A poem by Alan Seeger (1888-1916)
There was a boy — not above childish fears —
With steps that faltered now and straining ears,
Timid, irresolute, yet dauntless still,
Who one bright dawn, when each remotest hill
Stood sharp and clear in Heaven’s unclouded blue
And all Earth shimmered with fresh-beaded dew,
Risen in the first beams of the gladdening sun,
Walked up into the mountains. One by one
Each towering trunk beneath his sturdy stride
Fell back, and ever wider and more wide
The boundless prospect opened. Long he strayed,
From dawn till the last trace of slanting shade
Had vanished from the canyons, and, dismayed
At that far length to which his path had led,
He paused — at such a height where overhead
The clouds hung close, the air came thin and chill,
And all was hushed and calm and very still,
Save, from abysmal gorges, where the sound
Of tumbling waters rose, and all around
The pines, by those keen upper currents blown,
Muttered in multitudinous monotone.
Here, with the wind in lovely locks laid bare,
With arms oft raised in dedicative prayer,
Lost in mute rapture and adoring wonder,
He stood, till the far noise of noontide thunder,
Rolled down upon the muffled harmonies
Of wind and waterfall and whispering trees,
Made loneliness more lone. Some Panic fear
Would seize him then, as they who seemed to hear
In Tracian valleys or Thessalian woods
The god’s hallooing wake the leafy solitudes;
I think it was the same: some piercing sense
Of Deity’s pervasive immanence,
The Life that visible Nature doth indwell
Grown great and near and all but palpable . . .
He might not linger, but with winged strides
Like one pursued, fled down the mountain-sides —
Down the long ridge that edged the steep ravine,
By glade and flowery lawn and upland green,
And never paused nor felt assured again
But where the grassy foothills opened. Then,
While shadows lengthened on the plain below
And the sun vanished and the sunset-glow
Looked back upon the world with fervid eye
Through the barred windows of the western sky,
Homeward he fared, while many a look behind
Showed the receding ranges dim-outlined,
Highland and hollow where his path had lain,
Veiled in deep purple of the mountain rain.
A few random poems:
- The Fiddler Of Dooney by William Butler Yeats
- The Lament of the Border Cattle Thief by Rudyard Kipling
- Five Ways To Kill A Man poem – Andre Breton poems
- Robert Burns: Go On, Sweet Bird, And Sooth My Care:
- The Sick Stockrider
- For Mêng Hao-jan by Wang Wei
- Lines Inscribed under Fergusson’s Portrait by Robert Burns
- The lords above by Michael Nikoletseas
- Blue flower by Tanisha Avarsekar
- The Candle Indoors poem – Gerard Manley Hopkins poems
- Robert Burns: The Wren’s Nest: Fragment
- Winter Violets poem – Alfred Austin
- Tears. by Walt Whitman
- Владимир Гиляровский – Покаюсь
- Михаил Кузмин – Второй свидетель
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
- When Lilacs Last in the Door-yard Bloom’d. by Walt Whitman
- When I read the Book. by Walt Whitman
- When I peruse the Conquer’d Fame. by Walt Whitman
- When I heard the Learn’d Astronomer. by Walt Whitman
- When I heard at the Close of the Day. by Walt Whitman
- What think You I take my Pen in Hand? by Walt Whitman
- What Place is Besieged? by Walt Whitman
- What General has a Good Army. by Walt Whitman
- What Best I See In Thee. by Walt Whitman
- What am I, After All? by Walt Whitman
- We Two—How Long We were Fool’d. by Walt Whitman
- We Two Boys Together Clinging. by Walt Whitman
- Visor’d. by Walt Whitman
- Vigil Strange I Kept on the Field. by Walt Whitman
- Turn, O Libertad. by Walt Whitman
- To You. by Walt Whitman
- To Thee, Old Cause! by Walt Whitman
- To the Garden the World. by Walt Whitman
- To One Shortly to Die. by Walt Whitman
- To Him that was Crucified. by Walt Whitman
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.