A poem by Violet Nicolson, Lawrence Hope, Adela Florence Cory Nicolson (1865 – 1904)
He loved the Plant with a keen delight,
A passionate fervour, strange to see,
Tended it ardently, day and night,
Yet never a flower lit up the tree.
The leaves were succulent, thick, and green,
And, sessile, out of the snakelike stem
Rose spine-like fingers, alert and keen,
To catch at aught that molested them.
But though they nurtured it day and night,
With love and labour, the child and he
Were never granted the longed-for sight
Of a flower crowning the twisted tree.
Until one evening a wayworn Priest
Stopped for the night in the Temple shade
And shared the fare of their simple feast
Under the vines and the jasmin laid.
He, later, wandering round the flowers
Paused awhile by the blossomless tree.
The man said, “May it be fault of ours,
That never its buds my eyes may see?
“Aslip it came from the further East
Many a sunlit summer ago.”
“It grows in our Jungles,” said the Priest,
“Men see it rarely; but this I know,
“The Jungle people worship it; say
They bury a child around its roots–
Bury it living:–the only way
To crimson glory of flowers and fruits.”
He spoke in whispers; his furtive glance
Probing the depths of the garden shade.
The man came closer, with eyes askance,
The child beside them shivered, afraid.
A cold wind drifted about the three,
Jarring the spines with a hungry sound,
The spines that grew on the snakelike tree
And guarded its roots beneath the ground.
. . . . . .
After the fall of the summer rain
The plant was glorious, redly gay,
Blood-red with blossom. Never again
Men saw the child in the Temple play.
A few random poems:
- Picture Puzzle Piece by Shel Silverstein
- Sorrow’s Importunity poem – Alfred Austin
- The Sash by Sharon Olds
- Saint George the Dragon by Michael Nikoletseas
- Джон Мильтон – О своей слепоте
- Paul’s Wife by Robert Frost
- Acquainted With the Night by Robert Frost
- The Wise Builder by William Somervile
- Giving Myself Up by Mark Strand
- Владимир Луговской – Береза Карелии
- Михаил Кузмин – Вы молчаливо-нежное дитя
- I Begin To Think by Satish Verma
- Sir Launcelot and Queen Guinevere poem – Lord Alfred Tennyson poems
- The Doctor Will Return by Weldon Kees
- The Great Palaces Of Versailles by Rita Dove
External links
Bat’s Poetry Page – more poetry by Fledermaus
Talking Writing Monster’s Page –
Batty Writing – the bat’s idle chatter, thoughts, ideas and observations, all original, all fresh
Poems in English
- The Fault of It poem – Ezra Pound poems
- The Encounter poem – Ezra Pound poems
- The Bath-Tub poem – Ezra Pound poems
- Tame Cat poem – Ezra Pound poems
- Taking Leave of a Friend poem – Ezra Pound poems
- Sub Mare poem – Ezra Pound poems
- Statement of Being poem – Ezra Pound poems
- Song of the Bowmen of Shu poem – Ezra Pound poems
- Song in the Manner of Housman poem – Ezra Pound poems
- Song poem – Ezra Pound poems
- Silet poem – Ezra Pound poems
- Sestina: Altaforte poem – Ezra Pound poems
- Salutation poem – Ezra Pound poems
- Quies poem – Ezra Pound poems
- Portrait d’Une Femme poem – Ezra Pound poems
- In Tempore Senectutis poem – Ezra Pound poems
- Invern poem – Ezra Pound poems
- Ione, Dead the Long Year poem – Ezra Pound poems
- The Jewel Stairs’ Grievance poem – Ezra Pound poems
- Envoi poem – Ezra Pound poems
More external links (open in a new tab):
Doska or the Board – write anything
Search engines:
Yandex – the best search engine for searches in Russian (and the best overall image search engine, in any language, anywhere)
Qwant – the best search engine for searches in French, German as well as Romance and Germanic languages.
Ecosia – a search engine that supposedly… plants trees
Duckduckgo – the real alternative and a search engine that actually works. Without much censorship or partisan politics.
Yahoo– yes, it’s still around, amazingly, miraculously, incredibly, but now it seems to be powered by Bing.
Parallel Translations of Poetry
The Poetry Repository – an online library of poems, poetry, verse and poetic works
Violet Nicolson ( 1865 – 1904); otherwise known as Adela Florence Nicolson (née Cory), was an English poetess who wrote under the pseudonym of Laurence Hope, however she became known as Violet Nicolson. In the early 1900s, she became a best-selling author. She committed suicide and is buried in Madras, now Chennai, India.