In Memoriam - Alfred Lord Tennyson

Ring out, wild bells, to the wild sky,
   The flying cloud, the frosty light:
   The year is dying in the night;
Ring out, wild bells, and let him die.

The Sanctuary - St Catherine of Sienna

It could be said that God’s foot is so vast
That this entire earth is but a
field on His
toe,

Manly Canvas - Louisa April

He smells like dead butterflies.

Dreams and poetry - Hu Shih

It’s all ordinary experience,
All ordinary images.
By chance they emerge in a dream,
Turning out infinite patterns.

December 26 - Kenn Nesbitt

A BB gun.
A model plane.
A basketball.
A ’lectric train.

Noël: Christmas Eve 1913 - Robert Bridges

Pax hominibus bonae voluntatis
A frosty Christmas Eve
   when the stars were shining
Fared I forth alone
   where westward falls the hill,

The Shortest Day - Susan Cooper

And so the Shortest Day came and the year died
And everywhere down the centuries of the snow-white world
Came people singing, dancing,
To drive the dark away.

The Wisemen - Georg Johannes Gick

After the children and the shepherds
after the poor we beg of you,
Oh, may your heavenly loving-kindness bring
our souls to pasture too.

The moment - Eavan Boland

A neighbourhood.
At dusk.

She who is always in my thoughts - Bhartrhari

She who is always in my thoughts prefers
Another man, and does not think of me.

Everything promised him to me - Anna Akhmatova

Everything promised him to me:
the fading amber edge of the sky,
and the sweet dreams of Christmas,
and the wind at Easter, loud with bells,

Quarrelling - Tao Tschung Yu

The ancients argued that friendship could never last.
A few old friends, we walk on the mountain’s milder slopes,

Friendship - Octavio Paz

It is the awaited hour
over the table falls
interminably
the lamp’s spread hair

Among the multitudes - Wislawa Szymborska

I am who I am.
A coincidence no less unthinkable
than any other.

What, no reindeer? - Bruce Levitan

Some traditions are hard to break,
like the April fool and the birthday cake.

My father - Yehuda Amichai

The memory of my father is wrapped up in
white paper, like sandwiches taken for a day at work.

White paper and time - Jaan Kaplinski

White paper and time: one I am filling,
the other fills itself.

The Bard - Vasily Andreyevich Zhukovsky

My friends, can you descry that mound of earth
Above clear waters in the shade of trees?
You can just hear the babbling spring against the bank;
You can just feel a breeze that's wafting in the leaves;
A wreath and lyre hang upon the boughs...
Alas, my friends! This mound'ss a grave;
Here earth conceals the ashes of a bard;
Poor bard!

Inspiration Comes (Fibonacci) - Jim T. Henriksen

I

am

sitting

quietly,

On your birthday, today - Ivan Donn Carswell

On your birthday, today, there is time to reflect
On the essence of our intimacy,

Code - Eavan Boland

Poet to poet.  I imagine you
  at the edge of language, at the start of summer
    in Wolfeboro, New Hampshire, writing code.
      You have no sense of time.  No sense of minutes even.
        They cannot reach inside your world,
          your gray work station
            with when yet now never and once.
              You have missed the other seven.
                This is the eight day of Creation.

A poem for Christmas - Joseph Brodsky

Imagine striking a match that night in the cave:
use the cracks in the floor to feel the cold.
Use crockery in order to feel the hunger.

Weaver - Diane Fahey

So many stories to be woven.
She worked with a furious patience,
conjuring even through dream-weary eyes
the curved brightness of dew on spider webs.

Growing Towards the Earth - Luis Rosales

When night comes and all leans on darkness,
when the night comes the sea might be asleep,
and all its strength may not suffice to move a single grain of sand,
to lend a smile to another face,

Enemy of Death - Salvatore Quasimodo

You should not have
ripped out your image
taken from us, from the world,
a portion of beauty.

I shall soon fall prey to rot - Nikolai Nekrasov

I shall soon fall prey to rot.
Though it's hard to die, it's good to die;
I shall ask for no one's pity,
And there's no one who would pity me.

The Cat And The Fox - Jean de La Fontaine

The Cat and the Fox once took a walk together,
Sharpening their wits with talk about the weather
And as their walking sharpened appetite, too;
They also took some things they had no right to.
Cream, that is so delicious when it thickens,
Pleased the Cat best. The Fox liked little chickens.

25. XII. 1993 - Joseph Brodsky

For a miracle, take one shepherd’s sheepskin, throw
in a pinch of now, a grain of long ago,
and a handful of tomorrow. Add by eye
a little chunk of space, a piece of sky,

Ten thousand flowers - Wu-men

Ten thousand flowers in spring, the moon in autumn,
a cool breeze in summer, snow in winter.

A boy's head - Miroslav Holub

In it there is a space-ship
and a project
for doing away with piano lessons.

Tempus fugit - Lothar Schwabe

How do I measure time?
In years that start at midnight
On a wintry day?

Jack Frost - Gabriel Setoun

The door was shut, as doors should be,
Before you went to bed last night;
Yet Jack Frost has got in, you see,
And left your window silver white.

Scrawled in pencil in a sealed railway car - Dan Pagis

here in this transport

I Will Just Say This - St Teresa of Ávila

We
bloomed in Spring.

When everything in life’s haze - Maksym Rylsky

When everything in life’s haze
Is lost and leaves no traces,
You don’t feel like leaving home or going home,
Because even there the fire has long ago burned out —

The bright field - R. S. Thomas

I have seen the sun break through
to illuminate a small field

We are Like Worlds - Roy Campbell

We bear to future times the secret news
That first was whispered to the new-made earth:
We are like worlds with nations in our thews,
Shaped for delight, and primed for endless birth.

Nighthawks: after Edward Hopper's painting - Wolf Wondratschek

It is night
and the city is deserted.

The day breaks quietly - Ryokan

Morning — cutting firewood, filling my jug

When you were reading those tormented lines - Afanasy Afanasevich Fet

When you were reading those tormented lines
In which the heart's resonant flame sends out glowing streams
And passion's fatal torrents rear up,—
Didn't you recall a single thing?

Genesis - Ina Kontvainytė

When I was Eve a hundred million years ago
You laughed
That same laugh,
Tolerant, and amused, delighted I was Woman

Some Summers and Springs (no. 5) - Jaan Kaplinski

God has left us — I felt it clearly
digging the earth around a rhubarb plant.

The Stars - Edith Södergran

When night comes
I stand on the steps and listen.

You’re here - Boris Pasternak

You’re here. We breathe the self same air.
Your presence here is like the city,
like quiet Kiev wrapped in sultry
sunbeams there outside the window.

Shore of Silence - Karol Wojtyla

Love explained all for me,
all was resolved by love,
to this love I adore
wherever it may be.

Falling in love - S.J. Pedro Arrupe

Nothing is more practical than
finding God, that is, than
falling in love

Yes - Brian Kennelly

I love the word
And hear its long struggle with no
Even in the bird’s throat and budging crocus.
Some winter’s night
I see it flood the faces
Of my friends, ripen their laughter
And plant early flowers in
Their conversation.

God and Galaxies (poem for Remembrance Day) - Bruce Levitan

God knows; is who knows why
Life spirals like galaxies
Faintly glimmering in the sky.
He alone is the One who sees
Our bright paths on the starry gauze.
He was there in all the wars
Waiting for us to understand the cause.

Photograph from September 11 - Wislawa Szymborska

They jumped from the burning floors –
one, two, a few more,
higher, lower.

You who wronged - Czesław Miłosz

You who wronged a simple man
Bursting into laughter at the crime,
And kept a pack of fools around you
To mix good and evil, to blur the line.

Priceless Gifts - Anna Swir

An empty day without events.
And that is why
it grew immense
as space. And suddenly
happiness of being
entered me.

10,000 years for each earth citizen - john tiong chunghoo

the earth has enough years
to give every of its citizens
10,000 years or more
to live alone on the planet

Li Fu-jen - Wu-ti

The sound of her silk skirt has stopped.
On the marble pavement dust grows.

a thousand gallons - Kobayashi Issa

a thousand gallons

Alone At Your Feet - Sant Tukaram

Consider me yours;
for I worship You, Lord.
In the company of saints,
my spirit soared.

The Flowers - Stéphane Mallarmé

From golden showers of the ancient skies,
On the first day, and the eternal snow of stars,
You once unfastened giant calyxes
For the young earth still innocent of scars:

Autumn Evening - Fyodor Ivanovich Tyutchev

There is a wistful charm, a tenderness,
Mysterious and soft, in autumn's even:
The trees in weird and brilliant garments dress,
The gory leaves to whispered talk are given;

This is what I most want - Osip Emilevich Mandelstam

This is what I most want
unpursued, alone
to reach beyond the light
that I am furthest from.

The Giraffe - Nikolai Stepanovich Gumilev

Today I see that your look is particularly sad,
And your hands are particularly fragile, clasped over your knees.
Just listen: far, far away, on Lake Chad
Roams a proud giraffe.

At the Moor - Georg Trakl

Wanderer in the blackened wind. Dry reeds whisper
in the stillness of the moor. A column of savage birds
ensues in the dawning sky.
Over murky waters they cross.

Evening Song - Matthias Claudius

The moon is risen, beaming,
The golden stars are gleaming
So brightly in the skies;
The hushed, black woods are dreaming,
The mists, like phantoms seeming,
From meadows magically rise.

The Last Picture in the World - Al Purdy

A hunched gray shape
framed by leaves
with lake water behind

I Said It To You - Paul Éluard

I said it to you for the clouds
I said it to you for the tree of the sea

A Bush Christening - A B Banjo Paterson

On the outer Barcoo where the churches are few,
And men of religion are scanty,
On a road never cross'd 'cept by folk that are lost,
One Michael Magee had a shanty.

Now it's autumn... - Mihai Eminescu

Now it's autumn, leaves roam and scatter,
Again the wind flings heavy drops against the glazing;
And you're reading old letters, tattered and fading
And retrace a whole life-time in just one hour.

The Weathercock of the Cathedral at Quito - Jorge Carrera Andrade

The cock on the weathervane
Cannot flap his wings
Even though today is a feast.

Last Words - Annette Freün von Droste-Hülshoff

When I am gone, brook no complaining,
Beloved, shed no tears, I pray!
Where I shall dwell, there peace is reigning,
There shines an everlasting day.

I picked this flower for you - Victor Hugo

I picked this flower for you on the hilltop.
In the steep scarp that overhangs the tide,
Which only eagles know and only they can reach,
Calmly she grew on the rock's creviced side.

Nature's Way - Ikkyu

The wise heathens have no knowledge;
They just keep their mind continually set on the Way.

The Thracian Filly - Anacreon

Ah tell me why you turn and fly,
 My little Thracian filly shy?
         Why turn askance
         That cruel glance,
 And think that such a dunce am I?

Evening Tea - Euphrase Kezilahabi

While we're drinking tea on the verandah
watching our children
as they swing joyfully
we ought to know our rope
has frayed and worn thin:
a few more strands and we will fall.
Once, you used to push me
up higher than half a circle;
once, I used to catch you
as you almost fell.

The Breadbaker - Albinas Zukauskas

The millstones are footworn.
The walk is overgrown with grass.
There is no doorsill.
Aspens grow where the cradle once stood.
A bird warbles for the breadbaker.

Longing - Mengistu Lemma

The train hauled me out of London —
out of the smoke, the smog, the grime,
the filthy mix of soot and dust —

Peace - Henry Vaughan

My Soul, there is a country
     Afar beyond the stars,
Where stands a winged sentry
     All skillful in the wars;

Marseilles - Frédéric Mistral

Thou fair Marseilles, who openest on the sea
Thy haughty eyes and gazest languidly,

The Combat (The Hunter and the Hero - Book XI) - Bhāravi

Towering like a forest tree
   Stood the God of the lofty mind,
And his darksome hosts remained
   Like his shadow cast behind.

Mince and Tatties - J. K. Annand

I dinna like hail tatties
Pit on my plate o mince
For when I tak my denner
I eat them baith at yince.

Fiesole - Giosuè Carducci

Where Fiesole saw from her citadel
The livid Arno once stagnate, the place
Where flowers Sulla's city, now slow of pace
Franciscans climb, recalled by clanging bell.

These poems, she said - Robert Bringhurst

These poems, these poems,
these poems, she said, are poems
with no love in them. 

When Morning Breaks - Corsino Fortes

Oh when
Oh when the morning breaks
And the night becomes more night
When the morning breaks
With its feet on the ground
And the earth in its heart
When blood flows from the body
Like a tree with open arms
And the seed shouts from the rock
Like a green-mouthed drum
And from that sound
That warrior’s blood
Mouths are born
centred mouths
torn mouths
In the wheel of the sun

De Chaos - Gerard Nolst Trenité

Dearest creature in creation,
Study English pronunciation.
I will teach you in my verse
Sounds like corpse, corps, horse, and worse.
I will keep you, Suzy, busy,
Make your head with heat grow dizzy.
Tear in eye, your dress will tear.
So shall I! Oh hear my prayer.

You Still Wonder - John M Wenitong

I know you wonder why - them Abos get so mu$h
Once we could sing and dance and fly man you're really out of touch
We bin seen the white man comin all ran down to say g'day
But he used his guns an know-all eye blew lots of us away

Old Canal Waters - Georges Rodenbach

The waters of the old canals are mentally feeble,
so mournful, among the dead towns, along the quais

The Canoe - Isabella Valancy Crawford

My masters twain made me a bed
Of pine-boughs resinous, and cedar;
Of moss, a soft and gentle breeder
Of dreams of rest; and me they spread
With furry skins, and laughing said,
"Now she shall lay her polish'd sides,
As queens do rest, or dainty brides,
Our slender lady of the tides!"

cool air (two Haiku) - Kobayashi Issa

cool air--

Two chambers has the heart - Hermann Neumann

Two chambers has the heart
Wherein do dwell
Sorrow and Joy apart.

The prayer of the Horse - Carmen Bernos de Gasztold

See, Lord,
my coat hangs in tatters,
like homespun, old, threadbare.

All that I had of zest,
all my strength,
I have given in hard work
and kept nothing back for myself.

Now
my poor head swings
to offer up all the loneliness of my heart.

Dear God,
stiff on my thickened legs
I stand here before You:
Your unprofitable servant.
Oh! of Your goodness,
give me a gentle death.

---

Carmen Bernos de Gasztold (1919 - 1995) France
Translated by Rumer Godden

Source: Prayers From the Ark

The gift - Kevin Hart

One day the gift arrives — outside your door,
Left on a windowsill, inside the mailbox,
Or in the hallway, far too large to lift.

Spring - Antonio Vivaldi

Allegro
The festive Spring has arrived,
The birds celebrate her return with happy songs,

Autumn scenes - Balys Sruoga

I
We went walking in the morning just before the sun was rising.
Sad the orchard, sad our thoughts were, sad too was the autumn morning.

Lausavísur - Einarr Skúlason

Lord of the Mœrir,
I have good tidings to tell you,
so that there is no lack of it;
your glory is great;
you are most wise.
Reddener of shields,
slender-fingered Ívarr from Fløan
has not come here;
continue to stay quietly with her.

The Vigour of his White Body - Dulduityn Danzanravjaa

The vigour of his white body,
Vital and toned,
Brings forth thoughts
Of meeting with his lovliness.
Spring’s gentle winds

The Mediator - Hans Sachs

O Christ, true Son of God most high,
Thy name we praise for ever;
Whoe'er to Thee for help doth cry
Shall find Thee fail him never;
'Tis Thou wilt plead,
Thou intercede
With God, for us who need Thy prayers so sore:
Thy bitter strife
Hath wrought us life,
And Thine be thanks and praise for evermore!

Speak while There Is Time - Confucius

Plop Fall the plums; but there are still seven
Let those gentlemen that would court me
Come while it is lucky!

Heimweh - Lala Fisher

The silver sea creeps in to kiss
    The harbour's wooded edges,
And bears to ocean's wilderness
    The scent of may-sweet hedges.
The white-winged boats glide gently in,
    With scarce a breeze to guide them;
While shyly-peeping stars begin
    And gem the waves beside them.

A fairy-tale story - Jarmila Gajdová

I'm one of the guests
invited to take part
in the royal dinner.

Permanence - Duncan Campbell Scott

Set within a desert lone,
    Circled by an arid sea,
Stands a figure carved in stone,
    Where a fountain used to be.

Sonnet - Luís Vas de Camões

Leave me, all sweet refrains my lip hath made;
Leave me, all instruments attuned for song;

LORD, I ask a garden - Alfonso Guillén Zelaya

LORD, I ask a garden in a quiet spot
Where there may be a brook with a good flow,
An humble little house covered with bell-flowers
And a woman and a son who shall resemble Thee.

The Danube - Ján Kollár

Duna! thou queen of many rivers,—thou
Of all Slavonia, venerable mother!

my love - e.e. cummings

my love
thy hair is one kingdom
the king whereof is darkness

Intoxicated by the Wine of Love - Farīd ud-Dīn ʿAṭṭār

Intoxicated by the Wine of Love.
From each a mystic silence Love demands.
What do all seek so earnestly? 'Tis Love.

Love endures hardships at the hands of the Beloved - Jalal al-Din Rumi

Through love bitter things seem sweet,
Through love bits of copper are made gold.

Autumn Song - Dante Alighieri

Know’st thou not at the fall of the leaf
How the heart feels a languid grief
Laid on it for a covering,
And how sleep seems a goodly thing
In Autumn at the fall of the leaf?

How Humble is God - Kabir

God is the tree in the forest that
allows itself to die and will not defend itself in front of those
with the axe, not wanting to cause them
shame.

Rumour from the past - Chonggi Mah

Wind, you really give up so easily.
One evening a little while back you roared
knocking, knocking at the windows and the next day
the whole world was piled with fallen leaves
as the wind waved an elderly hand
from that lofty sky above.
Your voice is a chill in the spine,
the monotonous dream of a winter tree sleeping.

Johannesburg - Feyisayo Anjorin

Writing on the walls of history
in the city of gold
keeps you on your toes
fixes your eyes on your goals

Carcassonne - Gustave Nadaud

'I'm growing old, I've sixty years;
I've labored all my life in vain:
In all that time of hopes and fears
I've failed my dearest wish to gain.
I see full well that here below
Bliss unalloyed there is for none.
My prayer will ne'er fulfilment know
I never have seen Carcassonne!

The Sad Mother - Gabriela Mistral

Sleep, sleep, my beloved,
without worry, without fear,
although my soul does not sleep,
although I do not rest.

The March of Xerxes - Luigi Alamanni

When in the wantonness of kingly pride,

Deeply repentant of my sinful ways - Gaspara Stampa

Deeply repentant of my sinful ways
And of my trivial, manifold desires,

The Answer - George Remington

And if the rich and poor should meet
I trust they will each other greet,
And rich and poor and young and old
Together screen them from the cold:

He Jests Concerning His Poverty - Bartolomeo di Sant' Angelo

I am so passing rich in poverty
    That I could furnish forth Paris and Rome,

Arraignment Of The Men - Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz

Males perverse, schooled to condemn
Women by your witless laws,
Though forsooth you are prime cause
Of that which you blame in them:

Calm After Storm - Giacomo Leopardi

The storm hath passed;
I hear the birds rejoice; the hen,
Returned into the road again,

To Celia - Francisco Balagtas

If I recall and read again
those days in love’s long-faded script,
would there be not a mark or trace
but Celia’s, imprinted on my breast?

Empty Houses - Mary Colborne-Veel

I
There's not a person in the street,
This merry-making summer day!
The houses stand in dull array;
No profit on their doors to beat,
For all their owners are away.

For Us! 1915 - S. Reinhold

Far, far in the east is a gaping grave,
There they bury thousands of soldiers brave
For us!

God - Sri Aurobindo

Thou who pervadest all the worlds below,
Yet sitst above,

Absence - Abu Bakr al-Turtushi

Every night I scan
the heavens with my eyes
seeking the star
that you are contemplating.

When you think of technology - Neema Komba

There you go with your technology,
Enthusiasts,
Preachers of how the world is not how it seems,
Once round and big, now within my reach.

The Pen - Muhammad al-Ghuzzi

Take a pen in your uncertain fingers.

Ado - Mary Ursula Bethell

It grows too fast! I cannot keep pace with it!
While I mow the front lawns, the drying green becomes impossible;
While I weed the east path, from the west path spring dandelions,
What time I sort the borders, the orchard escapes me.

To my friends - Primo Levi

Dear friends, and here I say friends
In the broad sense of the word:
Wife, sister, associates, relatives,
Schoolmates of both sexes,
People seen only once
Or frequented all my life;
Provided that between us, for at least a moment,
A line has been stretched,
A well-defined bond.

The Story of Isaac - Leonard Cohen

The door it opened slowly,
my father he came in,
I was nine years old.
And he stood so tall above me,
his blue eyes they were shining
and his voice was very cold.
He said, “I've had a vision
and you know I'm strong and holy,
I must do what I've been told.”

Song - Oodgeroo Noonuccal

Life is ours in vain
Lacking love, which never
Counts the loss or gain.
But remember, ever
Love is linked with pain.

Fireflies - Rolf Jacobsen

It was that evening with fireflies
while we were waiting for the bus to Velletri

The Prayer of the Lark - Carmen Bernos de Gasztold

I am here! O my God.
I am here! I am here!

The same inside - Anna Swir

Walking to your place for a love feast
I saw at a street corner
an old beggar woman.

Father, where do the wild swans go? - Ludvig Holstein

Father, where do the wild swans go?
Far, far. Ceaselessly winging,
Their necks outstraining, they haste them singing
Far, far. Whither, none may know.

The good news - Thích Nhat Hanh

They don’t publish
the good news.
The good news is published
by us.

In Flanders fields - John McCrae

In Flanders fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses, row on row,
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.

Hints on pronounciation for foreigners - TSW

I take it you already know
Of tough and bough and cough and dough?
Others may stumble, but not you,
On hiccough, thorough, laugh and through.
Well done! And now you wish, perhaps,
To learn of these familiar traps.

The Cashier - Andrei Voznesensky

The dumb herd scowled:
“You’ve short-changed us,” they howled.
Pennies like medals stuck in the crust
Of sawdust.

Serranilla - Íñigo López de Mendoza

From Calatrava as I took my way
At holy Mary's shrine to kneel and pray,
And sleep upon my eyelids heavy lay,
There where the ground was very rough and wild,
I lost my path and met a peasant child:
From Finojosa, with the herds around her,
There in the fields I found her.

With a Green Scarf - Marin Sorescu

Listen.

With a green scarf I blindfolded
the eyes of the trees
and asked them to catch me.

Every church sings its own soft part - Osip Emilevich Mandelstam

Every church sings its own soft part
In the polyphony of a girl's choir,
And in the stone arches of the Assumption
I make out high, arched brows.

Conscience - Walter Wingate

'Twas a bonnie day – and a day o' dule
The day I plunkit the Sawbath schule!

The bear - Oleh Lysheha

After dining in the moonlight,
He sorted the bones —

the grandmother - Humberto Ak'abal

The night begins,
when the moon
—Grandmother of the villages—
comes out with her lime-white candle
to light up the silence.

A Song for My Father - Delores Gauntlett

Against the yam-vine quiet of the garden
a nightingale stirred with my father: the lift
and fall of the pickaxe, the heaving throat
of the hidden bird exacting
the subtleties of song.
This would become the memory of high grass
brushing wet against the black waterboots.

The Poet’s Voice - Khalil Reza Uluturk

I don’t want freedom gram by gram, grain by grain.

Some Bright Elegance - Kayo Chingonyi

For the screwfaced in good shoes that paper
the walls of dance halls. I have little patience.
I say dance, not to be seen but to be free, your feet
are made for better things. Feel the bitterness
in you lift as it did for a six year old Bojangles
tapping a living out of Richmond beer gardens
to the delight of a crowd that wasn’t lynching
today but laughing at the quickness of the kid.

The way leaves crackle - Eugene Dubnov

The way leaves crackle, snow crunches on the ears,
The way the dog scrabbles at the rustling leaves and the snow.

Imagine the scene - Bruce Levitan

If it wasn't for the
pain
You might almost think the scene
inspiring.

Maungatua - Alexander Bathgate

The spirits' mountain, such the name
The early Maori gave:
Where's his forgotten grave?
We know not; but thou'rt still the same
Gloomy and dread Maungatua.

My Country - Ricardo Miró

Such a small country, spread on an isthmus
where the sky is clearer, the sun brighter;
all your music echoes within me, like the sea
in the small cell of the conch.

Life's Gifts - Olive Shriner

I saw a woman sleeping.
In her sleep she dreamt Life stood before her,
and held in each hand a gift –
in the one Love, in the other Freedom.
And she said to the woman, ‘Choose!’

Water - Pablo Neruda

Everything on earth bristled, the bramble
pricked and the green thread
bit, the petal fell
until the only flower was the falling.

Pour Us Wine - Amir ibn Kolthum

Rise and hold up the curved glass,
And pour us wine of the morning, of El Andar.

To Lady Mori - Ikkyu

The most beautiful and truest of all women;
Her songs the fresh, pure melody of love.
A voice and sweet smile that rends my heart—
I'm in a spring forest of lovely cherry-apples.

The Crucifixion of Christ - William Topaz McGonagall

Then Pilate, the Roman Governor, took Jesus and scourged Him,
And the soldiers platted a crown of thorns, and thought it no sin
To put it on His head, while meekly Jesus stands;
They put on Him a purple robe, and smote Him with their hands.

Love Sonnet XII - Pablo Neruda

Full woman, fleshly apple, hot moon,
thick smell of seaweed, crushed mud and light,
what obscure brilliance opens between your columns?
What ancient night does a man touch with his senses?

The Lake Isle of Innisfree - W. B. Yeats

I will arise and go now, and go to Innisfree,
And a small cabin build there, of clay and wattles made:
Nine bean-rows will I have there, a hive for the honey-bee;
And live alone in the bee-loud glade.

Lesbia Railing - Catullus

Lesbia forever on me rails.
To talk of me, she never fails.
Now, hang me, but for all her art,
I find that I have gained her heart.

Past and Future - Sarojini Naidu

The new hath come and now the old retires:
And so the past becomes a mountain-cell,
Where lone, apart, old hermit-memories dwell
In consecrated calm, forgotten yet
Of the keen heart that hastens to forget
Old longings in fulfilling new desires.

To be born a man - Adela Zamudio

She works so hard
to make up for the sloth
of her husband, and in the house
(Pardon my surprise.)
he's so inept and pompous,
that of course he's the boss
because he's a man!

Curtains! - Jón Thoroddsen

It's raining roses. The angels clap and shout. God Almighty bows and smiles.
A young, inexperienced angel cannot restrain himself. He flaps his wings and shouts: Long live God Almighty. He lives!
The heavens shake with congratulatory shouts, but God Almighty pauses, biting his lip. He is eternal. He smiles and bows.

Yesterday - Nora May French

Now all my thoughts were crisped and thinned
    To elfin threads, to gleaming browns.
Like tawny grasses lean with wind
    They drew your heart across the downs.
Your will of all the winds that blew
    They drew across the world to me
To thread my whimsey thoughts of you
    Along the downs, above the sea.

South - Kamau Brathwaite

But today I recapture the islands'
bright beaches:  blue mist from the ocean
rolling into the fishermen's houses.
By these shores I was born:  sound of the sea
came in at my window, life heaved and breathed in me then
with the strength of that turbulent soil.

Twilight - Joaquín Arcadio Pagaza

Slowly the sun descends at fall of night,
And rests on clouds of amber, rose and red;
The mist upon the distant mountains shed
Turns to a rain of gold and silver light.

No One Plants Fish in the Sea - Flávio de Araújo

Cast your net, fisherman.
To wrap blue silk around the woman
praying on the wharf.
To pay for the children's notebooks.
To keep the storeowner
from turning away.

Banquet at the Tso Family Manor - Du Fu

The windy forest is chequered
By the light of the setting,
Waning moon. I tune the lute,
Its strings are moist with dew.

Matins - Charles Van Gorkom

A sickle of moon is caught
in the branches of cottonwoods
along the ice choked river.

The Willow-Leaf - Chang Chiu Ling

I am in love with a child dreaming at the window.

All Things Drink - Anacreon

Fruitful earth drinks up the rain;

Alone - Georges Rodenbach

To live as in exile, to live seeing no-one
in the vast desert of a town that is dying,
where one hears nothing but the vague murmur
of an organ sobbing, or the belfry tolling.

Sonnet de l’Absinthe - Raoul Ponchon

Absinthe, O my lively liquor,
It seems, when I drink you
I inhale the young forest’s soul
During the beautiful green season.

To my Husband on our Wedding-Day - Rosanna Eleanor Leprohon

I leave for thee, beloved one,
    The home and friends of youth,
Trusting my hopes, my happiness,
    Unto thy love and truth;
I leave for thee my girlhood's joys,
    Its sunny, careless mirth,
To bear henceforth my share amid
    The many cares of earth.

On Wings of Song - Heinrich Heine

On wings of song—ah, lightly,
Heart’s dearest, I bear thee away:
A nook is beckoning brightly
Where Ganges’ waters play.

The Immortality of Israel - Yehudah HaLevi

The sun and moon unchanging do obey
The laws that never cease or night or day.

Novel - Arthur Rimbaud

I.

No one's serious at seventeen.
—On beautiful nights when beer and lemonade
And loud, blinding cafés are the last thing you need
—You stroll beneath green lindens on the promenade.

The Beggar - José de Espronceda

The world is mine; I am free as air;
Let others work that I may eat;
All shall melt at my piteous prayer:—
"An alms, for God's sake, I entreat."

Ithaka - Constantine P. Cavafy

As you set out for Ithaka
hope your road is a long one,
full of adventure, full of discovery.

Vondel's Lucifer (Act I, lines 96-121) - Joost van den Vondel

Belzebub:
Now tell me of man's features and his form.

Washing-Day - Anna Lætitia Barbauld

The Muses are turned gossips; they have lost
The buskin'd step, and clear high-sounding phrase,
Language of gods. Come, then, domestic Muse,
In slip-shod measure loosely prattling on

The Celestial Weaver - T`ung Han-ching

A thing of stone beside Lake Kouen-ming
Has for a thousand autumns borne the name
Of the Celestial Weaver.

Song of Man XXV - Khalil Gibran

I was here from the moment of the
Beginning, and here I am still. And
I shall remain here until the end
Of the world, for there is no
Ending to my grief-stricken being.

First The Dog - Zbigniew Herbert

So first the faithful dog will go
and after it a pig or ass
through the black grass will beat a track
along it will the first man steal
who with iron hand will smother
on his glass brow a drop of fear

To a friend asking for help (Capitolo 18) - Veronica Franco

Most illustrious sir, the capitolo
that I came yesterday to show you
was not, in fact, my own invention;

Acrostic - Chibuzor Immaculata Ikemenogo

A poem or puzzle in which
Certain letters in each line
Represents a word
Or words.
So, i thought i should
Try writing one
Instead i
Came up with this

---

Chibuzor Immaculata Ikemenogo (20th century) Nigeria

Sydney Cove, 1788 - Roderic Quinn

She sat on the rocks, her fireless eyes
Teased and tired with the thoughts of yore;
And paining her sense were alien skies,
An alien sea and an alien shore.

Clair de Lune - Paul Verlaine

Your soul is as a moonlit landscape fair,
   Peopled with maskers delicate and dim,
That play on lutes and dance and have an air
   Of being sad in their fantastic trim.

The banks of the Dee - John Tait

'Twas summer, and softly the breezes were blowing,
And sweetly the nightingale sung from the tree,
At the foot of a rock where the river was flowing,
I sat myself down on the banks of the Dee.
Flow on, lovely Dee, flow on, thou sweet river,
Thy banks' purest stream shall be dear to me ever,
For there first I gain'd the affection and favour
Of Jamie, the glory and pride of the Dee.

Liber V.LVIII (To Morrow you will live) - Marcus Valerius Martialis

To Morrow you will live, you always cry;
In what far Country does this Morrow lye,

Sapho's Ode out of Longinus - Sappho

                            I
   The Gods are not more blest than he,
Who fixing his glad Eyes on thee,
With thy bright Rays his Senses chears,
And drinks with ever thirsty ears.
The charming Musick of thy Tongue,
Does ever hear, and ever long;
That sees with more than humane Grace,
Sweet smiles adorn thy Angel Face.

Spring Cattle - Louis Esson

With bells the bush tinkles,
   Men shout, hard hoofs rattle.
Spring sharpens the nostrils
   Of winter-wild cattle.

Yarns after yarns - Meng Jiao

Yarns after yarns,
Mother's busy weaving,

Shut out the noise - Georges Rodenbach

She is the lady of my Silence
Trailing wearily, with very gentle step

After Sunset - William Allingham

The vast and solemn company of clouds
Around the Sun's death, lit, incarnadined,

Pandangaran - Catharina Boer

Repelled in time, we are:
little wooden houses behind crude stones
against the sea, fishermen who graze
the bottom, deep abrasion to survive.

The Theatre of the Humble - Julio Herrera y Reissig

The countryside is as the Bible says…
evening sinks down among the hills to die;
a final flash of sunlight threads through high
towers, aligning fairy lattices.

When Plaintively And Near The Cricket Sings - Nora May French

Now evening comes.  Now stirs my discontent...
            Oh ache of smallest, unforgotten things!
How sharp you are when day and dark are blent,
  When beetles hurry by with vibrant wings,
  And plaintively and near the cricket sings.

The Raven Who Would Rival The Eagle - Jean de La Fontaine

An Eagle swooped from out the sky,
And carried off a sheep.
A Raven seeing him, said: "I
Could do that too if I should try.
His meal comes mighty cheap."

Cædmon's Hymn - Cædmon

Now let me praise the keeper of Heaven's kingdom,
the might of the Creator, and his thought,

Give Me Welcome All with Cheer - Walter von der Vogelweide

Give me welcome all with cheer!
Harken, what my tidings fair shall be.
All that you were wont to hear
Is a very trifle: now ask me.
But give me my reward!
Then, if that be good,
I shall tell what you will hear with joyful mood.
Take care, and honours fit accord!

I Would I Might Forget That I am I (Sonnet VII) - George Santayana

I would I might forget that I am I,
And break the heavy chain that binds me fast,
Whose links about myself my deeds have cast.

The Dying Hunter to his Dog - Susanna Moodie

Lie down — lie down! — my noble hound,
      That joyful bark give o'er;
It wakes the lonely echoes round,
      But rouses me no more —
Thy lifted ears, thy swelling chest,
      Thy eyes so keenly bright,
No longer kindle in my breast
      The thrill of fierce delight;
When following thee on foaming steed
My eager soul outstripped thy speed —

The Moonbeam - Luis G. Urbina

Moonbeam, come in! Thou art a welcome guest.
'Tis long since I have seen thy silver flame.
Although I left the casement open wide,
Shadows alone into my chamber came.

Deceased are the patrician mansions - Georges Rodenbach

Deceased are the patrician mansions,
And eternally enfolded in silence

Kleven - Jorgen Ingebrektsem Moe

Tread near the brink of the mountain here,
And let my home’s fair, blooming valley
With friendly greeting round us rally
The sons of countries far and near.
The lofty peaks with brows of snow,
The darksome woods and plains below,
The shining lakes,—all chime and sing
The glory of our Norway’s spring.

The Atheist And The Acorn - Anne Kingsmill Finch

Methinks this World is oddly made,
And ev'ry thing's amiss,
A dull presuming Atheist said,
As stretch'd he lay beneath a Shade;
And instanced in this:

At Sea - Ada Cambridge

    When the investing darkness growls,
    And deep reverberates to deep;
    When keyhole whines and chimney howls,
    And all the roofs and windows weep;
    Then, through the doorless walls of sleep,
    The still-sealed ear and shuttered sight,
    Phantoms of memory steal and creep,
    The very ghosts of sound and light —
Dream-visions and dream-voices of a bygone night.

On Meeting an Official Courier to the Capital - Cen Shen

East I look to my homestead, O long, long is the way;

Praise of Little Women - Juan Ruíz

I wish to make my sermon brief,—to shorten my oration,—
For a never-ending sermon is my utter detestation;
I like short women,—suits at law without procrastination,—
And am always most delighted with things of short duration.

Sterling Brings It - Dennis Vincent Brutus

From the blue and silver
fading to grey and darkness
over Chicago’s band shell
Sterling brings it

The Hedgehog - Carmen Bernos de Gasztold

Yes, Lord, I prick!
Life is not easy —
But You know that —
and I have too much on my shoulders!

Drinking alone with the moon - Li Bai

From a pot of wine among the flowers
I drank alone. There was no one with me —
Till, raising my cup, I asked the bright moon
To bring me my shadow and make us three.

Sonnet XIX - John Milton

When I consider how my light is spent,
Ere half my days, in this dark world and wide,

The Runaway - Evaleen Stein

A frantic clatter of horses' feet!
A runaway's coming down the street!
         Flurry, scurry,
         Children, hurry!

The Lily Bed - Isabella Valancy Crawford

His cedar paddle, scented, red,
He thrust down through the lily bed;

Invocation of Ireland - Amergin Glúingel

I request the land of Ireland (to come forth)
coursed is the wild sea
wild the crying mountains
crying the generous woods

’Tis The Feast Of Corn - Paul Verlaine

’Tis the feast of corn, ’tis the feast of bread,
   On the dear scene returned to, witnessed again!
So white is the light o’er the reapers shed
   Their shadows fall pink on the level grain.

Anthony and Cleopatra - Jose-Maria de Heredia

Together from the terrace they could see
Egypt bed down beneath a sultry sky;
through the black delta, fatly, massively,
to Saïs or Bubastis, Nile rolled by.

Arrival of the Emperor - Osmer Eder Balam

I know how much you wish to see me fall;
That in my life’s biography, death overshadows my feet
But speak not ill words that poison the wind
For you waste your energy, my author of deceit.

Fear Not, Dear Friend, But Freely Live Your Days - Robert Louis Stevenson

Fear not, dear friend, but freely live your days
Though lesser lives should suffer. Such am I,
A lesser life, that what is his of sky

Above Eurunderee - Henry Lawson

There are scenes in the distance where beauty is not,
On the desolate flats where gaunt appletrees rot.
Where the brooding old ridge rises up to the breeze
From his dark lonely gullies of stringy-bark trees,
There are voice-haunted gaps, ever sullen and strange,
But Eurunderee lies like a gem in the range.

The Veteran - Esaias Tegnér

I love the old heroic times
  Of Charles the Twelfth, our country’s glory,
And deem them fittest for the scenes
  Of stern or tender story;

Scythe Song - Andrew Lang

Mowers, weary and brown, and blithe,
What is the word methinks ye know —
Endless over-word that the scythe
Sings to the blades of the grass below?

The Himalayas (The Hunter and the Hero - Book V) - Bhāravi

The towering Himalaya rose,
   Surpassing mighty Meru high,
To view the limits of wide space,
   Perchance to scale the lofty sky!

To a Poor Old Woman - William Carlos Williams

munching a plum on
the street a paper bag
of them in her hand

Wild Rose - Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Once a lad a rose did spy,
On the moorland growing,
Young and lovely to the eye;
Fast he ran to see it nigh,
Ran with pleasure glowing.
Red rose, red rose, red rose red,
On the moorland growing.

April showers - anonymous

When April skies begin to frown,
And the cold rain comes pelting down,
We must not grumble nor complain,
Nor idly say, we hate the rain.

Advice to Mrs. Mowat - Anne Hecht

Dear Hetty —
                       Since the single state
You've left to choose yourself a mate,
Since metamorphosed to a wife,
And bliss or woe insured for life,
A friendly muse the way should show
To gain the bliss and miss the woe.

The Monkey And The Cat - Jean de La Fontaine

Jocko the Monkey, Mouser—his chum, the Cat,
Had the same master. Both were sleek and fat,
And mischievous. If anything went wrong,
The neighbours where not blamed. Be sure of that.

The Ballad of the Dead Ladies - François Villon

Tell me now, in what hidden way is
Lady Flora, the lovely Roman?
Where's Hipparchia, and where is Thaïs?
Neither of them the fairer woman?
Where is Echo, beheld of no man,
Only heard on river and mere—
She whose beauty was more than human?
But where are the snows of yesteryear?

Still Too Far Away - Xuân Diệu

The other day you sat too far away from me
So I asked you to move over a bit closer.
You inched over closer, but I demurred.
To be a good girl you inched still closer.
As I was boiling over, in haste with a smile
You scooted closer soothing, "Here I am!"
I brightened up then scowled at once
For I thought, you were still too far away.

The Corn Husker - Emily Pauline Johnson (Tekahionwake)

Hard by the Indian lodges, where the bush
  Breaks in a clearing, through ill-fashioned fields,
She comes to labour, when the first still hush
  Of autumn follows large and recent yields.

The Last Piper - Edward J. O’Brien

Dark winds of the mountain,
White winds of the sea,
Are skirling the pibroch
Of Seumas an Righ.

Flung to the Heedless Winds - Martin Luther

Flung to the heedless winds,
Or on the waters cast,
The martyrs' ashes, watched,
Shall gathered be at last.

If You Forget Me - Pablo Neruda

I want you to know
one thing.

Sunbeam - Anna Akhmatova

I pray to the sunbeam from the window -
It is pale, thin, straight.

Beg-Innish - John Millington Synge

Bring Kateen-beug and Maurya Jude
To dance in Beg-Innish,
And when the lads (they're in Dunquin)
Have sold their crabs and fish,
Wave fawny shawls and call them in,
And call the little girls who spin,
And seven weavers from Dunquin,
To dance in Beg-Innish.

Stars in the Sea - Roderic Quinn

I took a boat on a starry night
And went for a row on the Water,
And she danced like a child on a wake of light
And bowed where the ripples caught her.

The Ould Has-Been - Cicely Fox Smith

All down by the harbour a-walking one day,
I saw an old hulk by the wharf-side that lay,
Her topmasts lopped off and her paint weathered bare,
Red rust flaking off her, and no one to care.

The Blessed Nation - Georgia C. Elliott

He holds in remembrance
Each one of His fold;
Their hairs are all numbered,
Their names are all told;
Their prayers are all answered,
Their cries are all heard:
How blessed is the nation
Whose God is the Lord!

The soul and the body on the beach - Anna Swir

The soul on the beach
studies a textbook of philosophy.
The soul asks the body:
Who bound us together?
The body says:
Time to tan the knees.

Tigers at Play - Stafford Beer

Sea birds stand on a rocky wall
                  evening is here.
        Farewell to sunshine today.

By Night when Others Soundly Slept - Anne Bradstreet

By night when others soundly slept
And hath at once both ease and Rest,
My waking eyes were open kept
And so to lie I found it best.

In the Express Train - Ludwig Fulda

I hasten by a city lightning-fast
Here in the rattling train: I see
Streets, houses, people shooting past,

Say, How Many Stars Are Glowing - Wilhelm Hey

Say, how many stars are glowing
On the heavens’ deep blue dome?
Say, how many clouds are going,
Over all the world to roam?
God our Lord has told their host,
That no single one is lost,
Though their number be so great.

Longing - Joseph Freiherr von Eichendorff

The stars were so golden and glistening;
I stood by the window alone,
To songs of the post-horn listening,
O’er silent moorland blown.
My heart within me was burning.
“To travel—ah, what delight!”
I thought in my secret yearning,
In the glorious summer night.

The Wish - Aleksandr Pushkin

I shed my tears; my tears – my consolation;
And I am silent; my murmur is dead,

Easter Monday - Eleanor Farjeon

(In Memoriam E.T.)
In the last letter that I had from France
You thanked me for the silver Easter egg

Easter - Katharine Tynan

Bring flowers to strew His way,
Yea, sing, make holiday;
Bid young lambs leap,
And earth laugh after sleep.

Go To That Impenetrable Realm - Mirabai

Go to that impenetrable realm
That death himself trembles to look upon.
There plays the fountain of love
With swans sporting on its waters.

Salvator Mundi: Via Crucis - Denise Levertov

Maybe He looked indeed
much as Rembrandt envisioned Him
in those small heads that seem in fact
portraits of more than a model.

If My Voice Is Not Reaching You - Afzal Ahmed Syed

If my voice is not reaching you
add to it the echo
echo of ancient epics

Eve and Lilith - Seamus O'Sullivan

With Adam I have mourned for Lilith flown;
Yea, walked disconsolate in Paradise,

The Depth of a Landscape - Kim Sa-In

In gusting wind
short-stemmed plants shudder and tremble
yet no one pays attention.

A Thousand Desires - Mirza Ghalib

Thousands of desires, each worth dying for...
Many of them I have realised... yet I yearn for more...

A young Levite among priests - Osip Emilevich Mandelstam

A young Levite among priests,
He remained long on morning watch.
Jewish night grew thick around him,
The ruined temple was solemnly being raised.

They've Come - Alfonsina Storni

Today my mother and sisters
came to see me.

If You Are Seeking Allah - Shah Abdul Latif Bhittai

If you are seeking Allah,
Then keep clear of religious formalities.
Those who have seen Allah
Are away from all religions!
Those who do not see Allah here,
How will they see Him beyond?

To Margarita Debayle - Rubén Darío

Margarita, how beautiful the sea is:
still and blue.
The orange blossom in the breezes
drifting through.
The skylark in its glory
has your accent too:
Here, Margarita, is a story
made for you.

A Conceited Mistake - Vasko Popa

Once upon a time there was a mistake
So silly so small
That no one would even have noticed it

A Song Of Poppies - Virna Sheard

I love red poppies! Imperial red poppies!
Sun-worshippers are they;
Gladly as trees live through a hundred summers
They live one little day.

Cantiga de Santa Maria, No. 100 - Alfonso X El Sabio

Mary, magnified be,
with Daystar beside thee;
show the way where bide we
true to God and thou our guide be.

Hunger Camp At Jaslo - Wislawa Szymborska

Write it. Write. In ordinary ink
on ordinary paper: they were given no food,
they all died of hunger. "All. How many?

At crow's nest pass - Emily Pauline Johnson (Tekahionwake)

At Crow's Nest Pass the mountains rend
Themselves apart, the rivers wend
A lawless course about their feet,
And breaking into torrents beat
In useless fury where they blend
At Crow's Nest Pass.

from: Vikramankadevacarita - Bilhana Kavi

After scaling the peaks
of the of the curving-browed girl’s breasts,

Jerusalem - Nizar Qabbani

I wept until my tears were dry
I prayed until the candles flickered
I knelt until the floor creaked

While lounging in a chair - Afanasy Afanasevich Fet

While lounging in a chair, I looked up at the ceiling
   Where, teasing my imagination,
A circle hangs above the quiet lamp,
   And spins just like a ghostly shadow.

It was with awe - Matsuo Basho

It was with awe
That I beheld
Fresh leaves, green leaves,
Bright in the sun.

---

Matsuo Basho (1644 - 1694) Japan
Tranlsated by Nobuyuki Yuasa

A cold rain starting - Matsuo Basho

A cold rain starting
And no hat—
So?

Before the white chrysanthemum - Yosa Buson

Before the white chrysanthemum

Prabhujee - Ravi Shankar

Oh Master, show some compassion on me,
Please come and dwell in my heart.

Luna - Erik Johan Stagnelius

Deep slumber hung o'er sea and hill and plain;
With pale pink cheek fresh from her watery caves
Slow rose the moon out of the midnight waves,
Like Venus out of ocean born again.

Sitting under white branches - Heinrich Heine

Sitting under white branches,
You can hear the wind blowing,
In blankets of mist shrouded,
See the silent clouds flowing.

To Roosevelt - Rubén Darío

The voice that would reach you, Hunter, must speak
in Biblical tones, or in the poetry of Walt Whitman.
You are primitive and modern, simple and complex;
you are one part George Washington and one part Nimrod.
You are the United States,
future invader of our naive America
with its Indian blood, an America
that still prays to Christ and still speaks Spanish.

Indra - August Strindberg

Down to the sand-covered earth.
Straw from the harvested fields soiled our feet;
Dust from the high-roads,
Smoke from the cities,
Foul-smelling breaths,
Fumes from cellars and kitchens,
All we endured.
Then to the open sea we fled,
Filling our lungs with air,
Shaking our wings,
And laving our feet.

The Shining Hours (XVII) - Emile Verhaeren

That we may love each other through our eyes,
    Let us our glances lave, and make them clear
Of all the thousand glances that they here
Have met, in this base world of servile lies.

The Temple Tank - Govinda Krishna Chettur

Here, by this pool, where herons stand and wait,
In quietness I cannot imitate:

There's Nae Luck about the House (The Mariner's Wife) - William Mickle

And are ye sure the news is true?
    And are ye sure he's weel?
Is this a time to think o' wark?
    Mak haste, lay by your wheel;
Is this the time to spin a thread
    When Colin's at the door?
Reach me my cloak, I'll to the quay
    And see him come ashore.
For there's nae luck about the house,
    There's nae luck at a',
There's little pleasure in the house
    When our gudeman's awa.

Advice: to himself - Catullus

Sad Catullus, stop playing the fool,
and let what you know leads you to ruin, end.

My lady looks so gentle and so pure - Dante Alighieri

My lady looks so gentle and so pure
When yielding salutation by the way,

All the Hemispheres - Hafez

Leave the familiar for a while.
Let your senses and bodies stretch out

Love is the master - Jalal al-Din Rumi

Love is the One who masters all things;
I am mastered totally by Love.

Tonight the moon... - Kostas Karyotakis

Tonight the moon will fall upon
the strand, a heavy pearl.

Unison - F.R. Scott

What is it makes a church so like a poem?
The inner silence – spaces between words?

The Ninth Secret Poem - Guillaume Apollinaire

I worship your fleece which is the perfect triangle
Of the Goddess

The Ocean's Song - Victor Hugo

We walked amongst the ruins famed in story
Of Rozel-Tower,
And saw the boundless waters stretch in glory
And heave in power.

change - Lynn Paden

i know nothing
about my future

The Old Lizard - Federico García Lorca

In the parched path
I have seen the good lizard
(one drop of crocodile)
meditating.

The Castle By The Sea - Johann Ludwig Uhland

'Hast thou seen that lordly castle,
That Castle by the Sea?
Golden and red above it
The clouds float gorgeously.

Jonah’s Prayer - Mihaly Babits

Words have become unfaithful things to me,
or else am I an overflowing sea,
goalless and hesitant, without a shore.

Pointless your mourning - Adam Asnyk

Pointless your mourning and your toil
Helpless your curses dire
Past forms no miracle can bring
Back from funereal pyre.

Show Me The Mountain That Packed Up And Left - Nontsizi Mgqwetho

“Come back,” mountain that left.
There are your people frantically scrabbling,
knowing full well that this country
will stand to the end of time.

In Jerusalem - Mahmoud Darwish

In Jerusalem, and I mean within the ancient walls,
I walk from one epoch to another without a memory
to guide me. The prophets over there are sharing
the history of the holy... ascending to heaven

Beautiful Melite - Agathias Scholasticus

Beautiful Melite, in the throes of middle age,
retains her youthful grace.

Pine Forest - Gabriela Mistral

Let us go now into the forest.
Trees will pass by your face,
and I will stop and offer you to them,
but they cannot bend down.

Projection - Jules Supervielle

Cemetery in the air
—Celestial dust—
Where friends will recognize each other
With less miserly eyes,

The Cross - Leon Gellert

'I wear a cross of bronze,' he said,
'and men have told me I was brave.'

Haiku from The Three Cornered World - Natsume Soseki

from Chapter 3
Bamboo sweeps across the stairs,
But no dust rises
For 'tis but a shadow

Earthquake - Aimé Césaire

such great stretches of dreamscape
such lines of all too familiar lines
                                         staved in

Winter - Horace

[Book I: IX]

See how Soracte stands glistening with snowfall,
and the labouring woods bend under the weight:
see how the mountain streams are frozen,
cased in the ice by the shuddering cold?

Ballade [I die of thirst beside the fountain] - François Villon

I die of thirst beside the fountain
I'm hot as fire, I'm shaking tooth on tooth
In my own country I'm in a distant land
Beside the blaze I'm shivering in flames
Naked as a worm, dressed like a president
I laugh in tears and hope in despair
I cheer up in sad hopelessness
I'm joyful and no pleasure's anywhere
I'm powerful and lack all force and strength
Warmly welcomed, always turned away.

The lyric poet's epilogue - Mihaly Babits

I am the only hero of my verses,
the first and last in every line to dwell:
my poems hope to sing of Universes,
but never reach beyond my lonely cell.

To the Nightingale - Jorge Luis Borges

On what secret night in England
Or by the incalculable constant Rhine,
Lost among all the nights of my nights,
Carried to my unknowing ear
Your voice, burdened with mythology,
Nightingale of Virgil, of the Persians?

King Solomon and the Ants - John Greenleaf Whittier

Out from Jerusalem
The king rode with his great
War chiefs and lords of state,
And Sheba's queen with them;

Rosalind - Hubert Church

Rosalind has come to town!
All the street’s a meadow,
Balconies are beeches brown
With a drowsy shadow,
And the long-drawn window panes
Are the foliage of her lanes.

In The Forest - Sarojini Naidu

Here, O my heart, let us burn the dear dreams that are dead,
Here in this wood let us fashion a funeral pyre
Of fallen white petals and leaves that are mellow and red,
Here let us burn them in noon's flaming torches of fire.

Baby's Dreams - Isabella Valancy Crawford

I saw a fairy twine,
Of star-white jessamine,
A dainty seat, shaped like an airy swing,
With two round yellow stars

Stages - Hermann Hesse

As every flower fades and as all youth
Departs, so life at every stage,
So every virtue, so our grasp of truth,
Blooms in its day and may not last forever.

Sonnet 7 [The soote season, that bud and bloom forth brings] - Petrarch

The soote season, that bud and bloom forth brings
With green hath clad the hill and eke the vale;

Some an army of horsemen - Sappho

Some an army of horsemen, some an army on foot
and some say a fleet of ships is the loveliest sight
on this dark earth; but I say it is what—
ever you desire:

The Stars sang in God's Garden - Joseph Mary Plunkett

The stars sang in God’s garden;
The stars are the birds of God;
The night-time is God’s harvest,
Its fruits are the words of God.

A Little Love - Lưu Trọng Lư

I do not know your age or name.
Why is it my hearts in turmoil?
This lonely love does so embroil
Through long cold nights my soul in flame.

Judith triumphant - Lope Félix de Vega Carpio

From bed to floor dangles
the bloodied right shoulder of the ferocious tyrant,

The Common Man - Julian Tuwim

When plastered billboards scream with slogans
'fight for your country, go to battle'
When media's print assults your senses,
'Support our leaders' shrieks and rattles...
And fools who don't know any better
Believe the old, eternal lie
That we must march and shoot and kill
Murder, and burn, and bomb, and grill...

The drive - Adam Gottlob Oehlenschläger

From stuffy, dark houses
Out over the wold
Where the ploughed furrow drowses
In a haze of gold

I want to love - Michel Quoist

I want to love, Lord
I need to love.
All my being is desire;
My heart,
My body,
yearn in the night towards an unknown one to love.
My arms thrash about, and I can seize on no object for my love.
I am alone and want to be two. I speak, and no one is there to listen.
I live, and no one is there to share my life.
Why be so rich and have no one to enrich?
Where does this love come from?
Where is it going?
I want to love, Lord,
I need to love.
Here, this evening, Lord is all my love...

Toreador - Jean Cocteau

Pepita queen of Venice
When you go beneath your shutter
All gondoliers call out:
Watch out—Toreador!
No one rules your heart
In the grand palace where you sleep
And near you the old duenna lies in waiting
for the Toreador.
Toreador, bravest of the brave
When in Piazza San Marco
The wild, slobbering bull
Falls slain by your blade
It is not pride that caresses
Your heart beneath your golden cape
It is for a young goddess
That your passion burns, Toreador.

Resplendent in their biblical glory - Georgy Ivanov

Resplendent in their biblical glory
Above the city float the flaming clouds;
The angel that tops Peter and Paul's fortress
Looks through them into centuries massed…

The River All Red - Yueh Fei

By the railing I stand,
Showers have stopped,
I bristle with wrath, my hair uncaging.
My eyes towards the sky,
To arms! Long I cry,
To war, for a heavenly cause! I m raging.
My decade of deeds, as dust I deem, short of the final victory,
O er thousands of miles, day or night, been in battle engaging.
So take it to heart, get set!
Lest, in vain, we ll regret,
Turned grey, our youthful heads, on ageing.

Ballade 2 - Eustache Deschamps

In Antwerp, Bruges, Ostend and Ghent
I used to order food with flair,
But in every inn to which I went
They always brought me, with my fare,
With every roast and mutton dish,
With boar, with rabbit, pigeon, bustard,
With fresh and with salt-water fish,
Always, never asking, mustard.

A Wool Fleet Chorus - Cicely Fox Smith

Fare you well, you Sydney girls, time for us to go!
The Peter's at the fore truck, and five thousand bales below,
We've a dozen shellbacks forrard, and a skipper hard as nails,
And we're bound for old England and the January sales!