Different Types of Poetry - Essay Example

Edited (in the modern English language) Psalms 137: Super flumina by Myles Coverdale By the waters of Babylon, We sat down and wept When we remembered the old Zion As for our harps, we hung them up upon the trees that are there. Then they that led us away captives, Required of us a song and melody in our heaviness: Sing us one of the songs of Zion. How shall we sing the Lord's song in a strange land If I forgot you, o Jerusalem, Let my right hand be forgotten. If I do not remember you, Let my tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth. Yes, if I prefer not Jerusalem in my mirth. Remember the children of Edom, o Lord, In the days of Jerusalem, how they say: Down with it, down with it, even to the ground. O daughter of Babylon, You shall come to misery yourself: Yes happy shall he be, That rewards you as you have inflicted us. Blessed shall he be That has taken the children and thrown them against the stones. Edited (in the modern English language) August 1914 by Isaac Rosenburg What in our lives is burnt In this fire The heart's dear granary That shall we miss Three lives have one life - Iron, honey, gold. The gold and the honey are gone - Left is the hard and cold. Iron are our lives Molten right through our youth. A burnt space through ripe fields A fair mouth's broken tooth. Edited (in the modern English language) The Clod and the Pebble By William Blake Love does not seek to please itself, Nor for itself has it any care, But love seeks to care and ease others And builds a heaven in despairing hell. So sang a little clod of clay, Trodden by the cattle's feet, But a pebble of the brook Sung out these verses: Love seeks only to please itself, To take from another for its own delight, It rejoices in another's loss of ease And builds a hell instead of a heaven. Edited (in the modern English language) A Poison Tree By William Blake I was angry with my friend: I told my anger, and my anger ended. I was angry with my foe: I told did not tell him and my anger grew. And I watered it in fears, Night and morning with my tears; And I sunned it with smiles, And with soft deceitful tricks. And it grew both day and night, Till it produced an apple bright, And my foe believed it shine, And he knew that it was mine. And into my garden he stole, When the night had veiled the pole. In the morning, glad I see My foe outstretched beneath the tree. Edited (in the modern English language) Envy By Adelaide Anne Procter He was the first always: Fortune shone brightly in his face. I fought for years with no effort; He always conquered the place. We ran, and my feet were all bleeding, But he won the race. In spite of his many successes, Men loved him the same My one pale ray of good fortune, Met scoffing and blame. When we made a mistake, they gave him pity, But me - only shame. My home was still in the shadow His lay in the sun. I longed in vain: But what he asked for, It was straightaway done. Once I risked all my heart's treasure, We played - and he won. Yes, and just now I have seen him, Cold, smiling and blessed, Lying in his coffin. God help me! While he is at rest, I am cursed still to live Even death loved him the best. Edited (in the modern English language) Modern Love By Douglas Dunn It is summer, and we are in a house That is not ours, Sitting at a table Enjoying minutes of borrowed silence. The people upstairs have gone The pigeons are calm Sleeping among the under-tens and invalids. The tree shakes out its shadows to the grass, The roses rove through the wilds of my neglect Our lives flap And we have no hope of better happiness than this, This is not much show for love Than how we are Or how this evening is, Unpeopled, silent and where we are alive Semmingly alone In a domestic love, All other lives worn down to trees and sunlight, Looking forward to a visit From the cat. Edited (in the modern English language) Eden Rock By Charles Causley They are waiting for me somewhere beyond Eden Rock My father is twenty-five, always wearing the same suit His terrier Jack is of a genuine Irish Tweed, Still two years old and trembling at his feet. My mother is twenty-three She is dressed in a sprigged dress, Drawn at the waist, ribbon in her straw hat She spreads the stiff white cloth over the grass. Her hair, the colour of wheat, takes on the light. She pours tea from the Thermos The milk straight from an old H.P. sauce bottle, A screw of paper for a cork She slowly sets them out. The same three plates, the tin cups painted blue. The sky whitens as if lit by three suns, My mother shades her eyes and looks my way Over the drifted stream, My father spins a stone along the water. Leisurely they indicate to me from the other bank. I hear them call, "See where the stream path is!" Crossing is not as hard as you think. I had not thought that it would be like this. Edited (in the modern English language) Writing in Prison By Ken Smith Years ago, I was a gardener. I grew the flowers of my childhood, Lavender and wayside lilies. And my first love the cornflower. The wind on the summer wheat. The blue glaze in the vanished woods. In the space of my yard, I glimpsed again At all the lost places of my life. I was remaking them, Here in a space smaller Yet still I make them again. Edited (in the modern English language) The Reassurance By Thomas Gunn About ten days or so, After we saw you dead. You came back in a dream, "I am all right now", you said. And it was you, As if you were in the flesh again: You hugged us all round then, And gave your welcoming smile. It was so like you - to be kind, Seeking to reassure. And yes, how like my mind. It seeks to make itself secure. Edited (in the modern English language) Prayer By Hugo Williams God give me strength, to lead a double life. Cut my in half. Make each half happy in its own way, with what is left. Let me disobey my own best instincts. And do what I want to do, whatever that may be. Without regretting it, or thinking I might. When I come home late at night, Saying I have to go away. Remind me to look out the window To see which house I'm in, Pin a smile on my face. When I turn up two weeks later With a tan and presents for everyone. Teach me how to stand and where to look, When I say the words about where I've been. And what sort of time I've had. Was it good Was it bad Or was it somewhere in between I'd like to know how I feel about these things, Perhaps can tell me When its time for bed in one of my lives. Go ahead of me up the stairs, Shine a light in the corners of my room, Tell me this: Do I wear pyjamas here, or sleep with nothing on If you can't oblige by cutting me in half, God give me strength to lead a double life. Read More