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:
- A Sort Of A Song by William Carlos Williams
- The Meditation Of The Old Fisherman by William Butler Yeats
- A Certain Kind of Holy Men
- The Emigrant by Ndue Ukaj
- Long Long Ago by Robert Desnos
- The Grave of the Hundered Head by Rudyard Kipling
- Юлия Жадовская – Да, я вижу
- Sonnet 55: Not marble, nor the gilded monuments by William Shakespeare
- Олег Григорьев – Стаканы
- The Last of the Light Brigade by Rudyard Kipling
- Юргис Балтрушайтис – Твой знак пред жизнью
- Валерий Брюсов – После ночи бессонной
- Eclipse Of Love
- On The Grasshopper And Cricket poem – John Keats poems
- Los Able Minded Poets Music Review
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
- Adolescence II by Rita Dove
- Adolescence I by Rita Dove
- They are Cruel by Rixa White
- The Polar Koala Bear by Robby Charters
- The Lame Guy by Rob Leatherman Sr.
- The Invisible by Rixa White
- The Epic of Jack and Jill by Robby Charters
- The Commitment by Rob Leatherman Sr.
- The Beginning of the End by Rixa White
- The Ancient Deception by Rixa White
- Start Growing by Rixa White
- Splenda by Rob Leatherman Sr.
- Show me by Rixa White
- Rhyme by the Bog by Robby Charters
- Power of Peace by Rixa White
- Poetic Justice by Robby Charters
- Old Times by Rixa white
- Nothing is Real by Rixa White
- Limericks by Robby Charters
- It is a Show by Rixa White
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.