The continuous A2K anthology: post a poem that you love

I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings

A free bird leaps on the back of the wind
and floats downstream till the current ends
and dips his wings in the orange suns rays and dares to claim the sky.

But a bird that stalks down his narrow cage
can seldom see through his bars of rage
his wings are clipped and his feet are tied so he opens his throat to sing.

The caged bird sings with a fearful trill
of things unknown but longed for still
and his tune is heard on the distant hill
for the caged bird sings of freedom.

The free bird thinks of another breeze
and the trade winds soft through the sighing trees
and the fat worms waiting on a dawn-bright lawn and he names the sky his own.

But a caged bird stands on the grave of dreams
his shadow shouts on a nightmare scream
his wings are clipped and his feet are tied so he opens his throat to sing.

The caged bird sings with a fearful trill
of things unknown but longed for still
and his tune is heard on the distant hill
for the caged bird sings of freedom.

Maya Angelou

LEISURE

What is this life if, full of care,
We have no time to stand and stare?
No time to stand beneath the boughs
And stare as long as sheep and cows.

No time to see, when woods we pass,
Where squirrels hide their nuts in grass.

No time to see, in broad daylight
Streams full of stars, like skies at night.

No time to turn at Beauty's glance,
And watch her feet, how they can dance.

No time to wait till her mouth can
Enrich that smile her eyes began.

A poor life this if, full of care,
We have no time to stand and stare.

W. H. Davis

I feel this is a poem that puts certains things into perspective.
p.s. The squirrel bit always cracks me up
p.s.s Some of my favourite poets have been posted too. eg. Frost, Larkin, and Thomas. Great stuff!

Absolute brilliance!

I haven't been on here as much due to my having too many books to write, but I'll be able to keep a closer eye on this place henceforth.

Here's one of my favourite poems, that I re-discovered to-day when I met the man who wrote this out on the street and talked to him for twenty minutes. It is called 'I am very bothered when I think,' and was written by the Millenium Laureate, Simon Armitage.

I am very bothered when I think
of the bad things I have done in my life.
Not least that time in the chemistry lab
when I held a pair of scissors by the blades
and played the handles
in the naked lilac flame of the Bunsen burner;
then called your name, and handed them over.

O the unrivalled stench of branded skin
as you slipped your thumb and middle finger in,
then couldn't shake off the two burning rings. Marked,
the doctor said, for eternity.

Don't believe me, please, if I say
that was just my butterfingered way, at thirteen,
of asking you if you would marry me.

Through naming comes knowing; we grasp an object, mentally, by giving it a name cohension, prehension, apprehension. And thus through language create a whole world, corresponding to the other world out there. Or we trust that it corresponds. Or perhaps, like a German poet, we cease to care, becoming more concerned with the naming than with the things named; the former becomes more real than the latter. And so in the end the world is lost again. No, the world remains those unique, particular, incorrigibly individual junipers and sandstone +monoliths-and it is we who are lost. Again. Round and round, through the endless labyrinth of thought-the maze. dream.

Exception, this poem to me is one of the finest examples of compression on the planet. I have been an e.e. fan for years.

I gave this poem to my brother, to read at my grandfather's funeral. I was going to read it, but he insisted.

O You Whom I Often and Silently Come
Walt Whitman

O YOU whom I often and silently come where you are, that I may be with you;
As I walk by your side, or sit near, or remain in the same room with you,
Little you know the subtle electric fire that for your sake is playing within me.

I agree, Cav. As I just said right then when I couldn't think of a quote, to become an ok poet one must either have the skills to describe or the skill to compress. To be a great one, you need both.

I love both your poems; who wrote your one, Dys?

mine is not a poem, just words of thought.

The peculiar dove
spreads love
to the deserving one
and the un-

Your thoughts pass for poetry, Dys ...

As for succinct poems, I love the following:

This is just to say

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