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The Internet Is Not Yet Full: A Brief Tale of Two Poems
In a brief moment of quiet this afternoon, I was browsing the poetry shelf in my home library today and noticed a book I did not know we owned: Sonnets of This Century, edited and arranged, with a critical introduction on the sonnet, by William Sharp. The little volume was published by Walter Scott of…
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Antony and Cleopatra
Antony and Cleopatra by William Haines Lytle, 1826–1863 I AM dying, Egypt, dying! Ebbs the crimson life-tide fast, And the dark Plutonian shadows Gather on the evening blast; Let thine arm, O Queen, enfold me, Hush thy sobs and bow thine ear, Listen to the great heart secrets Thou, and thou alone, must hear. Though…
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Autumnal
Autumnal by Ernest Dowson, from Verses, 1896 Pale amber sunlight falls across The reddening October trees, That hardly sway before a breeze As soft as summer: summer’s loss Seems little, dear! on days like these. Let misty autumn be our part! The twilight of the year is sweet: Where shadow and the darkness meet Our…
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Post title
Limerick (III) from Generic Literature by Steve White There once was an X from place B That satisfied predicate P He or she did thing A In an adjective way Resulting in circumstance C Maybe my brain is not functioning entirely properly, being three days from freedom, but I found this poem to be rather…
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Life, to be sure
Jon pointed me years ago to this nearly perfect poem by A.E. Houseman: by A.E. Houseman Here dead lie we because we did not choose To live and shame the land from which we sprung. Life, to be sure, is nothing much to lose; But young men think it is, and we were young. I…
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Kisses
Jenny Kissed Me by Leigh Hunt Jenny kissed me when we met, Jumping from the chair she sat in; Time, you thief, who love to get Sweets into your list, put that in. Say I’m weary, say I’m sad, Say that health and wealth have missed me; Say I’m growing old, but add— Jenny kissed…
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Lexicographic
I had the greatest lexicographic moment of my life when I looked up the word ‘cromlech’ after reading this poem. The Cromlech by Louis MacNeice From trivia of froth and pollen White tufts in the rabbit warren And every minute like a thicket Nicked and dropped, nicked and dropped, Extracters and abstracters ask What emerges,…
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Boredom
The other day, I decided to try my hand at composing a more modern piece of poetry, but the results were dismal: A Meta-Analysis of Free Verse in Free VerseorOde on Itself by Michael Hoke Imagine how beautiful this poem could have been had you but written it Yourself I was struck today, however, when…
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Things Being Various
Snow by Louis MacNeice The room was suddenly rich and the great bay-window was Spawning snow and pink roses against it Soundlessly collateral and incompatible: World is suddener than we fancy it. World is crazier and more of it than we think, Incorrigibly plural. I peel and portion A tangerine and spit the pips and…
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Though it is not Spring
I am a huge fan of MacNeice now. Read this poem out loud. He is a poet who has such a mastery over sounds that I often care very little about his themes – though they are nothing to sneeze at, either. (It is almost embarrasing to love a poem so much that has “sunshine”…