Love The Wild Swan
"I hate my verses, every line, every word.
Oh pale and brittle pencils ever to try
One grass-blade's curve, or the throat of one bird
That clings to twig, ruffled against white sky.
Oh cracked and twilight mirrors ever to catch
One color, one glinting
Hash, of the splendor of things.
Unlucky hunter, Oh bullets of wax,
The lion beauty, the wild-swan wings, the storm of the wings."
--This wild swan of a world is no hunter's game.
Better bullets than yours would miss the white breast
Better mirrors than yours would crack in the flame.
Does it matter whether you hate your . . . self?
At least Love your eyes that can see, your mind that can
Hear the music, the thunder of the wings. Love the wild swan.
poem by Robinson Jeffers
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Related quotes
Shiva
There is a hawk that is picking the birds out of our sky,
She killed the pigeons of peace and security,
She has taken honesty and confidence from nations and men,
She is hunting the lonely heron of liberty.
She loads the arts with nonsense, she is very cunning
Science with dreams and the state with powers to catch them at last.
Nothing will escape her at last, flying nor running.
This is the hawk that picks out the star's eyes.
This is the only hunter that will ever catch the wild swan;
The prey she will take last is the wild white swan of the beauty of things.
Then she will be alone, pure destruction, achieved and supreme,
Empty darkness under the death-tent wings.
She will build a nest of the swan's bones and hatch a new brood,
Hang new heavens with new birds, all be renewed.
poem by Robinson Jeffers
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The Black Swan
When the swans turned my sister into a swan
I would go to the lake, at night, from milking:
The sun would look out through the reeds like a swan,
A swan's red beak; and the beak would open
And inside there was darkness, the stars and the moon.
Out on the lake, a girl would laugh.
"Sister, here is your porridge, sister,"
I would call; and the reeds would whisper,
"Go to sleep, go to sleep, little swan."
My legs were all hard and webbed, and the silky
Hairs of my wings sank away like stars
In the ripples that ran in and out of the reeds:
I heard through the lap and hiss of water
Someone's "Sister . . . sister," far away on the shore,
And then as I opened my beak to answer
I heard my harsh laugh go out to the shore
And saw - saw at last, swimming up from the green
Low mounds of the lake, the white stone swans:
The white, named swans . . . "It is all a dream,"
I whispered, and reached from the down of the pallet
To the lap and hiss of the floor.
And "Sleep, little sister," the swan all sang
From the moon and stars and frogs of the floor.
But the swan my sister called, "Sleep at last, little sister,"
And stroked all night, with a black wing, my wings.
poem by Randall Jarrell
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Wild East
(ian hunter)
Well its tuesday night
How Id like to be inside at this time
Watchin t.v. is killin me
Its such a drag tonight
I feel like jason
Just found a rusty fleece
And the cyclops all laughin at me
You cant tame wild east
Wild east wild east
Wild east wild east
Now some cynic from the methadone clinic
He keeps on bothering me
He writes all my lyrics backwards on diapers
And hangs em from the local trees
Watch out, white boy
Dont argue with a sawn off piece
Im a crazy son, mama
I love the grease of wild east
Wild east wild east
Wild east wild east
Wild east wild east
Wild east wild east
Now jezebel dont feel too well, she talks to jane
bout a one way conversation on a subway train
Hey! they took away her wallet and her valise
Love hate, love hate, love hate, love hate, wild east
Wild east wild east
Wild east wild east
Wild east wild east
Wild east come on crazy wild east
(repeat and fade)
song performed by by Ian Hunter
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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If My Verses Had The Wings
Songs as sweet as summer brings,
To your flowery lawn should fly
If my verses had the wings—
Wings of birds that haunt the sky.
Like the spark that upward springs,
They would seek your smiling hearth,
If my verses had the wings—
Wings such as a spirth hath.
Near you, close as ivy clings,
They would dwell by night and day
If my verses had the wings—
Wings like love to speed the way.
poem by Victor Hugo
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The Swan ~ A Villanelle
Floating upon the crystal pond
She kept wearing her diamond crown
While the other white swan was gone
Never doubting their fierce loving bond
As the leaves went from reddish to brown
Floating upon the crystal pond
Her blue eyes searching far beyond
Couldn't see that he'd recently drowned
While the other white swan was gone
So curling, becoming withdrawn
When ten suns in the sky settled down
Floating upon the crystal pond
She talked to the geese that were blond
And asked where he was with a frown
While the other white swan was gone
They cared not and didn't respond
In the reeds was a kings golden crown
Floating upon the crystal pond
While the other white swan was gone
poem by Sara Fielder
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Leda
Where the slow river
meets the tide,
a red swan lifts red wings
and darker beak,
and underneath the purple down
of his soft breast
uncurls his coral feet.
Through the deep purple
of the dying heat
of sun and mist,
the level ray of sun-beam
has caressed
the lily with dark breast,
and flecked with richer gold
its golden crest.
Where the slow lifting
of the tide,
floats into the river
and slowly drifts
among the reeds,
and lifts the yellow flags,
he floats
where tide and river meet.
Ah kingly kiss --
no more regret
nor old deep memories
to mar the bliss;
where the low sedge is thick,
the gold day-lily
outspreads and rests
beneath soft fluttering
of red swan wings
and the warm quivering
of the red swan's breast.
poem by Hilda Doolittle
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A Swan Song(dying sentence)
Remember me, remember my swan song,
I can't re-orient myself,
I can't live it all over again,
I can't re-orient myself,
I can't live that stain of my plastered smile again,
Let this be the last moment,
Let me say the last good-bye,
It won't count anything now,
So let me lay in silence,
Life has treated me well and I have had enough of it,
Lets end this game,
Enough of milling in and out,
Hear my swan song,
And let this end now,
I need to be away,
away from these thorns,
far far away,
Where you'll only see my memories,
my shadows,
my untold stories buried after me,
and my last swan song,
Hear my swan song,
I feel like a fish out of water,
from pillar to post,
fallen back upon,
Let me be buried under sand,
let me give my final test,
I'll never return, its time to sing,
sing my last swan song,
Hear my swan song,
maybe this moment or the other,
my soul would rest in peace,
before disappearing,
let me sing,
sing my swan song,
I only remember now the memory lived in me,
a perfectly encapsulated morsel,
of a good past,
from piebald brush strokes swaying,
to barren now, that I'd become,
As I'll say my last goodbye,
hear my swan song,
because now you'll never hear my voice again,
for ever and ever and ever...
Written on 5/6/11
poem by Ayesha Riaz
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Swan Lee
Swan lee got up at the running foot pow-wow,
Heading from the fire to his waiting canoe.
Chattering squaw untied the wigwam door,
The chief blew smoke rings two by two!
The land in silence stands...
Swan lee, his boat by the bank in the darkness,
Loosened the rope in the creek is entwined.
A feather from the wing of a wild young eagle,
Pointed to the land where his fortune he'd find
The land in silence stands
Swan lee paddled on from the land of his fathers,
His eyes scanned the undergrowth on either side.
From the shore hung a hot, heavy, creature infested
Tropic, swan lee had a bow by his side
The land in silence stands
Swan lee kept time, half on land, half on water,
Grizzly bear and raccoon his fare.
He followed his ears to the great water fall,
Swan lee knew deep down that his squaw was there!
The land in silence stands....
Suddenly the rush of the mighty great thunder,
Confronted swan lee as his song he sang,
In the dawn, with his squaw, he was battling homewards
It was all written down by long silas lang.
The land in silence stands...
The land in silence stands...
The land in silence stands.
song performed by by Pink Floyd
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Swan
Traffic jams, Concorde drones
TV's and radios drown me out
You won't change slamming doors
Temper, temper, that tongue of yours, drown me out
I've told you once when it comes to love
I'm like a swan, I only love once
I've told you once push comes to shove
I'm like a swan
I only love, only love, only love once
Dumbells crash, babies cry
A thousand voices, mostly lies, drown me out
The underground, Marble Arch
The deafening snap of breaking hearts, drown me out
I've told you once when it comes to love
I'm like a swan, I only love once
I've told you once push comes to shove
I'm like a swan
I only love, only love, only love once
Barking dogs, the lonely roam
The great unlaid making their way home, drown me out
I've told you once when it comes to love
I'm like a swan, I only love once
I've told you once push comes to shove
I'm like a swan
I only love, only love, only love once
song performed by by Right Said Fred
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Autumn Birds
The wild duck startles like a sudden thought,
And heron slow as if it might be caught.
The flopping crows on weary wings go by
And grey beard jackdaws noising as they fly.
The crowds of starnels whizz and hurry by,
And darken like a clod the evening sky.
The larks like thunder rise and suthy round,
Then drop and nestle in the stubble ground.
The wild swan hurries hight and noises loud
With white neck peering to the evening clowd.
The weary rooks to distant woods are gone.
With lengths of tail the magpie winnows on
To neighbouring tree, and leaves the distant crow
While small birds nestle in the edge below.
poem by John Clare
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Beauty
Say not of beauty she is good,
Or aught but beautiful,
Or sleek to doves' wings of the wood
Her wild wings of a gull.
Call her not wicked; that word's touch
Consumes her like a curse;
But love her not too much, too much,
For that is even worse.
O, she is neither good nor bad,
But innocent and wild!
Enshrine her and she dies, who had
The hard heart of a child.
poem by Elinor Morton Wylie
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If Love Is A Wild Bird
if love is a wild bird,
then i must be a cliff or a rock
far away from the trees,
where the wild bird
builds its nest,
i must be an unknown forest
where the eggs are hidden
where the hatching is done
without even my knowing.
if love is a wild bird
beyond the grasp of my twigs
then i must be the night that hovers
on its wings
and stays also wildly on its dreams
poem by Ric S. Bastasa
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The Cloud Confines
The day is dark and the night
To him that would search their heart;
No lips of cloud that will part
Nor morning song in the light:
Only, gazing alone,
To him wild shadows are shown,
Deep under deep unknown
And height above unknown height.
Still we say as we go,--
"Strange to think by the way,
Whatever there is to know,
That shall we know one day."
The Past is over and fled;
Nam'd new, we name it the old;
Thereof some tale hath been told,
But no word comes from the dead;
Whether at all they be,
Or whether as bond or free,
Or whether they too were we,
Or by what spell they have sped.
Still we say as we go,--
"Strange to think by the way,
Whatever there is to know,
That shall we know one day."
What of the heart of hate
That beats in thy breast, O Time?--
Red strife from the furthest prime,
And anguish of fierce debate;
War that shatters her slain,
And peace that grinds them as grain,
And eyes fix'd ever in vain
On the pitiless eyes of Fate.
Still we say as we go,--
"Strange to think by the way,
Whatever there is to know,
That shall we know one day."
What of the heart of love
That bleeds in thy breast, O Man?--
Thy kisses snatch'd 'neath the ban
Of fangs that mock them above;
Thy bells prolong'd unto knells,
Thy hope that a breath dispels,
Thy bitter forlorn farewells
And the empty echoes thereof?
Still we say as we go,--
"Strange to think by the way,
Whatever there is to know,
That shall we know one day."
The sky leans dumb on the sea,
Aweary with all its wings;
And oh! the song the sea sings
Is dark everlastingly.
Our past is clean forgot,
Our present is and is not,
Our future's a seal'd seedplot,
And what betwixt them are we?--
We who say as we go,--
"Strange to think by the way,
Whatever there is to know,
That shall we know one day."
poem by Dante Gabriel Rossetti
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Norse lullaby
The sky is dark and the hills are white
As the storm-king speeds from the north to-night,
And this is the song the storm-king sings,
As over the world his cloak he flings:
"Sleep, sleep, little one, sleep;"
He rustles his wings and gruffly sings:
"Sleep, little one, sleep."
On yonder mountain-side a vine
Clings at the foot of a mother pine;
The tree bends over the trembling thing,
And only the vine can hear her sing:
"Sleep, sleep, little one, sleep;
What shall you fear when I am here?
Sleep, little one, sleep."
The king may sing in his bitter flight,
The tree may croon to the vine to-night,
But the little snowflake at my breast
Liketh the song I sing the best,--
Sleep, sleep, little one, sleep;
Weary thou art, anext my heart
Sleep, little one, sleep.
poem by Eugene Field
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The White Swan
kiss the lake at dawn
graceful, divine, majestic
new queen, the white swan
haiku by Marius Alexandru (27 December 2020)
Submitted by anonym
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Sing Me A Swan-song Not
Sing me a swan-song not, the tacit allegory
Of all the shadows that squander in the squalid vale
When the Sun, kingly, circumnavigating in circumspect
All over the gardens of plush askance - sing me a swan-song not.
Sing me a swan-song not, pale lover
For as the ides dawn a marching twine
Here I wait, like a tavern-frequenter, longing to behold
The intoxication of your supple wine,
Your dank submission, and your obsequiousness resembling
A flower toadied; a stem of savvy mysticism.
Sing me a swan-song not, in and out of the madness
The drizzle upon the pliant seethe of gray fire carries
The semblance of the quietus: have you seen a taciturn storm
Upon a battered doorstep love? That is I, a calm tempest -
An angst-ridden farcical or perhaps, the behest of the lustre
Of romance. And so sing me a swan-song not, dear love
Traipse alongside in an entwined manner, a sequestering specification
Of the gracious moon in the midnight soiree of unsheathed dreams.
Sing me a swan-song not, never, not even for a day, love
The fountains of bliss are situated in each wayward corner
Of the pallid walls where we break and amalgamate ourselves
Again - that is where I found you, wincing away into the sultry air
A soul confined to the thresholds of a bewailing thousand-shards;
Sing me a swan-song not, I will croon the lullaby of a
Thousand-fabled joys and a too-sudden image cast into
These eyes. Sing me a swan-song not, as I knock upon
Your doorstep, waking you in your unsettling slumber,
Professing love, like a flame whilst speaking, tongue in a knot:
Love, sing me a swan-song not in the time of your iridescences!
poem by Windsor Guadalupe Jr
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The Mirror
Between the woods the afternoon
Its fallen in a golden swoon,
The sun looks down from quiet skies
To where a quiet water lies,
And silent trees stoop down to the trees.
And there I saw a white swan make
Another white swan in the lake;
And, breast to breast, both motionless,
They waited for the wind's caress. . .
And all the water was at ease.
poem by Alan Alexander Milne
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Hide and Seek
All the trees are sleeping, all the winds are still,
All the flocks of fleecy clouds have wandered past the hill;
Through the noonday silence, down the woods of June,
Hark, a little hunter's voice comes running with a tune.
"Hide and seek!
"When I speak,
"You must answer me:
"Call again,
"Merry men,
"Coo-ee, coo-ee, coo-ee!"
Now I hear his footsteps, rustling through the grass:
Hidden in my leafy nook, shall I let him pass?
Just a low, soft whistle,--quick the hunter turns,
Leaps upon me laughing, rolls me in the ferns.
"Hold him fast,
"Caught at last!
"Now you're it, you see.
"Hide your eye,
"Till I cry,
"Coo-ee, coo-ee, coo-ee!"
II
Long ago he left me, long and long ago:
Now I wander through the world and seek him high and low;
Hidden safe and happy, in some pleasant place,--
Ah, if I could hear his voice, I soon should find his face.
Far away,
Many a day,
Where can Barney be?
Answer, dear,
Don't you hear?
Coo-ee, coo-ee, coo-ee!
Birds that in the spring-time thrilled his heart with joy,
Flowers he loved to pick for me, mind me of my boy.
Surely he is waiting till my steps come nigh;
Love may hide itself awhile, but love can never die.
Heart, be glad,
The little lad
Will call some day to thee:
"Father dear,
"Heaven is here,
"Coo-ee, coo-ee, coo-ee!"
poem by Henry Van Dyke
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In heaven,
In heaven,
Some little blades of grass
Stood before God.
"What did you do?"
Then all save one of the little blades
Began eagerly to relate
The merits of their lives.
This one stayed a small way behind,
Ashamed.
Presently, God said,
"And what did you do?"
The little blade answered, "Oh my Lord,
Memory is bitter to me,
For, if I did good deeds,
I know not of them."
Then God, in all His splendor,
Arose from His throne.
"Oh, best little blade of grass!" He said.
poem by Stephen Crane
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A hall of mirrors...
She said—she'd love me forever.
And that she always would.
That our two hearts—thoughts
"Could bond; the stars for good".
It wasn't harmony: From
The outset—that is true!
For her my sweetheart, I'
"Watch's as infants, do".
Out of the sash-window
Or that—skylight in the soul,
In reflections, light...
"Entwined—we're made whole".
Halves of the locket...
Combined, clasped.
Is what we now—became!
"In each other's grasp".
But soon these mirrors
Broke like shards of glass...
A hall of mirrors...?
"With no-truths—Alas"...
The lights ebbing darkness...
Shone on, all their paths.
But; know all hearts—break!
"Drown in hollow—baths".
poem by Mark Heathcote
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