A Song Of Despair
The memory of you emerges from the night around me.
The river mingles its stubborn lament with the sea.
Deserted like the wharves at dawn.
It is the hour of departure, oh deserted one!
Cold flower heads are raining over my heart.
Oh pit of debris, fierce cave of the shipwrecked.
In you the wars and the flights accumulated.
'How Great My Grief' (Triolet)
How great my grief, my joys how few,
Since first it was my fate to know thee!
- Have the slow years not brought to view
How great my grief, my joys how few,
Nor memory shaped old times anew,
Nor loving-kindness helped to show thee
How great my grief, my joys how few,
Since first it was my fate to know thee?
Music, When Soft Voices Die
Music, when soft voices die,
Vibrates in the memory;
Odours, when sweet violets sicken,
Live within the sense they quicken.
Rose leaves, when the rose is dead,
Are heaped for the beloved's bed;
And so thy thoughts, when thou art gone,
Love itself shall slumber on.
Farewell
Farewell to thee! but not farewell
To all my fondest thoughts of thee:
Within my heart they still shall dwell;
And they shall cheer and comfort me.
O, beautiful, and full of grace!
If thou hadst never met mine eye,
I had not dreamed a living face
Could fancied charms so far outvie.
If I may ne'er behold again
Ars Poetica
A poem should be palpable and mute
As a globed fruit
Dumb
As old medallions to the thumb
Silent as the sleeve-worn stone
Of casement ledges where the moss has grown -
A poem should be wordless
A Bunch Of Roses
Roses ruddy and roses white,
What are the joys that my heart discloses?
Sitting alone in the fading light
Memories come to me here tonight
With the wonderful scent of the big red roses.
Memories come as the daylight fades
Down on the hearth where the firelight dozes;
Flicker and flutter the lights and shades,
And I see the face of a queen of maids
Whose memory comes with the scent of roses.
'I Have Lived With Shades'
I
I have lived with shades so long,
And talked to them so oft,
Since forth from cot and croft
I went mankind among,
That sometimes they
In their dim style
Will pause awhile
To hear my say;
Just Thinking
Got up on a cool morning. Leaned out a window.
No cloud, no wind. Air that flowers held
for awhile. Some dove somewhere.
Been on probation most of my life. And
the rest of my life been condemned. So these moments
count for a lot- peace, you know.
Let the bucket of memory down into the well,
bring it up. Cool, cool minutes. No one
Dedication
Inscribed to a Dear Child:
In Memory of Golden Summer Hours
And Whispers of a Summer Sea
Girt with a boyish garb for boyish task,
Eager she wields her spade: yet loves as well
Rest on a friendly knee, intent to ask
The tale he loves to tell.
Rude spirits of the seething outer strife,
Unmeet to read her pure and simple spright,
Blame Me
Blame me for everything,
Spare me for nothing,
I left behind special thing,
My memory to miss something,
It was to last and something to cherish,
Till I am forgotten and completely perished,
My soul still roams and not finished,
Blot on old cloths removed andwashed
A Weathered Skeleton
A weathered skeleton
in windy fields of memory,
piercing like a knife
Painting
I'm drawing a circle,
Which is concentrically diminishing,
With each gliding of the pencil on the paper,
Until it becomes a spiral.
I'm drawing the line of your oval eyes,
Which is concentrically diminishing,
With each winking of yours,
Until it becomes only the memory of your sight.
Merlin
O Merlin in your crystal cave
Deep in the diamond of the day,
Will there ever be a singer
Whose music will smooth away
The furrow drawn by Adam's finger
Across the memory and the wave?
Or a runner who'll outrun
Man's long shadow driving on,
Break through the gate of memory
And hang the apple on the tree?
And You, My Friends Who Have Been Called Away
And you, my friends who have been called away,
I have been spared to mourn for you and weep,
Not as a frozen willow over your memory,
But to cry to the world the names of those who sleep.
What names are those!
I slam shut the calendar,
Down on your knees, all!
Blood of my heart,
The people of Leningrad march out in even rows,
The living, the dead: fame can't tell them apart.
Last Night
Last night your faded memory came to me
As in the wilderness spring comes quietly,
As, slowly, in the desert moves thew breeze,
As to a sick man, without cause, comes peace
[Original: Urdu, Translated by: Faiz Ahmed Faiz]
Sonnet 02: Time Does Not Bring Relief; You All Have Lied
Time does not bring relief; you all have lied
Who told me time would ease me of my pain!
I miss him in the weeping of the rain;
I want him at the shrinking of the tide;
The old snows melt from every mountain-side,
And last year's leaves are smoke in every lane;
But last year's bitter loving must remain
Heaped on my heart, and my old thoughts abide
There are a hundred places where I fear
Memory Of Sun
Memory of sun seeps from the heart.
Grass grows yellower.
Faintly if at all the early snowflakes
Hover, hover.
Water becoming ice is slowing in
The narrow channels.
Nothing at all will happen here again,
Will ever happen.
Loss Of Memory
I thank the loss of my memory
Of those days when I had not a friend
I am thankful to the memory
Of those great moments when we are together
I thank the loss of my memory
Of those seconds prior to your reasonableness
I am thankful to the memory
Of the great dimple when you smile
A Single Note
A lilac for the anonymity,
Of Mrs. Hinkle's simple poetry.
It shines within the margins of its space,
A single note of captivating grace.
The subtle sun through ancient maple leaves,
Paints memory with a gentleness that grieves.
A touch of soul is music to the bone,
Even after every wing has flown.
Shadows On The Down
When daffodils danced in Chuck Hatch, and white clouds
Drew their own shadowy purple across the hills,
Darkening the valley where the small flint church
The Saxon built stood roofless to the sun,
Believe me, Memory, it was not a shadow!
No shadow of a cloud you saw that day
Flowing across the smooth deep-breasted downs,
But something darker, sweeter,- the wild thyme
Of Sussex, flowing like a river of joy
That tossed a hundred skylarks up.