Birds and poetry (9 Viewers)

[Tyke]

Thanks for some great poems Andrew.

Bredon Hill evokes memories of that lovely place -a terrific poem.

Oliver Goldsmith triggered long ago memories too-of school & She Stoops to Conquer!! His Deserted Village & the background to it is most interesting.
I love this line:-

Ill fares the land, to hast’ning ills a prey,

...it speaks of today as well!

Goldsmith wrote these lines on the Enclosures:-

They hang the man, and flog the woman,
That steals the goose from off the common;
But let the greater villain loose,
That steals the common from the goose.

It must have been a terrible time for those whose world was destroyed & he clearly felt strongly about it.

I didn't know where the line

The dog it was that died.

originated, but I do now-thank you Andrew -a funny poem.
Have a great time in Cornwall.

Welcome back Nerine.

Colin

 

[Nerine]

Andrew I really love Housman's Bredon Hill and the Goldsmith one was fun to read.

Colin, John Clare's The Flood is a real beauty. I loved reading it.

Wonderful poem by Edward Thomas, Merlin. He is such a great poet. This afternoon, over the garden, there were so many swifts swooping with the swallows. (sun's shining again and thanks for your words!) Reminded me of this one by Robert Louis Stevenson:


Swallows Travel To And Fro


Swallows travel to and fro,
And the great winds come and go,
And the steady breezes blow,
Bearing perfume, bearing love.
Breezes hasten, swallows fly,
Towered clouds forever ply,
And at noonday, you and I
See the same sunshine above.

Dew and rain fall everywhere,
Harvests ripen, flowers are fair,
And the whole round earth is bare
To the moonshine and the sun;
And the live air, fanned with wings,
Bright with breeze and sunshine, brings
Into contact distant things,
And makes all the countries one.

Let us wander where we will,
Something kindred greets us still;
Something seen on vale or hill
Falls familiar on the heart;
So, at scent or sound or sight,
Severed souls by day and night
Tremble with the same delight -
Tremble, half the world apart.


Robert Louis Stevenson

Nerine

 

[Tyke]

That's a smashing poem by RLS Nerine.

The rhyme pattern ( aaabcccb) is terrific-it's seems to jolt you awake to the theme on the "b" lines.
I love the poets idea-lovely.

Colin

 

[Merlin]

Hi Guys & Girls,

Sorry, I seem to have so little time for anything recently, but still trying to ‘keep up’ with the great poems and comments on this thread. Also in foreign parts again the end of this week and the beginning of next; so will catch up upon return.
However I do have another Edward Thomas poem that I think we have not had before??
Kind regards
Merlin

Bird’s Nest

The summer nests uncovered by the autumn wind,
Some torn, others dislodged, all dark
Everyone sees them; low or high in tree,
Or hedge, or single bush, they hang like a mark.

Since there’s no need of eyes to see them with
I cannot help a little shame
I missed most, even at eye’s level, till
The leaves blew off and made the seeing no game.

‘Tis a light pang, I like to see the nests
Still in their places, now first known,
At home and by far roads, boys knew them not,
Whatever jays and squirrels may have done.

And most I like the winter nests deep-hid
That leaves and berries fell into:
Once a dormouse dined there on hazel nuts,
And grass and goose-grass seeds found soil and grew.

Edward Thomas

 

[scampo]

"And at noonday, you and I
See the same sunshine above."

Thanks for the Stevenson Poem, Nerine. He's not a poet I read often and was surprised just how moving I found that poem. I especially liked the two lines above. A fine thought in this strangely torn world.

Merlin

That's a fine poem by Thomas and really did remind me of Clare - surely Thomas must have enjoyed his work.

 

[scampo]

...Goldsmith wrote these lines on the Enclosures:-

They hang the man, and flog the woman,
That steals the goose from off the common;
But let the greater villain loose,
That steals the common from the goose.

It must have been a terrible time for those whose world was destroyed & he clearly felt strongly about it.

Colin

I remember speaking to a local historian about the enclosures that occured in this area. It seems it was a terrible time with the poorest coming off much the worst, as usual. There is an interesting website on the issue here: http://www.countrylovers.co.uk/places/histlan4.htm

And here's a poem I think I might have posted before but which seems relevant both to Goldsmith's words and those of Nerine's Stevenson poem:


The Enclosure Acts

Ta was common so we didn’t say it.
My family belonged to too many classes
to risk relegation. Sod was common.
My father only said that when he dropped
a cigarette. Pop music was common
so we didn’t listen to it. We weren’t common.

My father called trunks ‘bathers’. That was common.
At dinner he’d stand in front of the fire
between courses. That was very common.

Meanwhile we owned our uncommon land,
fenced it in and worked it alone. We held
nothing in common and we had nothing
in common, digging behind tall hedges.

Lucian Jenkins

 

[montemerrick]

here now in los angeles

dear poet/birders

been here in LA working the domoic acid event (seabird rehabilitator) and missing out on what has been posted here of late -

on a quick glance through i am excited to see so much of the always delghtful and daring emily dickinson (who just celebrated a birthday - if she had lived she'd have been 177 years old!!!!)

here is a bit of prose poem from me regarding latest experiences - not exactly clear but more to come someday maybe i hope

take care

monte


today the marine layer is taking its time to burn off and last night i dreamed the facility where i've been working was surrounded by rising seas, and the netting that keeps our patients captive had vanished. so.....

we've treated and released between thirty and forty birds, mostly brown pelicans and loons -

the re-integration to this world of daily seabird rescue has not been seamless - i've been challenged, exhilarated, and fulfilled.

the strange privilege of holding a pelican or a gull or any wild animal in my hands - a privilege that i can take only because the animal is too sick or too young to resist - a privilege that comes with its own questions and concerns - but here i am - the bird is in my hand and broken - well what can i say - the thick and bloody dialog with the actual world - each day is a conversation with freedom, integrity and autonomy and each day the words are different but, so far, the actions are the same - i wake up, i make coffee - i plunge into the ocean of tasks - action in this world toward what we cannot know - but onward we go - may the eucalyptus trees of topanga canyon live another hundred years - may the seas thrive and never die - may our own hearts be useful to heal the wounds of our mad descent. - across the street from this cafe in playa del rey someone flies the american flag upside down and at half mast

we do not forget the larger world - we find the universe in the cormorant's eye.

this morning on the rocky shore beneath the shale and sandstone cliff forty pelican's unspooled themselves from beyond my sight and banked to the left, banked to the right and flew just above my extended reach - their perfect soaring, coasting flight - a cuneiform - a telegraph - whatever it is that they intend i hold it in my loosened grasp and see it only when i slit my eyes and obliquely let them glide.

 

[scampo]

Thanks for those few lines, Monte - always a pleasure to read even if some jealousy arises at your experiences! (-;

 

[Bascar]

Merlin and Nerine, good poems from Edward Thomas and R L Stevenson.

Colin, that is a splendid verse (‘They hang the man …’) – though I hadn’t realised it was Goldsmith who penned it. It is wonderful the power of a few simple lines!

Steve, thanks for the link to ‘A Green and Pleasant Land’ – very interesting.

Monte, that is a fascinating insight into the work you do. ‘Challenging, exhilarating and fulfilling’ sounds like a pretty accurate description. Thanks for posting it.

Here are a couple more offerings from Shakespeare. The first is the trio of delightful songs sung by Ariel in The Tempest (they came to mind when walking the coastal path in Cornwall!), and the second is one of the most famous of the sonnets (No 18).


Ariel's Songs

(i)
Come unto these yellow sands,
And then take hands:
Curtsied when you have, and kiss’d
The wild waves whist,
Foot it featly here and there;
And, sweet sprites, the burden bear.
Hark, hark!
Bow-wow,
The watch-dogs bark:
Bow-wow,
Hark, hark! I hear
The strain of strutting Chanticleer
Cry, Cock-a-diddle-dow!

(ii)
Full fathom five thy father lies;
Of his bones are coral made;
Those are pearls that were his eyes:
Nothing of him that doth fade,
But doth suffer a sea-change
Into something rich and strange.
Sea-nymphs hourly ring his knell:
Ding-dong!
Hark! now I hear them,
Ding-dong, bell!

(iii)
Where the bee sucks, there suck I;
In a cowslip's bell I lie;
There I couch when owls do cry.
On the bat's back I do fly
After summer merrily.
Merrily, merrily, shall I live now
Under the blossom that hangs on the bough.

William Shakespeare


Shall I Compare Thee to a Summer’s Day?

Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?
Thou art more lovely and more temperate:
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,
And summer's lease hath all too short a date:
Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,
And often is his gold complexion dimm’d:
And every fair from fair sometime declines,
By chance, or nature's changing course untrimm’d:
But thy eternal summer shall not fade,
Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow'st,
Nor shall death brag thou wander'st in his shade,
When in eternal lines to time thou grow'st;
So long as men can breathe, or eyes can see,
So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.

William Shakespeare


Andrew

 

[scampo]

"Nor shall death brag thou wander'st in his shade"

Wonderful words. I haven't posted because I thought I'd wait until something a little special came my way and it has. I hope others enjoy this unusual poem from Edward Thomas:

Words

That make rhymes,
Will you choose
Sometimes—
As the winds use
A crack in a wall
Or a drain,
Their joy or their pain
To whistle through—
Choose me,
You English words?
I know you:
You are light as dreams,
Tough as oak,
Precious as gold,
As poppies and corn,
Or an old cloak:
Sweet as our birds
To the ear,
As the burnet rose
In the heat
Of Midsummer:
Strange as the races
Of dead and unborn:
Strange and sweet
Equally,
And familiar,
To the eye,
As the dearest faces
That a man knows,
And as lost homes are:
But though older far
Than oldest yew,—
As our hills are, old,—
Worn new
Again and again:
Young as our streams
After rain:
And as dear
As the earth which you prove
That we love.

Make me content
With some sweetness
From Wales
Whose nightingales
Have no wings,—
From Wiltshire and Kent
And Herefordshire,
And the villages there,—
From the names, and the things
No less.
Let me sometimes dance
With you,
Or climb
Or stand perchance
In ecstasy,
Fixed and free
In a rhyme,
As poets do.

Edward Thomas

 

[Tyke]

Thread Index Update

This is an index to all the poems posted here-in whole or in part.
It is valid up to # 1630 Page 66

The Number after the Poem is the first Posting in which it is quoted.
The Index does not include poems posted with no attribution, or poems written by the Poster.

ADLER. RON
Untitled Poem 557
ALBANO. CHARLES
The Hawk 389
ANGELOU. MAYA
Caged Bird 5
ARMITAGE. SIMON
It Aint What You Do It's What It Does To You. 815
ARNOLD. MATHEW
Dover Beach 1060
AUDEN. WH
As I Walked Out One Evening 78
Funeral Blues ( Stop All the Clocks) 755
Say This City has Ten Million Souls 1244
Seascape 94
The More Loving One 1249
Their Lonely Betters 756
The Unknown Citizen 1225
BASHO. MATSUO
Lightening 434
Midfield 434
Moonlight Slanting 434
The sea darkens 440
Your song caresses 440
BEDOES. THOMAS LOVELL
Dream Pedlary 190
The Song that Wolfram Heard in Hell 189
BELLOC. HILLAIRE
The Vulture 102
BENT. ARTHUR CLEVELAND
High in the air they travel on. 777
BERRY. WENDELL
The Peace of Wild Things 196
The Wild Geese 200
BINYON. LAURENCE
For The Fallen( September 1914) 132
BISHOP. ELIZABETH
Sandpiper 812
The Armadillo 1302
BLAKE. WILLIAM
Auguries of Innocence 13
Jerusalem 1279
Nurses Song ( Songs of Innocence) 1430
Nurses Song ( Songs of Experience) 1431
Proverbs of Hell 508
Reeds of Innocence 1268
The Argument 1273
The Blossom 1423
The Ecchoing Green 1422
The Garden of Love 36
The Human Abstract 800
The Schoolboy 1326
The Tyger 1272
To Spring 1276
BLIND. MATHILDE
April Rain 1496
Birds of Passage 1454
BLUNDEN. EDMUND
Forefathers 1087
Vlamertinghe-Passing the Chateau July 1917 1075
BRECHT. BERTOLD
Questions From A Worker Who Reads 187
BRESSNER. KAY
Clear blue sky above 984
BRIDGES. ROBERT
Flycatchers 26
BROOKE. RUPERT
A Fragment 655
Pine-Trees and the Sky : Evening 113
The Dead 1525
The Voice 164
BROOKS. GWENDOLYN
Speech to the Young 1108
The Bean Eaters 1109
We Real Cool 1111
BROWNING. ELIZABETH BARRETT
How do I love thee?.Let me count the ways. 1362
The House of Clouds. 1360
BROWNING. ROBERT
Home-Thoughts From Abroad 30
Pippa's Song 1255
BRYANT. WILLIAM CULLEN
November 638
BUDBILL. DAVID
The Three Goals 1203
BURNS. ROBERT
Cauld Blows The Wind 384
Now Westlin Winds 396
Up in the Morning Early 1059
Yon banks and hills of bonnie Doon 384
BURROW. LUCY
Jacky Frost 626
BUXTON. JOHN
The Prisoner of the Singing Bird 1031
BYRON. GEORGE GORDON
Darkness 709
Epitaph to a dog 1533
Solitude 1528
CAMERON WILSON. TP
Magpies In Picardy 1022
CANDOLE ALEC DE
When the Last Long Trek is Over 1015
CAPERN. EDWARD
The Seagull 1378
O' the postman's is a pleasant life 1381
CARROLL. LEWIS
Jaberwocky 696
CARVER. RAYMOND
This Morning 318
CAUNT. MARGARET
The Green Sandpiper 1305
CIARDI. JOHN
White Heron 1435
CHESTERTON. GK
The Donkey 1117
CLARE. JOHN
Autumn Birds 1308
Emonsail's Heath in Winter 209
I am! 6
Little Trotty Wagtail 2
Song 692
The Early Nightingale 16
The Landrail 16
Love Lies Beyon The Tomb 1286
The Cuckoo 1612
The Flitting 1609
The Flood 1611
The Nightingale's Nest 289
The Nuthatch 719
The Old Year 969
The Shepherd's Calender 688
The Skylark 701
The Yellowhammer 718
Wood Pictures in Spring 1584
Written In Northampton County Asylum 693
CLARKE. GILLIAN
Birth 1321
Miracle on Saint David's Day 125
My Box 1043
RS 1327
CLAYTON. DAVID
The Carpet Fights 138
COLERIDGE. SAMUEL TAYLOR
Brockley Combe 1446
The Rime of The Ancient Mariner 1443
CONNOR. TW
One of The Early Birds 53
COPE. WENDY
Tich Miller 1341
COUSINS. DAVID
On Growing Older 1067
COWPER. WILIIAM
The Task 1549
To The Nightingale 1220
CRANE. HART
My Grandmother's Love Letters 672
CRANE. STEPHEN
Little Birds of The Night 919
The Wayfarer 278
CRISFIELD. LEM WARD
A Hunter's Poem 760
cummings. e e
christ but they're few 1354
for any ruffian of the sky 1354
In time of daffodils 1356
i thank You God for most this amazing 1472
Poem 1 1028
seeker of truth 1354
Why must itself up every of a park 1026
DARYUSH. ELIZABETH
Children of Wealth 1148
I saw the daughter of the sun 1147
Still Life 1148
DAVIES. WH
A Greeting 1258
And we have known those days 1328
April's Charms 1529
How sweet this morning air in Spring 25
I am the poet Davies, William. 1316
Leisure 1260
May Day 1536
No Master 544
The Example 1537
The Heap of Rags 1537
The Hermit 1316
The Kingfisher 25
DE LA MARE. WALTER
Before Dawn 273
King David was a Sorrowful man 267
The Listeners 270
DENNY. SANDY
Who knows where the time goes? 1384
DICKINSON. EMILY
A feather from the Whippoorwill 116
At Half past Three 1567
Bring me the sunset in a cup 1565
Hope is the thing with feathers 116
How the old Mountains drip with Sunset 1551
I'm nobody 1567
The Poets light but Lamps 1568
The Robin 1567
There came a wind like a bugle 1562
There's a certain Slant of Light 956
Wild Nights-Wild Nights 1569
DONNE. JOHN
Song 218
DRAKE. NICK
Which Will 1385
DRYDEN. JOHN
Happy the Man 1578
DUFFY. CAROL ANNE
Before You Were Mine 1123
In Mrs. Tilscher's Class 885
EDWARDS. MARJORIE
Morning Beach 506
EDGAR. MARRIOT
The Lion and Albert 530
EDGE. GRAEME
Late Lament 1064
The Day Begins 1064
The Dream 1061
EISELEY. LOREN
The Cardinals 158
ELIOT. TS
Burnt Norton 1040
The Waste Land 157 & 1142 & 1500
EZEKIEL. NISSIM
Night of the Scorpion 996
FARJEON. ELEANOR
Mrs. Peck Pigeon 1206
FERLINGHETTI. LAWRENCE
Seascape With Sun and Eagle 1604
The Light of Birds 277
FIELD. EUGENE
The Dinkey Bird 694
FIELD. RACHEL
Something Told The Wild Geese 760
FORSTER. MARYANN
Flight of Swallows 303
FROST. ROBERT
A Minor Bird 112
A Prayer in Spring 1013
Dust of Snow 111
My November Guest 938
Never Again Would Bird Song Be The Same 1025
Nothing Gold Can Stay 1271
Range Finding 1042
Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening 114
The Exposed Nest 1606
The Flood 745
The Ovenbird 921
The Pasture 1275
The Road Not Taken 114
The Sound of Trees 1469
To The Thawing Wind 115
Two Tramps in Mud Time 1430
GALLIENNE. RICHARD
I Meant To Do My Work Today 282
GIBRAN. KAHLIL
The Dying Man and The Vulture 488
GILBERT & SULLIVAN
Tit Willow 23
GOETHE. JOHANN WOLFGANG
Heather Rose 494
GOLDSMITH. OLIVER
Elegy on the Death of a Mad Dog 1620
The Deserted Village 1619
GRAVES. ROBERT
To Robert Nicholls 472
GRAY. THOMAS
Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard 1545
Ode on the Spring 1548
The Epitaph 1545
GRENFELL. JULIAN
The Naked Earth 1449
HARDY. THOMAS
A Christmas Ghost Story 924
Beeny Cliff 959
Old Furniture 1386
Paying Calls 810
The Darkling Thrush 50
The House of Hospitalities 1396
The Impercipient 1610
The Voice 644
The Yellowhammer 718
Transformations 1098
Weathers 1133
Where the Picnic Was 1105
HARRISON. TONY
Long Distance 889 & 894
HEANEY. SEAMUS
Anything Can Happen 862
A Shiver 770
Death of a Naturalist 1412
Digging 563
Drifting Off 1057
Edward Thomas on The Laggans Road 1240
Follower 888
MossBawn-Two Poems in Dedication-1 Sunlight 1518
Personal Helicon 1520
Planting The Alder 862
Punishment 1019
St. Kevin and the Blackbird 721
Serenades 1287
Stern 1582
The Birch Grove 1522
The Blackbird of Glanmore 1183
Bogland 1523
The Early Purges 1521
The Grabaulle Man 973
The Otter 1218
HECHT. ANTHONY
The Dover Bitch 1060
HEMANS. FELICIA
Casabianca 611
HEMMING. ANNE
Into my fever's flush 380
HEMMINGWAY. EARNEST
Along with Youth 478
HERRICK. ROBERT
Gather Ye Rosebuds 810
HODGSON. RALPH
The Great Auk's Ghost
HOGG. JAMES
A Boy's Song 1503
HOPKINS. GERARD MANLEY
As kingfishers catch fire, dragonflies draw flame 882
Binsey Poplars 1592
I Have Desired To Go 1593
Pied Beauty 576
Spring and Fall 1593
The Windhover 55
HOSKINS. ML
At The Gate of the Year 968
HOUSMAN. AE
Bredon Hill 1616
How clear, how lovely bright 1577
I Hoed and Trenched and Weeded 108
Loveliest of trees the cherry now 954
On Wenlock Edge The Wood's In Trouble 108
When smoke stood up from Ludlow 105
White in the moon the long road lies 954
XL 955
HUGHES. TED
A Childish Prank 71
Brambles 514
Crow Blacker than Ever 1467
Hawk Roosting 65
Heptonstall Old Church 1044
Relic 686
The swallow of summer 395
Thistles 868
Wodwo 1583
ISHERWOOD. CHRISTOPHER
The Common Cormorant ( or Shag) 368
IT'S A BEAUTIFUL DAY
White Bird 1082
JACOB. VIOLET
The Wild Geese 1387
JAMES. ERIC ANDREW
Canary Canary 1185
JAMIE. KATHLEEN
The Dipper 733
The Tree House 876
JARMAN. MARK
Old Acquaintance 932
JEFFERS. ROBINSON
Hurt Hawks 565
JENKINS. LUCIEN
The Enclosure Acts 821
JENNINGS. ELIZABETH
My Grandmother 1386
JONES. PETER
Buttercups 818
The Heron 818
JOYCE. JAMES
On the beach at Fontana 862
KEATS. JOHN
A Thing of Beauty is a Joy Forever 1179
Epistle to Charles Cowden Clarke 1176
La Belle Dame Sans Merci 18
O Solitude! If I must with thee dwell 1528
Ode to a Grecian Urn 1078
Ode to a Nightingale 689
The Terror of Death 1192
To Ailsa Rock 1264
To One Who Has Been Long In The City 1192
KENDON. FRANK
And ladders leaning against damson trees 517
KENNELLY. BRIAN
The Distinct Impression 815
KHAYYAM. OMAR
Rubaiyat 346
KINGSLY. CHARLES
Young and Old 1127
KIPLING. RUDYARD
If 952
In Springtime 669
Seal Lullaby 740
The Way Through The Woods 740
KOLATKAR. ARUN
An Old Woman 989
KLINE. MALINDA
Watching Over Me 984
LAIRD. CHRISTA
Fall Birthday 777
LARKIN. PHILIP
Afternoons 738
Born Yesterday 860
Coming 96
Cut Grass 331
Days 331
Deceptions 855
Faith Healing 101
Love Songs in Age 1394
Maiden Name 887
MCMXIV 746
Myxomatosis 581
Next Please 868
Reasons for Attendance 860
Sunny Prestatyn 848
The Explosion 1042
The Trees 99
This be the verse 737
Water 331
LAWLESS. EMILY
Now the seagull spreads his wing 72
LAWRENCE. DH
Humming Bird 851
Piano 1390
The Enkindled Spring 1313
LEAR. EDWARD
Mr. And Mrs. Spikky Sparrow 367
The Scroobious Pip 359
The Hunting of The Snark 364
There was an Old Man with a beard 367
LEDWIDGE. FRANCIS
A Rainy Day in April 1413
Lament for Thomas McDonagh 465
Soliloquy 1015
LEE. LAURIE
Town Owl 683
LEONARD. TOM
This is the Six O'Clock News 821
LINDSAY. VACHEL
The Flower-Fed Buffaloes 1607
The Leaden-Eyed 997
LOCKLEY
When Dotterel do first appear 688
LONGFELLOW. HENRY WADSWORTH
Children 1432
The Song of Hiawatha 484 1445
LONNROT. ELIAS
The Kalevala 249 & 250
LOWELL. ROBERT
The Quaker Graveyard in Nantucket 1358
LYALL. SARAH
Pigeons 1187
LYYVUO. EERO
A Chaffinch to a Poet 234
Laulurastas ylistaa Illan Rankaa 230
McCARTNEY. PAUL
Blackbird 1104
McGONOGAL. WILLIAM
Death and burial of Lord Tennyson 964
The Tay Bridge Disaster 961
McGOUGH. ROGER
Bees Cannot Fly 212
Crow 167
Defying Gravity 169
Let me die a young man's death 790
Nooligan 175
40 Love 713
McKAY. CLAUDE
Birds of Prey 1144
Winter in The Country 1146
McKAY. DON
Close-up on a Sharp-shinned Hawk 569
McMILLAN. JAN
Five artistic ducks 528
In Winter Silence 528
MacCAIG. NORMAN
Fetching Cows 1119
Ringed plover by water's edge 1119
Summer Farm 1115
MACNIECE. LOUIS
Apple Blossom 1050
The Sunlight on The Garden 1288
Trains in The Distance 1299
MACRAE. JOHN
In Flanders Fields 659
MAC GIOLLA GHUNNA. CATHAL BUIDHE
The Yellow Bittern 455
MARLOW. CHRISTOPHER
The face that launched a thousand ships 1095
MASEFIELD. JOHN
Sea Fever 1365
MEREDITH. GEORGE
He rises and begins to round 7
MERRITT DIXON LANIER
The Pelican 181
MEW. CHARLOTTE
I So Liked Spring 1591
The Trees are Down 1591
MILNE. AA
Oh the butterflies are flying 136
The Mirror 133
The Wrong House 133
MILTON. JOHN
Il Penseroso 1579
L'Allegro 1579
Lycidas 327
Paradise Lost 825 & 830
MOORE. MARIANNE
Poetry 1574
MOORE. THOMAS
The Young May Moon 1602
MOORMAN. FW
Fieldfares 722
MUELLER. LISEL
Why I need Birds 1156
What the Dog Perhaps Hears 1157
MUIR. EDWIN
The Horses 1037
MULDOON. PAUL
Plovers 1036
NAGY. MARY
A Lesson from the Birds 1214
NASH. OGDEN
Always Marry An April Girl 1499
Crossing the Border 806
Spring is Sprung 178
The Ant 529
The Birds 701
The Cuckoo 182
The Duck 182
The Germ 882
The Grackle 179
The Ostrich 182
The Squab 182
The Wapiti 529
Up from the Egg 529
NERUDA. PABLO
Bird 783
Black Vulture 488
The Stolen Branch 1370
You will remember 1373
NEWBOLT. HENRY
Vitai Lampada 1010
NICHOLSON. NORMAN
Boo to a Goose 127
The Black Guillemot 1
The Cock's Nest 98
Weeds 299
NOYES. ALFRED
Shadows on the Down 677
The Highwayman 676
OLIVER. MARY
Heron Rises from the Dark Summer Pond 172
The Swan 791
Wild Geese 1571
OWEN. WILFRED
Anthem for Doomed Youth 123
Dulce et Decorum Est 654
Elegy in April and September 123
PANGYARIHAN. GILBERT
The Birds of Hong Kong 1160
PATTEN. BRIAN
In Tintagel Graveyard 176
Lockerbie 177
PAULIN. TOM
Sea Wind 1376
The Lagan Blackbird
PAXTON. TOM
Whose Garden Was This 399
PEARSON. ENID
Frosty Morning 648
Owl 352
PENROSE. CLAUDE LEWIS
Billets at Dawn 1397
PLATH. SYLVIA
Blackberrying 67
Black Rook in Rainy Weather 73
Goatsucker 477
Spinster 486
POTTER. BEATRIX
Tommy Tittle mouse 719
POUND. EZRA
Ode Pour L'election De Son Sepulchre 1509
PUGH. SHEENAGH
Sometimes 733
RAINE. KATHLEEN
Nameless Islets 558
ROETHKE. THEODORE
In a Dark Time 1964 280
ROSEN. MICHAEL
Going Through Old Photos 518
ROSENBURG. ISAAC
Break of Day in the Trenches 1004
Returning We Hear the Larks 124
ROSS. ALAN
Night Patrol 1138
ROSSETI. CHRISTINA
Remember 951
Song 1598
RYAN. KAY
Mockingbird 925
Paired Things 929
The Other Shoe 930
RYOKAN.
Spring flows gently 442
Wind and Snow 441
SASSOON. SIEGFRIED
Butterflies 842
Everyone Sang 1088
Have you forgotten yet ? 131
The Hero 758
Thrushes 121
SCANNELL. VERNON
Nettles 1338
Rhyme-Time 1340
SCOTT. PETER
A picture of Gesse 1257
SCOTT. WALTER
The Lady of The Lake 471
SERVICE. ROBERT
Birdwatcher 186
Grey Gull 191
SHAKESPEARE. WILLIAM
Ariel's Songs 1629
A Midsummer Night's Dream 1543
King Lear 1558
Macbeth 1473. 1477
Richard II 1560
Shall I compare Thee to a Summer's Day ? 1629
Sonnet No, 73 767
The ouzel-cock so black of hue 1399
When to the sessions of sweet silent thought 1393
Winter 63
SHAW. GB
Wings 1155
SHELLEY. PERCY. BYSSHE
A widow bird sate mourning for her love 279
Adonais-An Elegy on the Death of John Keats 1508
England in 1819 712
Ode to a Skylark 60
Ode to the West Wind 712
Ozymandias 1517
Song 708
The Question 1541
SKELTON. JOHN
Merry Margaret as midsummer flower 376
The bittern with his bumpe 1081
SMITH. STEVIE
Not Waving but Drowning 743
The Airy Christ 1366
The Reason 1371
SNOWY WHITE
Bird of Paradise 1097
SNYDER. GARY
Magpies Song 1463
SORLEY. CHARLES HAMILTON
Rooks 1073
SOUTHEY. ROBERT
The Old Man's Comforts 1429
STAFFORD. WILLIAM
A Ritual To Read To Each Other 1350
Atavism 1458
At the Bomb Testing Site 931
Just Thinking 1389
Security 1350
The Well Rising 930
Walking West 1359
STALLWORTHY. JON
No Ordinary Sunday 656
STEPHENS. JAMES
The Shell 1531
STEVENS. WALLACE
Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird 1573
STEVENSON. ROBERT LEWIS
Swallows Travel To and Fro 1622
SULLIVAN. REBECCA
There Lie Forgotten Men 668
TAGORE. RABINDRANATH
The Gift 806
TASHIJAN. FIONA LEE
Birds of Prey are all the same 504
That Reptile-Bird called Archaeopterix 504
TAYLOR. JOHN
There were rare birds I never saw before 72
TEASDALE. SARA
April Song 1480
Fear 1484
May Day 1586
Morning 1484
Spring Night 1607
The Swans 1479
There Will Come Soft Rains 1478
TENNANT. EDWARD WYNDHAM
Home Thoughts in Laventie 1000
TENNYSON. ALFRED
Break, Break, Break 599
Cradle Song 265
I stood on a Tower in the West 965
Morte D'Arthur 346
Summer is Coming 235
The Brook 704
The Eagle 28
The Lady of Shallot 264
TYNEMAN. MAUREEN
Blackbird 1294
THE MOODY BLUES
The Swallow 1079
Voices in The Sky 1079
THOMAS. DYLAN
Do not go gentle in to that good night 1120
Fern Hill 1314
Notes on the Art of Poetry 1574
Poem in October 166
The Force That Through The Green Fuse Drives The Flower 1125
The Hand That Signed The Paper 573
When All My Five and Country Senses See 573
THOMAS. EDWARD
A Cat 1403
Adelstrop 128
And You Helen 130
As the Team's Head-Brass 107
Bird's Nest 1624
But these things also 1317
Fifty Faggots 905
For These 1513
How at Once 1614
In Memoriam 1515
Lights Out 1235
Lob 328
Rain 908
Sedge Warblers 171
She Dotes 978
Snow 1135
Tall Nettles 1337
Thaw 1326
The Cherry Trees 1126
The Combe 884
The Dark Forest 1126
The Mill-Pond 897
The Owl 1334
The Word 1235
This is no case of petty right or wrong 902
Words 1575
THOMAS. RS
A Blackbird Singing 768
A Welsh Testament 1315
Lore 1086
Moorland 978
THOREAU. HENRY DAVID
Mist 472
TOWNSEND WALKER. SYLVIA
In April 1505
TYNAN. KATHERIN
The End of the Day 532
TYREMAN. MAUREEN
Blackbird 1294
VERNEDE. RE
The Listening Post 1151
WAGONER. DAVID
Lost 780
WARDLE. SARAH
After Blake 1049
WATSON. STANLEY
Ah Bluejay 165
WHITMAN. WALT
O Me ! O Life! 82
The Dalliance of Eagles 91
To the Man-of-War Bird 92
Wood Odors 89
WILBUR. RICHARD
A Barred Owl 1224
WILCOX. EW
So many gods-so many creeds 275
WILSON. RAYMOND
Old Johnny Armstrong 159
WISE. BERTHA
Constant Velocity 312
WORDSWORTH. WILLIAM
Art thou the bird whom Man loves best 480
Tintern Abbey 479
Lines Written In Early Spring 1312
Near Anio's Stream I spied a gentle Dove 193
Ode on Intimations of Immortality 942
The Excursion 478
The Green Linnet 62
The Prelude 538
The Solitary Reaper 1215
The Waggoner 478
The World is Too Much With Us 1400
Written in March 1312
YEATS. WB
At Algeciras 699
Come Gather Round Me Parnellites 1414
Easter 1916 1531
Fergus and the Druid 1363
He Reproves The Curlew 1277
He Wishes for the Cloths of Heaven 32
Leda and the Swan 699
Sailing to Byzantium 699
The Cat and The Moon 1404
The Coming of Wisdom With Time 1425
The Fiddler of Dooney 1267
The Fisherman 1124
The Hawk 699
The Host Of The Air 1285
The Lake Isle of Innisfree 42
The Second Coming 27
The Song of Wandering Aengus 1129
The Tower 1280
The Two Trees 625
The White Birds 39
The Wild Swans at Coole 41
When you are old 39
Who Goes with Fergus 1363
YOSA. BUSSAN
Calligraphy of Geese 434
Dawn 434
Sparrow Singing 434
Sudden shower 440
The behaviour of the pigeon 434
YOUNG-LEE. LI
One Heart 976


TO POST #1630 PAGE 66

 

[Tyke]

Welcome back Andrew-thinking of The Tempest on the Cornish cliffs;you must have been at The Minack near Porthcurno ?

Steve-Words is a smashing poem.


The Lost Heifer

When the black herds of the rain were grazing,
In the gap of the pure cold wind
And the watery hazes of the hazel
Brought her into my mind,
I thought of the last honey by the water
That no hive can find.

Brightness was drenching through the branches
When she wandered again,
Turning the silver out of dark grasses
Where the skylark had lain,
And her voice coming softly over the meadow
Was the mist becoming rain.

Austin Clarke
1896-1974

____________________
Colin

 

[scampo]

The Lost Heifer

When the black herds of the rain were grazing,
In the gap of the pure cold wind
And the watery hazes of the hazel
Brought her into my mind,
I thought of the last honey by the water
That no hive can find.
...

Austin Clarke
1896-1974
____________
Colin

Nice one, Colin. He certainly uses many poetic techniques - a touch of Yeats and a dash of Dylan Thomas, maybe? And I'm still not entirely sure whether he found the calf!

 

[Bascar]

Welcome back Andrew-thinking of The Tempest on the Cornish cliffs;you must have been at The Minack near Porthcurno ?

___
Colin

Got it in one, Colin!! On a good night, the best theatre anywhere! The Tempest is in fact being staged there in August.

I like your poem from Austin Clarke, not a poet I am familiar with.

Steve, as you say, ‘Words’ is an unusual poem by Edward Thomas but very effective:

‘You are light as dreams,
Tough as oak,
Precious as gold,
As poppies and corn,
Or an old cloak;’

Great stuff! (Just one little glitch, though – the first line is missing: ‘Out of us all’!)

Another poet who shared the same dates as Austin Clarke is Edmund Blunden. I’ve just been listening to him reading this poem, which graphically contrasts the brief respite of a pleasurable concert party which he and other soldiers attended with the grim sound of battle which greeted them when they emerged from it.

Concert Party: Busseboom

The stage was set, the house was packed,
The famous troop began;
Our laughter thundered, act by act;
Time light as sunbeams ran.

Dance sprang and spun and neared and fled,
Jest chirped at gayest pitch,
Rhythm dazzled, action sped
Most comically rich.

With generals and lame privates both
Such charms worked wonders, till
The show was over – lagging loth
We faced the sunset chill;
And standing on the sandy way,
With the cracked church peering past,
We heard another matinée,
We heard the maniac blast

Of barrage south by Saint Eloi,
And the red lights flaming there
Called madness: Come, my bonny boy,
And dance to the latest air.

To this new concert, white we stood;
Cold certainty held our breath;
While men in tunnels below Larch Wood
Were kicking men to death.

Edmund Blunden


Andrew

 

[scampo]

Hi Andrew - I'm glad you enjoyed "Words" - the more I read it the more I like it!

Ah, I didn't notice the first line went adrift. Thanks for pointing it out - I tried to edit the post but it seems that editing is only allowed for a short time after posting these days (I'm sure that didn't used to be the case).

Blunden is not usually considered to be up there with the finest of war poets (and there have been those who didn't consider war poetry good at all - Yeats being notable). He seems to retain his fame more as the editor of Owen's collected poems. The poem you posted shows that this is unfair - it's excellent, contrasting the lightness and utter, utter darkness of those days so brilliantly.

Here are two more of his "war" poems that I find very moving:


Report on Experience (1929)

I have been young, and now am not too old;
And I have seen the righteous forsaken,
His health, his honour and his quality taken.
This is not what we were formerly told.
I have seen a green country, useful to the race,
Knocked silly with guns and mines, its villages vanished,
Even the last rat and the last kestrel banished –
God bless us all, this was peculiar grace.
I knew Seraphina; Nature gave her hue,
Glance, sympathy, note, like one from Eden.
I saw her smile warp, heard her lyric deaden;
She turned to harlotry; – this I took to be new.
Say what you will, our God sees how they run.
These disillusionments are His curious proving
That He loves humanity and will go on loving;
Over there are faith, life, virtue in the sun.


Premature Rejoicing

What’s that over there?

Thiepval
Wood.

Take a steady look at it; it’ll do you good.
Here, these glasses will help you. See any flowers?
There sleeps Titania (correct – the Wood is ours);
There sleeps Titania in a deep dugout,
Waking, she wonders what all the din’s about,
And smiles through her tears, and looks ahead ten years,
And sees the Wood again, and her usual Grenadiers,

All in green,
Music in the moon;

The burnt rubbish you’ve just seen
Won’t beat the Fairy Queen;

All the same, it’s a shade
too soon
For you to scribble rhymes
In your army book
About those times;
Take another look;

That’s where the difficulty is, over there.

Edmund Blunden

 

[Merlin]

Steve, Andrew & Colin great poems.
I quite like Austin Clarke and Blunden is a great favourite of mine. I mentioned before that I met one of his daughters a short time ago and like her father seem to have a 'presence' and was quite charming. Yeats had opinions about the Great War which may have reflected in his view about war poems, an opinion that did not stop him writing poems of his own.
It's glad to be back but had so little time recently, looking forward to contributing ,
regards to you all
Merlin

 

[Nerine]

Welcome back Merlin. I too have just returned. Been visiting in France and Germany. I took Edward Thomas with me and on returning to this board, to my delight, I see that Steve has submitted “Words” !! It is such a lovely and unusual poem. In 1923 while at school, ET’s youngest daughter, Myfanwy, was called to see her headmistress because she had done a pretty dreadful essay. Her headmistress asked her if she had read her father’s poem: Words. M had not read the poem, in fact she knew very little of her father’s poetry. So she read “Words” over and over again, and of course all her father’s poetry.

Thanks Steve for a truly wonderful poem.

Colin, I loved "The Lost Heifer" , I don't know much of Austin Clarke, that was lovely. (and thanks for the index up date!)

Andrew - good war poem by Blunden.

monte Good to read your prose poem.



Snow

In the gloom of whiteness,
In the great silence of snow,
A child was sighing
And bitterly saying, 'Oh,
They have killed a white bird up there on her nest,
The down is fluttering from her breast!'
And still it fell through the dusky brightness
On the child crying for the bird of the snow.

Edward Thomas

Myfanwy Thomas is supposed to be the girl in this sad poem. Edward Thomas suffered from awful attacks of gloom. His wife, Helen, was so understanding.

Good to be back!

Nerine

 

[scampo]

Here is a poem from WWII by Alun Lewis - one of the few WWII "soldier poets" to have risen to any prominence. Edward Thomas was a major influence on Lewis and, in this poem, there is a touching mention of the great man.


All Day It Has Rained

All day it has rained, and we on the edge of the moors
Have sprawled in our bell-tents, moody and dull as boors,
Groundsheets and blankets spread on the muddy ground
And from the first grey wakening we have found
No refuge from the skirmishing fine rain
And the wind that made the canvas heave and flap
And the taut wet guy-ropes ravel out and snap.
All day the rain has glided, wave and mist and dream,
Drenching the gorse and heather, a gossamer stream
Too light to stir the acorns that suddenly
Snatched from their cups by the wild south-westerly
Pattered against the tent and our upturned dreaming faces.
And we stretched out, unbuttoning our braces,
Smoking a Woodbine, darning dirty socks,
Reading the Sunday papers - I saw a fox
And mentioned it in the note I scribbled home; -
And we talked of girls and dropping bombs on Rome,

And thought of the quiet dead and the loud celebrities
Exhorting us to slaughter, and the herded refugees;
As of ourselves or those whom we
For years have loved, and will again
Tomorrow maybe love; but now it is the rain
Possesses us entirely, the twilight and the rain.

And I can remember nothing dearer or more to my heart
Than the children I watched in the woods on Saturday
Shaking down burning chestnuts for the schoolyard's merry play,
Or the shaggy patient dog who followed me
By Sheet and Steep and up the wooded scree
To the Shoulder o' Mutton where Edward Thomas brooded long
On death and beauty - till a bullet stopped his song.

Alun Lewis

 

[Merlin]

Nerine, good to have you back and another great poem from ET,

Steve,
a superb poem from Alun Lewis.

Another contribution fro Edward Thomas.

regards
Merlin

Two Pewits

Under the after- sunset sky
Two pewits sport and cry,
More white than in the moon on high
Riding the dark surge silently;
More black than earth. Their cry
Is the one sound under the sky.
They alone move, now low, now high,
And merrily they cry
To the mischievous spring sky,
Plunging earthward, tossing high,
Over the ghost who wonders why
So merrily they cry and fly,
Nor choose ‘twixt earth and sky.
While the moon’s quarter silently
Rides, and earth rests as silently

 

[scampo]

Steve,
a superb poem from Alun Lewis.

I thought you might enjoy it, Merlin. It is a fine poem indeed - parts of it are intensely moving, the way he brings together images and ideas. I remember having to study it at university and I recall thinking then that Lewis was speaking about an aspect of solders' lives that we rarely think about - the awful waiting and the weather. In WWII especially, apparently, most soldiers' lives were spent waiting and waiting. Imagine the tension?

The poem of Thomas's that Alun Lewis would have been thinking of, of course, is this one (it's been posted before but is, I hope people agree, good enough to repeat!):


Rain

Rain, midnight rain, nothing but the cold rain
On this bleak hut, and solitude, and me
Remembering again that I shall die
And neither hear the rain nor give it thanks
For washing me cleaner than I have been
Since I was born into this solitude.
Blessed are the dead that the rain rains upon:
But here I pray that none whom once I loved
Is dying tonight or lying still awake
Solitary, listening to the rain,
Either in pain or thus in sympathy
Helpless among the living and the dead,
Like a cold water among broken reeds,
Myriads of broken reeds all still and stiff,
Like me who have no love which this wild rain
Has not dissolved except the love of death,
If love it be towards what is perfect and
Cannot, the tempest tells me, disappoint.

Edward Thomas