A poem by Alan Seeger (1888-1916)
Do you remember once, in Paris of glad faces,
The night we wandered off under the third moon’s rays
And, leaving far behind bright streets and busy places,
Stood where the Seine flowed down between its quiet quais?
The city’s voice was hushed; the placid, lustrous waters
Mirrored the walls across where orange windows burned.
Out of the starry south provoking rumors brought us
Far promise of the spring already northward turned.
And breast drew near to breast, and round its soft desire
My arm uncertain stole and clung there unrepelled.
I thought that nevermore my heart would hover nigher
To the last flower of bliss that Nature’s garden held.
There, in your beauty’s sweet abandonment to pleasure,
The mute, half-open lips and tender, wondering eyes,
I saw embodied first smile back on me the treasure
Long sought across the seas and back of summer skies.
Dear face, when courted Death shall claim my limbs and find them
Laid in some desert place, alone or where the tides
Of war’s tumultuous waves on the wet sands behind them
Leave rifts of gasping life when their red flood subsides,
Out of the past’s remote delirious abysses
Shine forth once more as then you shone, — beloved head,
Laid back in ecstasy between our blinding kisses,
Transfigured with the bliss of being so coveted.
And my sick arms will part, and though hot fever sear it,
My mouth will curve again with the old, tender flame.
And darkness will come down, still finding in my spirit
The dream of your brief love, and on my lips your name.
II
You loved me on that moonlit night long since.
You were my queen and I the charming prince
Elected from a world of mortal men.
You loved me once. . . . What pity was it, then,
You loved not Love. . . . Deep in the emerald west,
Like a returning caravel caressed
By breezes that load all the ambient airs
With clinging fragrance of the bales it bears
From harbors where the caravans come down,
I see over the roof-tops of the town
The new moon back again, but shall not see
The joy that once it had in store for me,
Nor know again the voice upon the stair,
The little studio in the candle-glare,
And all that makes in word and touch and glance
The bliss of the first nights of a romance
When will to love and be beloved casts out
The want to question or the will to doubt.
You loved me once. . . . Under the western seas
The pale moon settles and the Pleiades.
The firelight sinks; outside the night-winds moan —
The hour advances, and I sleep alone.
III
Farewell, dear heart, enough of vain despairing!
If I have erred I plead but one excuse —
The jewel were a lesser joy in wearing
That cost a lesser agony to lose.
I had not bid for beautifuller hours
Had I not found the door so near unsealed,
Nor hoped, had you not filled my arms with flowers,
For that one flower that bloomed too far afield.
If I have wept, it was because, forsaken,
I felt perhaps more poignantly than some
The blank eternity from which we waken
And all the blank eternity to come.
And I betrayed how sweet a thing and tender
(In the regret with which my lip was curled)
Seemed in its tragic, momentary splendor
My transit through the beauty of the world.
A few random poems:
- The Promise of Sleep poem – Amy Levy poems | Poems and Poetry
- The Bugler’s First Communion poem – Gerard Manley Hopkins poems
- English Poetry. Thomas Moore. From “Irish Melodies”. 44. She Is Far From the Land. Томас Мур.
- Николай Языков – Водопад
- Lying Down by Robert Desnos
- In a Subway Station by Sara Teasdale
- Welcome A.O.H. Men by Michael McGovern
- The Rose of Midnight by Vachel Lindsay
- I Cast My Net Into The Sea by Rabindranath Tagore
- Appeal by Ndue Ukaj
- Aquamarine Butterfly by Nina Gabriel
- Robert Burns: Kellyburn Braes:
- A Night With Passion! by Stevens Cadet
- Michael Angelo In Reply To The Passage Upon His Staute Of Sleeping Night by William Wordsworth
- Катя Пиксаева – Давай поговорим о доброте
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
- Occupy the Wall Street by Sunil Sharma
- Morale by Sunil Sharma
- Finding freedom from invisible bonds by Sunil Sharma
- Birds heavenly by Sunil Sharma
- Afternoon song by Sunil Sharma
- A daily prayer by a kid by Sunil Sharma
- A beach dawn by Sunil Sharma
- The Pretense of Gathering Pebbles by the Shore by Syed Kawsar Jamal
- The Magician by Syed Kawsar Jamal
- Sunday Morning by Susan King Saunders
- Sitting atop the mountain hill by Swami Aaron Thomas
- Shattered Dreams by SWARAJ PRASAD
- Romantic Hour by Suuk Simon Subinimah
- Rememberance of that Power by sylvan lightbourne
- Protest poem by Susan King Saunders
- Od’d(ode) to Whitey Bulger by Susan King Saunders
- Michelle Obama Tribute by Susan King Saunders
- Little Girl Dancing by Susan King Saunders
- Independent at Birth by Suuk Simon Subinimah
- I am not ashamed of myself by Swami Aaron Thomas
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
Alan Seeger (1888-1916) was an American war poet who fought and died in World War I during the Battle of the Somme, serving in the French Foreign Legion. Seeger was the brother of Charles Seeger, a noted American pacifist and musicologist and the uncle of folk musician, Pete Seeger.