Leopards at Knole
Leopards on the gable-ends,
Leopards on the painted stair,
Stiff the blazoned shield they bear,
Or and gules, a bend of vair,
Leopards on the gable-ends,
Leopards everywhere.
Guard and vigil in the night
While the ancient house is sleeping
They three hundred years are keeping,
Nightly from their stations leaping,
Shadows black in moonlight bright,
Roof to gable creeping.
Rigid when the day returns,
Up aloft in sun or rain
Leopards at their posts again
Watch the shifting pageant's train;
And their jewelled colour burns
In the window-pane.
Often on the painted stair,
As I passed abstractedly,
Velvet footsteps, two and three,
Padded gravely after me.
- There was nothing, nothing there,
Nothing there to see.
poem by Victoria Sackville-West
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Related quotes
On A Painting By Patient B Of The Independence State Hospital For The Insane
1
These seven houses have learned to face one another,
But not at the expected angles. Those silly brown lumps,
That are probably meant for hills and not other houses,
After ages of being themselves, though naturally slow,
Are learning to be exclusive without offending.
The arches and entrances (down to the right out of sight)
Have mastered the lesson of remaining closed.
And even the skies keep a certain understandable distance,
For these are the houses of the very rich.
2
One sees their children playing with leopards, tamed
At great cost, or perhaps it is only other children,
For none of these objects is anything more than a spot,
And perhaps there are not any children but only leopards
Playing with leopards, and perhaps there are only the spots.
And the little maids that hang from the windows like tongues,
Calling the children in, admiring the leopards,
Are the dashes a child might represent motion by means of,
Or dazzlement possibly, the brilliance of solid-gold houses.
3
The clouds resemble those empty balloons in cartoons
Which approximate silence. These clouds, if clouds they are
(And not the smoke from the seven aspiring chimneys),
The more one studies them the more it appears
They too have expressions. One might almost say
They have their habits, their wrong opinions, that their
Impassivity masks an essentially lovable foolishness,
And they will be given names by those who live under them
Not public like mountains’ but private like companions’.
poem by Donald Justice
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Mountain Splendour
Snow leopards look at snow all day!
It's here, there, everywhere!
It hardly ever goes away!
It's white beyond compare!
It's dazzling white, it's total white,
It really, really is!
It's safe to say that it's too bright!
It's not something they'd miss...
Snow leopards sit the whole day long
On snow, snow, snow, snow, snow...
It's sometimes nice, don't get me wrong,
But doesn't that stuff glow! ?
It's freezing cold, no good at all...
And bores them all to tears...
They hate it when new snowflakes fall
And tickle both their ears!
Snow leopards wait for food to eat...
They wait, wait, wait, wait, wait...
They take things slow, they tap their feet...
And think life's just great!
They can't hum tunes like humans do...
Remembering each rhyme...
They just sit down, enjoy the view...
And... while... away... the... time...
Denis Martindale, copyright, November 2010.
The poem is based on the magnificent painting
by Stephen Gayford called 'Mountain Splendour II'.
More Stephen Gayford poems here:
denis-martindale-dot-blogspot-dot-com
poem by Denis Martindale
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Rainforest Phantoms
The leopards listen to each noise
Of their surrounding sounds...
On steadfast feet they gently poise,
Resisting fearful bounds.
Perhaps it isn't time to run,
Like cowards fearing pain,
Or just like girls who love the sun,
Yet flee from falling rain...
The leopards like the spot they've seen,
It suits them to a tee...
They'll stay till others intervene,
Like phantoms on their tree...
The forest has its moody times,
Its fierce and frantic days,
Its pleasant passing sunny climes
And melting dew-dropped phase...
The sun shines through the trees above,
The clouds go gliding by...
And soon the moon will shine with love,
To grace the midnight sky...
The leopards lack for nothing now,
True friends in harmony...
Receiving what the Fates allow,
Like phantoms, fancy free...
The poem is based on the magnificent painting
by Stephen Gayford called 'Rainforest Phantoms'.
Consider the UK Sky Digital Rainforest Rescue
charity appeal found on the UK sky-dot-com as
this explains how losing the rain forests destroys
the lives of those humans, animals and plants
in the name of progress for some, but not for all.
poem by Denis Martindale
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Blazing in Gold and quenching in Purple
228
Blazing in Gold and quenching in Purple
Leaping like Leopards to the Sky
Then at the feet of the old Horizon
Laying her spotted Face to die
Stooping as low as the Otter's Window
Touching the Roof and tinting the Barn
Kissing her Bonnet to the Meadow
And the Juggler of Day is gone
poem by Emily Dickinson
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Mountain Myth
Snow leopards once were thought as myths, ghostly apparitions,
Upon the mountains and on cliffs, mostly superstitions.
Then photographs so quickly proved what first was hard to see -
The way they laid, the way they moved, no more a mystery.
Yet when I look, there's still a part that takes my breath away,
A majesty that strikes my heart, no matter, come what may.
For beauty still affects my soul, my spirit and my mind,
Such that it swiftly takes control, as if a spell to bind.
Cat lovers know their soft embrace, that purring noise they make.
No other creature takes their place, of that, there's no mistake.
Imagine, then, if leopards, too, befriended Man as well,
With purring noise said, 'I love you! ' What tales we each could tell.
When Adam walked upon the Earth, with Eve right by his side,
The animals all knew their worth, each owned a sense of pride,
Each walked in peace, it all made sense, till sin and then the Fall.
Alas, we all know violence... its bitter taste is gall.
Snow leopards raise their families and do the best they can.
All creatures long to live in peace, yet none strives more than Man.
More Stephen Gayford poems here:
denis-martindale-dot-blogspot-dot-com
poem by Denis Martindale
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Indeed, if our ancestors of millions of years ago hadn't learned how to care for one another and hunt in packs, they'd all have ended up being eaten by leopards.
quote by Robert Shea
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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After dark all cats are leopards. Zuni
American Indian proverbs
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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leopards on prowl
kill sheep and cows
no line of control
quote by by John Celes
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All White
this afternoon you are
all white, so neat to see,
my flesh quivers
to kiss your lips
and hold your face
lick your body undressed
tonight
without all these white
trappings on
now either you are brown
or black, but just the same
my flesh quivers
for leopards and
black birds and
dark nights moaning
for love.
poem by Ric S. Bastasa
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Brown rosette
Brown rosette
Round wound
Sea roving tall
Time told bold
Bound like bounce
Salt seared tongue
Never-ending ends
Win express into
My heart torn apart
Rough trade rough tongue of
God kisses exchanging
French leopards
Imposable throat caught
Brought about the words
Head heard scaring eye
Over time rape rope ripe
He ground of it
Growth ghost got
Caught loving the God.
poem by David E. Patton
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Happening 1961
Greenfield said
where you from?
London you replied
I don’t like Londoners
he said as a bee
buzzed in the greenhouse
where the rural science teacher
Gable had sent you.
Greenfield pushed you
against the potting bench
and you pushed him
against begonia plants
which fell to the floor
and he punched
your arm
and you punched
his jaw
and he grabbed you
around the waist
and you both
fell to the floor.
You smelt his sweat
and saw blood
drip from his lips.
Get up you gits
another boy said
Old Gable’s coming
and so you pulled
Greenfield up
by the hand
and he brushed off
your school jacket
and you pushed
your fingers
through your hair
and he wiped blood
from his lips
and in came Gable
and said
what’s happening here?
And why are the begonias
on the floor?
My fault you said
I knocked them
with my elbow
and Greenfield
was going to
pick them up
when he banged his jaw
on the bench by accident.
Gable glared
at you both
and said
well bloody well
pick them up
and clean up the mess
and left.
Greenfield held
his handkerchief
to his lip.
You picked up
the begonias
one by one
and put them
on the bench.
Greenfield put them
tidy and neat
and kicked
the spilt earth
under the bench
with his feet.
Gable’s a toss
Greenfield said
and put out
his hand for
you to shake.
You shook his hand
and smiled
and he laughed
and said
I guess Londoners
aren’t all bad
and the bee buzzed
out the open window
and you watched it go
and was glad.
poem by Terry Collett
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To JRR Tolkien and Christopher
Do cats dream of lions,
and shirts dream of irons?
Do cats dream of leopards,
and sheep dream of shepherds?
poem by Michael Shepherd
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Softly
Softly she comes
Whispers the breeze with her passing
In secret love she is laughing
Softly she comes in the night
Softly she sighs
Sweetly she lies never sleeping
Her fragrance all in my keeping
Softly she comes in the night
Down the darkened hall
I hear her footsteps on my stair
And she is in my arms once more
Then softly she goes
Her shining lips in the shadows
Whisper goodbye at my window
Softly she goes in the dawn
Down the darkened hall
I hear her footsteps on my stair
And she is in my arms once more
Then softly she goes
Her shining lips in the shadows
Whisper goodbye at my window
Softly she goes in the dawn
Softly she goes in the dawn
song performed by by Gordon Lightfoot
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Lines Written In Dejection
WHEN have I last looked on
The round green eyes and the long wavering bodies
Of the dark leopards of the moon?
All the wild witches, those most noble ladies,
For all their broom-sticks and their tears,
Their angry tears, are gone.
The holy centaurs of the hills are vanished;
I have nothing but the embittered sun;
Banished heroic mother moon and vanished,
And now that I have come to fifty years
I must endure the timid sun.
poem by William Butler Yeats
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Contagion
Elephants are contagious!
Be careful how you tread.
An Elephant that's been trodden on
Should be confined to bed!
Leopards are contagious too.
Be careful tiny tots.
They don't give you a temperature
But lots and lots - of spots.
The Herring is a lucky fish
From all disease inured.
Should he be ill when caught at sea;
Immediately - he's cured!
poem by Spike Milligan
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Battle at the Lomba River
That night guns roared
all around us everywhere
and the field was acrid
with the smell
of the man made judgement day.
Howitzers flung their projectiles
miles high into the sky
flying by past the horizon
like glowing stars.
Tanks and armoured cars
crunched, raced on
over trees, anthills and almost anything
coughing death left and right
through flaming barrels
and some lions, leopards, hyenas,
jackals, suricates, scorpions
and snakes in the veldt
thought that this night
the world will come to an end
and later still the world
went on like before
while man had a armistice
and then again another war.
poem by Gert Strydom
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Leopard Sunset
The leopard lingered in the sun
Almost at close of day,
With all its hours almost done
And fast to ebb away...
The leopard let his memories
Remind him now and then,
Because he knew each day must cease
When moonlight shone again.
This day had seen new life, new death,
That's how time passes by...
We understand while we draw breath
Until our final sigh...
The leopard knew his time was near,
Just like the sun above,
Yet leopards are not prone to fear,
That's why they still share love...
His cubs were waiting down below,
As he watched like a king...
To see time like a river flow
To outlive everything...
Some day his cubs would watch in turn,
As their cubs played a while...
With each new day something to learn...
Some joy to raise a smile...
(July 2011/The poem is based on the
magnificent painting by Stephen Gayford
called 'Leopard Sunset'.)
poem by Denis Martindale
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Cat Family
Members of the cat family
All run very gracefully.
Jaguars eat birds in nests
But never eat pests.
Cheetah climbs trees
and destroys beehives.
Tiger eats animals
That are even 7 feet tall
A lion looks smaller than a tiger
But he is so much stronger!
Leopard’s name comes from “leo” lions
When angry, they are like hot irons!
Oelots are copycats
Of leopards and cheetahs
As they wear the same hats.
Now almost all are dead
so stop them from going to their deathbed!
poem by Aryaman Naik
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