Author: Philip Larkin

 

Philip Arthur Larkin was an English poet, novelist, and librarian. His first book of poetry, The North Ship, was published in 1945, followed by two novels, Jill and A Girl in Winter.

Bio:

 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philip_Larkin

New Stuff: Jan Wagner

New Stuff: William Carlos Williams

New Stuff: The Hollow of the Hand

Between 2011 and 2014 PJ Harvey and Seamus Murphy set out on a series of journeys together to Kosovo, Afghanistan, and Washington DC. Harvey collected words, Murphy collected pictures, and together they have created an extraordinary chronicle of our life and times

From my vaults: E. E. Cummings

Bio:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E._E._Cummings

From my vaults: Countee Cullen

Bio:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Countee_Cullen

R.I.P. Seamus Heaney

Eulogies:

http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/books/2013/08/remembering-seamus-heaney-poems-in-the-new-yorker.html

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/08/31/arts/seamus-heaney-acclaimed-irish-poet-dies-at-74.html

First Lines: Pablo Neruda - Memorial de Isla Negra

something started in my soul,
fever or forgotten wings,
and I made my own way,
deciphering
that fire
and wrote the first faint line,
faint without substance, pure
nonsense,
pure wisdom,
of someone who knows nothing,
and suddenly I saw
the heavens
unfastened
and open.

First Lines: Rabindranath Tagore - Gitanjali

Thou hast made me endless, such is thy pleasure.

First Lines: Frédéric Mistral - Mirèio

I sing the love of a Provencal maid;
How through the wheat-fields of La Crau she strayed,
Following the fate that drew her to the sea.

First Lines: Allen Ginsberg - Howl

(ph: Essie Snell)

I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by madness, starving hysterical naked,

dragging themselves through the negro streets at dawn looking for an angry fix,

angelheaded hipsters burning for the ancient heavenly connection to the starry dynamo in the machinery of night,

First Lines: T. S. Eliot - The Waste Land

APRIL is the cruellest month, breeding
Lilacs out of the dead land, mixing
Memory and desire, stirring
Dull roots with spring rain.

From my vaults: John Berryman

Bio:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Berryman

Frank O'Hara

TODAY
                         
                         
   Oh! kangaroos, sequins, chocolate sodas!
   You really are beautiful! Pearls,
   harmonicas, jujubes, aspirins! all
   the stuff they've always talked about
                       
   still makes a poem a surprise!
   These things are with us every day
   even on beachheads and biers. They
   do have meaning. They're strong as rocks.

From my vaults: W. H. Auden

Bio:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/W._H._Auden

Emily Dickinson: Quite Empty Quite at Rest

Quite Empty Quite at Rest


Quite empty, quite at rest,
The Robin locks her Nest, and tries her Wings.
She does not know a Route
But puts her Craft about
For rumored Springs
She does not ask for Noon
She does not ask for Boon,
Crumbless and homeless, of but one request
The Birds she lost

Carl Sandburg: Poppies

Poppies


She loves blood-red poppies for a garden to walk in.
In a loose white gown she walks
and a new child tugs at cords in her body.
Her head to the west at evening when the dew is creeping,
A shudder of gladness runs in her bones and torsal fiber:
She loves blood-red poppies for a garden to walk in.

Mark Twain: Ode to Stephen Dowling Bots

Ode to Stephen Dowling Bots


And did young Stephen sicken,
And did young Stephen die?
And did the sad hearts thicken,
And did the mourners cry?

No; such was not the fate of Young Stephen Dowling Bots;
Though sad hearts round him thickened,
'Twas not from sickness' shots.

No whooping-cough did rack his frame,
Nor measles drear, with spots;
Not these impaired the sacred name
Of Stephen Dowling Bots.

Despised love struck not with woe
That head of curly knots,
Nor stomach troubles laid him low,
Young Stephen Dowling Bots.

O no. Then list with tearful eye,
Whilst I his fate do tell.
His soul did from this cold world fly,
By falling down a well.

They got him out and emptied him;
Alas it was too late;
His spirit was gone for to sport aloft
In the realms of the good and great.

Walt Whitman: O Captain My Captain

(art: Gustave Doré)

O Captain My Captain


O Captain my Captain! our fearful trip is done,
The ship has weathered every rack, the prize we sought is won,
The port is near, the bells I hear, the people all exulting,
While follow eyes the steady keel, the vessel grim and daring;
But O heart! heart! heart!
O the bleeding drops of red,
Where on the deck my Captain lies,
Fallen cold and dead.

O Captain! my Captain! rise up and hear the bells;
Rise up--for you the flag is flung for you the bugle trills,
For you bouquets and ribboned wreaths for you the shores a-crowding,
For you they call, the swaying mass, their eager faces turning;
Here Captain! dear father!
This arm beneath your head!
It is some dream that on the deck,
You've fallen cold and dead.

My Captain does not answer, his lips are pale and still;
My father does not feel my arm, he has no pulse nor will;
The ship is anchored safe and sound, its voyage closed and done;
From fearful trip the victor ship comes in with object won;
Exult O shores, and ring O bells!
But I, with mournful tread,
Walk the deck my Captain lies,
Fallen cold and dead.

Emily Bronte: Love and Friendship

Love and Friendship


Love is like the wild rose-briar,
Friendship like the holly-tree
The holly is dark when the rose-briar blooms
But which will bloom most constantly?

The wild-rose briar is sweet in the spring,
Its summer blossoms scent the air;
Yet wait till winter comes again
And who will call the wild-briar fair?

Then scorn the silly rose-wreath now
And deck thee with the holly's sheen,
That when December blights thy brow
He may still leave thy garland green.