A poem by Alec Derwent-Hope (1907–2000)
by Alec Derwent Hope
I sing of the decline of Henry Clay
Who loved a white girl of uncommon size.
Although a small man in a little way,
He had in him some seed of enterprise.
Each day he caught the seven-thirty train
To work, watered his garden after tea,
Took an umbrella if it looked like rain A
nd was remarkably like you or me.
He had his hair cut once a fortnight, tried
Not to forget the birthday of his wife,
And might have lived unnoticed till he died
Had not ambition entered Henry’s life.
He met her in the lounge of an hotel;
A most unusual place for him to go;
But there he was and there she was as well
Sitting alone. He ordered beers for two.
She was so large a girl that when they came
He gave the waiter twice the usual tip.
She smiled without surprise, told him her name,
And as the name trembled on Henry’s lip,
His parched soul, swelling like a desert root,
Broke out its delicate dream upon the air;
The mountains shook with earthquake under foot;
An angel seized him suddenly by the hair;
The sky was shrill with peril as he passed;
A hurricane crushed his senses with its din;
The wildfire crackled up his reeling mast;
The trumpet of a maelstrom sucked hirn in;
The desert shrivelled and burnt off his feet;
His bones and buttons an enormous snake
Vomited up; still in the shimmering heat
The pygmies showed him their forbidden lake
And then transfixed him with their poison darts;
He married six black virgins in a bunch,
Who, when they had drawn out his manly parts,
Stewed him and ate him lovingly for lunch.
Adventure opened wide its grisly jaws;
Henry looked in and knew the Hero’s doom.
The huge white girl drank on without a pause
And, just at closing time, she asked him home.
The tram they took was full of Roaring Boys
Announcing the world’s ruin and Judgment Day;
The sky blared with its grand orchestral voice
The Gotterdammerung of Henry Clay.
But in her quiet room they were alone.
There, towering over Henry by a head,
She stood and took her clothes off one by one,
And then she stretched herself upon the bed.
Her bulk of beauty, her stupendous grace
Challenged the lion heart in his puny dust.
Proudly his Moment looked him in the face:
He rose to meet it as a hero must;
Climbed the white mountain of unravished snow,
Planted his tiny flag upon the peak.
The smooth drifts, scarcely breathing, lay below.
She did not take the trouble to smile or speak.
And afterwards, it may have been in play,
The enormous girl rolled over and squashed him flat;
And, as she could not send him home that way,
Used him thereafter as a bedside mat.
Speaking at large, I will say this of her: S
he did not spare expense to make him nice.
Tanned on both sides and neatly edged with fur,
The job would have been cheap at any price.
And when, in winter, getting out of bed,
Her large soft feet pressed warmly on the skin,
The two glass eyes would sparkle in his head,
The jaws extend their papier-mache grin.
Good people, for the soul of Henry Clay
Offer your prayers, and view his destiny!
He was the Hero of our Time. He may
With any luck, one day, be you or me.
A few random poems:
- Robert Burns: Love In The Guise Of Friendship:
- The Lamp by Sara Teasdale
- The joyful things in life by Martin Smith
- Ольга Седакова – Легенда шестая
- An Epitaph On Sr John Walter, Lord Cheife Baron by William Strode
- Epistle to Davie, A Brother Poet by Robert Burns
- Огюст Барбье – Тициан
- Full Moon by Walid Saba
- The Innovator by Stephen Vincent Benet
- Blue Roses by Rudyard Kipling
- Николай Языков – В альбом Ш. К. Фон-дер-Борг (Доверчивый, простосердечной)
- Федор Сологуб – Слепой судьбе противореча
- Under The Round Tower by William Butler Yeats
- Listening to the moon by Yosa Buson
- A Woman’s Last Word by Robert Browning
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
- Soul Receives From Soul by Jalal ad-Din Muhammad Rumi
- Some Kiss We Want by Rumi
- Sleep of the Body the Soul’s Awakening by Jalal ad-Din Muhammad Rumi
- Quatrain 1693 (Farsi with English Translation) by Jalal ad-Din Muhammad Rumi
- Passion makes the old medicine new: by Jalal ad-Din Muhammad Rumi
- Out of Your Love by Jalal ad-Din Muhammad Rumi
- Only Breath by Jelaluddin Rumi
- One Whisper of the Beloved by Jalal ad-Din Muhammad Rumi
- Ode 1957: An intellectual by Jalal ad-Din Muhammad Rumi
- O You Who’ve gone on Pilgrimage by Jalal ad-Din Muhammad Rumi
- Not Here by Rumi
- Not Intrigued With Evening by Jalal ad-Din Muhammad Rumi
- Love is a Tree by Rumi
- Love is the Water of Life by Jalal ad-Din Muhammad Rumi
- Love is Reckless by Jalal ad-Din Muhammad Rumi
- Love Has Nothing to Do with the Five Senses by Jalal ad-Din Muhammad Rumi
- Lord, what a Beloved is mine! by Jalal ad-Din Muhammad Rumi
- Like This by Rumi
- Let go of your worries by Jalal ad-Din Muhammad Rumi
- Late, by Myself by Jalal ad-Din Muhammad Rumi
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.