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 Заболоцкий – Дождь
- Love Preparing to Fly poem – Gerard Manley Hopkins poems
- To Mary by William Cowper
- I Sit and Look Out. by Walt Whitman
- Hidebound by Shaunna Harper
- Владимир Маяковский – Сейчас беднее нас нет… (РОСТА №742)
- With Scindia to Delphi by Rudyard Kipling
- Федор Тютчев – Каким венком нам увенчать
- London, 1802 by William Wordsworth
- Владимир Набоков – Цветет миндаль на перекрестке
- To My Brother George poem – John Keats poems
- What Happened by Rudyard Kipling
- Self-Portrait poem – Andrei Voznesensky poems
- The Boy by Vinko Kalinić
- An Excelente Balade of Charitie: As Wroten bie the Gode Pri by Thomas Chatterton
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
- Николай Гумилев – Какое отравное зелье
- Николай Гумилев – Как труп, бессилен небосклон
- Николай Гумилев – Избиение женихов
- Николай Глазков – Размышленья
- Николай Глазков – Раздумья
- Николай Глазков – Рассчитывая на успех
- Николай Глазков – Пятнадцать лет спустя
- Николай Глазков – Пусть будет эта повесть
- Николай Глазков – Про пожары
- Николай Глазков – Про чертей
- Николай Глазков – Последний зимний
- Николай Глазков – Пошел тропой
- Николай Глазков – Покуда карты не раскрыты
- Николай Глазков – Поэзия! Ты не потерпишь фальши
- Николай Глазков – Поэтоград
- Николай Глазков – Подражание
- Николай Глазков – Почему я отказался от самолёта
- Николай Глазков – Эрмитаж
- Николай Глазков – Эпилог
- Николай Глазков – Движутся телеги и калеки
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.