A poem by Alan Seeger (1888-1916)
I who, conceived beneath another star,
Had been a prince and played with life, instead
Have been its slave, an outcast exiled far
From the fair things my faith has merited.
My ways have been the ways that wanderers tread
And those that make romance of poverty —
Soldier, I shared the soldier’s board and bed,
And Joy has been a thing more oft to me
Whispered by summer wind and summer sea
Than known incarnate in the hours it lies
All warm against our hearts and laughs into our eyes.
I know not if in risking my best days
I shall leave utterly behind me here
This dream that lightened me through lonesome ways
And that no disappointment made less dear;
Sometimes I think that, where the hilltops rear
Their white entrenchments back of tangled wire,
Behind the mist Death only can make clear,
There, like Brunhilde ringed with flaming fire,
Lies what shall ease my heart’s immense desire:
There, where beyond the horror and the pain
Only the brave shall pass, only the strong attain.
Truth or delusion, be it as it may,
Yet think it true, dear friends, for, thinking so,
That thought shall nerve our sinews on the day
When to the last assault our bugles blow:
Reckless of pain and peril we shall go,
Heads high and hearts aflame and bayonets bare,
And we shall brave eternity as though
Eyes looked on us in which we would seem fair —
One waited in whose presence we would wear,
Even as a lover who would be well-seen,
Our manhood faultless and our honor clean.
A few random poems:
- Poem65
- Extinguish Thou My Eyes by Rainer Maria Rilke
- Ghazal to Pera Belle by Serkan Engin
- At Malvern by William Lisle Bowles
- Cain and Abel by Rudyard Kipling
- Николай Гумилев – Когда спокойно так и равнодушно мы
- The Angel Of The Church by William Gilmore Simms
- Sin and Prayer by Satish Verma
- Limitations by Siegfried Sassoon
- Владимир Костров – Мы на тяге ракетной берёзовых дров
- Владимир Маяковский – Нетрудно, ландышами дыша
- Locked Out by Robert Frost
- It Would poem – Alice Notley
- Fanny’s Be’th-Day by William Barnes
- Crow’s Fall by Ted Hughes
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
- In Imitation of E. of Rochester : On Silence poem – Alexander Pope poems | Poetry Monster
- In Imitation of E. of Dorset : Artemisia poem – Alexander Pope poems | Poetry Monster
- In Imitation of Dr. Swift : The Happy Life of a Country Parson poem – Alexander Pope poems | Poetry Monster
- In Imitation of Cowley : The Garden poem – Alexander Pope poems | Poetry Monster
- In Imitation of Chaucer poem – Alexander Pope poems | Poetry Monster
- Impromptu, to Lady Winchelsea poem – Alexander Pope poems | Poetry Monster
- Imitations of Horace: The First Epistle of the Second Book poem – Alexander Pope poems | Poetry Monster
- From an Essay on Man poem – Alexander Pope poems | Poetry Monster
- Essay on Man poem – Alexander Pope poems | Poetry Monster
- Epistles to Several Persons: Epistle to Dr. Arbuthnot poem – Alexander Pope poems | Poetry Monster
- Epistles to Several Persons: Epistle IV, To Richard Boyle, poem – Alexander Pope poems | Poetry Monster
- Epistle II: To A Lady (Of the Characters of Women) poem – Alexander Pope poems | Poetry Monster
- Epistle To Mrs Teresa Blount.[On Her Leaving The Town After The Coronation] poem – Alexander Pope poems | Poetry Monster
- Epistle To Mrs Teresa Blount.[On Her Leaving The Town After The Coronation] poem – Alexander Pope poems | Poetry Monster
- Epigram Engraved on the Collar of a Dog Which I Gave to His Royal Highness poem – Alexander Pope poems | Poetry Monster
- Eloisa to Abelard poem – Alexander Pope poems | Poetry Monster
- Elegy to the Memory of an Unfortunate Lady poem – Alexander Pope poems | Poetry Monster
- Couplets on Wit poem – Alexander Pope poems | Poetry Monster
- Chorus of Youths and Virgins poem – Alexander Pope poems | Poetry Monster
- Chorus of Athenians poem – Alexander Pope poems | Poetry Monster
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.