Related quotes: How darkly o'er yon far-off...

Sonnet 10

How darkly o'er yon far-off mountain frowns
The gather'd tempest! from that lurid cloud
The deep-voiced thunders roll, aweful and loud
Tho' distant; while upon the misty downs
Fast falls in shadowy streaks the pelting rain.
I never saw so terrible a storm!
Perhaps some way-worn traveller in vain
Wraps his torn raiment round his shivering form
Cold even as Hope within him! I the while
Pause me in sadness tho' the sunbeams smile
Cheerily round me. Ah that thus my lot
Might be with Peace and Solitude assign'd,
Where I might from some little quiet cot,
Sigh for the crimes and miseries of mankind!

poem by Robert Southey
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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The Last Assembly

As I walked to the last assembly,
There were tears in the back of my eyes,
And I saw all my friends all around me,
They were there to wish me goodbye.
As I stood in a line with my comrades,
I felt such a feeling of pride,
And I forgot all the grief and the hatred inside,
As we sang for the very last time.
Gather round, gather round,
Everybody gather round.
Come and join our last assembly,
Let us smile, wipe away all the frowns.
Gather round, gather round,
Everybody gather round.
As we stood at the last assembly,
All my friends came to wish me goodbye.
Gather round, gather round,
Gather round, gather round,
Everybody gather round.
As I stand at the last assembly,
I just cant keep the tears from my eyes.

song performed by by Kinks
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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The Chinese Son

I come to thee, my mother! the black sky
Is swollen with its thunder, and the air
Seems palpable with darkness, save when high,
The lurid lightning streams a ruddy glare
Across the heavens, rousing from their lair
The deep-voiced thunders! how the mounting storm
Strides o'er the firmament! yet I can dare
Its fiercest terrors, mother, that my arm
May wind its shield of love around thy sleeping form.

What uproar! raging winds, and smiting hail,
The lightning's blaze, and deaf'ning thunder's crash,
Let loose at once for havoc! I should quail
Before the terrors of the forked flash,
Did not the thought of thee triumphant dash
All selfish fears aside, and bid me fly
To kneel beside thy grave; the rain-drops plash
Heavily round thee from the rifted sky;
Yet I am here, fear not—beside thy couch I lie.

Thou canst not hear me—the storm brings not now,
One terror to thy bosom—yet 't is sweet
To call to mind the smile, wherewith thy brow
Was wont in by-gone days my step to greet,
When o'er the earth the summer tempest beat,
And the loosed thunder shook the heavens—but when
Was there a look of mine that did not meet
A smile of love from thee? the world of men
A friend, like thou hast been, will never yield again.

Oh! mother, mother, how could love like thine
Pass from the earth away! on other eyes,
The glances of maternal love will shine,
And still on other hearts the blessing lies,
That made mine blissful; yet far less they prize
That boon of happiness—and in their glee,
Around their spirits gather many ties
Of joy and tenderness—but all to me
That made the earth seem bright, is sepulchred with thee.

They sometimes strive to lead me to the halls,
Where wine and mirth the fleeting moments wing,
But on my clouded spirit sadness falls,
More darkly then, than when the cave-glooms fling
Their shadows round me, and the night-winds sing
Through the torn rocks their melancholy dirge,
Or when as now the echoing thunder rings
O'er the wide heavens, and the mad gales urge
Unto an answering cry, the overmastering surge.

The storms of nature pass, and soon no trace
Is left to mark their ravage—but long years
Pass lingeringly onward, nor efface
The deep-cut channel of our burning tears,
Or aching scars, that wasting sorrow sears
Upon the breast: lo! even now, a gleam
Of moonlight through the broken clouds appears,
To bless the earth again. I fain would dream,
It was a smile of thine, to bless me with its beam.

poem by Elizabeth Margaret Chandler from Poetical Works (1836)
Submitted by Veronica Serbanoiu
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Misty Cloud And Misty Sea

Misty Cloud called to blue Misty Sea,
Rise up to gather rain drops with me
Misty Sea called to driftin' Misty Cloud
To drift with you high up I'd be proud.

Misty Sea rose to join Misty Cloud,
Moist Misty Cloud came wet an' proud.
Joe Raindrop spoke to wet Raindrop Flo,
Dare you to drop down on Sea below.

Raindrop Flo splashed upon Misty Sea,
Joining pool of drops same as she.
Flo called to Raindrop Joe. I fell free
Dare you to drop down on wet Misty Sea.

Joe Raindrop splashed down on Misty Sea,
That's how rainfall comes down so free.
To drop on pleasant land or the Misty Sea,
Livin' things grow when rain falls free.

poem by Marion Gentry
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More Than Anything!

more than anything....
i want people to be free!
everybody, everywhere....

joined together as one,
feeling the tide come and go,
on sands that do not grasp!

more than anything,
i want to be the rain
that falls after the drought....

the snow that wraps the beaten earth
in the blanket of newness, and hope.
more than anything...

i want to be the cup...
the hammer and the nails,
the bowl of rice, the tent,

the fire that those cold gather round....
more than anything,
i want to be the steps,

the bridge, and the lighthouse....
whatever you need on the path,
that leads you home to freedom!

poem by Eric Cockrell
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One Jump Ahead Of The Storm

Lightnings flashing all around me,
Thunders rolling up behind.
Big blue clouds are going to roll in
Full of tears and make me blind.
I cant let her man recatch me.
I cant stop to cry no more.
Im just running down the highway,
One jump ahead of the storm.
One jump ahead of her crying,
One jump ahead of her cold cheating arm.
One jump ahead of her lying,
One jump ahead of the storm.
One day I looked on the horizon,
Saw her love just couldnt last.
Oh, my mind was torn to pieces.
I had to leave and get out fast.
And so I slipped out of her power.
I saw my chance and I was gone
Before the rain could start to falling.
One jump ahead of the storm.
Chorus
I was one jump ahead of the storm.
Just one jump ahead of the storm.
I was one jump ahead of the storm.
Just one jump ahead of the storm.
I was one jump ahead of the storm.
Just one jump ahead of the storm.
I was one jump ahead of the storm.
Just one jump ahead of the storm.

song performed by by Eric Clapton
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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The Hurricane

Lord of the winds! I feel thee nigh,
I know thy breath in the burning sky!
And I wait, with a thrill in every vein,
For the coming of the hurricane!

And lo! on the wing of the heavy gales,
Through the boundless arch of heaven he sails;
Silent and slow, and terribly strong,
The mighty shadow is borne along,
Like the dark eternity to come;
While the world below, dismayed and dumb,
Through the calm of the thick hot atmosphere
Looks up at its gloomy folds with fear.

They darken fast; and the golden blaze
Of the sun is quenched in the lurid haze,
And he sends through the shade a funeral ray--
A glare that is neither night nor day,
A beam that touches, with hues of death,
The clouds above and the earth beneath.
To its covert glides the silent bird,
While the hurricane's distant voice is heard,
Uplifted among the mountains round,
And the forests hear and answer the sound.

He is come! he is come! do ye not behold
His ample robes on the wind unrolled?
Giant of air! we bid thee hail!--
How his gray skirts toss in the whirling gale;
How his huge and writhing arms are bent,
To clasp the zone of the firmament,
And fold at length, in their dark embrace,
From mountain to mountain the visible space.

Darker--still darker! the whirlwinds bear
The dust of the plains to the middle air:
And hark to the crashing, long and loud,
Of the chariot of God in the thunder-cloud!
You may trace its path by the flashes that start
From the rapid wheels where'er they dart,
As the fire-bolts leap to the world below,
And flood the skies with a lurid glow.

What roar is that?--'tis the rain that breaks
In torrents away from the airy lakes,
Heavily poured on the shuddering ground,
And shedding a nameless horror round.
Ah! well known woods, and mountains, and skies,
With the very clouds!--ye are lost to my eyes.
I seek ye vainly, and see in your place
The shadowy tempest that sweeps through space,
A whirling ocean that fills the wall
Of the crystal heaven, and buries all.
And I, cut off from the world, remain
Alone with the terrible hurricane.

poem by William Cullen Bryant
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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The Spectral Horseman

What was the shriek that struck Fancy's ear
As it sate on the ruins of time that is past?
Hark! it floats on the fitful blast of the wind,
And breathes to the pale moon a funeral sigh.
It is the Benshie's moan on the storm,
Or a shivering fiend that thirsting for sin,
Seeks murder and guilt when virtue sleeps,
Winged with the power of some ruthless king,
And sweeps o'er the breast of the prostrate plain.
It was not a fiend from the regions of Hell
That poured its low moan on the stillness of night:
It was not a ghost of the guilty dead,
Nor a yelling vampire reeking with gore;
But aye at the close of seven years' end,
That voice is mixed with the swell of the storm,
And aye at the close of seven years' end,
A shapeless shadow that sleeps on the hill
Awakens and floats on the mist of the heath.
It is not the shade of a murdered man,
Who has rushed uncalled to the throne of his God,
And howls in the pause of the eddying storm.
This voice is low, cold, hollow, and chill,
'Tis not heard by the ear, but is felt in the soul.
'Tis more frightful far than the death-daemon's scream,
Or the laughter of fiends when they howl o’er the corpse
Of a man who has sold his soul to Hell.
It tells the approach of a mystic form,
A white courser bears the shadowy sprite;
More thin they are than the mists of the mountain,
When the clear moonlight sleeps on the waveless lake.
More pale HIS cheek than the snows of Nithona,
When winter rides on the northern blast,
And howls in the midst of the leafless wood.
Yet when the fierce swell of the tempest is raving,
And the whirlwinds howl in the caves of Inisfallen,
Still secure mid the wildest war of the sky,
The phantom courser scours the waste,
And his rider howls in the thunder's roar.
O'er him the fierce bolts of avenging Heaven
Pause, as in fear, to strike his head.
The meteors of midnight recoil from his figure,
Yet the 'wildered peasant, that oft passes by,
With wonder beholds the blue flash through his form:
And his voice, though faint as the sighs of the dead,
The startled passenger shudders to hear,
More distinct than the thunder's wildest roar.
Then does the dragon, who, chained in the caverns
To eternity, curses the champion of Erin,
Moan and yell loud at the lone hour of midnight,
And twine his vast wreaths round the forms of the daemons;
Then in agony roll his death-swimming eyeballs,
Though 'wildered by death, yet never to die!
Then he shakes from his skeleton folds the nightmares,
Who, shrieking in agony, seek the couch
Of some fevered wretch who courts sleep in vain;
Then the tombless ghosts of the guilty dead
In horror pause on the fitful gale.
They float on the swell of the eddying tempest,
And scared seek the caves of gigantic...
Where their thin forms pour unearthly sounds
On the blast that sweets the breast of the lake,
And mingles its swell with the moonlight air.

poem by Percy Bysshe Shelley
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Ring Memories

the tree wraps its memories
round and round in solid rings
rain, shine, storm of the years

i warmly wrap up yours in the things that we do
i feel myself swirling into your arms
holding them tight as rings, wooden rings
swirling, twirling and dancing round and round
to our best years.

poem by John Tiong Chunghoo
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To The Fossil Flower

Dark fossil flower! I see thy leaves unrolled,
With all thy lines of beauty freshly marked,
As when the eye of Morn beamed on thee first,
And thou first turn'dst to meet its welcome smile.
And sometimes in the coals' bright rain-bow hues,
I dream I see the colors of thy prime,
And for a moment robe thy form again
In splendor not its own. Flower of the past!
Now as I look on thee, life's echoing tread
Falls noiseless on my ear; the present dies;
And o'er my soul the thoughts of distant time,
In silent waves, like billows from the sea,
Come roling on and on, with ceaseless flow,
Innumerable. Thou may'st have sprung unsown
Into thy noon of life, when first earth heard
Its Maker's sovereign voice; and laughing flowers
Waved o'er the meadows, hung on mountain crags,
And nodded in the breeze on every hill.
Thou may'st have bloomed unseen, save by the stars
That sang together o'er thy rosy birth,
And came at eve to watch thy folded rest.
None may have sought thee on thy flagrant home,
Save light-voiced winds that round thy dwelling played,
Or seemed to sigh, as oft their winged haste
Compelled their feet to roam. Thou may'st have lived
Beneath the light of later days, when man
With feet free-roving as the homeless wind,
Sealed the thick-mantled height, coursed plains unshorn,
Breaking the solitude of nature's haunt
With voice that seemed to blend, in one sweet strain,
The mingled music of the elements.
And when against his infant frame they rose,
Uncurbed, unawed by his yet feeble hand,
And when the muttering storm, and shouting wave,
And rattling thunder, mated, round him raged,
And seemed at times like dæmon foes to gird,
Thou may'st have won with gentle look his heart,
And stirred the first warm prayer of gratitude,
And been his first, his simplest altar-gift.
For thee, dark flower! the kindling sun can bring
No more the colors that it gave, nor morn,
With kindly kiss, restore thy breathing sweets:
Yet may the mind's mysterious touch recall
The bloom and fragrance of thy early prime:
For HE who to the lowly lily gave
A glory richer than to proudest king,
He painted not those darkly-shining leaves,
With blushes like the dawn, in vain; nor gave
To thee its sweetly-scented breath, to waste
Upon the barren air. E'en though thou stood
Alone in nature's forest-home untrod,
The first-love of the stars and sighing winds,
The mineral holds with faithful trust thy form,
To wake in human hearts sweet thoughts of love,
Now the dark past hangs round thy memory.

poem by Jones Very
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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In Hilly-Wood

How sweet to be thus nestling deep in boughs,
Upon an ashen stoven pillowing me;
Faintly are heard the ploughmen at their ploughs,
But not an eye can find its way to see.
The sunbeams scarce molest me with a smile,
So thick the leafy armies gather round;
And where they do, the breeze blows cool the while,
Their leafy shadows dancing on the ground.
Full many a flower, too, wishing to be seen,
Perks up its head the hiding grass between.-
In mid-wood silence, thus, how sweet to be;
Where all the noises, that on peace intrude,
Come from the chittering cricket, bird, and bee,
Whose songs have charms to sweeten solitude.

poem by John Clare
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In A Lifetime

Clannad
Hard to tell
Or recognize a sign
To see me through
A warning sign
First the thunder
Then the storm
Torn asunder
In the storm
(bono
Satisfied
If the past it will not lie
The future, you and i
Get blown away)
In a lifetime in a lifetime
And as the rain it falls
Heavy in my heart
Believe the light in you
Faded and worn
Torn asunder in the storm
(bono
Begin again
As the storm breaks through
So the light shines in you
Without color
Torn asunder in the storm
Unless the sound has faded from
Your soul
Unless it disappears)
First the thunder
Then the storm
Torn asunder
In the storm
(bono:
Selfish storm
Hold on the inside
One life
In the storm)
In a lifetime
In a lifetime
In a lifetime
In a lifetime

song performed by by U2
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Midnight Odyssey

Started my midnight odyssey
Pondering some frivolity
Fixated at the storm's sound
Nature's theater in the round

Lightning illuminates the room
Chased by a vociferous sonic boom
Hope it's not a terrible tornado
Rather see a grand rainbow

News said this was to be mediocre
But it has turned into a real soaker
Little woman hasn't moved at all
She'll sleep through the squall

Rain is pelting the window
Adjust this new pillow
Just want to go to sleep
Will the Angel of Death reap?

Tomorrow will be here too soon
Hope we won't need a pontoon
Think I'm sleepy at long last
Lousy weather forecast

poem by Charles Hancock
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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We to Sigh Instead of Sing

"Rain and Rain! and rain and rain!"
Yesterday we muttered
Grimly as the grim refrain
That the thunders uttered:
All the heavens under cloud --
All the sunshine sleeping;
All the grasses limply bowed
With their weight of weeping.

Sigh and sigh! and sigh and sigh!
Never end of sighing;
Rain and rain for our reply --
Hopes half-drowned and dying;
Peering through the window-pane,
Naught but endless raining --
Endless sighing, and, as vain,
Endlessly conmplaining.

Shine and shine! and shine and shine!
Ah! to-day the splendor!--
All this glory yours and mine --
God! but God is tender!
We to sigh instead of sing,
Yesterday in sorrow,
While the lord was fashioning
This for our To-morrow!

poem by James Whitcomb Riley
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Lost

It was a restless wind that took her
In ever wakeful gales blowing
Blanketed by swollen clouds of rain-building
And an angry thunder ever growing;
Unfolding in perfectly stitched sheets pelting
Embroidered in the lightenings porcelain flash
A tempest entwined in threads of past emotions static
With no salvation-came the unforgiving Thunders crash;
Alas, no survivors of this storm
Lost in the mystery of the unknown Deep
No reprieve-no illusions tossed
'Neath fathoms-came the endless sleep;

poem by Theodora Onken
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The Steamboat

See how yon flaming herald treads
The ridged and rolling waves,
As, crashing oâ€™er their crested heads,
She bows her surly slaves!
With foam before and fire behind,
She rends the clinging sea,
That flies before the roaring wind,
Beneath her hissing lee.

The morning spray, like sea-born flowers,
With heaped and glistening bells,
Falls round her fast, in ringing showers,
With every wave that swells;
And, burning oâ€™er the midnight deep,
In lurid fringes thrown,
The living gems of ocean sweep
Along her flashing zone.

With clashing wheel and lifting keel,
And smoking torch on high,
When winds are loud and billows reel,
She thunders foaming by;
When seas are silent and serene,
With even beam she glides,
The sunshine glimmering through the green
That skirts her gleaming sides.

Now, like a wild, nymph, far apart
She veils her shadowy form,
The beating of her restless heart
Still sounding through the storm;
Now answers, like a courtly dame,
The reddening surges oâ€™er,
With flying scarf of spangled flame,
The Pharos of the shore.

To-night yon pilot shall not sleep,
Who trims his narrowed sail;
To-night yon frigate scarce shall keep
Her broad breast to the gale;
And many a foresail, scooped and strained,
Shall break from yard and stay,
Before this smoky wreath has stained
The rising mist of day.

Hark! hark! I hear yon whistling shroud,
I see yon quivering mast;
The black throat of the hunted cloud
Is panting forth the blast!
An hour, and, whirled like winnowing chaff,
The giant surge shall fling
His tresses oâ€™er yon pennon staff,
White as the sea-birdâ€™s wing.

Yet rest, ye wanderers of the deep;
Nor wind nor wave shall tire
Those fleshless arms, whose pulses leap
With floods of living fire;
Sleep on, and, when the morning light
Streams oâ€™er the shining bay,
Oh think of those for whom the night
Shall never wake in day.

poem by Oliver Wendell Holmes
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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Bird Of Hope

Soar not too high, O bird of Hope!
Because the skies are fair;
The tempest may come on apace
And overcome thee there.

When far above the mountain tops
Thou soarest, over all –
If, then, the storm should press thee back,
How great would be thy fall!

And thou wouldst lie here at my feet,
A poor and lifeless thing, -
A torn and bleeding birdling,
With limp and broken wing.

Sing not too loud, O bird of Hope!
Because the day is bright;
The sunshine cannot always last –
The morn precedes the night.

And if thy song is of the day,
Then when the day grows dim,
Forlorn and voiceless thou wouldst sit
Among the shadows grim.

Oh! I would have thee soar and sing,
But not too high, or loud,
Remembering that day meets night –
The brilliant sun the cloud.

poem by Ella Wheeler Wilcox
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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Stranger In West Lothian

As I walk alone in the Rain
Where I go, is a Lonely path
I feel alone, lost and cold
If you were me right now,
Ask yourself this...