A poem by Alec Derwent-Hope (1907–2000)
by Alec Derwent Hope
Year after year the princess lies asleep
Until the hundred years foretold are done,
Easily drawing her enchanted breath.
Caught on the monstrous thorns around the keep,
Bones of the youths who sought her, one by one
Rot loose and rattle to the ground beneath.
But when the Destined Lover at last shall come,
For whom alone Fortune reserves the prize
The thorns give way; he mounts the cobwebbed stair
Unerring he finds the tower, the door, the room,
The bed where, waking at his kiss she lies
Smiling in the loose fragrance of her hair.
That night, embracing on the bed of state,
He ravishes her century of sleep
And she repays the debt of that long dream;
Future and Past compose their vast debate;
His seed now sown, her harvest ripe to reap
Enact a variation on the theme.
For in her womb another princess waits,
A sleeping cell, a globule of bright dew.
Jostling their way up that mysterious stair,
A horde of lovers bursts between the gates,
All doomed but one, the destined suitor, who
By luck first reaches her and takes her there.
A parable of all we are or do!
The life of Nature is a formal dance
In which each step is ruled by what has been
And yet the pattern emerges always new
The marriage of linked cause and random chance
Gives birth perpetually to the unforeseen.
One parable for the body and the mind:
With science and heredity to thank
The heart is quite predictable as a pump,
But, let love change its beat, the choice is blind.
‘Now’ is a cross-roads where all maps prove blank,
And no one knows which way the cat will jump.
So here stand I, by birth a cross between
Determined pattern and incredible chance,
Each with an equal share in what I am.
Though I should read the code stored in the gene,
Yet the blind lottery of circumstance
Mocks all solutions to its cryptogram.
As in my flesh, so in my spirit stand I
When does this hundred years draw to its close?
The hedge of thorns before me gives no clue.
My predecessor’s carcass, shrunk and dry,
Stares at me through the spikes. Oh well, here goes!
I have this thing, and only this, to do.
A few random poems:
- The Name poem – Alexander Pushkin
- The useless counsellor by Ross D Tyler
- The Blessed Birth by Vasishta Sharma Gudi
- Николай Глазков – Раздумья
- Gratitude To The Unknown Instructors by William Butler Yeats
- 1914 III: The Dead by Rupert Brooke
- Владимир Британишский – Феодосия, Керчь, Таганрог
- The Three Gentle Shepherds poem – Alexander Pope
- No Worst, There Is None. Pitched Past Pitch Of Grief poem – Gerard Manley Hopkins poems
- Proactive Responses to Recession – 7 Creative Ways to Make Extra Money With Real Estate
- Whispers of Heavenly Death. by Walt Whitman
- Ольга Седакова – Вьюга
- By The Camp Fire
- Sonnet 111: O, for my sake do you with Fortune chide by William Shakespeare
- Audley Court poem – Lord Alfred Tennyson poems
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
- Юлия Друнина – Сверстницам
- Юлия Друнина – Страна Юность
- Юлия Друнина – Старый Крым
- Юлия Друнина – Старая лента, обугленный лес
- Юлия Друнина – Стал холоден мой тёплый старый дом
- Юлия Друнина – Сочетание
- Юлия Друнина – Слалом
- Юлия Друнина – Шторм
- Юлия Друнина – Ржавчина
- Юлия Друнина – Русский вечер
- Юлия Жадовская – Заколдованное сердце
- Юлия Жадовская – Я все хочу расслушать
- Юлия Жадовская – Всё ты уносишь, нещадное время
- Юлия Жадовская – Возврат весны
- Юлия Жадовская – Лучший перл таится
- Юлия Жадовская – Говорят придет пора
- Юлия Жадовская – Да, я вижу
- Юлия Жадовская – Чем ярче шумный пир
- Юлия Жадовская – Ах, бабушкин сад
- Юнна Мориц – Зимнее
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.