A poem by Alec Derwent-Hope (1907–2000)
by Alec Derwent Hope
What did I study in your School of Night?
When your mouth’s first unfathomable yes
Opened your body to be my book, I read
My answers there and learned the spell aright,
Yet, though I searched and searched, could never guess
What spirits it raised nor where their questions led.
Those others, familiar tenants of your sleep,
The whisperers, the grave somnambulists
Whose eyes turn in to scrutinize their woe,
The giant who broods above the nightmare steep,
That sleeping girl, shuddering, with clenched fists,
A vampire baby suckling at her toe,
They taught me most. The scholar held his pen
And watched his blood drip thickly on the page
To form a text in unknown characters
Which, as I scanned them, changed and changed again:
The lines grew bars, the bars a Delphic cage
And I the captive of his magic verse.

A few random poems:
- To Songs At the Marriage Of The Lord Fauconberg And The Lady Mary Cromwell poem – Andrew Marvell poems
- Кондратий Рылеев – О милый друг, как внятен голос твой
- Flight To Nature by William Gilmore Simms
- Зинаида Александрова – Волчонок
- Юлия Друнина – Два вечера
- A Circular by Thomas Hardy
- Shining Armour by Vaishnavi Prakash
- Джон Донн – Когда я с ней, с моим бесценным кладом
- An Epitaph 4 (From The Greek) by William Cowper
- Notes for Canto CXX poem – Ezra Pound poems
- Michaelangelo by Vachel Lindsay
- Николай Гумилев – Кармен худа, коричневатый
- Владимир Высоцкий – Запись в книге почётных гостей Киевского завода шампанских вин
- Robert Burns: Braving Angry Winter’s Storms:
- A General Summary by Rudyard Kipling
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
- A Drinking Song by William Butler Yeats
- A Dream Of Death by William Butler Yeats
- A Dialogue Of Self And Soul by William Butler Yeats
- A Deep Sworn Vow by William Butler Yeats
- A Crazed Girl by William Butler Yeats
- A Cradle Song by William Butler Yeats
- A Coat by William Butler Yeats
- A Bronze Head by William Butler Yeats
- He Reproves The Curlew by William Butler Yeats
- He Remembers Forgotten Beauty by William Butler Yeats
- He Hears The Cry Of The Sedge by William Butler Yeats
- He Gives His Beloved Certain Rhymes by William Butler Yeats
- He Bids His Beloved Be At Peace by William Butler Yeats
- Gratitude To The Unknown Instructors by William Butler Yeats
- Girl’s Song by William Butler Yeats
- From The ‘Antigone’ by William Butler Yeats
- Fragments by William Butler Yeats
- For Anne Gregory by William Butler Yeats
- Fergus And The Druid by William Butler Yeats
- Father And Child by William Butler Yeats
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.