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:
- Николай Карамзин – Из письма к И. И. Дмитриеву (Но что же скажем мы о времени прошедшем)
- Loneliness is a prison by Vladimir Marku
- Love Gregor; Or, The Lass Of Lochroyan poem – Andrew Lang poems
- The Mad Philosopher poem – Ambrose Bierce poems | Poems and Poetry
- O Daedalus, Fly Away Home by Robert Hayden
- Medallion by Sylvia Plath
- A Painting Morning
- Blue eyes by Tanisha Avarsekar
- The Boy by Vinko Kalinić
- Владимир Вишневский – На исходе двадцатого века
- In The Evening
- Yesterday’s Mishaps by Mary Etta Metcalf
- Владимир Маяковский – Обряды кому и на кой ляд целовальный обряд
- Let me Roam by Penny Leigh Moller
- Геннадий Айги – ЧИТАЯ НОРВИДА
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
- Night-Piece by Siegfried Sassoon
- Night on the Convoy by Siegfried Sassoon
- Morning-Land by Siegfried Sassoon
- Morning-Glory by Siegfried Sassoon
- Morning Express by Siegfried Sassoon
- Miracles by Siegfried Sassoon
- Middle-Ages by Siegfried Sassoon
- Memory by Siegfried Sassoon
- Memorial Tablet by Siegfried Sassoon
- Lovers by Siegfried Sassoon
- Limitations by Siegfried Sassoon
- Lamentations by Siegfried Sassoon
- Joy-Bells by Siegfried Sassoon
- Invocation by Siegfried Sassoon
- ‘In the Pink’ by Siegfried Sassoon
- In Me, Past, Present, Future meet by Siegfried Sassoon
- In Barracks by Siegfried Sassoon
- Idyll by Siegfried Sassoon
- I Stood With the Dead by Siegfried Sassoon
- How to Die by Siegfried Sassoon
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.