The Triumph Of Woman

Glad as the weary traveller tempest-tostTo reach secure at length his native coast,Who wandering long o'er distant lands has sped,The night-blast wildly howling round his head,Known all the woes of want, and felt the stormOf the bleak winter parch his shivering form;The journey o'er and every peril pastBeholds his little cottage-home at last,And as he sees afar the smoke curl slow,Feels his full

Sonnet 20: A woman's face with Nature's own hand painted

A woman's face with Nature's own hand paintedHast thou, the master-mistress of my passion;A woman's gentle heart, but not acquaintedWith shifting change, as is false women's fashion;An eye more bright than theirs, less false in rolling,Gilding the object whereupon it gazeth;A man in hue, all hues in his controlling,Which steals men's eyes and women's souls amazeth.And for a woman wert thou first

Barren Woman, Sylvia Plath

Empty, I echo to the least footfall,
Museum without statues, grand with pillars,
porticoes, rotundas.
In my courtyard a fountain leaps and sinks
back into itself,
Nun-hearted and blind to the world. Marble lilies
Exhale their pallor like scent.

I imagine myself with a great public,
Mother of a white Nike and several bald-eyed Apollos.
Insread, the dead injure me attentions, and nothing
can

To a Dead Man

Over the dead line we have called to you
To come across with a word to us,
Some beaten whisper of what happens
Where you are over the dead line
Deaf to our calls and voiceless.


The flickering shadows have not answered
Nor your lips sent a signal
Whether love talks and roses grow
And the sun breaks at morning
Splattering the sea with crimson.

Many a phrase has the English language

Many a phrase has the English language --I have heard but one --Low as the laughter of the Cricket,Loud, as the Thunder's Tongue --Murmuring, like old Caspian Choirs,When the Tide's a' lull --Saying itself in new inflection --Like a Whippoorwill --Breaking in bright OrthographyOn my simple sleep --Thundering its Prospective --Till I stir, and weep --Not for the Sorrow, done me --But the push of

Million Man March Poem

The night has been long,The wound has been deep,The pit has been dark,And the walls have been steep.Under a dead blue sky on a distant beach,I was dragged by my braids just beyond your reach.Your hands were tied, your mouth was bound,You couldn't even call out my name.You were helpless and so was I,But unfortunately throughout historyYou've worn a badge of shame.I say, the night has been long,The

The Dead Woman

If suddenly you do not exist,if suddenly you are not living,I shall go on living.I do not dare,I do not dare to write it,if you die.I shall go on living.Because where a man has no voice,there, my voiceWhere blacks are beaten,I can not be dead.When my brothers go to jailI shall go with them.When victory,not my victory,but the great victoryarrives,even though I am mute I must speak:I shall see it

The General Song Of Humanity

On the coast of Chile where Neruda lived
it's well known that
seabirds often steal
letters out of mailboxes
which they would like to scan
for various reasons
Shall I enumerate the reasons?
they are quite clear
even given the silence of birds on the subject
(except when they speak of it
among themselves
between cries)

First of all
they steal the letters because
they sense

Alms

by Edna St. Vincent Millay

My heart is what it was before,
A house where people come and go
But it is winter with your love,
The sashes are beset with snow.

I light the lamp and lay the cloth,
I blow the coals to blaze again
But it is winter with your love
The frost is thick upon the pane

I know a winter when it comes
The leaves are listless on the boughs;
I watched your love a little while