A Poem a Day Keeps the Writer's Block Away

[Lady Sabine]

Hello, Iwaku. ^^ I can't help but notice a sad lack of poetry being shared and discussed on the general chat at the moment, and I think it's a shame. So, without further ado, let's share some of our favorite poems and how they inspire us to write. :D My personal favorite is The Mower's Song by Andrew Marvell. For some reason, it always makes me feel like writing... something beautiful and dark and strangely un-romantic.



My mind was once the true survey
Of all these meadows fresh and gay,
And in the greenness of the grass
Did see its hopes as in a glass;
When Juliana came, and she
What I do to the grass, does to my thoughts and me.

But these, while I with sorrow pine,
Grew more luxuriant still and fine,
That not one blade of grass you spy'd
But had a flower on either side;
When Juliana came, and she
What I do to the grass, does to me thoughts and me.

Unthankful meadows, could you so
A fellowship so true forgo?
And in your gaudy May-games meet
While I lay trodden under feet?
When Juliana came, and she
What I do to the grass, does to my thoughts and me.

But what you in compassion ought,
Shall now by my revenge be wrought;
And flow'rs, and grass, and I and all,
Will in one common ruin fall.
For Juliana comes, and she
What I do to the grass, does to my thoughts and me.

And thus, ye meadows, which have been
Companions of my thoughts more green,
Shall now the heraldry become
With which I shall adorn my tomb;
For Juliana comes, and she
What I do to the grass, does to my thoughts and me.

 

[ze_kraken]

One fine day in the middle of the night,
Two dead boys got up to fight,
Back to back they faced each other,
Drew their swords and shot each other,

One was blind and the other couldn't, see
So they chose a dummy for a referee.
A blind man went to see fair play,
A dumb man went to shout "hooray!"

A paralyzed donkey passing by,
Kicked the blind man in the eye,
Knocked him through a nine inch wall,
Into a dry ditch and drowned them all,

A deaf policeman heard the noise,
And came to arrest the two dead boys,
If you don't believe this story's true,
Ask the blind man he saw it too!



This upbeat poem full of paradoxes really gets me in the mood to write. Can't put my finger on why, but it's definitely on the top list of poetry in general and writing inspiration.

 

[heliacalRebirth]

Nighttime winds lament
Despair
The child sleeps

 

[Peregrine]

The Mower's Song was in my AP test. What a fun coincidence.

A Noiseless Patient Spider
By Walt Whitman

A noiseless patient spider,
I mark'd where on a little promontory it stood isolated,
Mark'd how to explore the vacant vast surrounding,
It launch'd forth filament, filament, filament, out of itself,
Ever unreeling them, ever tirelessly speeding them.

And you O my soul where you stand,
Surrounded, detached, in measureless oceans of space,
Ceaselessly musing, venturing, throwing, seeking the spheres to connect them,
Till the bridge you will need be form'd, till the ductile anchor hold,
Till the gossamer thread you fling catch somewhere, O my soul.

 

[Lady Sabine]

The Mower's Song was in my AP test. What a fun coincidence.

Class of 2014 (I presume) FTW! I was so fucking happy to see that poem appear. I know I aced that section, at least. XD First time I've ever recognized anything (aside from the ubiquitous stuff) on an AP test.

 

[Peregrine]

Yes, indeed. I can't say I was so fortunate, but at least it is a fairly straightforward poem, once you actually get it.

 

[ze_kraken]

Remember guys, the AP-certified corporate assassins are waiting to eliminate anyone who discusses test material.

 

[Lady Sabine]

Oh no, not the corporate assassins!

 

[ze_kraken]

Remember, all test booklets must be bound and shut to be burned at a later date, or stored in the archives, never to be seen again....

I could really write a whole corporate dystopia from the viewpoint of the AP foundation.

 

[Lady Sabine]

Please do.

 

[Smo]

Getting back on topic...

THERE BE NONE OF BEAUTY'S DAUGHTERS - Lord Byron

• • 
    There be none of Beauty's daughters
    With a magic like Thee;
    And like music on the waters
    Is thy sweet voice to me:
    When, as if its sound were causing
    The charméd ocean's pausing,
    The waves lie still and gleaming,
    And the lull'd winds seem dreaming:
    And the midnight moon is weaving
    Her bright chain o'er the deep,
    Whose breast is gently heaving
    As an infant's asleep:
    So the spirit bows before thee
    To listen and adore thee;
    With a full but soft emotion,
    Like the swell of Summer's ocean.

 

[ze_kraken]

Lord Byron, granting the world the cynical asshole Byronic hero.

 

[Lady Sabine]

Lord Byron, granting the world the cynical asshole Byronic hero.

Lord Byron: so much of a man-ho, he couldn't be buried in the church graveyard next to the other poets.

I can do this all day. My thesis paper this year was on him. XD

 

[ze_kraken]

Oh, I know. Need I point to my title?

 

[Seiji]

The Hollow Men

Mistah Kurtz-he dead
A penny for the Old Guy


I

We are the hollow men
We are the stuffed men
Leaning together
Headpiece filled with straw. Alas!
Our dried voices, when
We whisper together
Are quiet and meaningless
As wind in dry grass
Or rats' feet over broken glass
In our dry cellar

Shape without form, shade without colour,
Paralysed force, gesture without motion;

Those who have crossed
With direct eyes, to death's other Kingdom
Remember us-if at all-not as lost
Violent souls, but only
As the hollow men
The stuffed men.


II

Eyes I dare not meet in dreams
In death's dream kingdom
These do not appear:
There, the eyes are
Sunlight on a broken column
There, is a tree swinging
And voices are
In the wind's singing
More distant and more solemn
Than a fading star.

Let me be no nearer
In death's dream kingdom
Let me also wear
Such deliberate disguises
Rat's coat, crowskin, crossed staves
In a field
Behaving as the wind behaves
No nearer-

Not that final meeting
In the twilight kingdom


III

This is the dead land
This is cactus land
Here the stone images
Are raised, here they receive
The supplication of a dead man's hand
Under the twinkle of a fading star.

Is it like this
In death's other kingdom
Waking alone
At the hour when we are
Trembling with tenderness
Lips that would kiss
Form prayers to broken stone.


IV

The eyes are not here
There are no eyes here
In this valley of dying stars
In this hollow valley
This broken jaw of our lost kingdoms

In this last of meeting places
We grope together
And avoid speech
Gathered on this beach of the tumid river

Sightless, unless
The eyes reappear
As the perpetual star
Multifoliate rose
Of death's twilight kingdom
The hope only
Of empty men.


V

Here we go round the prickly pear
Prickly pear prickly pear
Here we go round the prickly pear
At five o'clock in the morning.

Between the idea
And the reality
Between the motion
And the act
Falls the Shadow
For Thine is the Kingdom

Between the conception
And the creation
Between the emotion
And the response
Falls the Shadow
Life is very long

Between the desire
And the spasm
Between the potency
And the existence
Between the essence
And the descent
Falls the Shadow
For Thine is the Kingdom

For Thine is
Life is
For Thine is the

This is the way the world ends
This is the way the world ends
This is the way the world ends
Not with a bang but a whimper.

 

[Fijoli]

The Jabberwocky by Lewis Carol

'Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
Did gyre and gimble in the wabe:
All mimsy were the borogoves,
And the mome raths outgrabe.

"Beware the Jabberwock, my son!
The jaws that bite, the claws that catch!
Beware the Jubjub bird, and shun
The frumious Bandersnatch!"

He took his vorpal sword in hand:
Long time the manxome foe he sought
So rested he by the Tumtum tree,
And stood a while in thought.

And, as in uffish thought he stood,
The Jabberwock, with eyes of flame,
Came whiffling through the tulgey wood,
And burbled as it came!

One two! One two! And through and through
The vorpal blade went snicker-snack!
He left it dead, and with its head
He went galumphing back.
"And hast thou slain the Jabberwock?
Come to my arms, my beamish boy!
Oh frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!"
He chortled in his joy.

'Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
Did gyre and gimble in the wabe:
All mimsy were the borogoves,
And the mome raths outgrabe.

 

[Lady Sabine]

The Jaberwocky is one of my favorites.
The movie is also hilarious, though not at all the same.

 

[Fijoli]

My great grandmother read to me when I was little and it was from this rather strange book of poems and it was a collection of strange and horrific poetry. I'll be sure to share a poem everyday. :)

 

[Lady Sabine]

A poem thread is not complete without Shel Silverstein. In this case, The Boa Constrictor Song.


I'm being swallered by a Boa Constrictor
a Boa Constrictor, a Boa Constrictor
I'm being swallered by a Boa Constrictor
and I don't - like snakes - one bit!
Oh no, he swallered my toe.
Oh gee, he swallered my knee.
Oh fiddle, he swallered my middle.
Oh what a pest, he swallered my chest.
Oh heck, he swallered my neck.
Oh, dread, he swallered my - (BURP)

 

[Fijoli]

"The Nymph's Reply to the Shepherd"by Sir Walter Raleigh

If all the world and love were young, And truth in every shepherd's tongue, These pretty pleasures might me move To live with thee and be thy love. Time drives the flocks from field to fold, When rivers rage and rocks grow cold; And Philomel becometh dumb; The rest complains of cares to come. The flowers do fade, and wanton fields To wayward winter reckoning yields: A honey tongue, a heart of gall, Is fancy's spring, but sorrow's fall. The gowns, thy shoes, thy beds of roses, Thy cap, thy kirtle, and thy posies Soon break, soon wither, soon forgotten, -- In folly ripe, in reason rotten. Thy belt of straw and ivy buds, Thy coral clasps and amber studs, All these in me no means can move To come to thee and be thy love. But could youth last and love still breed, Had joys no date nor age no need, Then these delights my mind might move To live with thee and be thy love. ((In the TOP 5 of Fijo's favorite poems))