Fist by Philip Levine
Fist by Philip Levine Iron growing in the dark, it dreams all night long and will not work. A flower that hates God, a child tearing at itself, this one closes on nothing. Friday, late, Detroit Transmission. If I live forever, the first clouded light of dawn will flood me in the cold streams north […]
Father by Philip Levine
Father by Philip Levine The long lines of diesels groan toward evening carrying off the breath of the living. The face of your house is black, it is your face, black and fire bombed in the first street wars, a black tooth planted in the earth of Michigan and bearing nothing, and the earth is […]
Everything by Philip Levine
Everything by Philip Levine Lately the wind burns the last leaves and evening comes too late to be of use, lately I learned that the year has turned its face to winter and nothing I say or do can change anything. So I sleep late and waken long after the sun has risen in an […]
Coming Close by Philip Levine
Coming Close by Philip Levine Take this quiet woman, she has been standing before a polishing wheel for over three hours, and she lacks twenty minutes before she can take a lunch break. Is she a woman? Consider the arms as they press the long brass tube against the buffer, they are striated along the […]
Clouds Above The Sea by Philip Levine
Clouds Above The Sea by Philip Levine My father and mother, two tiny figures, side by side, facing the clouds that move in from the Atlantic. August, ’33. The whole weight of the rain to come, the weight of all that has fallen on their houses gathers for a last onslaught, and yet they hold, […]
Clouds by Philip Levine
Clouds by Philip Levine 1 Dawn. First light tearing at the rough tongues of the zinnias, at the leaves of the just born. Today it will rain. On the road black cars are abandoned, but the clouds ride above, their wisdom intact. They are predictions. They never matter. The jet fighters lift above the flat […]
Call It Music by Philip Levine
Call It Music by Philip Levine Some days I catch a rhythm, almost a song in my own breath. I’m alone here in Brooklyn Heights, late morning, the sky above the St. George Hotel clear, clear for New York, that is. The radio playing “Bird Flight,” Parker in his California tragic voice fifty years ago, […]
Black Stone On Top Of Nothing by Philip Levine
Black Stone On Top Of Nothing by Philip Levine Still sober, César Vallejo comes home and finds a black ribbon around the apartment building covering the front door. He puts down his cane, removes his greasy fedora, and begins to untangle the mess. His neighbors line up behind him wondering what’s going on. A middle-aged […]
Bitterness by Philip Levine
Bitterness by Philip Levine Here in February, the fine dark branches of the almond begin to sprout tiny clusters of leaves, sticky to the touch. Not far off, about the length of my morning shadow, the grass is littered with the petals of the plum that less than a week ago blazed, a living candle […]
Berenda Slough by Philip Levine
Berenda Slough by Philip Levine Earth and water without form, change, or pause: as if the third day had not come, this calm norm of chaos denies the Word. One sees only a surface pocked with rushes, the starved clumps pressed between water and space — rootless, perennial stumps fixed in position, entombed in nothing; […]
Belle Isle, 1949 by Philip Levine
Belle Isle, 1949 by Philip Levine We stripped in the first warm spring night and ran down into the Detroit River to baptize ourselves in the brine of car parts, dead fish, stolen bicycles, melted snow. I remember going under hand in hand with a Polish highschool girl I’d never seen before, and the cries […]
At Bessemer by Philip Levine
At Bessemer by Philip Levine 19 years old and going nowhere, I got a ride to Bessemer and walked the night road toward Birmingham passing dark groups of men cursing the end of a week like every week. Out of town I found a small grove of trees, high narrow pines, and I sat back […]
Any Night by Philip Levine
Any Night by Philip Levine Look, the eucalyptus, the Atlas pine, the yellowing ash, all the trees are gone, and I was older than all of them. I am older than the moon, than the stars that fill my plate, than the unseen planets that huddle together here at the end of a year no […]
Another Song by Philip Levine
Another Song by Philip Levine Words go on travelling from voice to voice while the phones are still and the wires hum in the cold. Now and then dark winter birds settle slowly on the crossbars, where huddled they caw out their loneliness. Except for them the March world is white and barely alive. The […]
Animals Are Passing From Our Lives by Philip Levine
Animals Are Passing From Our Lives by Philip Levine It’s wonderful how I jog on four honed-down ivory toes my massive buttocks slipping like oiled parts with each light step. I’m to market. I can smell the sour, grooved block, I can smell the blade that opens the hole and the pudgy white fingers that […]
An Abandoned Factory, Detroit by Philip Levine
An Abandoned Factory, Detroit by Philip Levine The gates are chained, the barbed-wire fencing stands, An iron authority against the snow, And this grey monument to common sense Resists the weather. Fears of idle hands, Of protest, men in league, and of the slow Corrosion of their minds, still charge this fence. Beyond, through broken […]
Among Children by Philip Levine
Among Children by Philip Levine I walk among the rows of bowed heads– the children are sleeping through fourth grade so as to be ready for what is ahead, the monumental boredom of junior high and the rush forward tearing their wings loose and turning their eyes forever inward. These are the children of Flint, […]
A Woman Waking by Philip Levine
A Woman Waking by Philip Levine She wakens early remembering her father rising in the dark lighting the stove with a match scraped on the floor. Then measuring water for coffee, and later the smell coming through. She would hear him drying spoons, dropping them one by one in the drawer. Then he was on […]
A Theory Of Prosody by Philip Levine
A Theory Of Prosody by Philip Levine When Nellie, my old pussy cat, was still in her prime, she would sit behind me as I wrote, and when the line got too long she’d reach one sudden black foreleg down and paw at the moving hand, the offensive one. The first time she drew blood […]
A Sleepless Night by Philip Levine
A Sleepless Night by Philip Levine April, and the last of the plum blossoms scatters on the black grass before dawn. The sycamore, the lime, the struck pine inhale the first pale hints of sky. An iron day, I think, yet it will come dazzling, the light rise from the belly of leaves and pour […]
To The Honble Commodore Hood on His Pardoning a Deserter by Phillis Wheatley
It was thy noble soul and high desert That caus’d these breathings of my grateful heart You sav’d a soul from Pluto’s dreary shore You sav’d his body and he asks no more This generous act Immortal wreaths shall bring To thee for meritorious was the Spring From whence from whence, [sic] this candid ardor […]
To Mrs. Leonard on The Death of Her Husband by Phillis Wheatley
GRIM Monarch! see depriv’d of vital breath, A young Physician in the dust of death! Dost thou go on incessant to destroy: The grief to double, and impair the joy? Enough thou never yet wast known to say, Tho’ millions die thy mandate to obey. Nor youth, nor science nor the charms of love, Nor […]
Phillis Wheatley – Phillis Wheatley
“author”: { “@type”: “Person”, “name”: “Phillis Wheatley” }, “publisher”: { “@type”: “Organization”, “name”: “Poetry Monster Encyclopedia”, “logo”: { “@type”: “ImageObject”, “url”: “https://www.best-poems.net/images/logo.png”, “width”: 233, “height”: 73 } } } var _gaq = _gaq || []; _gaq.push([‘_setAccount’, ‘UA-23275927-1’]); _gaq.push([‘_setDomainName’, ‘.best-poems.net’]); _gaq.push([‘_trackPageview’]); (function() { var ga = document.createElement(‘script’); ga.type = ‘text/javascript’; ga.async = true; ga.src = (‘https:’ […]
On The Death of Mr. Snider Murder’d By Richardson by Phillis Wheatley
In heavens eternal court it was decreed How the first martyr for the cause should bleed To clear the country of the hated brood He whet his courage for the common good Long hid before, a vile infernal here Prevents Achilles in his mid career Where’er this fury darts his Pois’nous breath All are endanger’d […]
On Messrs Hussey and Coffin by Phillis Wheatley
Did Fear and Danger so perplex your Mind, As made you fearful of the Whistling Wind? Was it not Boreas knit his angry Brow Against you? or did Consideration bow? To lend you Aid, did not his Winds combine? To stop your passage with a churlish Line, Did haughty Eolus with Contempt look down With […]
On Friendship by Phillis Wheatley
Let amicitia in her ample reign Extend her notes to a Celestial strain Benevolent far more divinely Bright Amor like me doth triumph at the sight When my thoughts in gratitude imploy Mental Imaginations give me Joy Now let my thoughts in Contemplation steer The Footsteps of the Superlative fair Boston July 15 1769 End […]
To The Honble Commodore Hood on His Pardoning a Deserter by Phillis Wheatley
It was thy noble soul and high desert That caus’d these breathings of my grateful heart You sav’d a soul from Pluto’s dreary shore You sav’d his body and he asks no more This generous act Immortal wreaths shall bring To thee for meritorious was the Spring From whence from whence, [sic] this candid ardor […]
His Excellency General Washington by Phillis Wheatley
Celestial choir! enthron’d in realms of light, Columbia’s scenes of glorious toils I write. While freedom’s cause her anxious breast alarms, She flashes dreadful in refulgent arms. See mother earth her offspring’s fate bemoan, And nations gaze at scenes before unknown! See the bright beams of heaven’s revolving light Involved in sorrows and the veil […]
On Friendship by Phillis Wheatley
Let amicitia in her ample reign Extend her notes to a Celestial strain Benevolent far more divinely Bright Amor like me doth triumph at the sight When my thoughts in gratitude imploy Mental Imaginations give me Joy Now let my thoughts in Contemplation steer The Footsteps of the Superlative fair Boston July 15 1769 End […]
America by Phillis Wheatley
New England first a wilderness was found Till for a continent ’twas destin’d round From feild to feild the savage monsters run E’r yet Brittania had her work begun Thy Power, O Liberty, makes strong the weak And (wond’rous instinct) Ethiopians speak Sometimes by Simile, a victory’s won A certain lady had an only son […]
To The University Of Cambridge, In New-England by Phillis Wheatley
WHILE an intrinsic ardor prompts to write, The muses promise to assist my pen; ‘Twas not long since I left my native shore The land of errors, and Egyptain gloom: Father of mercy, ’twas thy gracious hand Brought me in safety from those dark abodes. Students, to you ’tis giv’n to scan the heights Above, […]
To The Right Honourable William, Earl Of Dartmouth, His Majesty’s Principal Secretary Of The State For North-America, by Phillis Wheatley
HAIL, happy day, when, smiling like the morn, Fair Freedom rose New-England to adorn: The northern clime beneath her genial ray, Dartmouth, congratulates thy blissful sway: Elate with hope her race no longer mourns, Each soul expands, each grateful bosom burns, While in thine hand with pleasure we behold The silken reins, and Freedom’s charms […]
To the Rev. Dr. Thomas Amory by Phillis Wheatley
To cultivate in ev’ry noble mind Habitual grace, and sentiments refin’d, Thus while you strive to mend the human heart, Thus while the heav’nly precepts you impart, O may each bosom catch the sacred fire, And youthful minds to Virtue’s throne aspire! When God’s eternal ways you set in sight, And Virtue shines in all […]
To The King’s Most Excellent Majesty by Phillis Wheatley
YOUR subjects hope, dread Sire– The crown upon your brows may flourish long, And that your arm may in your God be strong! O may your sceptre num’rous nations sway, And all with love and readiness obey! But how shall we the British king reward! Rule thou in peace, our father, and our lord! Midst […]
To The Honourable T. H. Esq; On the Death Of His Daughter by Phillis Wheatley
WHILE deep you mourn beneath the cypress-shade The hand of Death, and your dear daughter laid In dust, whose absence gives your tears to flow, And racks your bosom with incessant woe, Let Recollection take a tender part, Assuage the raging tortures of your heart, Still the wild tempest of tumultuous grief, And pour the […]
To S.M., A Young African Painter, On Seeing His Works by Phillis Wheatley
O show the lab’ring bosom’s deep intent, And thought in living characters to paint, When first thy pencil did those beauties give, And breathing figures learnt from thee to live, How did those prospects give my soul delight, A new creation rushing on my sight? Still, wond’rous youth! each noble path pursue, On deathless glories […]
To Mæcenas by Phillis Wheatley
Mæcenas, you, beneath the myrtle shade, Read o’er what poets sung, and shepherds play’d. What felt those poets but you feel the same? Does not your soul possess the sacred flame? Their noble strains your equal genius shares In softer language, and diviner airs. While Homer paints, lo! circumfus’d in air, Celestial Gods in mortal […]
To His Honour the Lieutenant-Governor by Phillis Wheatley
All-Conquering Death! by thy resistless pow’r, Hope’s tow’ring plumage falls to rise no more! Of scenes terrestrial how the glories fly, Forget their splendors, and submit to die! Who ere escap’d thee, but the saint of old Beyond the flood in sacred annals told, And the great sage, whom fiery coursers drew To heav’n’s bright […]
To Captain H—–d, of the 65th Regiment by Phillis Wheatley
Say, muse divine, can hostile scenes delight The warrior’s bosom in the fields of fight? Lo! here the christian and the hero join With mutual grace to form the man divine. In H—–D see with pleasure and surprise, Where valour kindles, and where virtue lies: Go, hero brave, still grace the post of fame, And […]
To A Lady On The Death Of The Three Relations by Phillis Wheatley
WE trace the pow’r of Death from tomb to tomb, And his are all the ages yet to come. ‘Tis his to call the planets from on high, To blacken Phoebus, and dissolve the sky; His too, when all in his dark realms are hurl’d, From its firm base to shake the solid world; His […]