Students,
Please post your poems here. One poem's topic must involve beginnings or birth, while the other's must involve endings or death.
To comment on a poem, begin your comment with "@PoemName".
If the poem has no name, use the first line of the poem as the poem's name.
Thank you!
Nothing But Death by Pablo Neruda
ReplyDeleteThere are cemeteries that are lonely,
graves full of bones that do not make a sound,
the heart moving through a tunnel,
in it darkness, darkness, darkness,
like a shipwreck we die going into ourselves,
as though we were drowning inside our hearts,
as though we lived falling out of the skin into the soul.
And there are corpses,
feet made of cold and sticky clay,
death is inside the bones,
like a barking where there are no dogs,
coming out from bells somewhere, from graves somewhere,
growing in the damp air like tears of rain.
Sometimes I see alone
coffins under sail,
embarking with the pale dead, with women that have dead hair,
with bakers who are as white as angels,
and pensive young girls married to notary publics,
caskets sailing up the vertical river of the dead,
the river of dark purple,
moving upstream with sails filled out by the sound of death,
filled by the sound of death which is silence.
Death arrives among all that sound
like a shoe with no foot in it, like a suit with no man in it,
comes and knocks, using a ring with no stone in it, with no
finger in it,
comes and shouts with no mouth, with no tongue, with no
throat.
Nevertheless its steps can be heard
and its clothing makes a hushed sound, like a tree.
I'm not sure, I understand only a little, I can hardly see,
but it seems to me that its singing has the color of damp violets,
of violets that are at home in the earth,
because the face of death is green,
and the look death gives is green,
with the penetrating dampness of a violet leaf
and the somber color of embittered winter.
But death also goes through the world dressed as a broom,
lapping the floor, looking for dead bodies,
death is inside the broom,
the broom is the tongue of death looking for corpses,
it is the needle of death looking for thread.
Death is inside the folding cots:
it spends its life sleeping on the slow mattresses,
in the black blankets, and suddenly breathes out:
it blows out a mournful sound that swells the sheets,
and the beds go sailing toward a port
where death is waiting, dressed like an admiral.
Where the Sidewalk Ends by Shel Silverstein
ReplyDeleteThere is a place where the sidewalk ends
And before the street begins,
And there the grass grows soft and white,
And there the sun burns crimson bright,
And there the moon-bird rests from his flight
To cool in the peppermint wind.
Let us leave this place where the smoke blows black
And the dark street winds and bends.
Past the pits where the asphalt flowers grow
We shall walk with a walk that is measured and slow,
And watch where the chalk-white arrows go
To the place where the sidewalk ends.
Yes we'll walk with a walk that is measured and slow,
And we'll go where the chalk-white arrows go,
For the children, they mark, and the children, they know
The place where the sidewalk ends.
New Life
ReplyDeleteby Paul Bodet
I've been sitting around this life for years,
Not enough laughs and too many tears.
Trying to figure out where it all went,
These wasted years that I have spent.
Searching for something to go beyond,
Life's a stone skipping across a pond.
At the last skip, it hits with a splash,
Down the stone sinks, gone in a flash.
Pushing and pulling, it's tearing apart,
Poking and prodding an underused heart.
This dark velvet curtain that hides my soul,
Living this life has taken it's toll.
In a flash of bright light, the curtain is torn,
Tumbling down all tattered and worn.
Revealing new life, a child within,
Born free of hate, of suffering and sin.
Now my eyes see what has never been told,
Striving forth happy, confident and bold.
Into a world that's unfamiliar but friendly,
Into this new life my spirit will send me.
Living and laughing, loving it all,
I stood myself up and answered the call.
The darkness has gone, replaced by the light,
I gave up the darkness with hardly a fight.
I've been sitting around this life for years,
With laughter aplenty and hardly a tear.
Now I can see just where it all went,
Cherish every moment of this new life I've spent.
Emily Dickinson--Death
ReplyDeleteBecause I could not stop for Death,
He kindly stopped for me;
The carriage held but just ourselves
And Immortality.
We slowly drove, he knew no haste,
And I had put away
My labor, and my leisure too,
For his civility.
We passed the school, where children strove
At recess, in the ring;
We passed the fields of gazing grain,
We passed the setting sun.
Or rather, he passed us;
The dews grew quivering and chill,
For only gossamer my gown,
My tippet only tulle.
We paused before a house that seemed
A swelling of the ground;
The roof was scarcely visible,
The cornice but a mound.
Since then 'tis centuries, and yet each
Feels shorter than the day
I first surmised the horses' heads
Were toward eternity.
BIRTH IS BEGINNING by Shalom Freedman
ReplyDeleteBirth is beginning,
Hope is its name-
A child gives meaning to the world.
It's Death Again by Mark R. Slaughter
ReplyDeleteIt's Death again – He's always there –
Watching, waiting – e'er the stare!
Every time I look behind
Or reach to pull the window blind,
I catch a glimpse of grubby hood –
A little clue to where he stood;
The glint of light that caught the scythe.
Perhaps if I could pay a tithe…
But O! no use, he'll never go.
The adamant phantom; don't you know
He will but wait until it's time
For me to hear His fateful chime? –
The toll that claims my destiny,
To Hail: 'You're next, it has to be…'
Winter
ReplyDeleteIt’s winter now, the time has come,
Temperatures are freezing,
Bare hands become quite cold and numb,
With gloves, the weather’s pleasing.
Christmas is around the bend,
Sorrow is now closing,
A fun time with gifts to send,
Pain has begun its dozing.
Snow falls gently to the ground,
Laughter fills the air,
Lots of smiles all around,
And grimaces are rare.
A brand new year has now begun,
Old promises renewed,
Another second chance is won,
Past mistakes conclude.
The snow begins to melt away,
Spring is almost here,
In the warm sun now we play,
Yet another time of year.
Reminiscence
ReplyDeleteOne tear
Feelings sincere
The blue sky melts away
The bright sun fades and clouds appear
Today
@BIRTH IS BEGINNING
ReplyDeleteIf birth is beginning, and hope is its name, then birth must be labeled hope. The last line of the poem speaks of a child being born into the world. It portrays the hope every child's birth brings to the world. Any one child born into this world could eventually bring the end to cancer or HIV someday.
@Death
ReplyDeleteThe narrator in this poem did not long to find death, so death as a process found him/her. Death's carriage strode through the stages of life, and finally into eternity. But the narrator did not realize the carriage's heading until late in the journey.
@It's Death Again
ReplyDeleteIn the beginning of the poem, Death resembles a vulture with its sharp vision, watching and waiting to take its victim. The only difference is that a vulture makes its strike after death, but Death attacks the living. Continuing on in the poem, there are allusions made that relates Death to the Grim Reaper, counting down the seconds left until the end of its victim's destiny.
Seeds for Hymn by Octavio Paz
ReplyDeleteThe age of fire and the age of air
The youth of water springing
From green to yellow
From yellow to red
From dream to vigil
From desire to act
You needed only one step and that taken without effort
The insects then were jewels who were alive
The heat lay down to rest at the edge of the pool
Rain was the light hair of a willow tree
There was a tree growing within your hand
And as it grew it sang laughed prophesied
It cast the spells that cover space with wings
There were the simple miracles called birds
(No title) by Mary Frye
ReplyDeleteDo not stand at my grave and weep
I am not there, I do not sleep.
I am a thousand winds that blow
I am the diamond glint on snow.
I am the sunlight on ripened grain
I am the gentle autumn rain.
When you wake in the morning hush
I am the swift uplifting rush
Of quiet birds in circling flight
I am the soft stars that shine at night.
Do not stand at my grave and cry
I am not there, I did not die.
Humanity i love you
ReplyDeleteBy ee cummings
Humanity i love you
because you would rather black the boots of
success than enquire whose soul dangles from his
watch-chain which would be embarrassing for both
parties and because you
unflinchingly applaud all
songs containing the words country home and
mother when sung at the old howard
Humanity i love you because
when you're hard up you pawn your
intelligence to buy a drink and when
you're flush pride keeps
you from the pawn shops and
because you are continually committing
nuisances but more
especially in your own house
Humanity i love you because you
are perpetually putting the secret of
life in your pants and forgetting
it's there and sitting down
on it
and because you are
forever making poems in the lap
of death Humanity
i hate you
---------------------------------------
The Conqueror Worm
by Edgar Allan Poe
Lo! 't is a gala night
Within the lonesome latter years.
An angel throng, bewinged, bedight
In veils, and drowned in tears,
Sit in a theatre to see
A play of hopes and fears,
While the orchestra breathes fitfully
The music of the spheres.
Mimes, in the form of God on high,
Mutter and mumble low,
And hither and thither fly;
Mere puppets they, who come and go
At bidding of vast formless things
That shift the scenery to and fro,
Flapping from out their condor wings
Invisible Woe.
That motley drama—oh, be sure
It shall not be forgot!
With its Phantom chased for evermore
By a crowd that seize it not,
Through a circle that ever returneth in
To the self-same spot;
And much of Madness, and more of Sin,
And Horror the soul of the plot.
But see amid the mimic rout
A crawling shape intrude:
A blood-red thing that writhes from out
The scenic solitude!
It writhes—it writhes!—with mortal pangs
The mimes become its food,
And over each quivering form
In human gore imbued.
Out—out are the lights—out all!
And over each quivering form
The curtain, a funeral pall,
Comes down with the rush of a storm,
While the angels, all pallid and wan,
Uprising, unveiling, affirm
That the play is the tragedy, "Man,"
And its hero, the Conqueror Worm.
@BIRTH IS BEGINNING
ReplyDeletei actually saw this poem, but dismissed it because it's super short, but since you posted it i took a second look and realized it holds a lot of meaning in few words. i dont think it expresses any ground-shaking ideas, but i admire the way it's written because it makes it that much more sour
@New life
ReplyDeletethank you evan for that amazingggggggggggggg poem. i had a really hard time finding a "beginnings" poem because i didnt want the stereotypical birth poem. i was looking for a poem EXACTLY like this, about not literally being born, but about a rebirth in the life we already have
O Captain My Captain
ReplyDeleteO 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.
@ O Captain My Captain
ReplyDeleteBy: Walt Whitman
Marigolds
ReplyDeleteBy:Robert Graves
With a fork drive Nature out,
She will ever yet return;
Hedge the flowerbed all about,
Pull or stab or cut or burn,
She will ever yet return.
Look: the constant marigold
Springs again from hidden roots.
Baffled gardener, you behold
New beginnings and new shoots
Spring again from hidden roots.
Pull or stab or cut or burn,
They will ever yet return.
Gardener, cursing at the weed,
Ere you curse it further, say:
Who but you planted the seed
In my fertile heart, one day?
Ere you curse me further, say!
New beginnings and new shoots
Spring again from hidden roots.
Pull or stab or cut or burn,
Love must ever yet return.
Beginning
ReplyDeleteBY JAMES WRIGHT
The moon drops one or two feathers into the field.
The dark wheat listens.
Be still.
Now.
There they are, the moons young, trying
Their wings.
Between trees, a slender woman lifts up the lovely shadow
Of her face, and now she steps into the air, now she is gone
Wholly, into the air.
I stand alone by an elder tree, I do not dare breathe
Or move.
I listen.
The wheat leans back toward its own darkness,
And I lean toward mine.
To Death, To Death, To Death, To Death, To Death
By: Jane Van Doe
To Death… A toast in tainted wine
Let glasses ring its somber chime
As shadows cast its name in black
To Death we walk… with no path back
To Death… whose fame has spanned the ages
Only love has penned more pages
Only time outlives its quill
To Death … To Death 'til all is still
To Death… and to its secret kept
While all who live have stood and wept
To Death… and to its final kiss
I give a life… I shall not miss.
@Where The Sidewalk Ends by Shel Silverstein
ReplyDeleteThis just reminds me that I need to read the book by this title. >.> I didn't know the poems are so emotional! For me, there's no concrete meaning to this, though he uses some very nice sensory detail. Maybe the place where the sidewalk ends is simply out of the city, away in the country; but I think it goes deeper than that. Children have a way of escaping the boundaries society holds adults within, which could be represented in the black smoke and street, etc. Perhaps the "sidewalk" is the path we walk every day without thinking about, where we are kept in line, but the children easily break free from.
@New Life by Paul Bodet
ReplyDeleteThis poem, I think, is one that most can relate to. Many people have periods or years where they feel like they haven't lived, and it's a sad fact nowadays. Fear takes over their lives, the "darkness" of how they percieve their presumably wasted life and the world around them. But it only takes a leap of faith to drop that "curtain of darkness" from around your soul and reveal the child within, free of darkness, hate, and fear. I think this poem is pretty inspirational.
@Reminiscence
ReplyDeleteWow. Such a short poem, but so visual (and you could even feel it- or was it just me? It was almost like I got colder when "clouds appear") and emotional. The title helps to explain the idea behind this poem, which seems to be that the author is reminiscing about someone/something and that is making him/her very sad. The figurative devices really show this. I think this is my favorite so far because it's so simple and sad. :)
@Beginning by James Wright
ReplyDeleteI've read this one before! :D It's very pretty, the imagery is so fantastic. I have no clue if there's some kind of deep meaning, but it's very whimsical. I DO think of the legends of the elder tree, which is connected to magic and fairies, etc. I think it's interesting how, when most of the poems about beginnings deal with daylight and sunshine, this one introduces us to a nighttime scene illuminated by moonlight.
@Where the Sidewalk Ends
ReplyDeleteOh! The memories of Shel Silverstein books!!
It like goes towards kids having innocence and still having a grasp on their imagination and that's why they know where the sidewalk ends. Or perhaps the sidewalk (the imagination, i think of it as because of chalk drawings and drawings are from imagination when kids draw) doesn't end and the arrows keep going because kids don't hold back. The imagery is lovely :)
Good choice, good choice!
@New Life
ReplyDeleteI love this poem, it starts out so down and upsetting, but only to tell a story about finding hope and new beginnings. It reminds me of the discussion in class about Emma's poem choice, the one that's three lines. How in a child you find beginnings and newness like a blank canvas.
The imagery in the metaphors where something is there, and then is gone so quickly like the stone and the curtains, are fabulous. They create the perfect description of how life changes so quickly and no matter what course we're on, it can become entirely different in just a moment as a child is born in just a moment.
@Birth is Beginning
ReplyDeleteI love how much this poem says in so few words.
It's a hopeful and uplifting poem that brings us back to remembering our childhood where we weren't inhibited in what we do or say and how we thought everything was worthwhile whereas once one hits adulthood, all the stress kind of takes over one's mind. And if they have a child they remember that some things are worth the stress.
It pulls a string in my heart just because I can relate to this.
@It's Death Again
ReplyDeleteThe paranoia in this poem is so eminent. The persona speaking is so fearful of Death that he's dead to the world. He can't stop thinking of Death and when Death might choose him to be his next victim. "'You're next, it has to be...'" So obviously shows how he is expecting to die at any moment, but his paranoia and fear shows he doesn't. It kind of embodies the fear of death so many people have. It also reminds me of the obsession of the narrator from the Tell-Tale Heart with the man's eye. He was so fearful of it that he obsessed over getting rid of it.
@its death again
ReplyDeleteI was pleased with the way the poet was able to express the mind of the paranoid main character who is aware that he is soon going to die. Death is presented negatively in this poem.
@no title by Mary Frye
ReplyDeleteI liked this poem because it was basically telling a friend of a person who died that that person has moved on and that they shouldn't be sad or cry. Now I still haven't decided if this reincarnaction is physical, spiritual, or both, but I think that it is definatlely spritual, as if to say my soul has blended with nature.
@reminiscence
ReplyDeleteThis poem was relatively short and general. Because of the lack of specific details many ideas can be drawn from it. My personal thought was that someone who didn't really show their emotional side is finally showing a little bit of sadness.
@the conqueror worm
ReplyDeleteHonestly at first this poem confussed me but then it started to make sense. Ny interpretation of this is that mankind is the play going on, the puppets are humans who keep trying to figure out what the purpose of life is without actually living, and the Conqeror worm is death which is the destiny of everyone.
This is my repost poem:
ReplyDeleteDeath And Birth by Algernon Charles Swinburne
Death and birth should dwell not near together:
Wealth keeps house not, even for shame, with dearth:
Fate doth ill to link in one brief tether
Death and birth.
Harsh the yoke that binds them, strange the girth
Seems that girds them each with each: yet whether
Death be best, who knows, or life on earth?
Ill the rose-red and the sable feather
Blend in one crown's plume, as grief with mirth:
Ill met still are warm and wintry weather,
Death and birth.
@the conqueror worm
ReplyDeleteAs you know, I love this poem.
I think it's a great representation on how a lot of people live their lives in confusion and seeking for answers. It shows how that some things are not meant to be caught or found, and end with them not living their lives to their full potential
@Reminiscence
ReplyDeleteEven though the poem is short, I feel that the poem leaves the reader to fill in the blanks with their own feelings, which was literature is really about. Many go through this type of darkening even in a bright day, and it's supposed to open up the reader to empathizing with the poet
@Winter
ReplyDeleteEven though the poem is just a lot of description about Winter and then entering Spring, I feel that it symbolizes grief. How even though we cold and like no happiness will be in our life . It slowly ends and we are filled with an overwhelming feeling of joy
@A Birth is beginning
ReplyDeleteAlthough it is short, the poem shows how a lot of people feel about birth. It is a sign of hope, innocence, and purity. Hopefully leading to a new era of peace and happiness for all
@the conqueror worm
ReplyDeleteThis was an interesting poem in that Poe's mother was an actor and all of man died in this poem as actors, it seems like Poe added personal touch to this poem.
@Reminiscence
ReplyDeleteThis poem can be interpreted in many ways as long as you can clearly justify your reason. I think it deals more with an end rather than a beginning because of the fact that it is so melancholy.
@Birth is Beginning
ReplyDeleteI love the fact how the poem shows us that new life brings us hope rather than despair which is what it seems for most people who have kids now-a-days. Yes, it is really short yet it can say so much.
@Seeds for Hymn by Octavio Paz
ReplyDeleteThere's a great sense of creationism with this poem which goes hand in hand with beginnings. It seems that, at first, you dream of what you want to to make then there is a desire to do so, then you act on what to create. I am not sure what the color references signify or some of the other references.It is an interesting poem that I have not yet unveiled.
@Where the Sidewalk Ends
ReplyDeleteThis poem speaks of the innocence that children have and adults envy: That place away from the world yet still within it, the imagination of a child.