An Irish Airman Foresees His Death by William Butler YeatsI know that I shall meet my fate Somewhere among the clouds above; Those that I fight I do not hate Those that I guard I do not love; My country is Kiltartan Cross,My countrymen Kiltartan’s poor, No likely end could bring them loss Or leave them happier than before. Nor law, nor duty bade me…

Submarine Mountains by Cale Young RiceUnder the sea, which is their sky, they rise To watery altitudes as vast as those Of far Himalayan peaks impent in snows And veils of cloud and sacred deep repose. Under the sea, their flowing firmament, More dark than any ray of sun can pierce, The earthquake thrust them up with mighty tierce And left them to …

Passers-By by Carl SandburgPassers-by,Out of your many facesFlash memories to meNow at the day endAway from the sidewalksWhere your shoe soles traveledAnd your voices rose and blentTo form the city’s afternoon roarHindering an old silence.Passers-by,I remember lean ones among you,Throats in the clutch of a hope,Lips written over with strivings,Mout…

Serenity by Edward Rowland SillBrook,Be still,—be still!Midnight’s arch is brokenIn thy ceaseless ripples.Dark and cold below themRuns the troubled water,—Only on its bosom,Shimmering and trembling,Doth the glinted star-shine Sparkle and cease. Life,Be still,—be still!Boundless truth is shatteredOn thy hurrying current.Rest, with face uplifted,Calm…

The Wild Common by D.H. LawrenceThe quick sparks on the gorse bushes are leaping,Little jets of sunlight-texture imitating flame;Above them, exultant, the pee-wits are sweeping:They are lords of the desolate wastes of sadness their screamings proclaim.Rabbits, handfuls of brown earth, lieLow-rounded on the mournful grass they have bitten down to th…

The Grass Beneath My Head by FS FlintThe grass is beneath my head;and I gazeat the thronging starsin the night.They fall… they fall…I am overwhelmed,and afraid.Each leaf of the aspenis caressed by the wind,and each is crying.And the perfumeof invisible rosesdeepens the anguish.Let a strong mesh of rootsfeed the crimson of rosesupon my heart;and the…

Be Still, My Soul by A.E. HousmanBe still, my soul, be still; the arms you bear are brittle, Earth and high heaven are fixt of old and founded strong.Think rather,—call to thought, if now you grieve a little, The days when we had rest, O soul, for they were long.Men loved unkindness then, but lightless in the quarry I slept and saw not; tears fell …

As You Like It, Act II - Scene VII by William ShakespeareAll the world’s a stage,And all the men and women merely players;They have their exits and their entrances,And one man in his time plays many parts,His acts being seven ages. At first, the infant,Mewling and puking in the nurse’s arms.Then the whining schoolboy, with his satchelAnd shining mo…

Such an Arduosly Long Joyous Occasion by Amira Ram Graffar“Ha-nifrah beek” is an Arabic phrase meaning, loosely,“To rejoice for you.” Muttered most often by aunties?And uncles presiding over your cousins’ weddings.Though, it often tends to mean much more as, teary-eyed,?The line is directed at the yet to graduate,?The unmarried, and the consummatel…

Wonder and Joy by Robinson JeffersThe things that one grows tired of—O, be sureThey are only foolish artificial things!Can a bird ever tire of having wings?And I, so long as life and sense endure,(Or brief be they!) shall nevermore inureMy heart to the recurrence of the springs,Of gray dawns, the gracious evenings,The infinite wheeling stars. A won…

Deep in the Quiet Wood by James Weldon JohnsonAre you bowed down in heart?Do you but hear the clashing discords and the din of life?Then come away, come to the peaceful wood,Here bathe your soul in silence. Listen! Now,From out the palpitating solitudeDo you not catch, yet faint, elusive strains?They are above, around, within you, everywhere.Silent…

If by Rudyard KiplingIf you can keep your head when all about youAre losing theirs and blaming it on you;If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,But make allowance for their doubting too;If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,Or, being lied about, don’t deal in lies,Or, being hated, don’t give way to hating,And yet don’t look too good…

Ode on the Death of a Favorite Cat by Thomas GrayTwas on a lofty vase’s side,Where China’s gayest art had dyedThe azure flowers that blow;Demurest of the tabby kind,The pensive Selima, reclined,Gazed on the lake below.Her conscious tail her joy declared;The fair round face, the snowy beard,The velvet of her paws,Her coat, that with the tortoise vie…

The Soul Selects Her Own Society by Emily DickinsonThe Soul selects her own Society —Then — shuts the Door —To her divine Majority —Present no more —Unmoved — she notes the Chariots — pausing —At her low Gate —Unmoved — an Emperor be kneelingUpon her Mat —I’ve known her — from an ample nation —Choose One —Then — close the Valves of her attention —L…

Old Houses by Lizette Woodworth ReeseOld loveliness, set in the country wind,Or down some vain town road the careless tread,Like hush of candles lighted for the dead,That look of yours, half seeing and half blind.Still do you strain at door, but we come not,The little maids, the lads, bone of your bone;In some sad wise, you keep the dusk alone,Old …

Where They Lived by Thomas HardyDishevelled leaves creep downUpon that bank to-day,Some green, some yellow, and some pale brown;The wet bents bob and sway;The once warm slippery turf is soddenWhere we laughingly sat or lay.The summerhouse is gone,Leaving a weedy space;The bushes that veiled it once have grownGaunt trees that interlace,Through whose…

Paris by Willa CatherBehind the arch of glory sets the day;The river lies in curves of silver light,The Fields Elysian glitter in a sprayOf golden dust; the gilded dome is bright,The towers of Notre Dame cut clean and grayThe evening sky, and pale from left to rightA hundred bridges leap from either quay.Pillared with pride, the city of delightSits…

Swallows by Leonora SpeyerThey dip their wings in the sunset,They dash against the airAs if to break themselves upon its stillness:In every movement, too swift to count,Is a revelry of indecision,A furtive delight in trees they do not desireAnd in grasses that shall not know their weight.They hover and lean toward the meadowWith little edged cries;…

Reflections Irregular by John Rollin RidgeI cast a backward look—how changedThe scenes of other days!I walk, a wearied man, estrangedFrom youth’s delightful ways.There in the distance rolleth yetThat stream whose waves myBoyish bosom oft has met,When pleasure lit mine eye.It rolleth yet, as clear, as bold,As pure as it did then;But I have grown in …

Evening by Hilda DolittleThe light passesfrom ridge to ridge,from flower to flower—the hepaticas, wide-spreadunder the lightgrow faint—the petals reach inward,the blue tips bendtoward the bluer heartand the flowers are lost.The cornel-buds are still white,but shadows dartfrom the cornel-roots—black creeps from root to root,each leafcuts another lea…

With Music by Helen Hay WhitneyDear, did we meet in some dim yesterday?I half remember how the birds were muteAmong green leaves and tulip-tinted fruit,And on the grass, beside a stream, we layIn early twilight; faintly, far away,Came lovely sounds adrift from silver lute,With answered echoes of an airy flute,While Twilight waited tiptoe, fain to s…

The Passing of the Hours by Ella HigginsonThe hours steal by with still, unasking lips—So lightly that I cannot hear their tread;And softly touch me with their finger-tipsTo find if I be dreaming, or be dead.And yet however still their flight may be,Their ceaseless going weights my heart with tears;These touches will have wrought deep scars on me—W…

Spirits of the Dead by Edgar Allan PoeThy soul shall find itself alone‘Mid dark thoughts of the grey tomb-stone;Not one, of all the crowd, to pryInto thine hour of secrecy.Be silent in that solitude,Which is not loneliness — for thenThe spirits of the dead, who stoodIn life before thee, are againIn death around thee, and their willShall overshadow …

Rates of Change by Quinn Elliot DresdahlIt's all relative. Let me summarize.The scientists all agree,It's so imperativeThat you realize Your frame of reference is key. And the vectors,Take their summations.Note directions and the size.And the origins'Coordinate transformationsAllow for mathematic compromise.But then distances will lengthen.Observe …

Moonrise by Gerard Manly HopkinsI awoke in the Midsummer not to call night, in the white and the walk of the morning:The moon, dwindled and thinned to the fringe of a finger-nail held to the candle,Or paring of paradisaïcal fruit, lovely in waning but lustreless,Stepped from the stool, drew back from the barrow, of dark Maenefa the mountain;A cusp …

Night Fell by Florence Ripley MastinNight fell one year ago, like this.He had been writing steadily.Among these dusky walls of books,How bright he looked, intense as flame!Suddenly he paused,The firelight in his hair,And said, “The time has come to go.”I took his hand;We watched the logs burn out;The apple boughs fingered the window;Down the cool, …

When You Are Old by W.B. YeatsWhen you are old and grey and full of sleep,And nodding by the fire, take down this book,And slowly read, and dream of the soft lookYour eyes had once, and of their shadows deep;How many loved your moments of glad grace,And loved your beauty with love false or true,But one man loved the pilgrim soul in you,And loved th…

A January Dandelion by George Marion McClellanAll Nashville is a chill. And everywhereLike desert sand, when the winds blow,There is each moment sifted through the air,A powdered blast of January snow.O! thoughtless Dandelion, to be misledBy a few warm days to leave thy natural bed,Was folly growth and blooming over soon.And yet, thou blasted yello…

Sonnet to Winter by Emily Chubbuck JudsonThy brow is girt, thy robe with gems inwove;And palaces of frost-work, on the eye,Flash out, and gleam in every gorgeous dye,The pencil, dipped in glorious things above,Can bring to earth. Oh, thou art passing fair!But cold and cheerless as the heart of death,Without one warm, free pulse, one softening breat…

Dawn by John Gould FletcherAbove the east horizon,The great red flower of the dawnOpens slowly, petal by petal;The trees emerge from darknessWith ghostly silver leaves,Dew powdered.Now consciousness emergesReluctantly out of tides of sleep;Finding with cold surpriseNo strange new thing to match its dreams,But merely the familiar shapesOf bedpost, w…

Winter Branches by Margaret WiddemerWhen winter-time grows weary, I lift my eyes on highAnd see the black trees standing, stripped clear against the sky;They stand there very silent, with the cold flushed sky behind,The little twigs flare beautiful and restful and kind;Clear-cut and certain they rise, with summer past,For all that trees can ever le…

Beauty and Beauty by Rupert BrookeWhen Beauty and Beauty meetAll naked, fair to fair,The earth is crying-sweet,And scattering-bright the air,Eddying, dizzying, closing round,With soft and drunken laughter;Veiling all that may befallAfter—after—Where Beauty and Beauty met,Earth’s still a-tremble there,And winds are scented yet,And memory-soft the ai…

2018-01-09 - Dawns by Amy Lowell by Karim El AzhariVon Karim El Azhari

The Giver of Stars by Amy LowellHold your soul open for my welcoming.Let the quiet of your spirit bathe meWith its clear and rippled coolness,That, loose-limbed and weary, I find rest,Outstretched upon your peace, as on a bed of ivory.Let the flickering flame of your soul play all about me,That into my limbs may come the keenness of fire,The life a…

That Money I Ain't Got by Amira Ram GraffarOnce, and ever since,A wince, quite tense,At the expense of intenseScents of incense,I fled.With no pretense of affluence,Returning whence made sense.Hence, in essence,This dense verbal fenceWell read.-----Prosodia is a daily podcast dedicated to historical notes and poems, hosted by Karim El Azhari. Welco…

The Penitent by Edna St Vincent MillayI had a little Sorrow,Born of a little Sin,I found a room all damp with gloomAnd shut us all within;And, “Little Sorrow, weep," said I,“And, Little Sin, pray God to die,And I upon the floor will lieAnd think how bad I’ve been!”Alas for pious planning—It mattered not a whit!As far as gloom went in that room,The …