id stringlengths 16 16 | title stringlengths 1 203 | author stringlengths 2 40 | poem stringlengths 1 87.3k | labels_l1 listlengths 1 10 | labels_l2 listlengths 0 15 | labels_l1_names listlengths 1 10 | labels_l2_names listlengths 0 15 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
4ae100bba3fb281e | M is for Michael Jackson and Malcolm X | Divya Victor | In the epilogue to The Autobiography of Malcolm X, Alex Haley recounts meeting a pensive Malcolm at the Kennedy airport, watching newly immigrated children “romping and playing” in their sudden home. “By tomorrow night,” Malcolm says to Alex, “they’ll know how to say their first English word—nigger.”
Before cable tele... | [
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"Social Commentaries",
"History & Politics"
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"Social Commentaries/Race & Ethnicity",
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950c92dde3c5e110 | A Dog's Life | Daniel Groves | A stay of execution: one last day, your day, old Everydog, then, as they say, or as we say (a new trick to avoid finalities implicit in destroyed), you have to be put down, or put to sleep— the very dog who, once, would fight to keep from putting down, despite our shouts, a shoe until he gnawed it to the sole, and who ... | [
"S6",
"S8"
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"S6-4",
"S8-8"
] | [
"Living",
"Relationships"
] | [
"Living/Death & Dying",
"Relationships/Pets & Domestic Animals"
] |
9dbc739488ddff06 | The Good Provider | Sarah Gambito | The best thing of all is to take the enemy’s country whole and intact.
My mother took my heart out. She banked it on top of her stove.
It glowed white. She put it back in my chest.
Tita knew that overseas workers often had affairs.
He licked me and I pretended it pinged through my body like a swift idea
That I wro... | [
"S2",
"S8"
] | [
"S2-5",
"S8-5"
] | [
"Nature",
"Relationships"
] | [
"Nature/Animals",
"Relationships/Home Life"
] |
a75f2a7ef4bcfec2 | What Are You On? | Ron Padgett | If you asked an Elizabethan
What are you on?
he or she would have answered
The earth, this terrestrial globe
whereas today it means
What medication
are you taking?
(Are you taking has less energy
than What medication it is an anticlimax
without a climax)
And today What are you on about?
would have sounded li... | [
"S3",
"S6"
] | [] | [
"Social Commentaries",
"Living"
] | [] |
5adb00759eabdfda | Cornelius ... Cornelius Gurlitt | Gerard Malanga | How tired are you? How benevolent the cause for those slim, aching moments of blinding obscurity,and the blinds drawn and the sunlight louvereduntil even the knickknacks cling to their dust as to Timepassing passing, if even that. The yearningto be not bothered, to be passed on the street,the rehab, the food mart, the ... | [
"S6",
"S7",
"S10"
] | [
"S10-1",
"S10-4"
] | [
"Living",
"Time & Brevity",
"Arts & Sciences"
] | [
"Arts & Sciences/Architecture & Design",
"Arts & Sciences/Painting & Sculpture"
] |
246e999462e741ab | The Tree Agreement | Elise Paschen | The neighbor calls the Siberian Elma “weed” tree, demands we hackit down, says the leaves overwhelmhis property, the square backyard.He’s collar-and-tie. A weed tree?Branches screen buildings, subway tracks,his patch of yard. We disagree,claim back the sap, heartwood, wild bark.He declares the tree “hazardous.”We shelt... | [
"S2",
"S6",
"S8"
] | [
"S2-8",
"S8-4",
"S8-5"
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"Nature",
"Living",
"Relationships"
] | [
"Nature/Plants & Fungi",
"Relationships/Friendship",
"Relationships/Home Life"
] |
c4d50cb20374c8cc | The History of Ideas, 1973-2012: Authority | Brian Blanchfield | Where the correlative of reason was conviction and where the correlative of power was obedience, the correlative of authority was trust
Your job—she gives another to the child
hip-high—is to heat the money in your hands
to the optimum warmth for purchase. Cagey,
the diversion in the same coin as his want.
It buys ... | [
"S3",
"S4",
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"S9",
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] |
13b1ea5a62a9f28c | The Simplon Pass | William Wordsworth | —Brook and roadWere fellow-travellers in this gloomy Pass,And with them did we journey several hoursAt a slow step. The immeasurable heightOf woods decaying, never to be decayed,The stationary blasts of waterfalls,And in the narrow rent, at every turn,Winds thwarting winds bewildered and forlorn,The torrents shooting f... | [
"S2",
"S9"
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"S2-7",
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"Nature",
"Activities"
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"Nature/Landscapes & Pastorals",
"Activities/Travels & Journeys"
] |
4b226b91d8c399ff | Mirrors at 4 a.m. | Charles Simic | You must come to them sideways
In rooms webbed in shadow,
Sneak a view of their emptiness
Without them catching
A glimpse of you in return.
The secret is,
Even the empty bed is a burden to them,
A pretense.
They are more themselves keeping
The company of a blank wall,
The company of time and eternity
Which, ... | [
"S6",
"S7"
] | [] | [
"Living",
"Time & Brevity"
] | [] |
40a636a9e7b5c15f | In Memoriam A. H. H. OBIIT MDCCCXXXIII: 11 | Alfred, Lord Tennyson | Calm is the morn without a sound, Calm as to suit a calmer grief, And only thro' the faded leaf The chestnut pattering to the ground: Calm and deep peace on this high wold, And on these dews that drench the furze. And all the silvery gossamers That twinkle into green and gold: Calm a... | [
"S2",
"S6"
] | [
"S2-7",
"S6-5"
] | [
"Nature",
"Living"
] | [
"Nature/Landscapes & Pastorals",
"Living/Mourning"
] |
1d3a8ffb5d88b02f | On Wanting to Tell [ ] about a Girl Eating Fish Eyes | Mary Szybist | —how her loose curls float above each silver fish as she leans in to pluck its eyes— You died just hours ago. Not suddenly, no. You'd been dying so long nothing looked like itself: from your window, fishermen swirled sequins; fishnets entangled the moon. Now the dark rain looks like dark rain. Only the wine s... | [
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"S9",
"S10"
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"S10-5"
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"Living",
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"Arts & Sciences"
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"Arts & Sciences/Philosophy",
"Activities/Eating & Drinking"
] |
4afe5dbb5d529c63 | The Traitor | Sabrina Orah Mark | A few days before the first snow the soldiers dressed like children began to appear. “Come quick,” said Beatrice, fetching Walter B. away from his scripture, “and bring candy!” Walter B. pulled on his robe and joined Beatrice on the balcony. “Oh look,” said Beatrice, “you can see their small, sweet eyes peeking through... | [
"S3",
"S8"
] | [
"S3-11"
] | [
"Social Commentaries",
"Relationships"
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"Social Commentaries/War & Conflict"
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6c13b230e5004e19 | Song | Randall Mann | I found my muster station, sir.My skin is patent leather.The tourists are recidivists.This calm is earthquake weather.I’ve used up all the mulligans.I’d kill to share a vice.The youngster reads a yellowed Oui.The socialite has lice.The Europe trip I finally tookwas rash and Polaroid,was gilt, confit, and bathhouse foam... | [
"S6",
"S9"
] | [
"S6-4",
"S9-7"
] | [
"Living",
"Activities"
] | [
"Living/Death & Dying",
"Activities/Travels & Journeys"
] |
95df36e98dab8817 | Home | Edgar Albert Guest | It takes a heap o’ livin’ in a house t’ make it home, A heap o’ sun an’ shadder, an’ ye sometimes have t’ roam Afore ye really ’preciate the things ye lef’ behind, An’ hunger fer ’em somehow, with ’em allus on yer mind. It don’t make any differunce how rich ye get t’ be, How much yer chairs an’ tables cost, how great y... | [
"S6",
"S8"
] | [
"S8-5"
] | [
"Living",
"Relationships"
] | [
"Relationships/Home Life"
] |
57a8a8d80b883f6f | I Will Take Anyone to Bed (Poetically Speaking of Course) | Sara Littlecrow-Russell | I have made love with Pablo Neruda
On the heights of Machu Picchu
I flashed the tattoo on my thigh
And hitched a lowride with Luis Rodriguez
I have held Adrian Louis close
And danced a wild reservation two-step
Until beer cans and disposable diapers
Spun around us like stars.
I have surrendered to Leonel Rugama... | [
"S10"
] | [
"S10-6",
"S10-8"
] | [
"Arts & Sciences"
] | [
"Arts & Sciences/Poetry & Poets",
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ac75435330c7a745 | Gloss of the Past | David Trinidad | Pink Dawn, Aurora Pink, Misty Pink, Fresh Pink, Natural Pink, Country
Pink, Dusty Pink, Pussywillow Pink, Pink Heather, Pink Peony, Sunflower
Pink, Plum Pink, Peach of a Pink, Raspberry Pink, Watermelon Pink, Pink
Lemonade, Bikini Pink, Buoy Buoy Pink, Sea Shell Pink, Pebble Pink, Pink
Piper, Acapulco Pink, Tahiti ... | [
"S10"
] | [
"S10-2"
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"Arts & Sciences/Language & Linguistics"
] |
4898c195d68857f2 | The Museum | Yves Bonnefoy | A clamor, in the distance. A crowd running under the rain beatingdown, between the canvases the sea wind set clattering.A man passes crying something. What is he saying? What heknows! What he has seen! I make out his words. Ah, I almostunderstand!I took refuge in a museum. Outside the great wind mixed withwater reigns ... | [
"S9",
"S10"
] | [
"S9-3",
"S10-4"
] | [
"Activities",
"Arts & Sciences"
] | [
"Arts & Sciences/Painting & Sculpture",
"Activities/Indoor Activities"
] |
3f85a257e0092c19 | The Power of Armies is a Visible Thing | William Wordsworth | The power of Armies is a visible thing,Formal and circumscribed in time and space;But who the limits of that power shall traceWhich a brave People into light can bringOr hide, at will,—for freedom combatingBy just revenge inflamed? No foot may chase,No eye can follow, to a fatal placeThat power, that spirit, whether on... | [
"S3",
"S11"
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"S3-11",
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"Social Commentaries",
"Mythology & Folklore"
] | [
"Mythology & Folklore/Heroes & Patriotism",
"Social Commentaries/War & Conflict"
] |
66b4f84173c0562d | Nick and the Candlestick | Sylvia Plath | I am a miner. The light burns blue.
Waxy stalactites
Drip and thicken, tears
The earthen womb
Exudes from its dead boredom.
Black bat airs
Wrap me, raggy shawls,
Cold homicides.
They weld to me like plums.
Old cave of calcium
Icicles, old echoer.
Even the newts are white,
Those holy Joes.
And the fish, the... | [
"S3",
"S8"
] | [] | [
"Social Commentaries",
"Relationships"
] | [] |
39cfe9d10fa2ba75 | Within Two Weeks the African American Poet Ross Gay is Mistaken for Both the African American Poet Terrance Hayes and the African American Poet Kyle Dargan, Not One of Whom Looks Anything Like the Others | Ross Gay | If you think you know enough to say this poem
is about good hair, I'll correct you
and tell you it's about history
which is the blacksmith of our tongues.
Our eyes. Where you see misunderstanding
I see knuckles and teeth for sale
in a storefront window. I see the waterlogged
face of the fourteen-year-old boy.
T... | [
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"S10"
] | [
"S3-8",
"S10-6"
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"Social Commentaries",
"Arts & Sciences"
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"Arts & Sciences/Poetry & Poets",
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] |
c4fb3cf56cd98ac5 | Passage over Water | Robert Duncan | We have gone out in boats upon the sea at night,
lost, and the vast waters close traps of fear about us.
The boats are driven apart, and we are alone at last
under the incalculable sky, listless, diseased with stars.
Let the oars be idle, my love, and forget at this time
our love like a knife between us
defining ... | [
"S1",
"S2",
"S8"
] | [
"S1-3",
"S1-6",
"S2-6"
] | [
"Love",
"Nature",
"Relationships"
] | [
"Love/Heartache & Loss",
"Love/Realistic & Complicated",
"Nature/Bodies of Water"
] |
3dc7b3e1d9e40f7c | Beautiful Wreckage | W.D. Ehrhart | What if I didn’t shoot the old lady
running away from our patrol,
or the old man in the back of the head,
or the boy in the marketplace?
Or what if the boy—but he didn’t
have a grenade, and the woman in Hue
didn’t lie in the rain in a mortar pit
with seven Marines just for food,
Gaffney didn’t get hit in the kn... | [
"S3",
"S6",
"S8"
] | [
"S3-11",
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"Living",
"Relationships"
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"Social Commentaries/War & Conflict",
"Living/Death & Dying",
"Living/Mourning",
"Relationships/Friendship"
] |
1cd27275083a7746 | Herr Stimmung on Transparency | Keith Waldrop | To those of a certain temperament, there is nothing worse than the
thought of something hidden, secret, withheld from their knowing—
especially if they suspect that another knows about it and has even,
perhaps, connived at keeping it concealed.
D. H. Lawrence seems to have been irritated no end by the thought
... | [
"S3",
"S10"
] | [
"S3-7",
"S10-2",
"S10-5",
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"Arts & Sciences"
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"Arts & Sciences/Language & Linguistics",
"Arts & Sciences/Philosophy",
"Arts & Sciences/Poetry & Poets",
"Arts & Sciences/Sciences",
"Social Commentaries/Popular Culture"
] |
d2705483471ca3f0 | The Rape of the Lock: Canto 4 | Alexander Pope | But anxious cares the pensive nymph oppress'd, And secret passions labour'd in her breast. Not youthful kings in battle seiz'd alive, Not scornful virgins who their charms survive, Not ardent lovers robb'd of all their bliss, Not ancient ladies when refus'd a kiss, Not tyrants fierce that unrepenting die, Not Cynthia w... | [
"S3",
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"S3-4",
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"Social Commentaries",
"Relationships",
"Arts & Sciences"
] | [
"Social Commentaries/Gender & Sexuality",
"Relationships/Friendship"
] |
fa2f63a122fe213b | Auld Robin Forbes | Susanna Blamire | And auld Robin Forbes hes gien tem a dance,
I pat on my speckets to see them aw prance;
I thout o’ the days when I was but fifteen,
And skipp’d wi’ the best upon Forbes’s green.
Of aw things that is I think thout is meast queer,
It brings that that’s by-past and sets it down here;
I see Willy as plain as I dui this bit... | [
"S1"
] | [
"S1-3",
"S1-5"
] | [
"Love"
] | [
"Love/Heartache & Loss",
"Love/New Love"
] |
55138277f0a996d5 | Water | Ralph Waldo Emerson | The water understands Civilization well; It wets my foot, but prettily, It chills my life, but wittily, It is not disconcerted, It is not broken-hearted: Well used, it decketh joy, Adorneth, doubleth joy: Ill used, it will destroy, In perfect time and measure With a face of golden pleasure Elegantly destroy. | [
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] | [
"S10-5"
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"Social Commentaries",
"History & Politics",
"Arts & Sciences"
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"Arts & Sciences/Philosophy"
] |
71d7fc413527165a | Hatred and Vengeance, My Eternal Portion | William Cowper | Hatred and vengeance, my eternal portion, Scarce can endure delay of execution, Wait, with impatient readiness, to seize my Soul in a moment. Damned below Judas: more abhorred than he was, Who for a few pence sold his holy master. Twice betrayed, Jesus me, the last delinquent, ... | [
"S5",
"S6"
] | [
"S5-4",
"S6-6"
] | [
"Religion",
"Living"
] | [
"Religion/God & the Divine",
"Living/Health & Illness"
] |
9e181ec6cec445f3 | john brown’s | Geraldine Clarkson | fine parchment face
suddenly chantilly
lace his torso a doily
perforated twinkling
with sweet patient fungus
shiny maggot-
milled one old gold trinket slipped
between two ribs
his legs folded and cold
he too was somebody’s
honeybunch and heartleap
his jaw an ox-bone
h... | [
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"S4",
"S6"
] | [
"S3-11",
"S6-4"
] | [
"Social Commentaries",
"History & Politics",
"Living"
] | [
"Social Commentaries/War & Conflict",
"Living/Death & Dying"
] |
5bf7766f656012e8 | Hook | Ellery Akers | One year a generalpacks the dead arithmetic in a drawer—all the subtractions, divisions.The next year, vines cover the bunkers.The brain resumes its starbursts of rehearsal.The heart leaps under the defibrillator.The bone eases into its socket.Skin grows back. Scars fade. Eyes clear.Look at the trees at the burn, six y... | [
"S3",
"S6"
] | [
"S3-11"
] | [
"Social Commentaries",
"Living"
] | [
"Social Commentaries/War & Conflict"
] |
8418e8355fe02fb3 | Mother and Poet | Elizabeth Barrett Browning | I. Dead ! One of them shot by the sea in the east,
And one of them shot in the west by the sea.
Dead ! both my boys ! When you sit at the feast
And are wanting a great song for Italy free,
Let none look at me ! II. Yet I was a poetess only last year,
And good at my art, for a woman, men said ;
But this w... | [
"S3",
"S6",
"S11"
] | [
"S3-11",
"S6-4",
"S6-5",
"S6-7",
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"Social Commentaries",
"Living",
"Mythology & Folklore"
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"Mythology & Folklore/Heroes & Patriotism",
"Social Commentaries/War & Conflict",
"Living/Death & Dying",
"Living/Mourning",
"Living/Parenthood"
] |
36d619028cbd1513 | Pinocchio | Rae Armantrout | Strand. String.
In this dream,
the paths cross
and cross again.
They are spelling
a real boy
out of repetition.
•
Each one
is the one
real boy.
Each knows
he must be
wrong
about this, but
he can’t feel
how.
•
The fish
and the fisherman,
the pilot,
the princess,
the fireman and
the ones on fire. | [
"S6",
"S11"
] | [
"S11-1"
] | [
"Living",
"Mythology & Folklore"
] | [
"Mythology & Folklore/Fairy-tales & Legends"
] |
2e32605270b1f63c | Brahma | Ralph Waldo Emerson | If the red slayer think he slays,
Or if the slain think he is slain,
They know not well the subtle ways
I keep, and pass, and turn again.
Far or forgot to me is near;
Shadow and sunlight are the same;
The vanished gods to me appear;
And one to me are shame and fame.
They reckon ill who leave me out;
... | [
"S5"
] | [
"S5-4",
"S5-7"
] | [
"Religion"
] | [
"Religion/God & the Divine",
"Religion/Other Religions"
] |
1cacf32d44bcaf34 | Boy Goes to War | Max Ritvo | His father told him never start writing
or reading in the middle of a book.
There’s a title, don’t go on without one.
And he didn’t go on without one — he had the title Private.
This was life’s taproot — the obedient
boy began always at the beginning.
Books start out with what the boy calls Beauty
— the boat’s s... | [
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"S6",
"S7",
"S10"
] | [
"S3-11",
"S10-8"
] | [
"Social Commentaries",
"Living",
"Time & Brevity",
"Arts & Sciences"
] | [
"Arts & Sciences/Reading & Books",
"Social Commentaries/War & Conflict"
] |
4f6f8a106f6118bd | from Decadence: 7 — An Bonnán Buí | Derek Mahon | A heron-like species, rare visitors, most recent records
referring to winter months . . . very active at dusk.
—Guide to Irish Birds
A sobering thought, the idea of you stretched there,
bittern, under a dark sky, your exposed bones
yellow t... | [
"S2",
"S6",
"S9"
] | [
"S2-5",
"S6-4",
"S9-1"
] | [
"Nature",
"Living",
"Activities"
] | [
"Nature/Animals",
"Living/Death & Dying",
"Activities/Eating & Drinking"
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73406c7e5b8edf82 | Oread | H. D. | Whirl up, sea— whirl your pointed pines, splash your great pines on our rocks, hurl your green over us, cover us with your pools of fir. | [
"S2",
"S11"
] | [
"S2-6",
"S2-8"
] | [
"Nature",
"Mythology & Folklore"
] | [
"Nature/Bodies of Water",
"Nature/Plants & Fungi"
] |
5418fc4c73f276fa | Apology for Apostasy? | Etheridge Knight | Soft songs, like birds, die in poison air
So my song cannot now be candy.
Anger rots the oak and elm; roses are rare,
Seldom seen through blind despair.
And my murmur cannot be heard
Above the din and damn. The night is full
Of buggers and bastards; no moon or stars
Light the sky. And my candy is deferred
Till ... | [
"S3"
] | [] | [
"Social Commentaries"
] | [] |
5ecba42f8c2e4486 | The Woodpecker Keeps Returning | Jane Hirshfield | The woodpecker keeps returning
to drill the house wall.
Put a pie plate over one place, he chooses another.
There is nothing good to eat there:
he has found in the house
a resonant billboard to post his intentions,
his voluble strength as provider.
But where is the female he drums for? Where?
I ask this, who am... | [
"S2"
] | [
"S2-5"
] | [
"Nature"
] | [
"Nature/Animals"
] |
ea996e02ebabd7a5 | Vitamins and Roughage | Kenneth Rexroth | Strong ankled, sun burned, almost naked,
The daughters of California
Educate reluctant humanists;
Drive into their skulls with tennis balls
The unhappy realization
That nature is still stronger than man.
The special Hellenic privilege
Of the special intellect seeps out
At last in this irrigated soil.
Sweat of ... | [
"S9"
] | [
"S9-5",
"S9-6"
] | [
"Activities"
] | [
"Activities/Sports & Outdoor Activities",
"Activities/Study & Knowledge"
] |
6d37112492a5001a | City Without a Name | Czeslaw Milosz | 1
Who will honor the city without a name
If so many are dead and others pan gold
Or sell arms in faraway countries?
What shepherd's horn swathed in the bark of birch
Will sound in the Ponary Hills the memory of the absent—
Vagabonds, Pathfinders, brethren of a dissolved lodge?
This spring, in a desert, beyond a ... | [
"S2",
"S3",
"S4",
"S6",
"S7",
"S10"
] | [
"S2-7",
"S6-1",
"S10-5"
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"Nature",
"Social Commentaries",
"History & Politics",
"Living",
"Time & Brevity",
"Arts & Sciences"
] | [
"Arts & Sciences/Philosophy",
"Nature/Landscapes & Pastorals",
"Living/Aging"
] |
acd3a3cedc9ab0a8 | A Winter Daybreak above Vence | James Wright | The night’s drifts
Pile up below me and behind my back,
Slide down the hill, rise again, and build
Eerie little dunes on the roof of the house.
In the valley below me,
Miles between me and the town of St.-Jeannet,
The road lamps glow.
They are so cold, they might as well be dark.
Trucks and cars
Cough and dron... | [
"S2",
"S3"
] | [
"S2-4",
"S2-7",
"S3-1"
] | [
"Nature",
"Social Commentaries"
] | [
"Nature/Winter",
"Nature/Landscapes & Pastorals",
"Social Commentaries/Cities & Urban Life"
] |
a69b0ed61fd9dbb5 | To Katharine: At Fourteen Months | Joelle Biele | All morning, you’ve studied the laws of spoons, the rules of books, the dynamics of the occasional plate, observed the principles governing objects in motion and objects at rest. To see if it will fall, and if it does, how far, if it will rage like a lost penny or ring like a Chinese gong—because it does... | [
"S9",
"S10"
] | [
"S9-6",
"S10-9"
] | [
"Activities",
"Arts & Sciences"
] | [
"Arts & Sciences/Sciences",
"Activities/Study & Knowledge"
] |
8e5981cad1fe4e82 | The Horse Fell Off the Poem | Mahmoud Darwish | The horse fell off the poem
and the Galilean women were wet
with butterflies and dew,
dancing above chrysanthemum
The two absent ones: you and I
you and I are the two absent ones
A pair of white doves
chatting on the branches of a holm oak
No love, but I love ancient
love poems that guard
the sick moon from s... | [
"S1",
"S10"
] | [
"S10-6"
] | [
"Love",
"Arts & Sciences"
] | [
"Arts & Sciences/Poetry & Poets"
] |
8c5b8c5ae60dfc3a | Amoretti XXIII: Penelope for her Ulisses sake | Edmund Spenser | Penelope for her Ulisses sake,
Deviz’d a Web her wooers to deceave:
In which the worke that she all day did make
The same at night she did again unreave:
Such subtile craft my Damzell doth conceave,
Th’ importune suit of my desire to shonne:
For all that I in many dayes doo weave,
In one short houre I find by he... | [
"S1"
] | [
"S1-4",
"S1-9"
] | [
"Love"
] | [
"Love/Infatuation & Crushes",
"Love/Unrequited Love"
] |
76737fc42dc4ddac | Recycling Center | Brenda Hillman | The labeled bins on the California hillside
catch the glint and quarter-glint of passing cars.
Families pull up with their interesting trash
and start unloading: Here, sweetheart,
this goes over in Newspaper. The bundle
hits with a thud. Diet soda cans
spin almost noiselessly down, and the sun-
permitting bottle... | [
"S3",
"S6",
"S7"
] | [] | [
"Social Commentaries",
"Living",
"Time & Brevity"
] | [] |
5e279d0993f90092 | Leda | H. D. | Where the slow river
meets the tide,
a red swan lifts red wings
and darker beak,
and underneath the purple down
of his soft breast
uncurls his coral feet.
Through the deep purple
of the dying heat
of sun and mist,
the level ray of sun-beam
has caressed
the lily with dark breast,
and flecked with richer gol... | [
"S2",
"S11"
] | [
"S2-6",
"S11-3",
"S11-4"
] | [
"Nature",
"Mythology & Folklore"
] | [
"Mythology & Folklore/Greek & Roman Mythology",
"Mythology & Folklore/Heroes & Patriotism",
"Nature/Bodies of Water"
] |
fc47995bbc33f726 | wishes for sons | Lucille Clifton | i wish them cramps.
i wish them a strange town
and the last tampon.
i wish them no 7-11.
i wish them one week early
and wearing a white skirt.
i wish them one week late.
later i wish them hot flashes
and clots like you
wouldn't believe. let the
flashes come when they
meet someone special.
let the clots come... | [
"S2",
"S3",
"S6",
"S8"
] | [
"S3-4",
"S8-5"
] | [
"Nature",
"Social Commentaries",
"Living",
"Relationships"
] | [
"Social Commentaries/Gender & Sexuality",
"Relationships/Home Life"
] |
5a1b5951cdd5629a | To a Marsh Hawk in Spring | Henry David Thoreau | There is health in thy gray wing,
Health of nature’s furnishing.
Say, thou modern-winged antique,
Was thy mistress ever sick?
In each heaving of thy wing
Thou dost health and leisure bring,
Thou dost waive disease and pain
And resume new life again. | [
"S2",
"S6"
] | [
"S2-5",
"S6-6"
] | [
"Nature",
"Living"
] | [
"Nature/Animals",
"Living/Health & Illness"
] |
358223b8a693ed15 | The Courtship of the Lizard Lover | Kate Buckley | He crawls through the cracks
of my stone foundation,
sly and sleek as
I tempt him with food.
He stays out of habit; I cook
out of love for things that move.
We grow accustomed to each other’s
trails and smells, the skins we’ve shed
along the long, long road
of rubbing each other smooth.
Till all the skins we’... | [
"S1",
"S2",
"S9"
] | [
"S1-1",
"S2-5",
"S9-1"
] | [
"Love",
"Nature",
"Activities"
] | [
"Love/Desire & Erotic Love",
"Nature/Animals",
"Activities/Eating & Drinking"
] |
969b11f495f1ccd1 | Memento | Lily Cao | I give a piece quite near away,then another, one and two to threeand say good-bye with some dismay.We might have been twins, I born in Mayand she of the blistered Januarycolored like the vibrant cray-on, clinging on to toys of the day,as mine become that of history.“Again,” she cries and I obey.I hold the script of the... | [
"S6",
"S7",
"S8",
"S9"
] | [
"S6-3",
"S6-4",
"S8-1",
"S9-7"
] | [
"Living",
"Time & Brevity",
"Relationships",
"Activities"
] | [
"Living/Coming of Age",
"Living/Death & Dying",
"Relationships/Breakups & Separation",
"Activities/Travels & Journeys"
] |
16e1e445371f60ac | Perfect | Kenn Nesbitt | Today I managed something
that I’ve never done before.
I turned in this week’s spelling quiz
and got a perfect score.
Although my score was perfect,
it appears I’m not too bright.
I got a perfect zero—
not a single answer right. | [
"S9"
] | [
"S9-6"
] | [
"Activities"
] | [
"Activities/Study & Knowledge"
] |
06a963a7ec02e2b7 | from Endymion | John Keats | A Poetic Romance (excerpt)
BOOK I A thing of beauty is a joy for ever: Its loveliness increases; it will never Pass into nothingness; but still will keep A bower quiet for us, and a sleep Full of sweet dreams, and health, and quiet breathing. Therefore, on every morrow, are we wreathing A flowery band to bind us to t... | [
"S1",
"S2",
"S3",
"S8",
"S10"
] | [
"S1-7",
"S1-8",
"S2-7",
"S2-8",
"S3-4",
"S10-6"
] | [
"Love",
"Nature",
"Social Commentaries",
"Relationships",
"Arts & Sciences"
] | [
"Love/Romantic Love",
"Love/Classic Love",
"Arts & Sciences/Poetry & Poets",
"Nature/Landscapes & Pastorals",
"Nature/Plants & Fungi",
"Social Commentaries/Gender & Sexuality"
] |
932cbb48f9a4a315 | The Motorcyclists | James Tate | My cuticles are a mess. Oh honey, by the way,
did you like my new negligee? It’s a replica
of one Kim Novak wore in some movie or other.
I wish I had a foot-long chili dog right now.
Do you like fireworks, I mean not just on the 4th of July,
but fireworks any time? There are people
like that, you know. They’re li... | [
"S9"
] | [
"S9-7"
] | [
"Activities"
] | [
"Activities/Travels & Journeys"
] |
571da55ef946b572 | Zoom! | Simon Armitage | It begins as a house, an end terrace
in this case
but it will not stop there. Soon it is
an avenue
which cambers arrogantly past the Mechanics' Institute,
turns left
at the main road without even looking
and quickly it is
a town with all four major clearing banks,
a daily paper
and a footb... | [
"S10"
] | [
"S10-8"
] | [
"Arts & Sciences"
] | [
"Arts & Sciences/Reading & Books"
] |
ea013c18652ac675 | The Statesmen | Ambrose Bierce | How blest the land that counts among
Her sons so many good and wise,
To execute great feats of tongue
When troubles rise.
Behold them mounting every stump,
By speech our liberty to guard.
Observe their courage—see them jump,
And come down hard!
"Walk up, walk up!" each cries aloud,
... | [
"S3",
"S4",
"S10"
] | [] | [
"Social Commentaries",
"History & Politics",
"Arts & Sciences"
] | [] |
5c25fc320a2b3d1c | "It's such a shock, I almost screech" | William Cole | It's such a shock, I almost screech,
When I find a worm inside my peach!
But then, what really makes me blue,
Is to find a worm who's bit in two! | [
"S9",
"S10"
] | [
"S9-1"
] | [
"Activities",
"Arts & Sciences"
] | [
"Activities/Eating & Drinking"
] |
2461cdf68e86730d | This Is Just To Say | William Carlos Williams | I have eaten
the plums
that were in
the icebox
and which
you were probably
saving
for breakfast
Forgive me
they were delicious
so sweet
and so cold | [
"S1",
"S3",
"S6",
"S8",
"S9"
] | [
"S1-6",
"S3-4",
"S8-3",
"S8-5",
"S8-7",
"S9-1"
] | [
"Love",
"Social Commentaries",
"Living",
"Relationships",
"Activities"
] | [
"Love/Realistic & Complicated",
"Social Commentaries/Gender & Sexuality",
"Relationships/Family & Ancestors",
"Relationships/Home Life",
"Relationships/Marriage & Companionship",
"Activities/Eating & Drinking"
] |
98b919ec128795b9 | Wind, Water, Stone | Octavio Paz | for Roger Caillois
Water hollows stone,
wind scatters water,
stone stops the wind.
Water, wind, stone.
Wind carves stone,
stone's a cup of water,
water escapes and is wind.
Stone, wind, water.
Wind sings in its whirling,
water murmurs going by,
unmoving stone keeps still.
Wind, water, stone.
Each is anothe... | [
"S2"
] | [
"S2-6",
"S2-10"
] | [
"Nature"
] | [
"Nature/Weather",
"Nature/Bodies of Water"
] |
dd9a3d30aed8fa45 | The Orange Bottle | Joshua Mehigan | The clear orange bottle was empty. It had been empty a day.It suddenly seemed so costlyand uncalled for anyway. Two years had passed. They had passedmore or less the way years should.Maybe he’d changed. Or maybethe doctors had misunderstood. It was June. The enormous elm treewas green again, and the scentof hyacint... | [
"S3",
"S6"
] | [
"S3-6",
"S6-6"
] | [
"Social Commentaries",
"Living"
] | [
"Social Commentaries/Incarceration & Justice",
"Living/Health & Illness"
] |
236117dfa1290ce3 | Meta-A and the A of Absolutes | Jay Wright | I write my God in blue.
I run my gods upstream on flimsy rafts.
I bathe my goddesses in foam, in moonlight.
I take my reasons from my mother's snuff breath,
or from an old woman, sitting with a lemonade,
at twilight, on the desert's steps.
Brown by day and black by night,
my God has wings that open to no reason.... | [
"S5"
] | [] | [
"Religion"
] | [] |
aef6f80e04c4d24c | Elevators I | Donald Britton | An enormous list:
coming and goings, nights and mornings,
births and deaths
and rebirths and second deaths
and little lapses like grace notes
where sadness surges in:
sadness surges in,
a passing-windshield light-effect
on the ceiling.
Would you prefer it some other way?
I’m versatile.
I’m hungry.
I’m hot.
... | [
"S6"
] | [] | [
"Living"
] | [] |
853807b66c512700 | I would not paint — a picture — (348) | Emily Dickinson | I would not paint — a picture —
I'd rather be the One
It's bright impossibility
To dwell — delicious — on —
And wonder how the fingers feel
Whose rare — celestial — stir —
Evokes so sweet a torment —
Such sumptuous — Despair —
I would not talk, like Cornets —
I'd rather be the One
Raised softly to the Ceiling... | [
"S10"
] | [
"S10-3",
"S10-4",
"S10-6"
] | [
"Arts & Sciences"
] | [
"Arts & Sciences/Music",
"Arts & Sciences/Painting & Sculpture",
"Arts & Sciences/Poetry & Poets"
] |
a2e81d5b55e9257e | The Secret | Robert Nichols | Suddenly with a shy, sad grace She turns to me her lighted face, And I, who hear some idle phrase, Watch how her wry lips move And guess that the poor words they frame Mean naught for they would speak the same Message I read in the dark flame Within her eyes, which say, “I love.” But I can only turn away.I... | [
"S1",
"S3",
"S6",
"S8"
] | [
"S1-6",
"S1-9",
"S3-4",
"S3-11",
"S6-5"
] | [
"Love",
"Social Commentaries",
"Living",
"Relationships"
] | [
"Love/Realistic & Complicated",
"Love/Unrequited Love",
"Social Commentaries/War & Conflict",
"Social Commentaries/Gender & Sexuality",
"Living/Mourning"
] |
dac6fd903e74f806 | Ticking and Tocking | Ron Padgett | When people say
“Time is running out”
I see an alarm clock
with a bell on top
and with arms and legs
dashing out the door
of a room in which
time has stopped
reminding the human race
that we are running out.
I carry this idea
to a corner of the room
and set it down
gently.
I don’t want
to wake it up.
Th... | [
"S3",
"S4",
"S6",
"S7"
] | [] | [
"Social Commentaries",
"History & Politics",
"Living",
"Time & Brevity"
] | [] |
fe82c2836c4d16c4 | On a Drop of Dew | Andrew Marvell | See how the orient dew, Shed from the bosom of the morn Into the blowing roses, Yet careless of its mansion new, For the clear region where ’twas born Round in itself incloses: And in its little globe’s extent, Frames as it can its native element. How it the purple flow’r does slight, Scarce tou... | [
"S2",
"S5"
] | [] | [
"Nature",
"Religion"
] | [] |
de043477b8781df0 | recycling | Nate Marshall | it's your 1st year of college & you should be missing
home by now but mostly you don't. you read the
Chicago newspapers & call family on Sundays.
you pick up going to church at a place adjacent to the projects.
you're not from the projects & the ones in Chicago seem worse
but there's comfort in being around plains... | [
"S3",
"S6",
"S9",
"S10"
] | [
"S3-8",
"S6-3",
"S9-6",
"S10-8"
] | [
"Social Commentaries",
"Living",
"Activities",
"Arts & Sciences"
] | [
"Arts & Sciences/Reading & Books",
"Social Commentaries/Race & Ethnicity",
"Living/Coming of Age",
"Activities/Study & Knowledge"
] |
38ad874d046fc789 | Then | Roddy Lumsden | For the first time, I listen to a lost
and secret recording of us
making love near-on ten years ago.
I recognize your voice, your sounds,
though if I knew no better,
I could be any man in any room.
After, the rising sounds of rising
and of dressing and once
as you step up close to the deck,
perhaps to pick up ... | [
"S1",
"S8"
] | [
"S1-1",
"S1-3"
] | [
"Love",
"Relationships"
] | [
"Love/Desire & Erotic Love",
"Love/Heartache & Loss"
] |
2e82209ffb1797e6 | Emplumada | Lorna Dee Cervantes | When summer ended
the leaves of snapdragons withered
taking their shrill-colored mouths with them.
They were still, so quiet. They were
violet where umber now is. She hated
and she hated to see
them go. Flowers
born when the weather was good - this
she thinks of, watching the branch of peaches
daring their way... | [
"S2",
"S5",
"S6",
"S7"
] | [] | [
"Nature",
"Religion",
"Living",
"Time & Brevity"
] | [] |
9de1d91c29ee82ee | My Husband, Lost in the Wild | Jayme Ringleb | He said he buried
his right eye in South Georgia —
on a dare, he said,
when he was little, beneath
one green ash of two
that mark the end of a road
whose name he’s
by now forgotten: Lonesome
something, maybe Dog
or Cricket. He said
he couldn’t love me, not
really, not without
his old right eye,
and anyway... | [
"S1",
"S6",
"S8"
] | [
"S1-3",
"S8-1"
] | [
"Love",
"Living",
"Relationships"
] | [
"Love/Heartache & Loss",
"Relationships/Breakups & Separation"
] |
d3d33610a21074ab | To a Print of Queen Victoria | James K. Baxter | I advise rest; the farmhouse
we dug you up in has been
modernized, and the people
who hung you as their ikon
against the long passage wall
are underground — Incubus
and excellent woman, we
inherit the bone acre
of your cages and laws. This
dull green land suckled at your
blood’s frigor Anglicanus,
crowning w... | [
"S4",
"S10"
] | [
"S10-4"
] | [
"History & Politics",
"Arts & Sciences"
] | [
"Arts & Sciences/Painting & Sculpture"
] |
6887629f427549a4 | Morning Talk | Roberta Hill | —for Melissa L. Whiteman
“Hi, guy,” said I to a robin
perched on a pole in the middle
of the garden. Pink and yellow
firecracker zinnias, rough green
leaves of broccoli,
and deep red tomatoes on dying stems
frame his still presence.
“I’ve heard you’re not
THE REAL ROBIN. Bird watchers have
agreed,” I said. “T... | [
"S2",
"S3",
"S8"
] | [
"S2-5",
"S3-8",
"S8-3"
] | [
"Nature",
"Social Commentaries",
"Relationships"
] | [
"Nature/Animals",
"Social Commentaries/Race & Ethnicity",
"Relationships/Family & Ancestors"
] |
0b5630de02c3575d | Earth Science | J. T. Barbarese | I smell me coming up behind me some days— sweet sarcophagal history. The Ark after the beasts disembarked, the motel bed as the maid draws the shades, shakes the sheets, blinks back the stink, the leafed hollow where the stalled mower sits in its exhaust and smells of wronged flesh, wing, meat but me mostly, ... | [
"S6"
] | [
"S6-4"
] | [
"Living"
] | [
"Living/Death & Dying"
] |
54f807761c1aa3cc | How Soon | Gordon Henry Jr. | The story goes from in a rainfall
to sister walking a field
browned autumn. And when she arrives
winter has come, so the old man
rises from his chair, picks up
matches, pipes and tools, and
walks out to begin again.
The sculptures grow by the day,
birds in ice, recognizable
eagles, a bear who began
as a man i... | [
"S2",
"S6",
"S7",
"S10"
] | [
"S2-1",
"S2-4",
"S10-4"
] | [
"Nature",
"Living",
"Time & Brevity",
"Arts & Sciences"
] | [
"Arts & Sciences/Painting & Sculpture",
"Nature/Spring",
"Nature/Winter"
] |
ca03496a590c1b82 | Ten Thousand to One | Arthur Sze | The Phoenicians guarded a recipe that required
ten thousand murex shells to make
an ounce of Tyrian purple.
Scan the surface of Aldebaran with a radio wave;
grind lapis lazuli
into ultramarine.
Search the summer sky for an Anasazi turkey constellation;
see algae under an electron microscope
resemble a Magellani... | [
"S2",
"S3",
"S4",
"S10"
] | [
"S2-5",
"S2-8"
] | [
"Nature",
"Social Commentaries",
"History & Politics",
"Arts & Sciences"
] | [
"Nature/Animals",
"Nature/Plants & Fungi"
] |
bbac055bb9e4e49f | Retired Ballerinas, Central Park West | Lawrence Ferlinghetti | Retired ballerinas on winter afternoons
walking their dogs
in Central Park West
(or their cats on leashes—
the cats themselves old highwire artists)
The ballerinas
leap and pirouette
through Columbus Circle
while wino... | [
"S10"
] | [
"S10-10"
] | [
"Arts & Sciences"
] | [
"Arts & Sciences/Theater & Dance"
] |
ceb0093dc144bc3e | Ode to a Grasshopper | Pedro Pietri | (I hope)
the only reason
That I am this pre-autumn
Afternoon in the privacy
Of my suspicious living room
Grant myself permission
To believe in god once again
Is solely because I saw
An unexpected grasshopper
Staring at my thoughts
On the table that keeps
The telephone from having
A mind of its very own
At ... | [
"S2",
"S3",
"S5",
"S9",
"S10"
] | [
"S2-5",
"S3-1",
"S5-8",
"S9-7",
"S10-6"
] | [
"Nature",
"Social Commentaries",
"Religion",
"Activities",
"Arts & Sciences"
] | [
"Arts & Sciences/Poetry & Poets",
"Nature/Animals",
"Social Commentaries/Cities & Urban Life",
"Religion/The Spiritual",
"Activities/Travels & Journeys"
] |
507d6d55c6bc3444 | The north wind whips | Víctor Terán | The north wind whips through,
in the streets papers and leaves
are chased with resentment.
Houses moan,
dogs curl into balls.
There is something in
the afternoon’s finger,
a catfish spine,
a rusty nail.
Someone unthinkingly
smoked cigarettes in heaven,
left it overcast, listless.
Here, at ground level, no o... | [
"S2"
] | [
"S2-10"
] | [
"Nature"
] | [
"Nature/Weather"
] |
da01f259d9787b12 | Much Madness is divinest Sense - (620) | Emily Dickinson | Much Madness is divinest Sense -
To a discerning Eye -
Much Sense - the starkest Madness -
’Tis the Majority
In this, as all, prevail -
Assent - and you are sane -
Demur - you’re straightway dangerous -
And handled with a Chain - | [
"S6",
"S10"
] | [
"S6-6",
"S10-5"
] | [
"Living",
"Arts & Sciences"
] | [
"Arts & Sciences/Philosophy",
"Living/Health & Illness"
] |
69e7cac7d25484c4 | Three Poems for My Husband | Leanne O'Sullivan | walking to the hospital How the autumn dawn burned throughthe misty broods and settled down in fire;how quickly the sun glittered my shadow,how my shadow cried, a moment, with joy.A light frost, a vision of light cracklingdown the maples, down the tinder ash.I was the good thief. I held my Love’ssweet breath, his beaut... | [
"S1",
"S6"
] | [
"S1-1",
"S6-4",
"S6-6"
] | [
"Love",
"Living"
] | [
"Love/Desire & Erotic Love",
"Living/Death & Dying",
"Living/Health & Illness"
] |
5b1d3810db1d345e | Hot Sun, Cool Fire | George Peele | Hot sun, cool fire, tempered with sweet air, Black shade, fair nurse, shadow my white hair. Shine, sun; burn, fire; breathe, air, and ease me; Black shade, fair nurse, shroud me and please me. Shadow, my sweet nurse, keep me from burning; Make not my glad cause cause of mourning. Let not my beauty’s fire Inflam... | [
"S3",
"S6",
"S8",
"S9"
] | [
"S3-4",
"S6-5",
"S6-6",
"S9-4"
] | [
"Social Commentaries",
"Living",
"Relationships",
"Activities"
] | [
"Social Commentaries/Gender & Sexuality",
"Living/Mourning",
"Living/Health & Illness",
"Activities/Jobs & Working"
] |
fdebc5b0eedd06a7 | The Hyphen | Veronica Forrest-Thomson | For the centenary of Girton College
i hyphen (Gk. together, in one)
a short dash or line used to connect
two words together as a compound
1869-
1969
to connect Chapel Wing and Library.
But also: to divide
for etymological or other purpose.
A gap in stone makes actual
the paradox of a centenary.
“It was a hyp... | [
"S10"
] | [
"S10-2"
] | [
"Arts & Sciences"
] | [
"Arts & Sciences/Language & Linguistics"
] |
25b2443a11f8a881 | House of Fact, House of Ruin | Tom Sleigh | 1. homilies from home
You’ve got to put your pants on in the house of fact.
And in the house of fact, when you take off your shirt,
you can hear your shirt cry out, Facts are the floor, facts
are how you make the right side talk to the left. | [
"S5",
"S6",
"S7",
"S8"
] | [
"S5-2",
"S5-8",
"S6-1",
"S6-4",
"S6-8",
"S8-3",
"S8-5"
] | [
"Religion",
"Living",
"Time & Brevity",
"Relationships"
] | [
"Religion/Christianity",
"Religion/The Spiritual",
"Living/Aging",
"Living/Death & Dying",
"Living/Youth",
"Relationships/Family & Ancestors",
"Relationships/Home Life"
] |
8e4df6231cee305c | The Crystal Lithium | James Schuyler | The smell of snow, stinging in nostrils as the wind lifts it from a beach
Eve-shuttering, mixed with sand, or when snow lies under the street lamps and on all
And the air is emptied to an uplifting gassiness
That turns lungs to winter waterwings, buoying, and the bright white night
Freezes in sight a lapse of waves... | [
"S6"
] | [
"S6-6"
] | [
"Living"
] | [
"Living/Health & Illness"
] |
c40dc7584e889c3f | Resolution | Paul Violi | Whereas the porch screen sags from
the weight of flowers (impatiens) that grew
against it, then piles of wet leaves,
then drifted snow; and
Whereas, now rolled like absence in its
drooping length, a dim gold wave,
sundown’s last, cast across a sea of clouds
and the floating year, almost reaches
the legs of the ... | [
"S1"
] | [
"S1-3"
] | [
"Love"
] | [
"Love/Heartache & Loss"
] |
eccb81b5283aa8c3 | Thyrsis: A Monody, to Commemorate the Author's Friend, Arthur Hugh Clough | Matthew Arnold | How changed is here each spot man makes or fills!
In the two Hinkseys nothing keeps the same;
The village street its haunted mansion lacks,
And from the sign is gone Sibylla's name,
And from the roofs the twisted chimney-stacks—
Are ye too changed, ye hills?
See, 'tis n... | [
"S2",
"S6",
"S8"
] | [
"S2-7",
"S2-8",
"S6-1",
"S6-4",
"S8-4"
] | [
"Nature",
"Living",
"Relationships"
] | [
"Nature/Landscapes & Pastorals",
"Nature/Plants & Fungi",
"Living/Aging",
"Living/Death & Dying",
"Relationships/Friendship"
] |
24bb2b2ca6578a2c | Operation Punctum | Don Mee Choi | The television in The Deer Hunter is in Clairton, Pennsylvania. Everything is still at
Welsh’s Lounge: the clouds, the sky, the unlit neon sign outside the window. All is
calm, all is bright. I sing in English while my father is in Vietnam. American wives
are in immeasurable pain and so is my mother. American soldie... | [
"S3",
"S8"
] | [
"S3-11",
"S8-3"
] | [
"Social Commentaries",
"Relationships"
] | [
"Social Commentaries/War & Conflict",
"Relationships/Family & Ancestors"
] |
e71f6457836ab3bd | Me | Frederick Seidel | The fellow talking to himself is me,
Though I don't know it. That's to say, I see
Him every morning shave and comb his hair
And then lose track of him until he starts to care,
Inflating sex dolls out of thin air
In front of his computer, in a battered leather chair
That needs to be thrown out . . . then I lose tr... | [
"S6"
] | [
"S6-1",
"S6-4"
] | [
"Living"
] | [
"Living/Aging",
"Living/Death & Dying"
] |
2c2cc62be7ff9572 | O Tan-Faced Prairie-Boy | Walt Whitman | O tan-faced prairie-boy,
Before you came to camp came many a welcome gift,
Praises and presents came and nourishing food, till at last among the recruits,
You came, taciturn, with nothing to give – we but look’d on each other,
When lo! more than all the gifts of the world you gave me. | [
"S1"
] | [
"S1-1",
"S1-7"
] | [
"Love"
] | [
"Love/Desire & Erotic Love",
"Love/Romantic Love"
] |
87c5aece3a725602 | Gnomic Verses | Robert Creeley | loop
Down the road Up the hill Into the house
Over the wall Under the bed After the fact
By the way Out of the woods Behind the times
In front of the door Between the lines Along the pathecho
In the way it was in the street
it was in the back it was
in the house it was in the room
it was in the dark it wasfat f... | [
"S2",
"S6",
"S7"
] | [
"S2-9"
] | [
"Nature",
"Living",
"Time & Brevity"
] | [
"Nature/Stars, Moons, & Space"
] |
d07bd213d76e47d1 | Gettysburg: July 1, 1863 | Jane Kenyon | The young man, hardly more
than a boy, who fired the shot
had looked at him with an air
not of anger but of concentration,
as if he were surveying a road,
or feeding a length of wood into a saw:
It had to be done just so.
The bullet passed through
his upper chest, below the collar bone.
The pain was not what h... | [
"S2",
"S3",
"S5",
"S6",
"S10"
] | [
"S2-7",
"S3-11",
"S5-2",
"S6-4",
"S10-5"
] | [
"Nature",
"Social Commentaries",
"Religion",
"Living",
"Arts & Sciences"
] | [
"Arts & Sciences/Philosophy",
"Nature/Landscapes & Pastorals",
"Social Commentaries/War & Conflict",
"Religion/Christianity",
"Living/Death & Dying"
] |
493556757b813163 | What the Body Told | Rafael Campo | Not long ago, I studied medicine.
It was terrible, what the body told.
I’d look inside another person’s mouth,
And see the desolation of the world.
I’d see his genitals and think of sin.
Because my body speaks the stranger’s language,
I’ve never understood those nods and stares.
My parents held me in their arms,... | [
"S6",
"S9",
"S10"
] | [
"S9-6",
"S10-9"
] | [
"Living",
"Activities",
"Arts & Sciences"
] | [
"Arts & Sciences/Sciences",
"Activities/Study & Knowledge"
] |
86ceb24bc989f978 | Tortoise Shout | D. H. Lawrence | I thought he was dumb,
I said he was dumb,
Yet I've heard him cry.
First faint scream,
Out of life's unfathomable dawn,
Far off, so far, like a madness, under the horizon's dawning rim,
Far, far off, far scream.
Tortoise in extremis.
Why were we crucified into sex?
Why were we not left rounded off, and finished in ours... | [
"S1",
"S8"
] | [
"S1-1",
"S1-6",
"S8-8"
] | [
"Love",
"Relationships"
] | [
"Love/Desire & Erotic Love",
"Love/Realistic & Complicated",
"Relationships/Pets & Domestic Animals"
] |
86e78896971cd1f6 | Winter, Hospital Bed | Robert Adamson | Memory was the room I entered down a long corridor
Thrown by the white drugs of pain though pain
Was adrift on a glassy stream of green tide
Where images flickered and ran on
I didn’t write poetry for publication
In those days but to grab the attention
Of readers nearby who had been crushed by life
Who floated a... | [
"S6",
"S10"
] | [
"S6-5",
"S6-6",
"S10-6"
] | [
"Living",
"Arts & Sciences"
] | [
"Arts & Sciences/Poetry & Poets",
"Living/Mourning",
"Living/Health & Illness"
] |
462d4ff846d196c4 | The Seekonk Woods | Galway Kinnell | When first I walked here I hobbled
along ties set too close together
for a boy to step easily on each.
I thought my stride one day
would reach every other and from then on
I would walk in time with the way
toward that Lobachevskian haze
up ahead where the two rails meet.
Here we put down our pennies, dark,
on ... | [
"S6",
"S7",
"S9"
] | [
"S9-5",
"S9-7"
] | [
"Living",
"Time & Brevity",
"Activities"
] | [
"Activities/Sports & Outdoor Activities",
"Activities/Travels & Journeys"
] |
3372fde24d33166d | Like a Cloud above a Ravine | Anthony Madrid | Like a cloud above a ravine is the hell you already know:That sublime work of the imagination by Dante Alighieri. But the rain that falls from that cloud is not made up of human souls. It rains, and the rain funnels down into the something-other-than-human sewer.Look how a Chinese writing brush ends in a cone of rigid ... | [
"S2",
"S5",
"S10"
] | [
"S2-5",
"S5-7",
"S5-8",
"S10-6"
] | [
"Nature",
"Religion",
"Arts & Sciences"
] | [
"Arts & Sciences/Poetry & Poets",
"Nature/Animals",
"Religion/Other Religions",
"Religion/The Spiritual"
] |
fe44530100cb7593 | When Last We Parted | Catherine Maria Fanshawe | When last we parted, thou wert young and fair,
How beautiful let fond remembrance say!
Alas! since then old time has stolen away
Full thirty years, leaving my temples bare.—
So has it perished like a thing of air,
The dream of love and youth!— now both are grey
Yet still remembering that delightful day,
Tho... | [
"S1"
] | [
"S1-3",
"S1-6"
] | [
"Love"
] | [
"Love/Heartache & Loss",
"Love/Realistic & Complicated"
] |
4970ff09f8f07116 | Groovin’ Low | A. B. Spellman | my swing is more mellow
these days: not the hardbop drive
i used to roll but more of a cool
foxtrot. my eyes still close
when the rhythm locks; i’ve learned
to boogie with my feet on the floor
i’m still movin’, still groovin’
still fallin’ in love
i bop to the bass line now. the trap set
paradiddles ratamacues... | [
"S3",
"S10"
] | [
"S3-7",
"S10-3"
] | [
"Social Commentaries",
"Arts & Sciences"
] | [
"Arts & Sciences/Music",
"Social Commentaries/Popular Culture"
] |
6a03c19ecded64e5 | Wine | Pierre Martory | The flowers I planted along my road
Have lasted long despite winds and cold
Already fiery noons begin to burn
Slyly the secret of the roots
And I know that of my footsteps nothing will remain
But a trace a cluster a drop
To recall along the paths I’ve chosen
Those evening when the light sang
In eyes hands heart... | [
"S9"
] | [
"S9-1"
] | [
"Activities"
] | [
"Activities/Eating & Drinking"
] |
b2240c2a1015cc55 | The Invention of Pigs | Les Murray | Come our one great bushfire
pigs, sty-released, declined to quit
their pavements of gravel and shit.
Other beasts ran headlong, whipping
off with genitals pinched high.
Human mothers taught their infants creek-dipping.
Fathers galloped, gale-blown blaze stripping
grass at their heels and on by
too swift to igni... | [
"S2",
"S3",
"S8"
] | [
"S2-5",
"S3-9",
"S8-3",
"S8-5"
] | [
"Nature",
"Social Commentaries",
"Relationships"
] | [
"Nature/Animals",
"Social Commentaries/Rural & Country Life",
"Relationships/Family & Ancestors",
"Relationships/Home Life"
] |
979a2574dd5bb0da | Break, Break, Break | Alfred, Lord Tennyson | Break, break, break,
On thy cold gray stones, O Sea!
And I would that my tongue could utter
The thoughts that arise in me.
O, well for the fisherman's boy,
That he shouts with his sister at play!
O, well for the sailor lad,
That he sings in his boat on the bay!
And the statel... | [
"S2",
"S6"
] | [
"S2-6",
"S6-5"
] | [
"Nature",
"Living"
] | [
"Nature/Bodies of Water",
"Living/Mourning"
] |
b62edee9fa72c779 | [Fortune Hath Taken Thee Away, My Love] | Sir Walter Ralegh | Fortune hath taken thee away, my love,
My life’s soul and my soul’s heaven above;
Fortune hath taken thee away, my princess;
My only light and my true fancy’s mistress.
Fortune hath taken all away from me,
Fortune hath taken all by taking thee.
Dead to all joy, I only live to woe,
So fortune now becomes my mortal foe.
... | [
"S1"
] | [
"S1-3",
"S1-4"
] | [
"Love"
] | [
"Love/Heartache & Loss",
"Love/Infatuation & Crushes"
] |
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