George Gordon Byron – from Don Juan: Canto 1, Stanzas 41-42

41

His classic studies made a little puzzle,

   Because of filthy loves of gods and goddesses,

Who in the earlier ages raised a bustle,

   But never put on pantaloons or bodices;

His reverend tutors had at times a tussle,

   And for their Aeneids, Iliads, and Odysseys,

Were forced to make an odd sort of apology,

For Donna Inez dreaded the mythology.

 

42

Ovid's a rake, as half his verses show him,

   Anacreon's morals are a still worse sample,

Catullus scarcely has a decent poem,

   I don't think Sappho's Ode a good example,

Although Longinus tells us there is no hymn

   Where the sublime soars forth on wings more ample:

But Virgil's songs are pure, except that horrid one

Beginning with 'Formosum Pastor Corydon.'

Anne Spencer – Before the Feast of Shushan

Garden of Shushan!

After Eden, all terrace, pool, and flower recollect thee:

Ye weavers in saffron and haze and Tyrian purple,

Tell yet what range in color wakes the eye;

Sorcerer, release the dreams born here when

Drowsy, shifting palm-shade enspells the brain;

And sound! ye with harp and flute ne'er essay

Before these star-noted birds escaped from paradise awhile to

Stir all dark, and dear, and passionate desire, till mine

Arms go out to be mocked by the softly kissing body of the wind—

Slave, send Vashti to her King!

The fiery wattles of the sun startle into flame

The marbled towers of Shushan:

So at each day's wane, two peers—the one in

Heaven, the other on earth—welcome with their

Splendor the peerless beauty of the Queen.

Cushioned at the Queen's feet and upon her knee

Finding glory for mine head,—still, nearly shamed

Am I, the King, to bend and kiss with sharp

Breath the olive-pink of sandaled toes between;

Or lift me high to the magnet of a gaze, dusky,

Like the pool when but the moon-ray strikes to its depth;

Or closer press to crush a grape ‘gainst lips redder

Than the grape, a rose in the night of her hair;

Then—Sharon's Rose in my arms.

And I am hard to force the petals wide;

And you are fast to suffer and be sad.

Is any prophet come to teach a new thing

Now in a more apt time?

Have him ‘maze how you say love is sacrament;

How says Vashti, love is both bread and wine;

How to the altar may not come to break and drink,

Hulky flesh nor fleshly spirit!

I, thy lord, like not manna for meat as a Judahn;

I, thy master, drink, and red wine, plenty, and when

I thirst. Eat meat, and full, when I hunger.

I, thy King, teach you and leave you, when I list.

No woman in all Persia sets out strange action

To confuse Persia's lord—

Love is but desire and thy purpose fulfillment;

I, thy King, so say!

Rabindranath Tagore – The Gardener 68

None lives for ever, brother, and

nothing lasts for long. Keep that in

mind and rejoice.

Our life is not the one old burden,

our path is not the one long

journey.

One sole poet has not to sing one

aged song.

The flower fades and dies; but he

who wears the flower has not to

mourn for it for ever.

Brother, keep that in mind and

rejoice.

There must come a full pause to

weave perfection into music.

Life droops toward its sunset to be

drowned in the golden shadows.

Love must be called from its play

to drink sorrow and be borne to the

heaven of tears.

Brother, keep that in min and

rejoice.

We hasten to gather our flowers lest

they are plundered by the passing

winds.

It quickens our blood and brightens

our eyes to snatch kisses that would

vanish if we delayed.

Our life is eager, our desires are keen,

for time tolls the bell of parting.

Brother, keep that in mind and

rejoice.

There is not time for us to clasp a

thing and crush it and fling it away to

the dust.

The hours trip rapidly away, hiding

their dreams in their skirts.

Our life is short; it yields but a

few days for love.

Were it for work and drudgery it

would be endlessly long.

Brother, keep that in mind and

rejoice.

Beauty is sweet to us, because she

dances to the same fleeting tune with

our lives.

Knowledge is precious to us, because

we shall never have time to

complete it.

All is done and finished in the eternal

Heaven.

But earth's flowers of illusion are

kept eternally fresh by death.

Brother, keep that in mind and

rejoice.

Wilfred Owen – Shadwell Stair

I am the ghost of Shadwell Stair.
Along the wharves by the water-house,
And through the cavernous slaughter-house,
I am the shadow that walks there.


Yet I have flesh both firm and cool,
And eyes tumultuous as the gems
Of moons and lamps in the full Thames
When dusk sails wavering down the pool.


Shuddering the purple street-arc burns
Where I watch always; from the banks
Dolorously the shipping clanks
And after me a strange tide turns.


I walk till the stars of London wane
And dawn creeps up the Shadwell Stair.
But when the crowing syrens blare
I with another ghost am lain.

Charles Bukowski – As The Poems Go

as the poems go into the thousands you
realize that you've created very
little.
it comes down to the rain, the sunlight,
the traffic, the nights and the days of the
years, the faces.
leaving this will be easier than living
it, typing one more line now as
a man plays a piano through the radio,
the best writers have said very
little
and the worst,
far too much.