He lurks among the reeds, beside the marsh,
Red oleanders twisted in His hair,
His eyes are haggard and His lips are harsh,
Upon His breast the bones show gaunt and bare.
The green and stagnant waters lick His feet,
And from their filmy, iridescent scum
Clouds of mosquitoes, gauzy in the heat,
Rise with His gifts: Death and Delirium.
His messengers: They bear the deadly taint
On spangled wings aloft and far away,
Making thin music, strident and yet faint,
From golden eve to silver break of day.
The baffled sleeper hears th’ incessant whine
Through his tormented dreams, and finds no rest
The thirsty insects use his blood for wine,
Probe his blue veins and pasture on his breast.
While far away He in the marshes lies,
Staining the stagnant water with His breath,
An endless hunger burning in His eyes,
A famine unassuaged, whose food is Death.
He hides among the ghostly mists that float
Over the water, weird and white and chill,
And peasants, passing in their laden boat,
Shiver and feel a sense of coming ill.
A thousand burn and die; He takes no heed,
Their bones, unburied, strewn upon the plain,
Only increase the frenzy of His greed
To add more victims to th’ already slain.
He loves the haggard frame, the shattered mind,
Gloats with delight upon the glazing eye,
Yet, in one thing, His cruelty is kind,
He sends them lovely dreams before they die;
Dreams that bestow on them their heart’s desire,
Visions that find them mad, and leave them blest,
To sink, forgetful of the fever’s fire,
Softly, as in a lover’s arms, to rest.
A few random poems:
- Desire # 4 by Patricia Fargnoli
- Вера Павлова – Весть обызвестковалась
- Elizabeth by Michael Ondaatje
- Эмиль Верхарн – Я покидаю сна густую сень
- The Wrath of Love by Shawn Ervin
- Private Ground by Sylvia Plath
- Written In Early Youth. The Time,–An Autumnal Evening by Samuel Taylor Coleridge
- Fragment: Modern Love poem – John Keats poems
- Robert Burns: Highland Harry Back Again:
- September poem – Aldous Huxley poems | Poetry Monster
- Music poem – Amy Lowell poems | Poems and Poetry
- Shining Armour by Vaishnavi Prakash
- Иван Бунин – Богиня
- Иван Бунин – Балагула
- Николай Некрасов – Демону
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
- Robert Burns: Address To The Woodlark:
- Robert Burns: Does Haughty Gaul Invasion Threat?:
- Robert Burns: Had I The Wyte? She Bade Me:
- Robert Burns: The Lass That Made The Bed To Me :
- Robert Burns: The Cooper O’ Cuddy:
- Robert Burns: The Cardin O’t, The Spinnin O’t:
- Robert Burns: Inscription For An Altar Of Independence: At Kerroughtree, the Seat of Mr. Heron.
- Robert Burns: Ballads on Mr. Heron’s Election, 1795: Ballad Third – John Bushby’s Lamentation.
- Robert Burns: Ballads on Mr. Heron’s Election, 1795: Second-Election Day
- Robert Burns: :
- Robert Burns: Ballads on Mr. Heron’s Election, 1795: Ballad First
- Robert Burns: O Wat Ye Wha’s In Yon Town:
- Robert Burns: I’ll Aye Ca’ In By Yon Town:
- Robert Burns: Her Answer:
- Robert Burns: O Let Me In Thes Ae Night:
- Robert Burns: The Lass O’ Ecclefechan:
- Robert Burns: O Steer Her Up An’ Haud Her Gaun:
- Robert Burns: Gude Ale Keeps The Heart Aboon:
- Robert Burns: O Aye My Wife She Dang Me:
- Robert Burns: Wee Willie Gray:
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
Violet Nicolson ( 1865 – 1904); otherwise known as Adela Florence Nicolson (née Cory), was an English poetess who wrote under the pseudonym of Laurence Hope, however she became known as Violet Nicolson. In the early 1900s, she became a best-selling author. She committed suicide and is buried in Madras, now Chennai, India.