Poems--from anywhere, for Brokeback Mountain sensitized feelings...

[twistedude]

Punch up "Amazon.com; then type in "CD--Lili Marlene". THEN click on "z-shops." There's a real expensive one, but two cheap ones, too. The tune is lovely. I think a lot of people don't know that the song was sung by BOTH sides in WW2, and Marlene Dietrich recorded it for the OSS. A lot of people think of it as a Nazi marching song..hmmm,. how HANDY. "Lili Marlene" was the song the freezing Germans and Americans dug into fox holes started harmonizing on one night, the Germans in German, and the Americans in English (Vor der Kaserne, vor dem grossen Tor, steht eine Laterne, und steht sie noch davorn..she waits for a boy who marched away...and so on...)

This story better get a move on, or I'm going to be adding chapters myself...just kidding.\
I sent the verse to my GFIC (gay friend in closet), and added, "how'd you like to pay a visit to Germany, 1933...me neither." he wrote back," '33, maybe, '43 no."

Oh, I'm Jewish.

So I wrote back: after the election of Hitler as Chancellor, things weren't too pleasant for Guys Like Me...or even Guys Like You...

[twistedude]

He's the Lilly of the Valley,
The Bright and Morning Star,
He's the Fairest of 10,000 to my Soul.

                ---part of a hymn by Charles W. Fry, 19th century England

[dly64]

Wild Nights
by Emily  Dickinson

Wild nights.  Wild nights!
Were I with thee,
Wild nights should be
Our luxury!

Futile the winds
To a heart in port
Done with the compass
Done with the chart.

Rowing in Eden.
Ah, the sea.
Might I but moor
Tonight with thee!

The Clod & the Pebble
by William  Blake

Love seeketh not Itself to please,
Nor for itself hath any care;
But for another gives its ease,
And builds a Heaven in Hell's despair.

   So sang a little Clod of Clay,
   Trodden with the cattle's feet;
   But a Pebble of the brook,
   Warbled out these metres meet.

Love seeketh only Self to please,
To bind another to It's delight:
Joys in another's loss of ease,
And builds a Hell in Heavens despite.

[twistedude]

Love Blake!

[dly64]

Love Blake!

Ditto! I think he's great!

[undercarriage]

Death is nothing at all
I have only slipped away into the next room
I am I
you are you
Whatever we were to each other that we still are

Call me by my old familiar name
speak to me in the easy way you always used to

Put no difference in your tone
wear no forced air of solemnity or sorrow
Laugh as we always laughed at the little jokes we enjoyed together

Let my name be ever the household word it always was
let it be spoken without effort
without the trace of a shadow on it
Life means all that it ever meant

Why should I be out of mind because I am out of sight
I am waiting for you
for an interval
somewhere very near
just round the corner
All is well

Canon Henry Scott Holland, 1847-1918
Canon of St Paul's Cathedral

[David In Indy]

Thank you for posting this, undercarriage.... and everybody!   

[moremojo]

The winds out of the west land blow,
     My friends have breathed them there;
Warm with the blood of lads I know
     Comes east the sighing air.

It fanned their temples, filled their lungs,
     Scattered their forelocks free;
My friends made words of it with tongues
     That talk no more to me.

Their voices, dying as they fly,
     Loose on the wind are sown;
The names of men blow soundless by,
     My fellows' and my own.

Oh lads, at home I heard you plain,
     But here your speech is still,
And down the sighing wind in vain
     You hollo from the hill.

The wind and I, we both were there,
     But neither long abode;
Now through the friendless world we fare
     And sigh upon the road.

--poem XXXVIII from 'A Shropshire Lad' by A.E. Housman (1859-1936)

[ranchgal]

I don't know, I thought about putting this in Ennis and Ellery, but then thought maybe here?? this is kind of greeting card stuff--no author is credited in the place I read it, but when I did  read it, it sounded so Ennis, both about Jack and even about Ellery, I thought maybe I would share it anyway.

If Tears could build a stairway
and memories a lane
I would walk right up to heaven
and bring you back again.

No farewell words were spoken.
No time to say "Goodbye".
You were gone before I knew it
And only God knows why.

My heart still aches with sadness
and secret tears still flow.
What it meant to love you
No one can ever know.

But now  I know you want me
To mourn for you no more.
To remember all the happy times.
Life still has much in store.

Since you'll never be forgotten
I pledge to you today
A hollowed place within my heart
Is where you'll always stay.


they are  putting that first verse on a "in loving memory"  Christmas tree ornament.
but they are sending the whole poem in the box, and it just sort of grabbed me when I read it.

[twistedude]

I put Rou8's Pablo Naruda poem (page one) on "picture captions"--and someone said it was the most beautiful thing he/she had ever read...so I'm bumping this back to page 1...some great poems here.

I know...some of you just don't dig poetry, but for the rest of us...

Thanks for the beautiful stuff. The Naruda poem begins "I don't love you as if you were the salt rose topaz ..."