"dower" poems
672
The Future—never spoke—
Nor will He—like the Dumb—
Reveal by sign—a syllable
Of His Profound To Come—
But when the News be ripe—
Presents it—in the Act—
Forestalling Preparation—
Escape—or Substitute—
Indifference to Him—
The Dower—as the Doom—
His Office—but to execute
Fate’s—Telegram—to Him—
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505
I would not paint—a picture—
I’d rather be the One
Its bright impossibility
To dwell—delicious—on—
And wonder how the fingers feel
Whose rare—celestial—stir—
Evokes so sweet a Torment—
Such sumptuous—Despair—
I would not talk, like Cornets—
I’d rather be the One
Raised softly to the Ceilings—
And out, and easy on—
Through Villages of Ether—
Myself endued Balloon
By but a lip of Metal—
The pier to my Pontoon—
Nor would I be a Poet—
It’s finer—own the Ear—
Enamored—impotent—content—
The License to revere,
A privilege so awful
What would the Dower be,
Had I the Art to stun myself
With Bolts of Melody!
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A Sonnet is a moment’s monument,—
Memorial from the Soul’s eternity
To one dead deathless hour. Look that it be,
Whether for lustral rite or dire portent,
Of its own arduous fulness reverent:
Carve it in ivory or in ebony,
As Day or Night may rule; and let Time see
Its flowering crest impearled and orient.
A Sonnet is a coin: its face reveals
The soul,—its converse, to what Power ’tis due:—
Whether for tribute to the august appeals
Of Life, or dower in Love’s high retinue,
It serve; or, ’mid the dark wharf’s cavernous breath,
In Charon’s palm it pay the toll to Death.
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1734
Oh, honey of an hour,
I never knew thy power,
Prohibit me
Till my minutest dower,
My unfrequented flower,
Deserving be.
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I will not die for you
Woman fey of flesh and home,
I linger but to see you unfrock
The holy, set rogues to roam.
Why should I thus be consumed
In breath like coldest fire?
Shape of rising waterfalls
That state, I surely do not desire
The downy ******* the runny skin,
Spark of cheek, notes of hair in shower,
The gliding step, the gusty tone,
Fools have died for much less a dower.
The lancing pools, the hemlock mien,
The highland sheen, the dawn-bird voice,
The Safire eye, over step of pyramid
Merlin gave Arthur a safer choice.
I will not drown for you,
Flood of hair, red as the lye
In parted Jordan, that sea, not me,
Shall pine as ever, slowly dying.
Your healing humors, your subtle sovereignty,
Your blood, noble as seven-seas are blue,
Little mirror who paints the sky,
Though nearly, I will not die for you.
Jun 24, 2012
Jun 24, 2012 at 10:28 AM UTC
I thought of Thee, my partner and my guide,
As being pass’d away.—Vain sympathies!
For, backward, Duddon! as I cast my eyes,
I see what was, and is, and will abide;
Still glides the Stream, and shall for ever glide;
The Form remains, the Function never dies;
While we, the brave, the mighty, and the wise,
We Men, who in our morn of youth defied
The elements, must vanish;—be it so!
Enough, if something from our hands have power
To live, and act, and serve the future hour;
And if, as toward the silent tomb we go,
Through love, through hope, and faith’s transcendent dower,
We feel that we are greater than we know.
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Once of a bride was I by a belle informed;
Who, on the very night of their honeymoon
Upon sighting her groom's dower, screamed
And would not let him in for his ***** boon,
Until she's taken thru the script the following
Morn by her parson's wife in cool counselling.
Many things in morals and etiquette do
Parents their children ever and anon teach
Except on this single unfolding issue
Will they falter to them plainly preach:
The act of marriage in its detailed image,
Cause it's found nay on their nurturing page.
An African mother will quiver her girl to lecture,
For instance, in the subject under review,
But will leave it to the Omniscient Nature
To instruct her like cry to a curlew.
So the bride's mom will not to her say:
This is how you should roll in the hay.
Neither will a father his son likewise tell
Explicitly of this duty--this too I know--
How to make his led-to-the-altar angel
Fly on cloud nine during their maiden show.
My pa never me of this nuptial scene told,
How in bed my lady I should stylishly hold.
Yet instinct, that great ancient teacher,
The green Adam and ****** Eve taught
On man's debut moment of ecstasy ever,
And did lead him to her piquant spot,
Whilst one another they caressed for affection,
Premiering for all couples conjugal copulation.
And the animals who do not the wisdom
Of man have, even every diminutive creature,
How each by divine smarts in their kingdom--
Like the fish in the sea of their rapture--
Do with themselves mate with none
Giving them tutorials nor showing them ****
To close this up where it had first started:
The *iyawo after the pending deed was done,
As it should betwixt man and wife, delighted
Was and with glowing warmth did thence burn
In the hearth of her *ókò with ultra joy,
Who at the beginning of performance was coy.
Nov 28, 2011
Nov 28, 2011 at 4:43 AM UTC
Oh, to be in England
Now that April’s there,
And whoever wakes in England
Sees, some morning, unaware,
That the lowest boughs and the brushwood sheaf
Round the elm-tree bole are in tiny leaf,
While the chaffinch sings on the orchard bough
In England—now!
And after April, when May follows,
And the whitethroat builds, and all the swallows!
Hark, where my blossomed pear-tree in the hedge
Leans to the field and scatters on the clover
Blossoms and dewdrops—at the bent spray’s edge—
That’s the wise thrush; he sings each song twice over,
Lest you should think he never could recapture
The first fine careless rapture!
And though the fields look rough with hoary dew,
All will be gay when noontide wakes anew
The buttercups, the little children’s dower
—Far brighter than this gaudy melon-flower!
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Milton! thou should’st be living at this hour:
England hath need of thee: she is a fen
Of stagnant waters: altar, sword, and pen,
Fireside, the heroic wealth of hall and bower,
Have forfeited their ancient English dower
Of inward happiness. We are selfish men;
Oh! raise us up, return to us again;
And give us manners, virtue, freedom, power.
Thy soul was like a Star, and dwelt apart:
Thou hadst a voice whose sound was like the sea:
Pure as the naked heavens, majestic, free,
So didst thou travel on life’s common way,
In cheerful godliness; and yet thy heart
The lowliest duties on herself did lay.
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1376
Dreams are the subtle Dower
That make us rich an Hour—
Then fling us poor
Out of the purple Door
Into the Precinct raw
Possessed before—
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869
Because the Bee may blameless hum
For Thee a Bee do I become
List even unto Me.
Because the Flowers unafraid
May lift a look on thine, a Maid
Alway a Flower would be.
Nor Robins, Robins need not hide
When Thou upon their Crypts intrude
So Wings bestow on Me
Or Petals, or a Dower of Buzz
That Bee to ride, or Flower of Furze
I that way worship Thee.
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Your hands lie open in the long fresh grass,—
The finger-points look through the rosy blooms:
Your eyes smile peace. The pasture gleams and glooms
’Neath billowing skies that scatter and amass.
All round our nest, far as the eye can pass,
Are golden kingcup-fields with silver edge
Where the cow-parsley skirts the hawthorn-hedge.
’Tis visible silence, still as the hour-glass.
Deep in the sun-searched growths the dragon-fly
Hangs like a blue thread loosened from the sky:
So this wing’d hour is dropt to us from above.
Oh! clasp we to our hearts, for deathless dower,
This close-companioned inarticulate hour
When twofold silence was the song of love.
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I thought of Thee, my partner and my guide,
As being past away.—Vain sympathies!
For, backward, Duddon! as I cast my eyes,
I see what was, and is, and will abide;
Still glides the Stream, and shall for ever glide;
The Form remains, the Function never dies;
While we, the brave, the mighty, and the wise,
We Men, who in our morn of youth defied
The elements, must vanish;—be it so!
Enough, if something from our hands have power
To live, and act, and serve the future hour;
And if, as toward the silent tomb we go,
Through love, through hope, and faith’s transcendent dower,
We feel that we are greater than we know.
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One spoke: "Come, let us gaily go
With laughter, love and lust,
Since in a century or so
We'll all be boneyard dust.
When unborn shadows hold the screen,
(Our betters, I'll allow)
'Twill be as if we'd never been,
A hundred years from now.
When we have played life's lively game
Right royally we'll rot,
And not a soul will care a ****
The why or how we fought;
To grub for gold or grab for fame
Or raise a holy row,
It will be all the ****** same
A hundred years from now."
Said I: "Look! I have built a tower
Upon you lonely hill,
Designed to be a daughter's dower,
Yet when my heart is still,
The stone I set with ***** hand
And salty sweat of brow,
A record of my strength will sand
A hundred years from now.
"There's nothing lost and nothing vain
In all this world so wide;
The ocean hoards each drop of rain
To swell its sweeping tide;
The desert seeks each grain of sand
It's empire to endow,
And we a bright brave world have planned
A hundred years from now.
And all we are and all we do
Will bring that world to be;
Our strain and pain let us not rue,
Though other eyes shall see;
For other hearts will bravely beat
And lips will sing of how
We strove to make life sane and sweet
A hundred years from now.
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257
Delight is as the flight—
Or in the Ratio of it,
As the Schools would say—
The Rainbow’s way—
A Skein
Flung colored, after Rain,
Would suit as bright,
Except that flight
Were Aliment—
“If it would last”
I asked the East,
When that Bent Stripe
Struck up my childish
Firmament—
And I, for glee,
Took Rainbows, as the common way,
And empty Skies
The Eccentricity—
And so with Lives—
And so with Butterflies—
Seen magic—through the fright
That they will cheat the sight—
And Dower latitudes far on—
Some sudden morn—
Our portion—in the fashion—
Done—
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Your hands lie open in the long fresh grass, -
The finger-points look through like rosy blooms:
Your eyes smile peace. The pasture gleams and glooms
'Neath billowing skies that scatter and amass.
All round our nest, far as the eye can pass,
Are golden kingcup-fields with silver edge
Where the cow-parsley skirts the hawthorn-hedge.
'Tis visible silence, still as the hour-glass.
Deep in the sun-searched growths the dragon-fly
Hangs like a blue thread loosened from the sky: -
So this wing'd hour is dropt to us from above.
Oh! clasp we to our hearts, for deathless dower,
This close-companioned inarticulate hour
When twofold silence was the song of love.
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697
I could bring You Jewels—had I a mind to—
But You have enough—of those—
I could bring You Odors from St. Domingo—
Colors—from Vera Cruz—
Berries of the Bahamas—have I—
But this little Blaze
Flickering to itself—in the Meadow—
Suits Me—more than those—
Never a Fellow matched this Topaz—
And his Emerald Swing—
Dower itself—for Bobadilo—
Better—Could I bring?
1.9k
How stern are the woes of the desolate mourner
As he bends in still grief o’er the hallowed bier,
As enanguished he turns from the laugh of the scorner,
And drops to perfection’s remembrance a tear;
When floods of despair down his pale cheeks are streaming,
When no blissful hope on his ***** is beaming,
Or, if lulled for a while, soon he starts from his dreaming,
And finds torn the soft ties to affection so dear.
Ah, when shall day dawn on the night of the grave,
Or summer succeed to the winter of death?
Rest awhle, hapless victim! and Heaven will save
The spirit that hath faded away with the breath.
Eternity points, in its amaranth bower
Where no clouds of fate o’er the sweet prospect lour,
Unspeakable pleasure, of goodness the dower,
When woe fades away like the mist of the heath.
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Many a flower hath perfume for its dower,
And many a bird a song,
And harmless lambs milkwhite beside their dams
Frolic along,--
Perfume and song and whiteness offering praise
In humble, peaceful ways.
Man's high degree hath will and memory,
Affection and desire;
By loftier ways he mounts of prayer and praise,
Fire unto fire,
Deep unto deep responsive, height to height,
Until he walk in white.
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275
Doubt Me! My Dim Companion!
Why, God, would be content
With but a fraction of the Life—
Poured thee, without a stint—
The whole of me—forever—
What more the Woman can,
Say quick, that I may dower thee
With last Delight I own!
It cannot be my Spirit—
For that was thine, before—
I ceded all of Dust I knew—
What Opulence the more
Had I—a freckled Maiden,
Whose farthest of Degree,
Was—that she might—
Some distant Heaven,
Dwell timidly, with thee!
Sift her, from Brow to Barefoot!
Strain till your last Surmise—
Drop, like a Tapestry, away,
Before the Fire’s Eyes—
Winnow her finest fondness—
But hallow just the snow
Intact, in Everlasting flake—
Oh, Caviler, for you!
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424
Removed from Accident of Loss
By Accident of Gain
Befalling not my simple Days—
Myself had just to earn—
Of Riches—as unconscious
As is the Brown Malay
Of Pearls in Eastern Waters,
Marked His—What Holiday
Would stir his slow conception—
Had he the power to dream
That put the Dower’s fraction—
Awaited even—Him—
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Not I myself know all my love for thee:
How should I reach so far, who cannot weigh
To-morrow’s dower by gage of yesterday?
Shall birth and death, and all dark names that be
As doors and windows bared to some loud sea,
Lash deaf mine ears and blind my face with spray;
And shall my sense pierce love,—the last relay
And ultimate outpost of eternity?
Lo! what am I to Love, the lord of all?
One murmuring shell he gathers from the sand,—
One little heart-flame sheltered in his hand.
Yet through thine eyes he grants me clearest call
And veriest touch of powers primordial
That any hour-girt life may understand.
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727
Precious to Me—She still shall be—
Though She forget the name I bear—
The fashion of the Gown I wear—
The very Color of My Hair—
So like the Meadows—now—
I dared to show a Tress of Theirs
If haply—She might not despise
A Buttercup’s Array—
I know the Whole—obscures the Part—
The fraction—that appeased the Heart
Till Number’s Empery—
Remembered—as the Millner’s flower
When Summer’s Everlasting Dower—
Confronts the dazzled Bee.
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No not the falls but the laugh phenomenal engaging pure intoxicating the crinkle of eyes the
Aliveness the reverberation does fall and streams down like water it washes ones face nothing
Holds it back part of its softer moods is its winsomeness airy innocence that speaks tenderly as
It outwardly shouts what a find recently I spoke of the money I spent trying to find a singer to
Move and touch my soul so many was good and held promise but time after time
Disappointment it’s the same nothing is prettier than ones smile they are wonderful you
Cherish them and then you see the day change in a moment electricity crackles a heart shines
Through every pour of a face we are all blessed with a special something that makes us unique
A quiet power to touch a sweeping away of cares and frowns it spills down country lanes quaint
Sidewalks of the mind when it is observed it is telling in that it dispels the lie that life is nothing
But pain and drudgery my contrary heart argues such statements but the soul and spirit
Overrule by having just been ignited thrown into a tizzy thats alright everyone needs to get tizzy
Every once in a while the blues is cruel laughter shoots them down allows you to bounce back
And enjoy life laughter truly is like a medicine well if she isn’t hospital size she is defiantly a
Clinic no guaranties in life they say I’ll give this one look into that laugh your expression and
Outlook will change it worked for her here is her own direct quote “Previously my life was
Complex, I helped make it that way. Now, I keep it simple and fun.” Take delirious look at it
Aghast as we must we can’t have that so throw a big pinch of sober a tiny dash of dower ok fine
Now just for a minute laugh your head off good lord what fun don’t worry about the stunned
Faces they will get over it I bet a lot of country people have had similar experiences if they own
A jack *** you know how they have those signs in some neighborhoods for different reasons
Well some Need no Laughing out loud fuddy dudy lives at such in such address go up behind
Them and Scream get Crazy they will live longer and that I can guarantee I have written about a
Great lady With a Great laugh enjoy making her acquaintance
Jul 17, 2013
Jul 17, 2013 at 4:30 PM UTC
High grace, the dower of queens; and therewithal
Some wood-born wonder’s sweet simplicity;
A glance like water brimming with the sky
Or hyacinth-light where forest-shadows fall;
Such thrilling pallor of cheek as doth enthral
The heart; a mouth whose passionate forms imply
All music and all silence held thereby;
Deep golden locks, her sovereign coronal;
A round reared neck, meet column of Love’s shrine
To cling to when the heart takes sanctuary;
Hands which for ever at Love’s bidding be,
And soft-stirred feet still answering to his sign:—
These are her gifts, as tongue may tell them o’er.
Breathe low her name, my soul; for that means more.
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