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 Dying Christian to His Soul poem – Alexander Pope poems | Poetry Monster
- Ольга Седакова – Баллада
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- The Gardener LIX: O Woman by Rabindranath Tagore
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- Юлия Друнина – Баллада о десанте
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- Владимир Британишский – Далекая скрипка
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
- Here’s to the Mice! by Vachel Lindsay
- On the Road to Nowhere by Vachel Lindsay
- Heart of God by Vachel Lindsay
- On the Garden Wall by Vachel Lindsay
- On the Building of Springfield by Vachel Lindsay
- On Reading Omar Khayyam by Vachel Lindsay
- Niagara by Vachel Lindsay
- My Lady in Her White Silk Shawl by Vachel Lindsay
- Michaelangelo by Vachel Lindsay
- Mark Twain and Joan of Arc by Vachel Lindsay
- Love and Law by Vachel Lindsay
- Look You, I’ll Go Pray by Vachel Lindsay
- Lincoln by Vachel Lindsay
- King Arthur’s Men Have Come Again by Vachel Lindsay
- Incense by Vachel Lindsay
- In Praise of Songs that Die by Vachel Lindsay
- In Memory of a Child by Vachel Lindsay
- I Went Down into the Desert by Vachel Lindsay
- I Heard Immanuel Singing by Vachel Lindsay
- How Samson Bore Away the Gates of Gaza by Vachel Lindsay
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.