A poem by Alec Derwent-Hope (1907–2000)
by Alec Derwent Hope
A Nation of trees, drab green and desolate grey
In the field uniform of modern wars,
Darkens her hills, those endless, outstretched paws
Of Sphinx demolished or stone lion worn away.
They call her a young country, but they lie:
She is the last of lands, the emptiest,
A woman beyond her change of life, a breast
Still tender but within the womb is dry.
Without songs, architecture, history:
The emotions and superstitions of younger lands,
Her rivers of water drown among inland sands,
The river of her immense stupidity
Floods her monotonous tribes from Cairns to Perth.
In them at last the ultimate men arrive
Whose boast is not: “we live” but “we survive”,
A type who will inhabit the dying earth.
And her five cities, like five teeming sores,
Each drains her: a vast parasite robber-state
Where second hand Europeans pullulate
Timidly on the edge of alien shores.
Yet there are some like me turn gladly home
From the lush jungle of modern thought, to find
The Arabian desert of the human mind,
Hoping, if still from the deserts the prophets come,
Such savage and scarlet as no green hills dare
Springs in that waste, some spirit which escapes
The learned doubt, the chatter of cultured apes
Which is called civilization over there.
A few random poems:
- The River Of Pearls At Fez Translation
- Владимир Маяковский – Стих как бы шофера
- Ольга Берггольц – Пахнет соснами, гарью, тленьем
- Олег Бундур – Тропа
- run home, run home butterfly by Raj Arumugam
- Владимир Маяковский – Тропики
- In Imitation of E. of Dorset : Artemisia poem – Alexander Pope poems | Poetry Monster
- I Heard Immanuel Singing by Vachel Lindsay
- For All We Have And Are by Rudyard Kipling
- Юнна Мориц – Мой подвал
- Михаил Лермонтов – Зови надежду сновиденьем
- Is It True! by Luis Estable
- Владимир Высоцкий – Шляпник
- Федор Сологуб – Когда я в бурном море плавал
- The Bankrupt Peace-Maker by Vachel Lindsay
External links
Bat’s Poetry Page – more poetry by Fledermaus
Talking Writing Monster’s Page –
Batty Writing – the bat’s idle chatter, thoughts, ideas and observations, all original, all fresh
Poems in English
- Heaven and You by Samuel Stephen Wakdok
- Goddess by Samuel Stephen Wakdok
- Ghazal to Pera Belle by Serkan Engin
- Garden of Sprites by Lyndsey Hylton
- Forgiveness by Zaklina (Jacqueline) Filipova- Svekjarovska
- For Aun by Lynne Scott
- Eternity by Samuel Stephen Wakdok
- Come by Samuel Stephen Wakdok
- Before You Returned by Shahida Latif
- Aquí te hubiese amado by Luz del Alba Nicola
- And because Love battles by Pablo Neruda
- An Untold Tale by Shahida Latif
- After the Last Glacier is Gone by Benjamin Alva Polley
- A Lover’s Prayer by St Antoine de la Vuadi
- Orlando Furioso Canto 19 by Ludovico Ariosto
- Orlando Furioso Canto 18 by Ludovico Ariosto
- His Insufficiency Of Praise by Luis Vaz de Camoes
- Light and Darkness
- You Are One For Whom Ma Heart Really Cares by Miraj Patel
- World’s Sweetest Sister Of Mine by Miraj Patel
More external links (open in a new tab):
Doska or the Board – write anything
Search engines:
Yandex – the best search engine for searches in Russian (and the best overall image search engine, in any language, anywhere)
Qwant – the best search engine for searches in French, German as well as Romance and Germanic languages.
Ecosia – a search engine that supposedly… plants trees
Duckduckgo – the real alternative and a search engine that actually works. Without much censorship or partisan politics.
Yahoo– yes, it’s still around, amazingly, miraculously, incredibly, but now it seems to be powered by Bing.
Parallel Translations of Poetry
The Poetry Repository – an online library of poems, poetry, verse and poetic works
Alec Derwent-Hope (1907–2000) was an Australian poet and essayist known for his satirical slant. He was also a critic, teacher and academic.