On the Road to Chorrera
Three horsemen galloped the dusty way
While sun and moon were both in the sky;
An old crone crouched in the cactus' shade,
And craved an alms as they rode by.
A friendless hag she seemed to be,
But the queen of a bandit crew was she.
One horseman tossed her a scanty dole,
A scoffing couplet the second trolled;
But the third, from his blue eyes frank and free,
No glance vouchsafed the beldam old;
As toward the sunset and the sea,
No evil fearing, rode the three.
A curse she gave for the pittance small,
A gibe for the couplet 's ribald word;
But that which once had been her heart
At sight of the silent horseman stirred:
And safe through the ambushed band they speed
For the sake of the rider who would not heed!
poem by Arlo Bates
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
Related quotes
A Vision of Youth
A horseman on a hilltop green
Drew rein, and wound his horn;
So bright he looked he might have been
The Herald of the Morn.
His steed was of the sovran strain
In Fancy’s meadows bred—
And pride was in his tossing mane,
And triumph in his tread.
The rider’s eyes like jewels glowed—
The World was in his hand—
As down the woodland way he rode
When Spring was in the land.
From golden hour to golden hour
For him the woodland sang.
And from the heart of every flower
A singing fairy sprang.
He rode along with rein so free,
And, as he rode, the Blue
Mysterious Bird of Fantasy
Ever before him flew.
He rode by cot and castle dim
Through all the greenland gay;
Bright eyes through casements glanced at him:
He laughed—and rode away.
The world with sunshine was aflood,
And glad were maid and man,
And through his throbbing veins the blood
In keen, sweet shudders ran.
His steed tossed head with fiery scorn,
And stamped, and snuffed the air—
As though he heard a sudden horn
Of far-off battle blare.
Erect the rider sat awhile
With flashing eyes, and then
Turned slowly, sighing, with a smile,
“0 weary world of men!”
For aye the Bird of Fantasy
Sang magic songs to him,
And deeper and deeper still rode he
Into the Forest Dim.
That rider with his face aglow
With joy of life I see
In dreams. Ah, years and years ago
He parted ways with me!
Yet, sometimes, when the days are drear
And all the world forlorn,
From out the dim wood’s heart I hear
The echo of his horn.
poem by Victor James Daley
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
Green Couplets 02 Touchy Composition
Between two cotyledons— plant grows with a bud!
With two lines— couplets come into flower with an idea.
Sometimes, two lines may be more powerful than two hundred lines.
Small verses like couplets are really beautiful.
They speak and touch with peace— as Poems for Life.
Couplet— I
Watering rain on the leaves
Orchid plant mutely sleeps
Couplet— II
Under the pillow raining night
Memory coins may or might!
Couplet— III
All green buds grows yellow
Plant or animal must follow!
Couplet— IV
Shooting stars proclaimed that
No one ever will be mate…
Couplet— V
How the moon came into being
The way fishes sleep and sing
Ashraful Musaddeq
poem by Ashraful Musaddeq
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
Green Couplets 01 Lucid Cute Verse
The word ‘couplet' derives from the word ‘couple'— means one pair of anything. A couplet is the shortest and simplest form or type of poetry with a certain idea. It generally consists of single stanza of two lines of rhyming poetry that usually has the same meter. There is no hard and fast rule about length or rhythm.
As the shortest form of poetry couplets are green and attractive those proclaim Poems for Life.
Couplet— I
Orchid flower on the pot
Rainy summer not so hot
Couplet— II
Online romance chat is the key
Late night knows the honey-bee
Couplet— III
Moonbeam dropping dazzling night
Knocking the doors memories right.
Couplet— IV
Filipino cat in the dream
Crossing Ocean alone swims!
Couplet— V
Two leaves and a bud green leaf tea
Exploiting labors can we see?
Ashraful Musaddeq
poem by Ashraful Musaddeq
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
Different Sunset.
Kempton was one of your
Best friends at school he
Was a year older than you
And having had polio it left
Him with a limp and when
He ran it seemed as if he was
Riding an imaginary horse
And to keep up with him
You had to ride one too.
Your horse was brown
And ordinary but his was
White like the one the Lone
Ranger rode and when you
Both came out of the movies
You rode off into the sunset
Together you trying to keep
Up with him as he rode ahead.
You envied his small collection
Of knives. His father brought
Them back from the WW2 taken
From dead Germans and they
Were laid out in his bedroom
Like a small treasure trove big
And small ones and your eyes
Ran over them bound down
With an inner envy. All you had
Was a small penknife which you
Bought out of pocket money
You’d earned running errands
And kept in the loop of your jeans
Where the belt went through.
Kempton rode off into another
Bright sunset from you in 1961.
You think of him now and then
Riding into a different sunset
A young boy amongst old men.
poem by Terry Collett
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
The Traveller
As I rode in to Burrumbeet,
I met a man with funny feet;
And, when I paused to ask him why
His feet were strange, he rolled his eye
And said the rain would spoil the wheat;
So I rode on to Burrumbeet.
As I rode in to Beetaloo,
I met a man whose nose was blue;
And when I asked him how he got
A nose like that, he answered, "What
Do bullocks mean when they say 'Moo'?"
So I rode on to Beetaloo.
As I rode in to Ballarat,
I met a man who wore no hat;
And, when I said he might take cold,
He cried, "The hills are quite as old
As yonder plains, but not so flat."
So I rode on to Ballarat.
As I rode in to Gundagai,
I met a man and passed him by
Without a nod, without a word.
He turned, and said he'd never heard
Or seen a man so wise as I.
But I rode on to Gundagai.
As I rode homeward, full of doubt,
I met a stranger riding out:
A foolish man he seemed to me;
But, "Nay, I am yourself," said he,
"Just as you were when you rode out."
So I rode homeward, free of doubt.
poem by Clarence Michael James Stanislaus Dennis
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
A White Horse Of The Most Magical Kind
She rode a white horse,
rode it for sanity;
galloped and cantered
with rhythmic consistency,
walked for a while
along glistening streams
and trotted through dark woods
with the darkest of dreams.
Bridled with a need to express
she rode east and rode west,
never stopping or ceasing her quest,
until she reached
the most beautiful shore,
of a beach of white sand
with a moon in the sky
that reached with its moonlight
into her heart, that had cried.
She dismounted the horse
and danced on the sands
with stars in her eyes;
pure love in her hands.
She looked at her horse
praised it and said
'a horse such as you
is a magical find
a horse that's named poetry
is the most wonderful kind.'
poem by David Taylor
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
~! ! ~! ! ~! ! ~! ! ~! My City
Night rode pillion* in city
Where neighbours meet;
Only in seminars
Night rode pillion in city
Where mortar of fear
Hold bricks together
Night rode pillion in city
Where only sex can be
Legally traded for hunger
Night rode pillion in city
Whose beaches have to answer?
For their wet look
Night rode pillion in city
Where green n white hangs in shame
Rest brazenly flutter
Night rode pillion
Holy are the whores and
righteous are hounded
Night rode pillion in city
Where pillion riding is banned
Night rode pillion in city
Where I mooched sex
From my wife dressed in outage
Night rode pillion in city
Which gulped my love
Without a burp
Night rode pillion in city
Where mothers are kept collateral
To buy some text msgs and gas:
So that night may clandestinely
Ride pillion
* On of the commonest of Karachi’s sight and sounds is a motorbike. It would invariably have a young rider with his friend pillion riding. Pillion riding is a source of entertainment for majority of youth who prowl the city street overnight on their two-wheeler be it a religious, cultural or national occasion or an electrical outage. It is a most usual vehicle for street crimes like drive by shooting, cell phone/car snatching etc. Wrote this during outage when some thousand miles away someone’s “ceiling swam in shadows black when seen through hollow moisture laden eyes.
poem by Frank Lisa IndiRa Francesca Roger Platt Cornish Ma
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
The Brook
Seated once by a brook, watching a child
Chiefly that paddled, I was thus beguiled.
Mellow the blackbird sang and sharp the thrush
Not far off in oak and hazel brush,
Unseen. There was a scent like honeycomb
From mugwort dull. And down upon the dome
Of the stone the cart-horse kicks against so oft
A butterfly alighted. From aloft
He took the heat of the sun, and from below.
On the hot stone he perched contented so,
As if never a cart would pass again
That way; as if I were the last of men
And he the first of insects to have earth
And sun together and to know their worth.
I was divided between him and the gleam,
The motion, and the voices, of the stream,
The waters running frizzled over gravel,
That never vanish and for ever travel.
A grey flycatcher silent on a fence
And I sat as if we had been there since
The horseman and the horse lying beneath
The fir-tree-covered barrow on the heath,
The horseman and the horse with silver shoes,
Galloped the downs last. All that I could lose
I lost. And then the child's voice raised the dead.
'No one's been here before' was what she said
And what I felt, yet never should have found
A word for, while I gathered sight and sound.
poem by Edward Thomas
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
The Bush Rangers
Four horseman rode out from the heart of the range,
Four horseman with aspects forbidding and strange.
They were booted and spurred, they were armed to the teeth,
And they frowned as they looked at the valley beneath,
As forward they rode through the rocks and the fern -
Ned Kelly, Dan Kelly, Steve Hart and Joe Byrne.
Ned Kelly drew rein and he shaded his eyes -
'The town's at our mercy! See yonder it lies!
To hell with the troopers!' - he shook his clenched fist -
'We will shoot them like dogs if they dare to resist!'
And all of them nodded, grim-visaged and stern -
Ned Kelly, Dan Kelly, Steve Hart and Joe Byrne.
Through the gullies and creeks they rode silently down;
They stuck-up the station and raided the town;
They opened the safe and they looted the bank;
They laughed and were merry, they ate and they drank.
Then off to the ranges they went with their gold -
Oh! never were bandits more reckless and bold.
But time brings its punishment, time travels fast -
And the outlaws were trapped in Glenrowan at last,
Where three of them died in the smoke and the flame,
And Ned Kelly came back - to the last he was game.
But the Law shot him down (he was fated to hang),
And that was the end of the bushranging gang.
Whatever their faults and whatever their crimes,
Their deeds lend romance to those faraway times.
They have gone from the gullies they haunted of old,
And nobody knows where they buried their gold.
To the ranges they loved they will never return -
Ned Kelly, Dan Kelly, Steve Hart and Joe Byrne.
But at times when I pass through that sleepy old town
Where the far-distant peaks of Strathbogie look down
I think of the days when those grim ranges rang
To the galloping hooves of the bushranging gang.
Though the years bring oblivion, time brings a change,
The ghosts of the Kellys still ride from the range.
poem by Edward Harrington
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
My Wild Love
My wild love went ridin
She rode all the day
She wrote to the devil
And asked him to pay
The devil was wiser
Its time to repent
He asked her to give back
The money she spent
My wild love went ridin
She rode to the sea
She gathered together
Some shells for her head
She rode and she rode on
She rode for a while
Then stopped for an evenin
And lay her head down
She rode on to christmas
She rode to the farm
She rode to japan
And re-entered a town
By this time the weather
Had changed one degree
She asked for the people
To let her go free
My wild love is crazy
She screams like a bird
She moans like a cat
When she wants to be heard
My wild love went ridin
She rode for an hour
She stopped and she rested
And then she rode on
Ride, cmon
song performed by by Doors
Submitted by Lucian Velea
Vote! | Copy!
Ballade Of The Headless Man
(after A.G. Visser)
On a distant road through some hillocks
a young Boer greets his pretty wife
and the robust man
holds her against him for a moment.
Choir:
In the sky there’s a moon
hanging sickle,
when I pass the bottom of a cliff
where I notice a man on his horse biting at its bridle.
Later when the weather gets cloudy
and bolts of blue lightning fall like shots about me
something happens that can take away a brave man’s courage
before the first drops of rain come down like gunshots.
When the hoofs of a horse thunder past
while a church bell rings of midnight in the distance
and nobody still walks around in the streets,
when the doors of most of the houses are locked,
there’s something unearthly
that stands straight up in the stirrups.
Just a glace when another thunderbolt crashes down
is so frightening that I almost loose my faith
when I look at the horse and its rider
and that thunder crashes sinister
while a headless man leans forward
as he passes at a hell of a speed
while he fires his rifle that his fingers is clinging onto
and at a old dilapidated ruin near to me
there’s a women in white spectre form
whose shrill voice cuts through the night,
screaming at the passing horseman:
“Can nothing stop you? Jan van der Meer? ”
[References: “Die ruiter van Skimmelperdpan” (The horseman of Skimmelperdpan by A.G. Visser and “At a pan at night” by Gert Strydom. This poem is based on a myth of a horseman that had been decapitated by canon fire during the second Anglo-Boer war.]
poem by Gert Strydom
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
Fairy Tale
Once, in times forgotten,
In a fairy place,
Through the steppe, a rider
Made his way apace.
While he sped to battle,
Nearing from the dim
Distance, a dark forest
Rose ahead of him.
Something kept repeating,
Seemed his heart to graze:
Tighten up the saddle,
Fear the watering-place.
But he did not listen.
Heeding but his will,
At full speed he bounded
Up the wooded hill;
Rode into a valley,
Turning from the mound,
Galloped through a meadow,
Skirted higher ground;
Reached a gloomy hollow,
Found a trail to trace
Down the woodland pathway
To the watering-place.
Deaf to voice of warning,
And without remorse,
Down the slope, the rider
Led his thirsty horse.
____
Where the stream grew shallow,
Winding through the glen,
Eerie flames lit up the
Entrance to a den.
Through thick clouds of crimson
Smoke above the spring,
An uncanny calling
Made the forest ring.
And the rider started,
And with peering eye
Urged his horse in answer
To the haunting cry.
Then he saw the dragon,
And he gripped his lance;
And his horse stood breathless
Fearing to advance.
Thrice around a maiden
Was the serpent wound;
Fire-breathing nostrils
Cast a glare around.
And the dragon's body
Moved his scaly neck,
At her shoulder snaking
Whiplike forth and back.
By that country's custom
Was a young and fair
Captive brought as ransom
To the dragon's lair.
This then was the tribute
That the people owed
To the worm-protection
For a poor abode.
Now the dragon hugged his
Victim in alarm,
And the coils grew tighter
Round her throat and arm.
Skyward looked the horseman
With imploring glance,
And for the impending
Fight he couched his lance.
____
Tightly closing eyelids.
Heights and cloudy spheres.
Rivers. Waters. Boulders.
Centuries and years.
Helmetless, the wounded
Lies, his life at stake.
With his hooves the charger
Tramples down the snake.
On the sand, together-
Dragon, steed, and lance;
In a swoon the rider,
The maiden-in a trance.
Blue the sky; soft breezes
Tender noon caress.
Who is she? A lady?
Peasant girl? Princess?
Now in joyous wonder
Cannot cease to weep;
Now again abandoned
To unending sleep.
Now, his strength returning,
Opens up his eyes;
Now anew the wounded
Limp and listless lies.
But their hearts are beating.
Waves surge up, die down;
Carry them, and waken,
And in slumber drown.
Tightly closing eyelids.
Heights and cloudy spheres.
Rivers. Waters. Boulders.
Centuries and years.
poem by Boris Pasternak
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
After the Hunt
Underneath the windy mountain walls
Forth we rode, an eager band,
By the surges and the verges and the gorges,
Till the night was on the land—
On the hazy, mazy land!
Far away the bounding prey
Leapt across the ruts and logs,
But we galloped, galloped, galloped on,
Till we heard the yapping of the dogs—
The yapping and the yelping of the dogs.
Oh, it was a madly merry day
We shall not so soon forget,
And the edges and the ledges and the ridges
Haunt us with their echoes yet—
Echoes, echoes, echoes yet!
While the moon is on the hill
Gleaming through the streaming fogs,
Don’t you hear the yapping of the dogs—
The yapping and the yelping of the dogs?
poem by Henry Kendall
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
Morgan
When Morgan crossed the Murray to Peechelba and doom
A sombre silent shadow rode with him through the gloom.
The wild things of the forest slunk from the outlaw's track,
The boobook croaked a warning, "Go back, go back, go back!"
It woke no answering echo in Morgan's blackened soul,
As onward through the darkness he rode towards his goal.
An evil man was Morgan, a price was on his head;
The simple bush-folk whispered his very name with dread;
Before the fierce Dan Morgan the bravest man might quake-
A cold and callous killer, he killed for killing's sake. .
Past swamp and creek and gully, and settler's lone abode,
Towards the station homestead the grim Dan Morgan rode.
And still that hooded horseman that Morgan could not see,
Watched by the wild bush-creatures, rode close beside his knee.
Before them in a clearing a drover's campfire burned:
The phantom rode with Morgan, and turned when Morgan turned.
And loud the boobook's warning came on the cold night air,
"Go back, go back, Dan Morgan. Beware, beware, beware!"
He reached the station homestead, into the hall he strode,
And on his evil features, the flickering lamplight glowed.
"Into one room!" he thundered. Bring me a glass of grog!
If any disobey me I'll shoot him like a dog!"
With pistols cocked and ready, dark-eyed and beetle-browed-
Before the famous outlaw the bravest hearts were cowed.
All night with loaded pistols he dozed and muttered there,
All night the evil shadow stood close behind his chair.
The brave Scotch girl McDonald, a lass who knew no fear,
Slipped out unseen by Morgan to warn the homesteads near.
And in the hours of darkness, before the break of dawn,
Around the fierce Dan Morgan the fatal net was drawn.
Day broke upon the Murray, the morning mists were gone,
The magpies sang their matins, the river murmured on.
When Morgan left the homestead and neared the stockyard gate
He heard the boobooks warning, and turned but turned to late -
For Quinlan pressed the trigger as Morgan swung around,
And sent the grim bushranger blaspheming to the ground.
So fell the dread Dan Morgan in Eighteen sixty-five,
In death as much unpitied as hated when alive.
He lived by blood and plunder, an outlaw to the end;
In life he showed no mercy, in death he left no friend.
And all who seek to follow in Morgan's evil track
Should heed the boobook's warning: "Go back, go back, go back!"
poem by Edward Harrington
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
Australia's Vision
ALL still! and, high above, the sun
In cloudless, golden reign —
A mirage in the quivering west —
A horseman on the plain!
Silent, with hand above his eyes,
With thoughts undreamed, unguessed,
Like some bronze shape immovable,
He gazes down the west.
High overhead an eagle soars
On proud, wide-spreading wings;
Crouching, they watch with stricken eyes —
The furred and feathered things.
No song, no sound! but arching skies
With not a cloud to mar;
O horseman, gazing down the west,
What seest thou afar?
Is you a mirage dream, indeed,
Heat-born, shape-thronged, sublime?
Or but a mirror of the things
That thou shalt know in time?
What comes and goes in yonder haze?
What moving things are these?
Are they the masts of battleships,
Or are they phantom trees?
Speak thou, whose eyes are eagle-keen,
Nor dimmed with old regrets;
Are yonder shapes but spectral reeds,
Or are they bayonets?
Look well into the Vision's heart,
O horseman on the plain!
Trust nought except thine own true eyes —
For thine the loss or gain.
poem by Roderic Quinn
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
Red BMX Bicycle
There was a small boy
In the countryside
Who had a small red BMX bicycle
Kept in the store besides the herbicides
Every evening like a cycle
He would ride down the dusty road
The sun a yellow ball
on the west side
Glittering under the sun`s rays
Was that small
RED BMX BICYCLE
There was a smaller boy
In the countryside
Who had nothing…
Totally nothing
He was a friend to the small boy
Every evening like a cycle
He would wait by the dusty road
To have a chance
On the small red BMX bicycle
His face would be all smiles
Even after falling off that
RED BMX BICYCLE
One day at dusk
The smaller boy
Stood next to the small boy
And asked
“When you grow up, would you give me this bike? ”
The small boy without thinking
Said YES..
There was a smaller boy
In the countryside
One night
He had a bad stomach ache
His mum wiping the tiny streams of tears
That fell from his small face
That was pale…
Due to dust from the dusty road
As he played with his the small boy
And rode on that
RED BMX BICYCLE
There was a small boy
In the countryside…
Now HE is all grown
And in the university
Far away in the city
That RED BMX BICYCLE
Now long gone
Given to some relative, I guess
If I could go back
To those days…
Those days with beautiful sunsets
Back in the countryside
Waiting for my chance
On my red BMX bicycle
Watching that smaller boy fall off
I would give him…
I would hand him that bicycle
And never expect it back
And watch him ride
Towards the beautiful sunset
On my red BMX bicycle
But if I can go back
All will be in vain
Because on that night…in the dark
He struggled with pain
His small heart couldn`t keep on
Outside there was rain
The gods possibly wanted to cleanse
All the evil that night
That took him away
Now I reminisce
As I keep moving on
About that smaller boy
And our small
RED BMX BICYCLE…
poem by Paul Oguda
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
War's Want
War
Such a mad man
Staring after what he cannot have
A girl with black hair
But on Death's arm she is
War's heart fills with Envy
He wishes Death dead
But how?
War
The second Horseman
He wants what he cannot have
A girl who gives him glances
But ultimately
She is memorized
by the first Horseman Death
Lust..
War wishes he had what death has.
poem by Lovely No One
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
When I left home, I was going to ride around a little while and then go to my mom's. As I rode and rode and rode, I felt even more anxiety coming upon me about not wanting to live.
quote by Susan Smith
Submitted by Lucian Velea
Vote! | Copy!
The Night Ride
The red sun on the lonely lands
Gazed, under clouds of rose,
As one who under knitted hands
Takes one last look and goes.
Then Pain, with her white sister Fear,
Crept nearer to my bed:
"The sands are running; dost thou hear
Thy sobbing heart?" she said.
There came a rider to the gate,
And stern and clear spake he:
"For meat or drink thou must not wait,
But rise and ride with me."
I waited not for meat or drink,
Or kiss, or farewell kind --
But oh! my heart was sore to think
Of friends I left behind.
We rode o'er hills that seemed to sweep
Skyward like swelling waves;
The living stirred not in their sleep,
The dead slept in their graves.
And ever as we rode I heard
A moan of anguish sore --
No voice of man or beast or bird,
But all of these and more.
"Is it the moaning of the Earth?
Dark Rider, answer me!"
"It is the cry of life at birth"
He answered quietly:
"But thou canst turn a face of cheer
To good days still in store;
Thou needst not care for Pain or Fear --
They cannot harm thee more."
Yet I rode on with sullen heart,
And said with breaking breath,
"If thou art he I think thou art,
Then slay me now, O Death!"
The veil was from my eyesight drawn --
"Thou knowest now," said he:
"I am the Angel of the Dawn!
Ride back, and wait for me."
So I rode back at morning light,
And there, beside my bed,
Fear had become a lily white
And Pain a rose of red.
poem by Victor James Daley
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
A Horseman At Night
In the darkness without any clear moon
I suddenly hear the gallop, the thunder
of horse hooves and there far below
I see a black horseman passing by,
With some red sparks coming from the quarts rocks
as if it comes straight from revelation
or an ancient war, I am astounded,
struggle with some fear to go on my way,
maybe it is a wanderer from death
but with him I have nothing in common,
I see the rider hang over to me
and my need suddenly becomes great
but when the moon appears unexpected
there is nothing at the troubled old brook.
poem by Gert Strydom
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!