Poets of the day Comrade_: ~~Friday 21-Jan-2011 [ARGENTINA, South America] Jorge Luis Borges (24 August 1899 – 14 June 1986 Buenos Aires, Argentina) ***We are the time. We are the famous*** We are the time. We are the famous metaphor from Heraclitus the Obscure. We are the water, not the hard diamond, the one that is lost, not the one that stands still. We are the river and we are that greek that looks himself into the river. His reflection changes into the waters of the changing mirror, into the crystal that changes like the fire. We are the vain predetermined river, in his travel to his sea. The shadows have surrounded him. Everything said goodbye to us, everything goes away. Memory does not stamp his own coin. However, there is something that stays however, there is something that bemoans Comrade_: haa yes but its still great. ~~ Saturday 22 Jan. 2011~~ [United States of America] Edgar Allan Poe -Boston,North American Poet (born: January 19, 1809- died: October 7, 1849) **A Dream Within A Dream** Take this kiss upon the brow! And, in parting from you now, Thus much let me avow-- You are not wrong, who deem That my days have been a dream; Yet if hope has flown away In a night, or in a day, In a vision, or in none, Is it therefore the less gone? All that we see or seem Is but a dream within a dream. I stand amid the roar Of a surf-tormented shore, And I hold within my hand Grains of the golden sand-- How few! yet how they creep Through my fingers to the deep, While I weep--while I weep! O God! can I not grasp Them with a tighter clasp? O God! can I not save One from the pitiless wave? Is all that we see or seem But a dream within a dream? Comrade_: ~~Sunday 23.January.2011~~ [Chile, South America] Pablo Neruda (12th July,1904 - September 23 1973) Parral, Chile (South America) [real name is Neftalí Ricardo Reyes Basoalto] ****Nothing But Death**** There are cemeteries that are lonely, graves full of bones that do not make a sound, the heart moving through a tunnel, in it darkness, darkness, darkness, like a shipwreck we die going into ourselves, as though we were drowning inside our hearts, as though we lived falling out of the skin into the soul. And there are corpses, feet made of cold and sticky clay, death is inside the bones, like a barking where there are no dogs, coming out from bells somewhere, from graves somewhere, growing in the damp air like tears of rain. Sometimes I see alone coffins under sail, embarking with the pale dead, with women that have dead hair, with bakers who are as white as angels, and pensive young girls married to notary publics, caskets sailing up the vertical river of the dead, the river of dark purple, moving upstream with sails filled out by the sound of death, filled by the sound of death which is silence. Death arrives among all that sound like a shoe with no foot in it, like a suit with no man in it, comes and knocks, using a ring with no stone in it, with no finger in it, comes and shouts with no mouth, with no tongue, with no throat. Nevertheless its steps can be heard and its clothing makes a hushed sound, like a tree. I'm not sure, I understand only a little, I can hardly see, but it seems to me that its singing has the color of damp violets, of violets that are at home in the earth, because the face of death is green, and the look death gives is green, with the penetrating dampness of a violet leaf and the somber color of embittered winter. But death also goes through the world dressed as a broom, lapping the floor, looking for dead bodies, death is inside the broom, the broom is the tongue of death looking for corpses, it is the needle of death looking for thread. Death is inside the folding cots: it spends its life sleeping on the slow mattresses, in the black blankets, and suddenly breathes out: it blows out a mournful sound that swells the sheets, and the beds go sailing toward a port where death is waiting, dressed like an admiral. Comrade_: ~~ Monday 24 January 2011~~ [Jamaica] Claude McKay ..born in Jamaica, West Indies, in 1889. He was educated by his older brother, who possessed a library of English novels, poetry, and scientific texts. He died in 1948. **If We Must Die** If we must die—let it not be like hogs Hunted and penned in an inglorious spot, While round us bark the mad and hungry dogs, Making their mock at our accursed lot. If we must die—oh, let us nobly die, So that our precious blood may not be shed In vain; then even the monsters we defy Shall be constrained to honor us though dead! Oh, Kinsmen! We must meet the common foe; Though far outnumbered, let us show us brave, And for their thousand blows deal one deathblow! What though before us lies the open grave? Like men we'll face the murderous, cowardly pack, Pressed to the wall, dying, but fighting back! Comrade_: thx, if you know any good famous poets you can tell me, some are great but not popular in other countries. Morsy: I like writing my own stuff, used to psot when I was on before.........don't really know many published poets Comrade_: I understand, I'll post with you in mind. My dad was a literature professor so I know some from him, but I don't make poems anymore. Comrade_: ~~ Tuesday 25 Jan. 2011~~ [England] William Shakespeare ..born in Stratford-upon-Avon,England He was allegedly born on April 23 1564, died 23 April 1616.. ***My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun (Sonnet 130)*** My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun; Coral is far more red than her lips' red; If snow be white, why then her breasts are dun; If hairs be wires, black wires grow on her head. I have seen roses damasked, red and white, But no such roses see I in her cheeks; And in some perfumes is there more delight Than in the breath that from my mistress reeks. I love to hear her speak, yet well I know That music hath a far more pleasing sound; I grant I never saw a goddess go; My mistress when she walks treads on the ground. And yet, by heaven, I think my love as rare As any she belied with false compare. Winter0fDiscontent: Daddy by Sylvia Plath You do not do, you do not do Any more, black shoe In which I have lived like a foot For thirty years, poor and white, Barely daring to breathe or Achoo. Daddy, I have had to kill you. You died before I had time-- Marble-heavy, a bag full of God, Ghastly statue with one gray toe Big as a Frisco seal And a head in the freakish Atlantic Where it pours bean green over blue In the waters off beautiful Nauset. I used to pray to recover you. Ach, du. In the German tongue, in the Polish town Scraped flat by the roller Of wars, wars, wars. But the name of the town is common. My Polack friend Says there are a dozen or two. So I never could tell where you Put your foot, your root, I never could talk to you. The tongue stuck in my jaw. It stuck in a barb wire snare. Ich, ich, ich, ich, I could hardly speak. I thought every German was you. And the language obscene An engine, an engine Chuffing me off like a Jew. A Jew to Dachau, Auschwitz, Belsen. I began to talk like a Jew. I think I may well be a Jew. The snows of the Tyrol, the clear beer of Vienna Are not very pure or true. With my gipsy ancestress and my weird luck And my Taroc pack and my Taroc pack I may be a bit of a Jew. I have always been scared of you, With your Luftwaffe, your gobbledygoo. And your neat mustache And your Aryan eye, bright blue. Panzer-man, panzer-man, O You-- Not God but a swastika So black no sky could squeak through. Every woman adores a Fascist, The boot in the face, the brute Brute heart of a brute like you. You stand at the blackboard, daddy, In the picture I have of you, A cleft in your chin instead of your foot But no less a devil for that, no not Any less the black man who Bit my pretty red heart in two. I was ten when they buried you. At twenty I tried to die And get back, back, back to you. I thought even the bones would do. But they pulled me out of the sack, And they stuck me together with glue. And then I knew what to do. I made a model of you, A man in black with a Meinkampf look And a love of the rack and the screw. And I said I do, I do. So daddy, I'm finally through. The black telephone's off at the root, The voices just can't worm through. If I've killed one man, I've killed two-- The vampire who said he was you And drank my blood for a year, Seven years, if you want to know. Daddy, you can lie back now. There's a stake in your fat black heart And the villagers never liked you. They are dancing and stamping on you. They always knew it was you. Daddy, daddy, you bastard, I'm through. ------ "Every woman loves a fascist",lol, so true... Zoey234: Thank you for post. Can't read all at once. Too much content. Good poetry is crammed with content like it's pregnant or something. Comrade_: @Lore: **26 January 2011. Sylvia Plath was born in Boston, Massachusetts, on October 27, 1932..committed suicide in February 11, 1963. ..I never heard of her before. @Zoey, don't worry it'd only be one poet and their poem a day haaha you'll have time to keep up. Who is your favourite poet? Winter0fDiscontent: Sylvia commited suicide by placing her head in her oven. Her husband had made her life a burden. Comrade_: ~~Thursday 27 January 2011~~ [Russia] Mikhail Lermontov born October 15, 1814 [Moscow, Russia] and died July 27, 1841. sometimes called "the poet of the Caucasus" ***The Cup of Life*** When we are born, a cup appears: It is the cup of being. We wet its golden edge with tears And drink from it unseeing. But when the great delusion fails And Father Death is calling, When from our eyes - at last - the scales Once and for all are falling; We note that someone else's cup Distracted us and tempted; All was a dream, the game is up - The cup of life is empty. Winter0fDiscontent: I hate it when translated poems rhyme. It makes you wonder what the original rhyme sounded like and how forced the translation is. Comrade_: ~~Friday 28th January, 2011~~ [Italy] Dante Alighieri, (Durante degli Alighieri) born May/June c.1265 – died September 14, 1321, commonly known as Dante, was an Italian poet of the Middle Ages. **There is a gentle thought** There is a gentle thought that often springs to life in me, because it speaks of you. Its reasoning about love’s so sweet and true, the heart is conquered, and accepts these things. ‘Who is this’ the mind enquires of the heart, ‘who comes here to seduce our intellect? Is his power so great we must reject every other intellectual art? The heart replies ‘O, meditative mind this is love’s messenger and newly sent to bring me all Love’s words and desires. His life, and all the strength that he can find, from her sweet eyes are mercifully lent, who feels compassion for our inner fires.’ Comrade_: yes danke! Dante! haa ~~Saturday 29 January, 2011~~ [France] Charles Baudelaire - born in Paris in 1821 and died in Paris on August 31, 1867, in his mother's arms. was one of the greatest French poets of the 19th century. His work has been a major influence on Western poetry and modern poetry in general as, thematically, he was one of the first poets (along with Rimbaud) whose subject was often urban life and its dark side, with all of its evils and the degradation of its temptations. His poems, classical in form, introduced Symbolism, he is also known as a writer of the Decadent group. ***The Enemy*** My youth was nothing but a black storm Crossed now and then by brilliant suns. The thunder and the rain so ravage the shores Nothing's left of the fruit my garden held once. I should employ the rake and the plow, Having reached the autumn of ideas, To restore this inundated ground Where the deep grooves of water form tombs in the lees. And who knows if the new flowers you dreamed Will find in a soil stripped and cleaned The mystic nourishment that fortifies? —O Sorrow—O Sorrow—Time consumes Life, And the obscure enemy that gnaws at my heart Uses the blood that I lose to play my part. Comrade_: ~~Sunday 30 January 2011~~ [England] JOHN KEATS was born in London, October 29, 1795, and he died of consumption, February 23, 1821, in Rome. ***When I Have Fears That I May Cease To Be*** When I have fears that I may cease to be Before my pen has glean'd my teeming brain, Before high-piled books, in charactery, Hold like rich garners the full ripen'd grain; When I behold, upon the night's starr'd face, Huge cloudy symbols of a high romance, And think that I may never live to trace Their shadows, with the magic hand of chance; And when I feel, fair creature of an hour, That I shall never look upon thee more, Never have relish in the faery power Of unreflecting love;--then on the shore Of the wide world I stand alone, and think Till love and fame to nothingness do sink. Lily_in_the_Field: J <3 wonderful selections! Can I request a German poet? my german-blooded babushka | poems Chat Room Similar Conversations |