none from that of Art.
A winding wall of mossy stone,
Frost-flung and broken, lines
A lonesome acre thinly grown
With grass and wandering vines.
Without the wall a birch-tree shows
Its drooped and tasselled head;
Within, a stag-horned sumach grows,
Fern-leafed, with spikes of red.
There, sheep that graze the neighboring plain
Like white ghosts come and go,
The farm-horse drags his fetlock chain,
The cow-bell tinkles slow.
Low moans the river from its bed,
The distant pines reply;
Like mourners shrinking from the dead,
They stand apart and sigh.
Unshaded smites the summer sun,
Unchecked the winter blast;
The school-girl learns the place to shun,
With glances backward cast.
For thus our fathers testified,
That he might read who ran,
The emptiness of human pride,
The nothingness of man.
They dared not plant the grave with flowers,
Nor dress the funeral sod,
Where, with a love as deep as ours,
They left their dead with God.
The hard and thorny path they kept
From beauty turned aside;
Nor missed they over those who slept
The grace to life denied.
Yet still the wilding flowers would blow,
The golden leaves would fall,
The seasons come, the seasons go,
And God be good to all.
Above the graves the' blackberry hung
In bloom and green its wreath,
And harebells swung as if they rung
The chimes of peace beneath.
The beauty Nature loves to share,
The gifts she hath for all,
The common light, the common air,
O'ercrept the graveyard's wall.
It knew the glow of eventide,
The sunrise and the noon,
And glorified and sanctified
It slept beneath the moon.
With flowers or snow-flakes for its sod,
Around the seasons ran,
And evermore the love of God
Rebuked the fear of man.
We dwell with fears on either hand,
Within a daily strife,
And spectral problems waiting stand
Before the gates of life.
The doubts we vainly seek to solve,
The truths we know, are one;
The known and nameless stars revolve
Around the Central Sun.
And if we reap as we have sown,
And take the dole we deal,
The law of pain is love alone,
The wounding is to heal.
Unharmed from change to change we glide,
We fall as in our dreams;
The far-off terror at our side
A smiling angel seems.
Secure on God's all-tender heart
Alike rest great and small;
Why fear to lose our little part,
When He is pledged for all?
O fearful heart and troubled brain
Take hope and strength from this,--
That Nature never hints in vain,
Nor prophesies amiss.
Her wild birds sing the same sweet stave,
Her lights and airs are given
Alike to playground and the grave;
And over both is Heaven.
poem by John Greenleaf Whittier
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New For Old
Bud blisters into life
Stretching for the light
Unfolding radiant green
Upturned palm to the sun
Life seeping in, breathing out
Green, Green so Green
Resurrected hope, so Green
Summer breeze stroking
Branches ebb and flow
Leaves so Green strong now
Fear not wind of change
Mellow summer turns
Green, green, green-yellow
Yellow area of dieing heart
Green lingers no more
Limp transparent yellow
Barely a breeze takes one
Fierce Hyde-like wind now
Cracking and ripping
Wind torn leaves fall
Life chords snapped
Death too early, still Green
Nourishment broken not ended
Seasons build up to tear down
To build up, to tear down
Leaves fall, Green leaves fall
And then some more
Until leaves are falling, falling
Trees and branches revealed
In the x-ray of autumn blast
Winter is coming
Winter is coming
Yellow pale yellow carpet
Beneath the naked tree
Yellow, mulchy brown
Once crisp leaves scatter
Green, yellow, transparent veins
Tired, half dead, leaves lose their grip
Join the autumn rain soaked mound
Providing new life to the roots
Old for new, New for Old
Seeds buried in death
Bring new life in Spring
In the end is the beginning.
poem by Adrian Wait
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Autumn And Rain
The rain drops make a weave like a spider web
To keep hanged the whole sadness in the air.
On cobbled streets, people hear the sounds' ebb
Silver clouds are choleric dreams in sun's glare.
Some pieces of a shattered happiness may be seen,
The lightning still coils like a huge snake on the sky.
Beckoning the visible stubborn sunbeams for green,
The whisper of the fickle gale becomes a battle cry.
Rain stops placidly amid the noise of broken dreams.
The nature's fears and wills disappear in ignorance.
New blossoming buds are waited on tree maternal limbs,
But autumn’s milk of green is only sweet remembrance.
The rainbow appears as a belt of multicolor weaves,
The streams of old life begin again to flow in delight.
The noisy wind still dances on the shivering leaves.
The lake reflections may steal the crude sun's light.
poem by Marieta Maglas
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Elegy to the Memory of David Garrick, Esq.
DEAR SHADE OF HIM, who grac'd the mimick scene,
And charm'd attention with resistless pow'r;
Whose wond'rous art, whose fascinating mien,
Gave glowing rapture to the short-liv'd hour!
Accept the mournful verse, the ling'ring sigh,
The tear that faithful Mem'ry stays to shed;
The SACRED TEAR, that from Reflection's eye,
Drops on the ashes of the sainted dead.
Lov'd by the grave, and courted by the young,
In social comforts eminently blest;
All hearts rever'd the precepts of thy tongue,
And Envy's self thy eloquence confess'd.
Who could like thee the soul's wild tumults paint,
Or wake the torpid ear with lenient art?
Touch the nice sense with pity's dulcet plaint,
Or soothe the sorrows of the breaking heart?
Who can forget thy penetrating eye,
The sweet bewitching smile, th' empassion'd look?
The clear deep whisper, the persuasive sigh,
The feeling tear that Nature's language spoke?
Rich in each treasure bounteous Heaven could lend,
For private worth distinguish'd and approv'd,
The pride of WISDOM,VIRTUE's darling friend,
By MANSFIELD honor'dand by CAMDEN lov'd!
The courtier's cringe, the flatt'rer's abject smile,
The subtle arts of well-dissembled praise,
Thy soul abhorr'd;above the gloss of guile,
Truth lead thy steps, and Friendship crown'd thy days.
Oft in thy HAMPTON's dark embow'ring shade
The POET's hand shall sweep the trembling string;
While the proud tribute §to thy mem'ry paid,
The voice of GENIUS on the gale shall fling.
Yes, SHERIDAN! thy soft melodious verse
Still vibrates on a nation's polish'd ear;
Fondly it hover'd o'er the sable hearse,
Hush'd the loud plaint, and triumph'd in a tear.
In life united by congenial minds,
Dear to the MUSE, to sacred friendship true;
Around her darling's urn a wreath SHE binds,
A deathless wreathimmortaliz'd by YOU!
But say, dear shade, is kindred mem'ry flown?
Has widow'd love at length forgot to weep?
That no kind verse, or monumental stone,
Marks the lone spot where thy cold relics sleep!
Dear to a nation, grateful to thy muse,
That nation's tears upon thy grave shall flow,
For who the gentle tribute can refuse,
Which thy fine feeling gave to fancied woe?
Thou who, by many an anxious toilsome hour,
Reap'd the bright harvest of luxuriant Fame,
Who snatch'd from dark oblivion's barb'rous pow'r
The radiant glories of a SHAKSPERE's name!
Rembrance oft shall paint the mournful scene
Where the slow fun'ral spread its length'ning gloom,
Where the deep murmur, and dejected mien,
In artless sorrow linger'd round thy tomb.
And tho' no laurel'd bust, or labour'd line,
Shall bid the passing stranger stay to weep;
Thy SHAKSPERE's hand shall point the hallow'd shrine,
And Britain's genius with thy ashes sleep.
Then rest in peace, O ever sacred shade!
Your kindred souls exulting FAME shall join;
And the same wreath thy hand for SHAKSPERE made,
Gemm'd with her tears about THY GRAVE SHALL TWINE.
poem by Mary Darby Robinson
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The Grave of Love
I DUG, beneath the cypress shade,
What well might seem an elfin's grave;
And every pledge in earth I laid,
That erst thy false affection gave.
I press'd them down the sod beneath;
I placed one mossy stone above;
And twined the rose's fading wreath
Around the sepulchre of love.
Frail as thy love, the flowers were dead
Ere yet the evening sun was set:
But years shall see the cypress spread,
Immutable as my regret.
poem by Thomas Love Peacock
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Autumn Falling Leaves
When all have been and gone away,
Like leaves from green to amber orange,
Falling down and to decay,
Is the time for all in nature to fall,
And the leaves on the trees show it all,
Autumn and its falls of fall,
Where all the branches have dropped their leaves,
All have gone except the evergreens,
Showing signs to us that live among,
Four seasons weather,
Where Autumn is,
Just like in life,
When full circle of life is known,
A start in spring where buds appear,
Then in summer full bloom trees will be,
Hence, fall shows all,
When nature falls,
Begining another season,
Winter and chill tempetures,
Where nature decays,
And leaves do fall,
To generate again,
Renewing its life,
Come spring again,
Untill then,
Autumn sheads its leaves of blossom and blooms,
And soon again autumn begins,
From new to old,
And then old to new,
Buds in spring and leaves of green,
Showing birth from what did decayed,
And brought forth from,
What was bear on the trees,
From where beneath was where once,
Those Autumn falling leaves.
poem by Ellen Ni Bheachain
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Spring
Wake up again, sad heart, wake up again !
(I heard the birds this morning singing sweet.)
Wake up again ! The sky was crystal clear,
And washed quite clean with rain ;
And tar below my heart stirred with the year,
Stirred with the year and sighed. O pallid feet
Move now at last, O heart that sleeps with pain
Rise up and hear
The voices in the valleys, run to meet
The songs and shadows. O wake up again !
Put out green leaves, dead tree, put out green leaves t
(Last night the moon was soft and kissed the air.)
Put out green leaves ! The moon was in the skies,
All night she wakes and weaves.
The dew was on the grass like fairies' eyes,
Like fairies' eyes. O trees so black and bare,
Remember all the fruits, the full gold sheaves;
For nothing dies,
The songs that are, are silences that were,
Summer was Winter. O put but green leaves!
Break through the earth, pale flower, break through the earth !
(All day the lark has sung a madrigal.)
Break through the earth that lies not lightly yet
And waits thy patient birth,
Waits for the jonquil and the violet,
The violet. Full soon the heavy pall
Will be a bed, and in the noon of mirth
Some rivulet
Will bubble in my wilderness, some call
Will touch my silence. O break through the earth.
poem by Lord Alfred Douglas
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Benevolent Tears
Dark clouds scattered everywhere
Dried ponds, rivers, oceans
Par unquenched thirst of million birds, beasts, humans
Cannot bear the agony of nature
Thus a tribute to its melancholy pours down in torrents
Overfills everywhere
Green grass greets the grasshoppers
On green stalks fire red roses brightly dance
Green leaves attached to ripe yellow fruits
Hearts gladden, souls solace
The Descend of ecstasy, gaiety, charm
In the golden farms
The yellow light scattered everywhere
The air of fulfilment, solemnity, tranquility that's rare.
poem by Green Peace
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Nature and Art For an Album
'Man goeth forth' with reckless trust
Upon his wealth of mind,
As if in self a thing of dust
Creative skill might find;
He schemes and toils; stone, wood and ore
Subject or weapon of His power.
By arch and spire, by tower-girt heights,
He would his boast fulfil;
By marble births, and mimic lights,—
Yet lacks one secret still;
Where is the master-hand shall give
To breathe, to move, to speak, to live?
O take away this shade of might,
The puny toil of man,
And let great Nature in my sight
Unroll her gorgeous plan;
I cannot bear those sullen walls,
Those eyeless towers, those tongueless halls.
Art's labour'd toys of highest name
Are nerveless, cold, and dumb;
And man is fitted but to frame
A coffin or a tomb;
Well suits, when sense is pass'd away,
Such lifeless works the lifeless clay.
Here let me sit where wooded hills
Skirt yon far-reaching plain;
While cattle bank its winding rills,
And suns embrown its grain;
Such prospect is to me right dear,
For freedom, health, and joy are here.
There is a spirit ranging through
The earth, the stream, the air;
Ten thousand shapes, garbs ever new,
That busy One doth wear;
In colour, scent, and taste, and sound
The energy of Life is found.
The leaves are rustling in the breeze,
The bird renews her song;
From field to brook, o'er heath, o'er trees,
The sunbeam glides along;
The insect, happy in its hour,
Floats softly by, or sips the flower.
Now dewy rain descends, and now
Brisk showers the welkin shroud;
I care not, though with angry brow
Frowns the red thunder-cloud;
Let hail-storm pelt, and lightning harm,
'Tis Nature's work, and has its charm.
Ah! lovely Nature! others dwell
Full favour'd in thy court;
I of thy smiles but hear them tell,
And feed on their report,
Catching what glimpse an Ulcombe yields
To strangers loitering in her fields.
I go where form has ne'er unbent
The sameness of its sway;
Where iron rule, stern precedent,
Mistreat the graceful day;
To pine as prisoner in his cell,
And yet be thought to love it well.
Yet so His high dispose has set,
Who binds on each his part;
Though absent, I may cherish yet
An Ulcombe of the heart;
Calm verdant hope divinely given,
And suns of peace, and scenes of heaven;—
A soul prepared His will to meet,
Full fix'd His work to do;
Not laboured into sudden heat,
But inly born anew.—
So living Nature, not dull Art,
Shall plan my ways and rule my heart.
poem by John Henry Newman
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Similis Smiles
Like the moon, he speaks - a silver-
tongued devil dressed in black,
his words slithering across my skin
like rain on the rhombus of a diamondback.
Similis smiles like a vacant house,
like the death of a dappled dove;
and like stains in a broken China cup,
he is at the bottom when it comes to love.
For his heart is like a mangled mass,
a mountain crumbled as grains of sand.
Like a tear to the eye, he clouds the sight,
like a veil of fog across the land.
The senses are stifled from his desert air,
like pressing fingers around my throat.
He slips like a stone, a rolling stone,
into the great ache of life's emote.
Like the grave, he is full of bones -
the ancient sorrow of hapless isles.
He is a carcass of man, an empty shell;
and like a leper, Similis smiles.
Note: A simile is a figure of speech in which two essentially unlike things are compared, often in a phrase introduced by like or as as in: He was as strong as a bull. (Latin, neuter of similis, like.) Thus, the name, Similis Smiles.
poem by Linda Marie Van Tassell
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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The Veil
THE SISTER
Why, brother, why upon me stare?
Why do your brows so fiercely lower?
Your eyes like funeral torches glare,
Beneath their gloomy looks I cower.
Why do I see your sashes rent?
Why have you thrice your fingers laid
Upon the sheath? What dire intent
Makes you half draw the glittering blade?
FIRST BROTHER
Raised you today your veil, and face displayed!
SISTER
Home from the bath my path I took—
Brothers! Look not so terribly!—
And I was hidden from the look
Of every unbeliever's eye.
But as the Mosque I hurried by,
Close covered in my palanquin,
Stifled beneath the mid-day sky,
I loosed my veil to breathe between.
SECOND BROTHER
Did not a man then pass in Cafton green?
SISTER
Ah, yes, perhaps it may be so;
But he ne'er saw my face. My brothers,
Together you are whispering low—
What whisper you to one another?
You would not kill me? On your soul
He saw me not! My oath believe!
Have mercy! Your blind rage control!
Your poor young sister, O reprieve!
THIRD BROTHER
Blood-red I saw the sun sink down at eve.
SISTER
Mercy, O mercy! Brothers, cease,
Your daggers stab me to the heart!
Brothers! I cling about your knees!
O veil! White veil! The cause thou art!
Brothers! Your dying sister prop,
Tear not my bleeding hand away—
Darkness come o'er me—with me stop—
The veil of death shuts out the day.
FOURTH BROTHER
Unlifted by your hands this veil will stay.
poem by Victor Hugo
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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