As I Ponder’d in Silence. by Walt Whitman
1 AS I ponder’d in silence, Returning upon my poems, considering, lingering long, A Phantom arose before me, with distrustful aspect, Terrible in beauty, age, and power, The genius of poets of old lands, As to me directing like flame its eyes, With finger pointing to many immortal songs, And menacing voice, What singest thou? […]
As I lay with Head in your Lap, Camerado. by Walt Whitman
AS I lay with my head in your lap, Camerado, The confession I made I resume—what I said to you in the open air I resume: I know I am restless, and make others so; I know my words are weapons, full of danger, full of death; (Indeed I am myself the real soldier; It […]
As Consequent, Etc. by Walt Whitman
AS consequent from store of summer rains, Or wayward rivulets in autumn flowing, Or many a herb-lined brook’s reticulations, Or subterranean sea-rills making for the sea, Songs of continued years I sing. Life’s ever-modern rapids first, (soon, soon to blend, With the old streams of death.) Some threading Ohio’s farm-fields or the woods, Some down […]
As At Thy Portals Also Death. by Walt Whitman
AS at thy portals also death, Entering thy sovereign, dim, illimitable grounds, To memories of my mother, to the divine blending, maternity, To her, buried and gone, yet buried not, gone not from me, (I see again the calm benignant face fresh and beautiful still, I sit by the form in the coffin, I kiss […]
As Adam, Early in the Morning. by Walt Whitman
AS Adam, early in the morning, Walking forth from the bower, refresh’d with sleep; Behold me where I pass—hear my voice—approach, Touch me—touch the palm of your hand to my Body as I pass; Be not afraid of my Body. 5 ————— The End And that’s the End of the Poem © Poetry Monster, 2021. Poems […]
As a Strong Bird on Pinions Free. by Walt Whitman
1 AS a strong bird on pinions free, Joyous, the amplest spaces heavenward cleaving, Such be the thought I’d think to-day of thee, America, Such be the recitative I’d bring to-day for thee. The conceits of the poets of other lands I bring thee not, Nor the compliments that have served their turn so long, […]
Artilleryman’s Vision, The. by Walt Whitman
WHILE my wife at my side lies slumbering, and the wars are over long, And my head on the pillow rests at home, and the vacant midnight passes, And through the stillness, through the dark, I hear, just hear, the breath of my infant, There in the room, as I wake from sleep, this vision […]
Apostroph. by Walt Whitman
O MATER! O fils! O brood continental! O flowers of the prairies! O space boundless! O hum of mighty products! O you teeming cities! O so invincible, turbulent, proud! O race of the future! O women! O fathers! O you men of passion and the storm! O native power only! O beauty! O yourself! O […]
Ages and Ages, Returning at Intervals. by Walt Whitman
AGES and ages, returning at intervals, Undestroy’d, wandering immortal, Lusty, phallic, with the potent original loins, perfectly sweet, I, chanter of Adamic songs, Through the new garden, the West, the great cities calling, Deliriate, thus prelude what is generated, offering these, offering myself, Bathing myself, bathing my songs in Sex, Offspring of my loins. ————— […]
Adieu to a Soldier by Walt Whitman
ADIEU, O soldier! You of the rude campaigning, (which we shared,) The rapid march, the life of the camp, The hot contention of opposing fronts—the long manoeuver, Red battles with their slaughter,—the stimulus—the strong, terrific game, Spell of all brave and manly hearts—the trains of Time through you, and like of you, all fill’d, With […]
Aboard at a Ship’s Helm. by Walt Whitman
, at a ship’s helm, A young steersman, steering with care. A bell through fog on a sea-coast dolefully ringing, An ocean-bell—O a warning bell, rock’d by the waves. O you give good notice indeed, you bell by the sea-reefs ringing, Ringing, ringing, to warn the ship from its wreck-place. For, as on the alert, […]
A Woman Waits for Me. by Walt Whitman
A WOMAN waits for me—she contains all, nothing is lacking, Yet all were lacking, if sex were lacking, or if the moisture of the right man were lacking. Sex contains all, Bodies, Souls, meanings, proofs, purities, delicacies, results, promulgations, Songs, commands, health, pride, the maternal mystery, the seminal milk; All hopes, benefactions, bestowals, All the […]
A Sight in Camp. by Walt Whitman
A SIGHT in camp in the day-break grey and dim, As from my tent I emerge so early, sleepless, As slow I walk in the cool fresh air, the path near by the hospital tent, Three forms I see on stretchers lying, brought out there, untended lying, Over each the blanket spread, ample brownish woollen […]
A Paumanok Picture. by Walt Whitman
TWO boats with nets lying off the sea-beach, quite still, Ten fishermen waiting—they discover a thick school of mossbonkers—they drop the join’d seine-ends in the water, The boats separate and row off, each on its rounding course to the beach, enclosing the mossbonkers, The net is drawn in by a windlass by those who stop […]
A March in the Ranks, Hard-prest. by Walt Whitman
A MARCH in the ranks hard-prest, and the road unknown; A route through a heavy wood, with muffled steps in the darkness; Our army foil’d with loss severe, and the sullen remnant retreating; Till after midnight glimmer upon us, the lights of a dim-lighted building; We come to an open space in the woods, and […]
A Leaf for Hand in Hand. by Walt Whitman
A LEAF for hand in hand! You natural persons old and young! You on the Mississippi, and on all the branches and bayous of the Mississippi! You friendly boatmen and mechanics! You roughs! You twain! And all processions moving along the streets! I wish to infuse myself among you till I see it common for […]
A Hand-Mirror. by Walt Whitman
HOLD it up sternly! See this it sends back! (Who is it? Is it you?) Outside fair costume—within ashes and filth, No more a flashing eye—no more a sonorous voice or springy step; Now some slave’s eye, voice, hands, step, A drunkard’s breath, unwholesome eater’s face, venerealee’s flesh, Lungs rotting away piecemeal, stomach sour and […]
A Farm-Picture. by Walt Whitman
THROUGH the ample open door of the peaceful country barn, A sun-lit pasture field, with cattle and horses feeding; And haze, and vista, and the far horizon, fading away. ————— The End And that’s the End of the Poem © Poetry Monster, 2021. Poems by topic and subject. Poetry Monster — the ultimate repository of world […]
A child said, What is the grass by Walt Whitman
A child said, What is the grass? fetching it to me with full hands; How could I answer the child?. . . .I do not know what it is any more than he. I guess it must be the flag of my disposition, out of hopeful green stuff woven. Or I guess it is the […]
A Terre (being the philosophy of many soldiers) by Wilfred Owen
Sit on the bed. I’m blind, and three parts shell. Be careful; can’t shake hands now; never shall. Both arms have mutinied against me,-brutes. My fingers fidget like ten idle brats. I tried to peg out soldierly,-no use! One dies of war like any old disease. This bandage feels like pennies on my eyes. I […]
Disabled by Wilfred Owen
He sat in a wheeled chair, waiting for dark, And shivered in his ghastly suit of grey, Legless, sewn short at elbow. Through the park Voices of boys rang saddening like a hymn, Voices of play and pleasure after day, Till gathering sleep had mothered them from him. About this time Town used to swing […]
Anthem For Doomed Youth by Wilfred Owen
What passing-bells for these who die as cattle? Only the monstrous anger of the guns. Only the stuttering rifles’ rapid rattle Can patter out their hasty orisons. No mockeries for them; no prayers nor bells, Nor any voice of mourning save the choirs, — The shrill, demented choirs of wailing shells; And bugles calling for […]
Dulce Et Decorum Est by Wilfred Owen
Bent double, like old beggars under sacks, Knock-kneed, coughing like hags, we cursed through sludge, Till on the haunting flares we turned our backs And towards our distant rest began to trudge. Men marched asleep. Many had lost their boots But limped on, blood-shod. All went lame; all blind; Drunk with fatigue; deaf even to […]
Conscious by Wilfred Owen
His fingers wake, and flutter up the bed. His eyes come open with a pull of will, Helped by the yellow may-flowers by his head. A blind-cord drawls across the window-sill . . . How smooth the floor of the ward is! what a rug! And who’s that talking, somewhere out of sight? Why are […]
Insensibility by Wilfred Owen
I Happy are men who yet before they are killed Can let their veins run cold. Whom no compassion fleers Or makes their feet Sore on the alleys cobbled with their brothers. The front line withers, But they are troops who fade, not flowers For poets’ tearful fooling: Men, gaps for filling Losses who might […]
A Terre by Wilfred Owen
(Being the philosophy of many Soldiers.) Sit on the bed; I’m blind, and three parts shell, Be careful; can’t shake hands now; never shall. Both arms have mutinied against me — brutes. My fingers fidget like ten idle brats. I tried to peg out soldierly — no use! One dies of war like any old […]
Arms And The Boy by Wilfred Owen
Let the boy try along this bayonet-blade How cold steel is, and keen with hunger of blood; Blue with all malice, like a madman’s flash; And thinly drawn with famishing for flesh. Lend him to stroke these blind, blunt bullet-heads Which long to muzzle in the hearts of lads. Or give him cartridges of fine […]
Asleep by Wilfred Owen
Under his helmet, up against his pack, After the many days of work and waking, Sleep took him by the brow and laid him back. And in the happy no-time of his sleeping, Death took him by the heart. There was a quaking Of the aborted life within him leaping … Then chest and sleepy […]
Exposure by Wilfred Owen
I Our brains ache, in the merciless iced east winds that knife us . . . Wearied we keep awake because the night is silent . . . Low drooping flares confuse our memory of the salient . . . Worried by silence, sentries whisper, curious, nervous, But nothing happens. Watching, we hear the mad […]
Futility by Wilfred Owen
Move him into the sun — Gently its touch awoke him once, At home, whispering of fields unsown. Always it woke him, even in France, Until this morning and this snow. If anything might rouse him now The kind old sun will know. Think how it wakes the seeds — Woke, once, the clays of […]
Le Christianisme by Wilfred Owen
So the church Christ was hit and buried Under its rubbish and its rubble. In cellars, packed-up saints long serried, Well out of hearing of our trouble. One Virgin still immaculate Smiles on for war to flatter her. She’s halo’d with an old tin hat, But a piece of hell will batter her. ————— The […]
An Imperial Elegy by Wilfred Owen
Not one corner of a foreign field But a span as wide as Europe; An appearance of a titan’s grave, And the length thereof a thousand miles, It crossed all Europe like a mystic road, Or as the Spirits’ Pathway lieth on the night. And I heard a voice crying This is the Path of […]
But I Was Looking At The Permanent Stars by Wilfred Owen
Bugles sang, saddening the evening air, And bugles answered, sorrowful to hear. Voices of boys were by the river-side. Sleep mothered them; and left the twilight sad. The shadow of the morrow weighed on men. Voices of old despondency resigned, Bowed by the shadow of the morrow, slept. ( ) dying tone Of receding voices […]
I Saw His Round Mouth’s Crimson by Wilfred Owen
[I saw his round mouth’s crimson deepen as it fell], Like a Sun, in his last deep hour; Watched the magnificent recession of farewell, Clouding, half gleam, half glower, And a last splendour burn the heavens of his cheek. And in his eyes The cold stars lighting, very old and bleak, In different skies. ————— […]
I know The Music (unfinished) by Wilfred Owen
All sounds have been as music to my listening: Pacific lamentations of slow bells, The crunch of boots on blue snow rosy-glistening, Shuffle of autumn leaves; and all farewells: Bugles that sadden all the evening air, And country bells clamouring their last appeals Before [the] music of the evening prayer; Bridges, sonorous under carriage wheels. […]
Hospital Barge At Cerisy by Wilfred Owen
Budging the sluggard ripples of the Somme, A barge round old Cérisy slowly slewed. Softly her engines down the current screwed, And chuckled softly with contented hum, Till fairy tinklings struck their croonings dumb. The waters rumpling at the stern subdued; The lock-gate took her bulging amplitude; Gently from out the gurgling lock she swum. […]
Has Your Soul Sipped? by Wilfred Owen
Has your soul sipped Of the sweetness of all sweets? Has it well supped But yet hungers and sweats? I have been witness Of a strange sweetness, All fancy surpassing Past all supposing. Passing the rays Of the rubies of morning, Or the soft rise Of the moon; or the meaning Known to the rose […]
Happiness by Wilfred Owen
Ever again to breathe pure happiness, So happy that we gave away our toy? We smiled at nothings, needing no caress? Have we not laughed too often since with Joy? Have we not stolen too strange and sorrowful wrongs For her hands’ pardoning? The sun may cleanse, And time, and starlight. Life will sing great […]
Greater Love by Wilfred Owen
Red lips are not so red As the stained stones kissed by the English dead. Kindness of wooed and wooer Seems shame to their love pure. O Love, your eyes lose lure When I behold eyes blinded in my stead! Your slender attitude Trembles not exquisite like limbs knife-skewed, Rolling and rolling there Where God […]
From My Diary, July 1914 by Wilfred Owen
Leaves Murmuring by miriads in the shimmering trees. Lives Wakening with wonder in the Pyrenees. Birds Cheerily chirping in the early day. Bards Singing of summer, scything thro’ the hay. Bees Shaking the heavy dews from bloom and frond. Boys Bursting the surface of the ebony pond. Flashes Of swimmers carving thro’ the sparkling cold. […]