Favorite poems?

[DustyWolfe]

Here is one of my favorites poems. Written by Robert Frost.

BIRCHES

When I see birches bend to left and right
Across the lines of straighter darker trees,
I like to think some boy's been swinging them.
But swinging doesn't bend them down to stay.
Ice-storms do that. Often you must have seen them
Loaded with ice a sunny winter morning
After a rain. They click upon themselves
As the breeze rises, and turn many-colored
As the stir cracks and crazes their enamel.
Soon the sun's warmth makes them shed crystal shells
Shattering and avalanching on the snow-crust --
Such heaps of broken glass to sweep away
You'd think the inner dome of heaven had fallen.
They are dragged to the withered bracken by the load
And they seem not to break; though once they are bowed
So low for long they never right themselves:
You may see their trunks arching in the woods
Years afterwards, trailing their leaves on the ground
Like girls on hands and knees that throw their hair
Before them over their heads to dry in the sun.
But I was going to say when truth broke in
With all her matter-of-fact about the ice storm,
(Now am I free to be poetical?)
I should prefer to have some boy bend them
As he went out and in to fetch the cows --
Some boy too far from town to learn baseball,
Whose only play was what he found himself,
Summer or winter, and could play alone.
One by one he subdued his father's trees
By riding them down over and over again
Until he took the stiffness out of them
And not one but hung limp, not one was left
For him to conquer. He learned all there was
To learn about not launching out too soon
And so not carrying the tree away
Clear to the ground. He always kept his poise
To the top branches, climbing carefully
With the same pains you use to fill a cup
Up to the brim, and even above the brim.
Then he flung outward, feet first, with a swish,
Kicking his way down through the air to the ground.
So was I once myself a swinger of birches.
And so I dream of going back to be.
It's when I'm weary of considerations,
And life is too much like a pathless wood
Where your face burns and tickles with the cobwebs
Broken across it, and one eye is weeping
From a twig's having lashed across it open.
I'd like to get away from earth awhile
And then come back to it and begin over.
May no fate willfully misunderstand me
And half grant what I wish and snatch me away
Not to return. Earth's the right place for love:
I don't know where it's likely to go better.
I'd like to go by climbing a birch tree,
And climb black branches up a snow-white trunk
Toward heaven, till the tree could bear no more,
But dipped its top and set me down again.
That would be good both going and coming back.
One could do worse than be a swinger of birches

 

[AusTess]

The boy stood on the burning deck
his pocket full of crackers.
One fell down his trouser leg,
and blew off both his knackers.



I'm SUCH a scholarly lass.

Does schollarly have one l or two?
Or is that 3?

 

[DustyWolfe]

Another favorite of mine by Frost

THE ROAD NOT TAKEN

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;
Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim
Because it was grassy and wanted wear,
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I marked the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way
I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I,
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.

 

[Ice Cold]

Funny mine is also by Frost:

Stopping by the woods on a snowy evening


Whose woods these are, I think I know.
His house is in the village though.
He will not se me stopping here
to watch his woods fill with snow.

My little horse must think it queer,
to stop without a farmhouse near.
Between the woods and frozen lake,
the drakest evening of the year.

He gives his harness bells a shake,
to ask if there is some mistake.
The only other sound is the sweep
of easy wind and downey flake.

The woods are lovely, dark and deep.
But I have promises to keep,
and miles to go before I sleep,
miles to go before I sleep.

 

[DustyWolfe]

LOL AusTess... Funny


One more by Frost.. this is my ultimate favorite

Nothing Gold Can Stay

Nature's first green is gold,
Her hardest hue to hold.
Her early leaf's a flower;
But only so an hour.
Then leaf subsides to leaf.
So Eden sank to grief,
So dawn goes down to day.
Nothing gold can stay.

 

[DustyWolfe]

I love that poem too Ice Cold. Frost is amazing.

 

[AusTess]

Poetry snobs?
*sniffs*
figures.

 

[Ishmael]

Hmmmmmmmmmm

It's genuinely gratifying to see that 'ole Robert is not forgotten.

Check out "Fire and Ice"

Ishmael

 

[DustyWolfe]

*blinks* ummm? snob? Hey.. I said I liked your poem silly...


Here is a small collection of several poems by Frost.
I apologize for this. I just found a book of his poetry and am recalling some of my favorites.

LONELINESS
(Her Word)
One ought not to have to care
So much as you and I
Care when the birds come round the house
To seem to say good-bye;
Or care so much when they come back
With whatever it is they sing;
The truth being we are as much
Too glad for the one thing
As we are too sad for the other here --
With birds that fill their breasts
But with each other and themselves
And their built or driven nests.

HOUSE FEAR
Always -- I tell you this they learned--
Always at night when they returned
To the lonely house from far away
To lamps unlighted and fire gone gray,
They learned to rattle the lock and key
To give whatever might chance to be
Warning and time to be off in flight:
And preferring the out- to the in-door night,
They. learned to leave the house-door wide
Until they had lit the lamp inside.

THE SMILE
(Her Word)
I didn't like the way he went away.
That smile! It never came of being gay.
Still he smiled- did you see him?- I was sure!
Perhaps because we gave him only bread
And the wretch knew from that that we were poor.
Perhaps because he let us give instead
Of seizing from us as he might have seized.
Perhaps he mocked at us for being wed,
Or being very young (and he was pleased
To have a vision of us old and dead).
I wonder how far down the road he's got.
He's watching from the woods as like as not.

THE OFT-REPEATED DREAM
She had no saying dark enough
For the dark pine that kept
Forever trying the window-latch
Of the room where they slept.
The tireless but ineffectual hands
That with every futile pass
Made the great tree seem as a little bird
Before the mystery of glass!
It never had been inside the room,
And only one of the two
Was afraid in an oft-repeated dream
Of what the tree might do.

THE IMPULSE
It was too lonely for her there,
And too wild,
And since there were but two of them,
And no child,
And work was little in the house,
She was free,
And followed where he furrowed field,
Or felled tree.
She rested on a log and tossed
The fresh chips,
With a song only to herself
On her lips.
And once she went to break a bough
Of black alder.
She strayed so far she scarcely heard.
When he called her--
And didn't answer -- didn't speak --
Or return.
She stood, and then she ran and hid
In the fern.
He never found her, though he looked
Everywhere,
And he asked at her mother's house
Was she there.
Sudden and swift and light as that
The ties gave,
And he learned of finalities
Besides the grave.

 

[Oasis690]

Hey Dustygrrl

I love Robert Frost and my favorite poem is
Ode to a Bluebird...

It is cute and fun and typical Frost.
If you have access to it can you post it? PWEEEEZE?

 

[DustyWolfe]

Re: Hmmmmmmmmmm

It's genuinely gratifying to see that 'ole Robert is not forgotten.

Check out "Fire and Ice"

Ishmael

Oh.. You mean this one?

Some say the world will end in fire,
Some say in ice.
From what I've tasted of desire
I hold with those who favour fire.
But if it had to perish twice,
I think I know enough of hate
To say that for destruction ice
Is also great
And would suffice.

 

[DustyWolfe]

Re: Hey Dustygrrl

I love Robert Frost and my favorite poem is
Ode to a Bluebird...

It is cute and fun and typical Frost.
If you have access to it can you post it? PWEEEEZE?

Unfortunately I don't have Ode to Bluebird by Robert Frost...
Would you settle for a parody of it? I have even looked for it online and all I can find is the parody.. So here goes the funny one.

Ode to a Bluebird...
I woke early one morning,
The earth lay cool and still
When suddenly a tiny bird
Perch on my window sill,
He sang a song so lovely
So carefree and so gay,
That slowly all my troubles
Began to slip away.
He sang of far off places
Of laughter and of fun,
It seemed his very trilling,
brought up the morning sun.
I stirred beneath the covers
Crept slowly out of bed,
And gently lowered the window
And crushed his fucking head.

 

[Oasis690]

AWWW Dustygrrl

That's so nice...hey wait!

"crushed his fucking head"

What a horrible thing to do to a nice birdy.

Nice poem, though. Thanks for looking.

 

[Oasis690]

Hey Dusty,


Maybe the reason you can't find it is because I got the title wrong. I think it is The Last Word of A Bluebird.

 

[DustyWolfe]

Yeah.. I know... I didn't think the last part was very funny... Hmmph. Some people.. I just don't know... lol

Ok.. looking for it now

 

[DustyWolfe]

FOUND IT!

As I went out a Crow
In a low voice said, "Oh,
I was looking for you.
How do you do?
I just came to tell you
To tell Lesley (will you?)
That her little Bluebird
Wanted me to bring word
That the north wind last night
That made the stars bright
And made ice on the trough
Almost made him cough
His tail feathers off.
He just had to fly!
But he sent her Good-by,
And said to be good,
And wear her red hood,
And look for skunk tracks
In the snow with an ax-
And do everything!
And perhaps in the spring
He would come back and sing."

 

[Oasis690]

THANKS DUSTY!

I live that poem, especially the line:

Almost made him cough
His tail feathers off

 

[DustyWolfe]

Re: THANKS DUSTY!

I live that poem, especially the line:

Almost made him cough
His tail feathers off

You are so very welcome. Yes that is a great line.
Hmmm.. Perhaps we need to vary this a bit with some poems by others. Burns perhaps?

 

[DustyWolfe]

Robert Burns... dang I wish I could find my book of his stuff...

1 O my Luve's like a red, red rose,
2 That's newly sprung in June;
3 O my Luve's like the melodie
4 That's sweetly play'd in tune.

5 As fair art thou, my bonie lass,
6 So deep in luve am I;
7 And I will luve thee still, my Dear,
8 Till a' the seas gang dry.

9 Till a' the seas gang dry, my Dear,
10 And the rocks melt wi' the sun;
11 I will luve thee still my Dear,
12 While the sands o' life shall run.

13 And fare thee weel, my only Luve,
14 And fare the weel, a while!
15 And I will come again, my Luve,
16 Tho' it ware ten thousand mile!

 

[DustyWolfe]

Lord Byron

CLXXIII. "She walks in beauty, like the night"

SHE walks in beauty, like the night
Of cloudless climes and starry skies,
And all that's best of dark and bright
Meets in her aspect and her eyes;
Thus mellow'd to that tender light 5
Which Heaven to gaudy day denies.

One shade the more, one ray the less,
Had half impair'd the nameless grace
Which waves in every raven tress
Or softly lightens o'er her face, 10
Where thoughts serenely sweet express
How pure, how dear their dwelling-place.

And on that cheek and o'er that brow
So soft, so calm, yet eloquent,
The smiles that win, the tints that glow, 15
But tell of days in goodness spent,—
A mind at peace with all below,
A heart whose love is innocent.

 

[DustyWolfe]

umm.. no takers on the poetry? Come on... You people have to have a favorite poem

 

[DustyWolfe]

Emily Dickinson

IF I can stop one heart from breaking,
I shall not live in vain;
If I can ease one life the aching,
Or cool one pain,
Or help one fainting robin
Unto his nest again,
I shall not live in vain.

 

[Ice Cold]

I've always been a bit Partial to Poe also.

Just somethng about hearing The Raven... the way it sets the mood. Have to see where I have my copies of it stashed.

 

[Ayaka]

Re: Re: Hmmmmmmmmmm

Oh.. You mean this one?

I love that

 

[The_Masseur]

My favorite...

I recently had to have surgery, and had complications which nearly killed me. As a result, I have a newfound (in addition to my previously considerable) respect for Dylan Thomas' 'Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night':



Do not go gentle into that good night,
Old age should burn and rave at close of day;
Rage, rage against the dying of the light!

Though wise men at their end know dark is right,
Because their words had forked no lightning they
Do not go gentle into that good night.

Good men, the last wave by, crying how bright
Their frail deeds might have danced in a green bay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light!

Wild men who caught and sang the sun in flight,
And learn, too late, they grieved it on its way,
Do not go gentle into that good night.

Grave men, near death, who see with blinding sight
Blind eyes could blaze like meteors and be gay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light!

And you, my father, there on the sad height,
Curse me, bless me, now with your fierce tears, I pray.
Do not go gentle into that good night.
Rage, rage against the dying of the light!



Because I'm a published author, I've got to give credit to Thinkquest.Org for providing the text at http://library.thinkquest.org/3721/poems/forms/villa.html