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:
- When Smoke Stood Up From Ludlow poem – A. E. Housman
- Sonnet, an encyclopedic definition
- Goddess by Samuel Stephen Wakdok
- Mariana In The South poem – Lord Alfred Tennyson poems
- Creative Writing For Stress Relief
- ” When in the long–drawn avenues of Thought” poem – Alfred Austin
- Альфред Теннисон – Лорд Борлей
- Thought. by Walt Whitman
- Free Poetry Competitions – Prepare to Win The Next Poetry Competition That You Enter!
- Blue Period by Shaunna Harper
- Praying Drunk poem – Andrew Hudgins poems | Poems and Poetry
- Idylls of the King: The Marriage of Geraint poem – Lord Alfred Tennyson poems
- DOWNHILL JOURNEY by Satish Verma
- Николай Заболоцкий – Лесная сторожка
- Ballad Of The Despairing Husband by Robert Creeley
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
- Life of Ms Anonymous by Raj Arumugam
- life begins tomorrow by Raj Arumugam
- Li Po, the moon and me by Raj Arumugam
- Li Po drowns by Raj Arumugam
- Let us pull, pull the boat by Raj Arumugam
- let us go with no care by Raj Arumugam
- let the calm of the evening by Raj Arumugam
- let’s love the lawn by Raj Arumugam
- let’s go mummy by Raj Arumugam
- laugh to cry by Raj Arumugam
- last words to the moon by Raj Arumugam
- Kangaroo talks to the Sun by Raj Arumugam
- Kadambari by Raj Arumugam
- it flows by Raj Arumugam
- in praise of the moon by Raj Arumugam
- I waited by Raj Arumugam
- I see you moon by Raj Arumugam
- I just love you by Raj Arumugam
- I bring hope and love by Raj Arumugam
- I am Yun Du-seo by Raj Arumugam
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.