Her Vision In The Wood
Dry timber under that rich foliage,
At wine-dark midnight in the sacred wood,
Too old for a man's love I stood in rage
Imagining men. Imagining that I could
A greater with a lesser pang assuage
Or but to find if withered vein ran blood,
I tore my body that its wine might cover
Whatever could rccall the lip of lover.
And after that I held my fingers up,
Stared at the wine-dark nail, or dark that ran
Down every withered finger from the top;
But the dark changed to red, and torches shone,
And deafening music shook the leaves; a troop
Shouldered a litter with a wounded man,
Or smote upon the string and to the sound
Sang of the beast that gave the fatal wound.
All stately women moving to a song
With loosened hair or foreheads grief-distraught,
It seemed a Quattrocento painter's throng,
A thoughtless image of Mantegna's thought --
Why should they think that are for ever young?
Till suddenly in grief's contagion caught,
I stared upon his blood-bedabbled breast
And sang my malediction with the rest.
That thing all blood and mire, that beast-torn wreck,
Half turned and fixed a glazing eye on mine,
And, though love's bitter-sweet had all come back,
Those bodies from a picture or a coin
Nor saw my body fall nor heard it shriek,
Nor knew, drunken with singing as with wine,
That they had brought no fabulous symbol there
But my heart's victim and its torturer.
poem by William Butler Yeats
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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Related quotes
A Woman Young And Old
I
FATHER AND CHILD
SHE hears me strike the board and say
That she is under ban
Of all good men and women,
Being mentioned with a man
That has the worst of all bad names;
And thereupon replies
That his hair is beautiful,
Cold as the March wind his eyes.
II
BEFORE THE WORLD WAS MADE
IF I make the lashes dark
And the eyes more bright
And the lips more scarlet,
Or ask if all be right
From mirror after mirror,
No vanity's displayed:
I'm looking for the face I had
Before the world was made.
What if I look upon a man
As though on my beloved,
And my blood be cold the while
And my heart unmoved?
Why should he think me cruel
Or that he is betrayed?
I'd have him love the thing that was
Before the world was made.
III
A FIRST CONFESSION
I ADMIT the briar
Entangled in my hair
Did not injure me;
My blenching and trembling,
Nothing but dissembling,
Nothing but coquetry.
I long for truth, and yet
I cannot stay from that
My better self disowns,
For a man's attention
Brings such satisfaction
To the craving in my bones.
Brightness that I pull back
From the Zodiac,
Why those questioning eyes
That are fixed upon me?
What can they do but shun me
If empty night replies?
IV
HER TRIUMPH
I DID the dragon's will until you came
Because I had fancied love a casual
Improvisation, or a settled game
That followed if I let the kerchief fall:
Those deeds were best that gave the minute wings
And heavenly music if they gave it wit;
And then you stood among the dragon-rings.
I mocked, being crazy, but you mastered it
And broke the chain and set my ankles free,
Saint George or else a pagan Perseus;
And now we stare astonished at the sea,
And a miraculous strange bird shrieks at us.
V
CONSOLATION
O BUT there is wisdom
In what the sages said;
But stretch that body for a while
And lay down that head
Till I have told the sages
Where man is comforted.
How could passion run so deep
Had I never thought
That the crime of being born
Blackens all our lot?
But where the crime's committed
The crime can be forgot.
VI
CHOSEN
THE lot of love is chosen. I learnt that much
Struggling for an image on the track
Of the whirling Zodiac.
Scarce did he my body touch,
Scarce sank he from the west
Or found a subtetranean rest
On the maternal midnight of my breast
Before I had marked him on his northern way,
And seemed to stand although in bed I lay.
I struggled with the horror of daybreak,
I chose it for my lot! If questioned on
My utmost pleasure with a man
By some new-married bride, I take
That stillness for a theme
Where his heart my heart did seem
And both adrift on the miraculous stream
Where -- wrote a learned astrologer --
The Zodiac is changed into a sphere.
VII
PARTING
i{He.} Dear, I must be gone
While night Shuts the eyes
Of the household spies;
That song announces dawn.
i{She.} No, night's bird and love's
Bids all true lovers rest,
While his loud song reproves
The murderous stealth of day.
i{He.} Daylight already flies
From mountain crest to crest
i{She.} That light is from the moom.
i{He.} That bird...
i{She.} Let him sing on,
I offer to love's play
My dark declivities.
VIII
HER VISION IN THE WOOD
DRY timber under that rich foliage,
At wine-dark midnight in the sacred wood,
Too old for a man's love I stood in rage
Imagining men. Imagining that I could
A greater with a lesser pang assuage
Or but to find if withered vein ran blood,
I tore my body that its wine might cover
Whatever could rccall the lip of lover.
And after that I held my fingers up,
Stared at the wine-dark nail, or dark that ran
Down every withered finger from the top;
But the dark changed to red, and torches shone,
And deafening music shook the leaves; a troop
Shouldered a litter with a wounded man,
Or smote upon the string and to the sound
Sang of the beast that gave the fatal wound.
All stately women moving to a song
With loosened hair or foreheads grief-distraught,
It seemed a Quattrocento painter's throng,
A thoughtless image of Mantegna's thought --
Why should they think that are for ever young?
Till suddenly in grief's contagion caught,
I stared upon his blood-bedabbled breast
And sang my malediction with the rest.
That thing all blood and mire, that beast-torn wreck,
Half turned and fixed a glazing eye on mine,
And, though love's bitter-sweet had all come back,
Those bodies from a picture or a coin
Nor saw my body fall nor heard it shriek,
Nor knew, drunken with singing as with wine,
That they had brought no fabulous symbol there
But my heart's victim and its torturer.
IX
A LAST CONFESSION
WHAT lively lad most pleasured me
Of all that with me lay?
I answer that I gave my soul
And loved in misery,
But had great pleasure with a lad
That I loved bodily.
Flinging from his arms I laughed
To think his passion such
He fancied that I gave a soul
Did but our bodies touch,
And laughed upon his breast to think
Beast gave beast as much.
I gave what other women gave
'That stepped out of their clothes.
But when this soul, its body off,
Naked to naked goes,
He it has found shall find therein
What none other knows,
And give his own and take his own
And rule in his own right;
And though it loved in misery
Close and cling so tight,
There's not a bird of day that dare
Extinguish that delight.
X
MEETING
HIDDEN by old age awhile
In masker's cloak and hood,
Each hating what the other loved,
Face to face we stood:
'That I have met with such,' said he,
'Bodes me little good.'
'Let others boast their fill,' said I,
'But never dare to boast
That such as I had such a man
For lover in the past;
Say that of living men I hate
Such a man the most.'
'A loony'd boast of such a love,'
He in his rage declared:
But such as he for such as me --
Could we both discard
This beggarly habiliment --
Had found a sweeter word.
XI
FROM THE 'ANTIGONE'
OVERCOME -- O bitter sweetness,
Inhabitant of the soft cheek of a girl --
The rich man and his affairs,
The fat flocks and the fields' fatness,
Mariners, rough harvesters;
Overcome Gods upon Parnassus;
Overcome the Empyrean; hurl
Heaven and Earth out of their places,
That in the Same calamity
Brother and brother, friend and friend,
Family and family,
City and city may contend,
By that great glory driven wild.
Pray I will and sing I must,
And yet I weep -- Oedipus' child
Descends into the loveless dust.
poem by William Butler Yeats
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Hannibal's Oath
AND the night was dark and calm,
There was not a breath of air,
The leaves of the grove were still,
As the presence of death were there;
Only a moaning sound
Came from the distant sea,
It was as if, like life,
It had no tranquillity.
A warrior and a child
Pass'd through the sacred wood,
Which, like a mystery,
Around the temple stood.
The warrior's brow was worn
With the weight of casque and plume,
And sun-burnt was his cheek,
And his eye and brow were gloom.
The child was young and fair,
But the forehead large and high,
And the dark eyes' flashing light
Seem'd to feel their destiny.
They enter'd in the temple,
And stood before the shrine,
It stream'd with the victim's blood,
With incense and with wine.
The ground rock'd beneath their feet,
The thunder shook the dome,
But the boy stood firm, and swore
Eternal hate to Rome.
There's a page in history
O'er which tears of blood were wept,
And that page is the record
How that oath of hate was kept.
poem by Letitia Elizabeth Landon
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The German Legion
In the cot beside the water,
In the white cot by the water,
The white cot by the white water,
There they laid the German maid.
There they wound her, singing round her,
Deftly wound her, singing round her,
Softly wound her, singing round her,
In a shroud like a cloud.
And they decked her as they wound her,
With a wreath of leaves they bound her,
Lornest leaves they scattered round her,
Singing grief with every leaf.
Singing grief with every leaf.
Sadder grief with sadder leaf,
Sweeter leaf with sweeter grief,
So't was sung in a dark tongue.
Like a latter lily lying,
O'er whom falling leaves are sighing,
And Autumn vapours crying,
Pale and cold on misty mould,
So I saw her sweet and lowly,
Shining shining pale and holy,
Thro' the dim woe slowly slowly,
Said and sung in that dark tongue.
Such an awe her beauty lent her,
While they sang I dared not enter
That charmed ring where she was centre,
But I stood with stirring blood
Till the song fell like a billow,
And I saw them leave her pillow,
And go forth to the far willow,
For the wreath of virgin death.
And I stood beside her pillow,
While they plucked the distant willow,
And my heart rose like a billow
As I said to the pale dead-
'Oh, thou most fair and sweet virginity,
Of whom this heart that beats for thee doth know
Nor name nor story, that these limbs can be
For no man evermore, that thou must go
Cold to the cold, and that no eye shall see
That which thine unsolved womanhood doth owe
Of the incommunicable mystery
Shakes me with tears. I could kneel down by thee,
And o'er thy chill unmarriageable rest
Cry, 'Thou who shalt no more at all be prest
To any heart, one moment come to this!
And feel me weeping with thy want of bliss,
And all the unpraisèd beauties of thy breast-
Thy breast which never shall a lover kiss!''
Then I slowly left her pillow,
For they came back with the willow,
And my heart sinks as a billow
Doth implore towards the shore,
As I see the crown they weave her,
And I know that I must leave her,
And I feel that I could grieve her
Sad and sore for evermore.
And again they sang around her,
In a richer robe they wound her,
With the willow wreath they bound her,
And the loud song like a cloud
Of golden obscuration,
With the strange tongue of her nation,
Filled the house of lamentation,
Till she lay in melody,
Like a latter lily lying,
O'er whom falling leaves are sighing,
And the Autumn vapours crying,
In a dream of evening gleam.
And I saw her sweet and lowly,
Shining shining pale and holy,
Thro' the dim woe slowly slowly
Said and sung in a dark tongue.
In the cot beside the water,
The white cot by the white water,
English cot by English water
That shall see the German sea.
poem by Sydney Thompson Dobell
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Red, Sparkling Wine
I Have Seen A Sight
Of a Man Falling Down …
… it wasn’t for a Fight
… but it was due to what He’d Found …
… Red Sparkling Wine… Does It Every Time
Red Sparkling Wine… She Should Be A Crime …
Red Sparkling Wine…
She Starts out – Flowing – Smooth
Gets in Your Blood – Then You got Somethin’ to Prove!
You Chase Her Intoxicating Perfume
… must be Brand X … or Lady-Doom …
… Red Sparkling Wine… Does It Every Time
Red Sparkling Wine… Feeling So Sublime …
Red Sparkling Wine…
… Sweet from the Vine, but She ain’t Vintage
Make You Loose Your Mind and Your Hard-Earned Wages
Her Cheap-Thrills… can’t Heal a Heart, that’s Bruised …
You ain’t in Love! … just in a Bottle of Booze …
of Red Sparkling Wine… Once in awhile is Fine
Red Sparkling Wine… Know the Warning Signs ….
of Red Sparkling Wine…
She’s Beautiful, as She Pours
Your Problems – Passed-Out, on The Floor
She’s Crystal-Blood in an Hour-Glass
Her Pity-Promises… just don’t Last…
Red Sparkling Wine… Does It Every Time
Red Sparkling Wine… She’ll have You begging for Dimes …
… to buy … Red Sparkling Wine…
She’ll leave You Broke, You won’t be able to Think
She’s ‘Madam Dope’ … if You Need One More Drink
… of Red Sparkling Wine… Just a Matter of Time
Red Sparkling Wine… Have Another… ‘ Cause I’m …
… Red Sparkling Wine …
poem by MoonBee Canady
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The Sea-Swallows
THIS FELL when Christmas lights were done,
Red rose leaves will never make wine;
But before the Easter lights begun;
The ways are sair fra’ the Till to the Tyne.
Two lovers sat where the rowan blows
And all the grass is heavy and fine,
By the gathering-place of the sea-swallows
When the wind brings them over Tyne.
Blossom of broom will never make bread,
Red rose leaves will never make wine;
Between her brows she is grown red,
That was full white in the fields by Tyne.
“O what is this thing ye have on,
Show me now, sweet daughter of mine?”
“O father, this is my little son
That I found hid in the sides of Tyne.
“O what will ye give my son to eat,
Red rose leaves will never make wine?”
“Fen-water and adder’s meat,
The ways are sair fra’ the Till to the Tyne.”
“Or what will ye get my son to wear,
Red rose leaves will never make wine?”
“A weed and a web of nettle’s hair,
The ways are sair fra’ the Till to the Tyne.”
“Or what will ye take to line his bed,
Red rose leaves will never make wine?”
“Two black stones at the kirkwall’s head,
The ways are sair fra’ the Till to the Tyne.”
“Or what will ye give my son for land,
Red rose leaves will never make wine?”
“Three girl’s paces of red sand,
The ways are sair fra’ the Till to the Tyne.”
“Or what will ye give me for my son,
Red rose leaves will never make wine?”
“Six times to kiss his young mouth on,
The ways are sair fra’ the Till to the Tyne.”
“But what have ye done with the bearing-bread,
And what have ye made of the washing-wine?
Or where have ye made your bearing-bed,
To bear a son in the sides of Tyne?”
“The bearing-bread is soft and new,
There is no soil in the straining wine:
The bed was made between green and blue,
It stands full soft by the sides of Tyne.
“The fair grass was my bearing-bread,
The well-water my washing-wine;
The low leaves were my bearing-bed,
And that was best in the sides of Tyne.”
“O daughter, if ye have done this thing,
I wot the greater grief is mine;
This was a bitter child-bearing,
When ye were got by the sides of Tyne.
“About the time of sea-swallows
That fly full thick by six and nine,
Ye’ll have my body out of the house,
To bury me by the sides of Tyne.
“Set nine stones by the wall for twain,
Red rose leaves will never make wine;
For the bed I take will measure ten,
The ways are sair fra’ the Till to the Tyne.
“Tread twelve girl’s paces out for three,
Red rose leaves will never make wine;
For the pit I made has taken me,
The ways are sair fra’ the Till to the Tyne.”
poem by Algernon Charles Swinburne
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The Grey Rock
Poets with whom I learned my trade.
Companions of the Cheshire Cheese,
Here's an old story I've remade,
Imagining 'twould better please
Your cars than stories now in fashion,
Though you may think I waste my breath
Pretending that there can be passion
That has more life in it than death,
And though at bottling of your wine
Old wholesome Goban had no say;
The moral's yours because it's mine.
When cups went round at close of day --
Is not that how good stories run? --
The gods were sitting at the board
In their great house at Slievenamon.
They sang a drowsy song, Or snored,
For all were full of wine and meat.
The smoky torches made a glare
On metal Goban 'd hammered at,
On old deep silver rolling there
Or on somc still unemptied cup
That he, when frenzy stirred his thews,
Had hammered out on mountain top
To hold the sacred stuff he brews
That only gods may buy of him.
Now from that juice that made them wise
All those had lifted up the dim
Imaginations of their eyes,
For one that was like woman made
Before their sleepy eyelids ran
And trembling with her passion said,
'Come out and dig for a dead man,
Who's burrowing Somewhere in the ground
And mock him to his face and then
Hollo him on with horse and hound,
For he is the worst of all dead men.'
We should be dazed and terror-struck,
If we but saw in dreams that room,
Those wine-drenched eyes, and curse our luck
That empticd all our days to come.
I knew a woman none could please,
Because she dreamed when but a child
Of men and women made like these;
And after, when her blood ran wild,
Had ravelled her own story out,
And said, 'In two or in three years
I needs must marry some poor lout,'
And having said it, burst in tears.
Since, tavern comrades, you have died,
Maybe your images have stood,
Mere bone and muscle thrown aside,
Before that roomful or as good.
You had to face your ends when young -
'Twas wine or women, or some curse -
But never made a poorer song
That you might have a heavier purse,
Nor gave loud service to a cause
That you might have a troop of friends,
You kept the Muses' sterner laws,
And unrepenting faced your ends,
And therefore earned the right - and yet
Dowson and Johnson most I praise -
To troop with those the world's forgot,
And copy their proud steady gaze.
'The Danish troop was driven out
Between the dawn and dusk,' she said;
'Although the event was long in doubt.
Although the King of Ireland's dead
And half the kings, before sundown
All was accomplished.
'When this day
Murrough, the King of Ireland's son,
Foot after foot was giving way,
He and his best troops back to back
Had perished there, but the Danes ran,
Stricken with panic from the attack,
The shouting of an unseen man;
And being thankful Murrough found,
Led by a footsole dipped in blood
That had made prints upon the ground,
Where by old thorn-trees that man stood;
And though when he gazed here and there,
He had but gazed on thorn-trees, spoke,
"Who is the friend that seems but air
And yet could give so fine a stroke?"
Thereon a young man met his eye,
Who said, "Because she held me in
Her love, and would not have me die,
Rock-nurtured Aoife took a pin,
And pushing it into my shirt,
Promised that for a pin's sake
No man should see to do me hurt;
But there it's gone; I will not take
The fortune that had been my shame
Seeing, King's son, what wounds you have."
'Twas roundly spoke, but when night came
He had betrayed me to his grave,
For he and the King's son were dead.
I'd promised him two hundred years,
And when for all I'd done or said --
And these immortal eyes shed tears --
He claimed his country's need was most,
I'd saved his life, yet for the sake
Of a new friend he has turned a ghost.
What does he cate if my heart break?
I call for spade and horse and hound
That we may harry him.' Thereon
She cast herself upon the ground
And rent her clothes and made her moan:
'Why are they faithless when their might
Is from the holy shades that rove
The grey rock and the windy light?
Why should the faithfullest heart most love
The bitter sweetness of false faces?
Why must the lasting love what passes,
Why are the gods by men betrayed?'
But thereon every god stood up
With a slow smile and without sound,
And Stretching forth his arm and cup
To where she moaned upon the ground,
Suddenly drenched her to the skin;
And she with Goban's wine adrip,
No more remembering what had been.
Stared at the gods with laughing lip.
I have kept my faith, though faith was tried,
To that rock-born, rock-wandering foot,
And thc world's altered since you died,
And I am in no good repute
With the loud host before the sea,
That think sword-strokes were better meant
Than lover's music -- let that be,
So that the wandering foot's content.
poem by William Butler Yeats
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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A Case Of You
A case of you
Just before our love got lost you said
I am as constant as a northern star
And I said, constant in the darkness
Wheres that at?
If you want me Ill be in the bar
On the back of a cartoon coaster
In the blue tv screen light
I drew a map of canada
Oh canada
And your face sketched on it twice
Oh you are in my blood like holy wine
Oh and you taste so bitter but you taste so sweet
Oh I could drink a case of you
I could drink a case of you darling
And I would still be on my feet
Oh Id still be on my feet
Oh I am a lonely painter
I live in a box of paints
Im frightened by the devil
And Im drawn to those ones that aint afraid
I remember that time that you told me, you said
Love is touching souls
Surely you touched mine
Cause part of you pours out of me
In these lines from time to time
Oh you are in my blood like holy wine
And you taste so bitter but you taste so sweet
Oh I could drink a case of you
I could drink a case of you darling
Still Id be on my feet
And still be on my feet
I met a woman
She had a mouth like yours
She knew your life
She knew your devils and your deeds
And she said
Color go to him, stay with him if you can
Oh but be prepared to bleed
Oh but you are in my blood youre my holy wine
Oh and you taste so bitter, bitter and so sweet
Oh I could drink a case of you darling
Still Id be on my feet
Id still be on my feet
Mmmmmmm
song performed by by Joni Mitchell
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Wine, Women An Song
(coverdale/lord/marsden/moody/murray/paice)
I aint an educated man
As all you fleet street preachers know,
Its just the simple things in life
Get my motor running, ready to go
If I can make you smile
I will raise my glass,
An if you dont like it
Then, baby, you can kiss my ass!
You can tell me its wrong,
But, I love wine, women an song
Give me a good time woman,
An a love potion bottle of booze
cos I got a juke box heart
Full of honky tonk rhythm an blues
You better lock up your daughter, your sister too,
If get in my way, Im gonna rock an roll over you,
Aint nothing you can do
You can tell its wrong,
But I love wine, women an song
Wine, women an song, talking bout
Wine, women an song,
Wine, women an song,
Wine, women an song
You get what you can
But, dont take too long
Wine, women an song,
Give me a rock an roll band
With a mean an dirty blues guitar,
Take me to a dance hall palace
With a twenty four hour bar
Then you better lock up your daughter, your sister too,
If you get in my way, Im gonna rock an roll over you,
Aint nothing you can do
You can tell me its wrong,
But I love wine, women an song
Wine, women an song, talking bout
Wine, women an song,
Wine, women an song,
Wine, women an song
You get what you can
But, dont take too long,
Wine, women an song
Wine, women an song,
Wine, women an song,
Wine, women an song
You get what you can
But, dont take too long,
Wine, women an song
Wine, women an song
song performed by by Whitesnake
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Wine (Love Poem)
Wine is for laughing
Wine is for talking all night
Wine is for living life out loud
Wine is for making us beautiful
Wine is for all-night conversations
Wine is for getting together again
Wine is for ‘never again’ tomorrow
Wine is for sleeping like a baby
Wine is for telling the truth
Wine is food for love
Wine is friendship
Wine is fresh
Wine
Can
Be
The
One
Perfe ct
Companion
At the end of a long day
poem by Ian Beckett
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I think that at the supper I neither receive flesh nor blood, but bread and wine; which bread when it is broken, and the wine when it is drunken, put me in remembrance how that for my sins the body of Christ was broken, and his blood shed on the cross.
Ode To Wine
Day-colored wine,
night-colored wine,
wine with purple feet
or wine with topaz blood,
wine,
starry child
of earth,
wine, smooth
as a golden sword,
soft
as lascivious velvet,
wine, spiral-seashelled
and full of wonder,
amorous,
marine;
never has one goblet contained you,
one song, one man,
you are choral, gregarious,
at the least, you must be shared.
At times
you feed on mortal
memories;
your wave carries us
from tomb to tomb,
stonecutter of icy sepulchers,
and we weep
transitory tears;
your
glorious
spring dress
is different,
blood rises through the shoots,
wind incites the day,
nothing is left
of your immutable soul.
Wine
stirs the spring, happiness
bursts through the earth like a plant,
walls crumble,
and rocky cliffs,
chasms close,
as song is born.
A jug of wine, and thou beside me
in the wilderness,
sang the ancient poet.
Let the wine pitcher
add to the kiss of love its own.
My darling, suddenly
the line of your hip
becomes the brimming curve
of the wine goblet,
your breast is the grape cluster,
your nipples are the grapes,
the gleam of spirits lights your hair,
and your navel is a chaste seal
stamped on the vessel of your belly,
your love an inexhaustible
cascade of wine,
light that illuminates my senses,
the earthly splendor of life.
But you are more than love,
the fiery kiss,
the heat of fire,
more than the wine of life;
you are
the community of man,
translucency,
chorus of discipline,
abundance of flowers.
I like on the table,
when we're speaking,
the light of a bottle
of intelligent wine.
Drink it,
and remember in every
drop of gold,
in every topaz glass,
in every purple ladle,
that autumn labored
to fill the vessel with wine;
and in the ritual of his office,
let the simple man remember
to think of the soil and of his duty,
to propagate the canticle of the wine.
poem by Pablo Neruda
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The Guardian and BloodRose
BloodRose,
Rose of my love,
My love for Dark moon,
Dark as my heart,
Black as my soul,
And gave me my rose.
The rose of blood,
With petals soft and black,
Never as a rose so beautiful,
Grown not in light,
But under a dark moon lit sky.
Guardian,
Yes a guardian of BloodRose,
With teeth long and sharp,
Claws hard as diamonds,
Scales as dark as night.
My dear sweet guardian,
Guardian black as my heart,
Fire in your eyes,
Shadows in your soul,
A dragon of the dark moon.
A single rose,
With petals so fare,
As dark as my heart,
I now hold in my hand,
The rose of blood.
You are my darkness,
Fear of this love,
This love for you,
Love for darkness,
The cold shadows in my heart
That makes me yearn for you.
Now as you lay dying,
I hold a single rose,
The rose you gave me,
And as I hold it tight,
The thorns slice my hand,
Covered with blood,
My blood.
I have one fear,
The fear of death,
Symbol of my lost love,
Rose as dark as me,
Laying in a pool of blood,
Blood from me.
As I lay dying,
I remember my name,
BloodRose,
I am the rose of blood,
And I died of my own creation.
A creation of perfect beauty,
Petals dark black,
Thorns like small daggers,
Grown from my love,
My love for a dragon,
A dragon as dark as my heart.
Even in my death,
I think of you,
And the rose you gave me,
The rose that killed me,
The Rose of Blood.
poem by Nicolette Gonzalez
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Dark As A Dungeon
Come and listen you fellows
So young and do fine
And seek not your fortune
In the dark, dreary mines
It will form as a habit
Seep in your soul
til the blood in your veins
Runs as black as the coal
Theres many a man
That Ive known in my day
Who lived just to labor
His whole life away
Like a fiend with his dope
And a drunkard his wine
A man will have lust for
The lure of the mine
Its dark as a dungeon
Damp as the dew
The danger is double
And the pleasures are few
Where the rain never falls
Where the sun never shines
Its dark as a dungeon
Way down in the mine
I hope when Im gone
And the ages shall roll
My body will blacken
And turn into coal
Then Ill look out the door
Of my heavenly home
And Ill pity the miners
A-diggin my bones
Its dark as a dungeon
Damp as the dew
The danger is double
And the pleasures are few
Where the rain never falls
Where the sun never shines
Its dark as a dungeon
Way down in the mine
Where the rain never falls
Where the sun never shines
Its dark as a dungeon
Way down in the mine
song performed by by Dolly Parton
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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The Host Of The Air
O'DRISCOLL drove with a song
The wild duck and the drake
From the tall and the tufted reeds
Of the drear Hart Lake.
And he saw how the reeds grew dark
At the coming of night-tide,
And dreamed of the long dim hair
Of Bridget his bride.
He heard while he sang and dreamed
A piper piping away,
And never was piping so sad,
And never was piping so gay.
And he saw young men and young girls
Who danced on a level place,
And Bridget his bride among them,
With a sad and a gay face.
The dancers crowded about him
And many a sweet thing said,
And a young man brought him red wine
And a young girl white bread.
But Bridget drew him by the sleeve
Away from the merry bands,
To old men playing at cards
With a twinkling of ancient hands.
The bread and the wine had a doom,
For these were the host of the air;
He sat and played in a dream
Of her long dim hair.
He played with the merry old men
And thought not of evil chance,
Until one bore Bridget his bride
Away from the merry dance.
He bore her away in his atms,
The handsomest young man there,
And his neck and his breast and his arms
Were drowned in her long dim hair.
O'Driscoll scattered the cards
And out of his dream awoke:
Old men and young men and young girls
Were gone like a drifting smoke;
But he heard high up in the air
A piper piping away,
And never was piping so sad,
And never was piping so gay.
poem by William Butler Yeats
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An Image From A Past Life
He. Never until this night have I been stirred.
The elaborate starlight throws a reflection
On the dark stream,
Till all the eddies gleam;
And thereupon there comes that scream
From terrified, invisible beast or bird:
Image of poignant recollection.
She. An image of my heart that is smitten through
Out of all likelihood, or reason,
And when at last,
Youth's bitterness being past,
I had thought that all my days were cast
Amid most lovely places; smitten as though
It had not learned its lesson.
He. Why have you laid your hands upon my eyes?
What can have suddenly alarmed you
Whereon 'twere best
My eyes should never rest?
What is there but the slowly fading west,
The river imaging the flashing skies,
All that to this moment charmed you?
She. A Sweetheart from another life floats there
As though she had been forced to linger
From vague distress
Or arrogant loveliness,
Merely to loosen out a tress
Among the starry eddies of her hair
Upon the paleness of a finger.
He. But why should you grow suddenly afraid
And start -- I at your shoulder --
Imagining
That any night could bring
An image up, or anything
Even to eyes that beauty had driven mad,
But images to make me fonder?
She. Now She has thrown her arms above her head;
Whether she threw them up to flout me,
Or but to find,
Now that no fingers bind,
That her hair streams upon the wind,
I do not know, that know I am afraid
Of the hovering thing night brought me.
poem by William Butler Yeats
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The House Of Dust: Part 03: 02: The Screen Maiden
You read—what is it, then that you are reading?
What music moves so silently in your mind?
Your bright hand turns the page.
I watch you from my window, unsuspected:
You move in an alien land, a silent age . . .
. . . The poet—what was his name—? Tokkei—Tokkei—
The poet walked alone in a cold late rain,
And thought his grief was like the crying of sea-birds;
For his lover was dead, he never would love again.
Rain in the dreams of the mind—rain forever—
Rain in the sky of the heart—rain in the willows—
But then he saw this face, this face like flame,
This quiet lady, this portrait by Hiroshigi;
And took it home with him; and with it came
What unexpected changes, subtle as weather!
The dark room, cold as rain,
Grew faintly fragrant, stirred with a stir of April,
Warmed its corners with light again,
And smoke of incense whirled about this portrait,
And the quiet lady there,
So young, so quietly smiling, with calm hands,
Seemed ready to loose her hair,
And smile, and lean from the picture, or say one word,
The word already clear,
Which seemed to rise like light between her eyelids . .
He held his breath to hear,
And smiled for shame, and drank a cup of wine,
And held a candle, and searched her face
Through all the little shadows, to see what secret
Might give so warm a grace . . .
Was it the quiet mouth, restrained a little?
The eyes, half-turned aside?
The jade ring on her wrist, still almost swinging? . . .
The secret was denied,
He chose his favorite pen and drew these verses,
And slept; and as he slept
A dream came into his heart, his lover entered,
And chided him, and wept.
And in the morning, waking, he remembered,
And thought the dream was strange.
Why did his darkened lover rise from the garden?
He turned, and felt a change,
As if a someone hidden smiled and watched him . . .
Yet there was only sunlight there.
Until he saw those young eyes, quietly smiling,
And held his breath to stare,
And could have sworn her cheek had turned—a little . . .
Had slightly turned away . . .
Sunlight dozed on the floor . . . He sat and wondered,
Nor left his room that day.
And that day, and for many days thereafter,
He sat alone, and thought
No lady had ever lived so beautiful
As Hiroshigi wrought . . .
Or if she lived, no matter in what country,
By what far river or hill or lonely sea,
He would look in every face until he found her . . .
There was no other as fair as she.
And before her quiet face he burned soft incense,
And brought her every day
Boughs of the peach, or almond, or snow-white cherry,
And somehow, she seemed to say,
That silent lady, young, and quietly smiling,
That she was happy there;
And sometimes, seeing this, he started to tremble,
And desired to touch her hair,
To lay his palm along her hand, touch faintly
With delicate finger-tips
The ghostly smile that seemed to hover and vanish
Upon her lips . . .
Until he knew he loved this quiet lady;
And night by night a dread
Leered at his dreams, for he knew that Hiroshigi
Was many centuries dead,—
And the lady, too, was dead, and all who knew her . .
Dead, and long turned to dust . . .
The thin moon waxed and waned, and left him paler,
The peach leaves flew in a gust,
And he would surely have died; but there one day
A wise man, white with age,
Stared at the portrait, and said, 'This Hiroshigi
Knew more than archimage,—
Cunningly drew the body, and called the spirit,
Till partly it entered there . . .
Sometimes, at death, it entered the portrait wholly . .
Do all I say with care,
And she you love may come to you when you call her . . . '
So then this ghost, Tokkei,
Ran in the sun, bought wine of a hundred merchants,
And alone at the end of day
Entered the darkening room, and faced the portrait,
And saw the quiet eyes
Gleaming and young in the dusk, and held the wine-cup,
And knelt, and did not rise,
And said, aloud, 'Lo-san, will you drink this wine?'
Said it three times aloud.
And at the third the faint blue smoke of incense
Rose to the walls in a cloud,
And the lips moved faintly, and the eyes, and the calm hands stirred;
And suddenly, with a sigh,
The quiet lady came slowly down from the portrait,
And stood, while worlds went by,
And lifted her young white hands and took the wine cup;
And the poet trembled, and said,
'Lo-san, will you stay forever?'—'Yes, I will stay.'—
'But what when I am dead?'
'When you are dead your spirit will find my spirit,
And then we shall die no more.'
Music came down upon them, and spring returning,
They remembered worlds before,
And years went over the earth, and over the sea,
And lovers were born and spoke and died,
But forever in sunlight went these two immortal,
Tokkei and the quiet bride . . .
poem by Conrad Potter Aiken
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Die Romantic
You Look Fabulous In Your Dark Dress Tongiht
Your Black Lipstick Calling Me To You Like A Magic Spell
The Only Thing That You Disliked Is The Light
Tonight We'll Meet Our Master Satan and Reign In Hell
I Walk Up To You My Black Hair Covering My Dark Eyes
I'm Dressed In A Blood Staind Tuxedo
I've Already Put On My Black Eyeliner I'm Also Wearing My Red Tie
Where Not Fit For This Life Of Secrets and Incognito
We'll Drown This Poison With Cheap Wine
We'll Drink It From Our Cups Devine
Tonight We'll Die Romantic
Plus For This Murder Scene Where Fanatics
We'll Put The Poison On Our Lips and Kiss It Off
Soon The Nightmare People Call Life Will Be Over For Us
It'll First Start Off As Just A Light Cough
This Will Be A Slow Painful Death We'll Enjoy It This Won't Be Rushed
We Finish The Battle Of Wine and Open Another One
All We Can Do Now Is Wait and Laugh About Are Soon To Be Bodies
Normally People Would Be Scared Of This Outcome Where Just Having Fun
Look At Us Enjoying Our Last Few Hours We're Being So Haughty
We'll Drown This Poison With Cheap Wine
We'll Drink It From Our Cups Devine
Tonight We'll Die Romantic
Plus For This Murder Scene Where Fanatics
We See The Sun Coming Up As We Began To Laugh At Each Other
This Will Be The Last Sunrise We'll Ever Get To See
Our Lips Now Covered In Blood Soon I'll Cease To Be The Big Brother
Now That It's Almost Time I Propose To You On One Knee
We'll Be Dead Lovers You Laugh and Say Yes
With Our Last Dying Breath We Give Each Other A Kiss
Soon We'll Be Six Feet Under Laid To Rest
It Happend Just How It Should've Just Like This
We'll Drown This Poison With Cheap Wine
We'll Drink It From Our Cups Devine
Tonight We'll Die Romantic
Plus For This Murder Scene Where Fanatics
poem by Patrick Shields
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The Great Sorrow
Voice of a great wind, of wild ocean surges,
Storming the gates of Heaven,
The people of God singing under the scourges
Wherewith they are healed and shriven.
This is no sound, no wail of lamentation
Such as of old was heard
When Rachael cried to Heaven her desolation
Until all Heaven was stirred.
The people sing, crushed in the wine-press ruddy,
Broken but not dismayed,
The triumph-song of the soul over the body
Heaven-lifted, angel-stayed.
The white sorrow homes to the heavenly portal.
This grief, this grief has wings --
Blood on her breast, but through the groves immortal
Her song of triumph rings.
poem by Katharine Tynan
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Fall In Love With Me
Pop/bowie/sales/sales
You look so good to me
Here in this old saloon
Way back in west berlin
A bottle of white wine
White wine and you
A table made of wood
And how I wish you would
Fall in love with me
You look so good to me
Standing out in the street
With your cheap fur on
Or maybe your plastic raincoat
And your plastic shoes
They look good too
Standing in the snow
Youre younger than you look
Fall in love with me
Fall in love with me
How I wish you would
A table made of wood
And a bottle of white wine
And you-and a bottle of
White wine and you
And when youre standing
In the street and its cold
And it snows on you
And you look younger
Than you really are
I wish you would
Fall in love with me
I wish you would
Fall in love with me
I wish you would
Fall in love with me
I wish you would
Fall in love with me
Yeah
The way your eyes are black
The way your hair is black
The way your heart is young
Theres just a few like you
Just the kind I need
To fall in love with me
Oh and you look so good
Yes you look so good
A bottle of white wine
A cigarette and you
Here in this saloon
White wine and you
I wish youd fall in love with me
I wish youd fall in love with me
cause theres
Just a few like you
So young and real
Theres just a few like you
So young and real
Fall in love with me
Fall in love with me
Fall in love with me
Fall in love with me
I wish you would
You look so good
When youre young at heart
Theres just a few like you
Youre young at heart
Wont you
Come to this old saloon
Come to my waiting arms
A table made of wood
And I will look at you
cause youre so young and pure
And youre young at heart
Youre young at heart
A bottle of white wine
And when youre tumbling down
You just look better
When youre tumbling down
You just look finer
song performed by by Iggy Pop
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Thèlus Wood
I came by night to Thèlus wood,
And though in dark and desperate places
Stubborned with wire and brown with blood
Undaunted April crept and sewed
Her violets in dead men's faces,
And in a soft and snowy shroud
Drew the scarred fields with gentle stitch;
Though in the valley where the ditch
Was hoarse with nettles, blind with mud,
She stroked the golden-headed bud,
And loosed the fern, she dared not here
To touch nor tend this murdered thing;
The wind went wide of it, the year
Upon this breast stopped short of Spring:
Beauty turned back from Thèlus Wood.
From broken brows the dim eyes stared,
Blistered and maimed the wide stumps grinned
From the black mouth of Thèlus bared
In laughter at some monstrous jest.
No creature moved there, weed nor wind.
Huge arms, half-torn from savage breast,
Hung wide, and tangled limbs and faces
Lay, as if giants blind and stark
With violent, with perverse embraces
Groped for each other in the dark.
A moaning rose — not of the wind,
— There was no wind, but hollowly
From its dim bed of mud each tree
Gave forth a sound, till trees and mud
Seemed but a single, sighing mouth,
A wound that spoke with lips uncouth,
And cried to me from Thèlus Wood.
I heard one tree say: 'This was I
Who drew great clouds across the sky
To weep against me.' This one said:
'I made a gloom where love might lie
All day and dream it night, a bed
Secret and soft, the birds' song had
A twilight sound the whole day there.'
One said: 'Last night I shook my hair
Before the mirror of the moon.'
'I saw a corpse to-day,' said one
'That was but buried yester-year.'
And one, the smallest, sweetest thing —
A fair child-tree made never stir,
Dead before God had tended her
In the green nurseries of Spring.
She lay, the loveliest, loneliest,
Among the old and ruined trees,
And at each small and broken wrist
The white flowers grew like bandages.
Then from the ruined churchyard where
Old vaults and graves lay turned and tossed
And earth from earth was shaken bare,
Came murmurings of a tongueless host
That to each ghastly brother said:
'Who raised us from our sleep? Is this
The resurrection of the dead?
Upon our bodies no flesh grows,
No bright blood through our temples springs,
No glory spreads, no trumpet blows,
The air is not white and blind with wings.
And yet dragged up before us lie
The woods of Thèlus at our feet,
And strange hills sentinel the sky,
And where the road went yawns a pit.
The world is finished: let us sleep.
God has forgotten: we shall keep
Here a sweet, safe Eternity.
There is no other end than this,
And this is death, and that is peace.'
But even as they ceased the stones
Were loosed, the earth shook where I stood,
And from far off the crouching guns
Swung slowly round on Thèlus Wood.
poem by Muriel Stuart
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