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I saw a man
pursuing the horizon
I saw a man pursuing the horizon;
Round and round they sped.
I was disturbed at this;
I accosted the man.
“It is futile,” I said,
“You can never —”
“You lie,” he cried,
And ran on.
Stephen Crane
(1871 – 1900)
I saw a man pursuing the horizon
• fleursdumal.nl magazine
More in: *War Poetry Archive, Archive C-D, Archive C-D, Stephen Crane
Simplify Me When I’m Dead
Remember me when I am dead
and simplify me when I’m dead.
As the processes of earth
strip off the colour of the skin:
take the brown hair and blue eye
and leave me simpler than at birth,
when hairless I came howling in
as the moon entered the cold sky.
Of my skeleton perhaps,
so stripped, a learned man will say
“He was of such a type and intelligence,” no more.
Thus when in a year collapse
particular memories, you may
deduce, from the long pain I bore
the opinions I held, who was my foe
and what I left, even my appearance
but incidents will be no guide.
Time’s wrong-way telescope will show
a minute man ten years hence
and by distance simplified.
Through that lens see if I seem
substance or nothing: of the world
deserving mention or charitable oblivion,
not by momentary spleen
or love into decision hurled,
leisurely arrive at an opinion.
Remember me when I am dead
and simplify me when I’m dead.
Keith Douglas
(1920 – 1944)
Simplify Me When I’m Dead
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The Knife
Can I explain this to you? Your eyes
are entrances the mouths of caves
I issue from wonderful interiors
upon a blessed sea and a fine day,
from inside these caves I look and dream.
Your hair explicable as a waterfall
in some black liquid cooled by legend
fell across my thought in a moment
became a garment I am naked without
lines drawn across through morning and evening.
And in your body each minute I died
moving your thigh could disinter me
from a grave in a distant city:
your breasts deserted by cloth, clothed in twilight
filled me with tears, sweet cups of flesh.
Yes, to touch two fingers made us worlds
stars, waters, promontories, chaos
swooning in elements without form or time
come down through long seas among sea marvels
embracing like survivors in our islands.
This I think happened to us together
though now no shadow of it flickers in your hands
your eyes look down on ordinary streets
If I talk to you I might be a bird
with a message, a dead man, a photograph.
Keith Douglas
(1920 – 1944)
The Knife
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More in: Archive C-D, Archive C-D, Douglas, Keith, WAR & PEACE
Do not weep, maiden, for war is kind
Do not weep, maiden, for war is kind.
Because your lover threw wild hands toward the sky
And the affrighted steed ran on alone,
Do not weep.
War is kind.
Hoarse, booming drums of the regiment,
Little souls who thirst for fight,
These men were born to drill and die.
The unexplained glory flies above them,
Great is the battle-god, great, and his kingdom—
A field where a thousand corpses lie.
Do not weep, babe, for war is kind.
Because your father tumbled in the yellow trenches,
Raged at his breast, gulped and died,
Do not weep.
War is kind.
Swift, blazing flag of the regiment,
Eagle with crest of red and gold,
These men were born to drill and die.
Point for them the virtue of slaughter,
Make plain to them the excellence of killing
And a field where a thousand corpses lie.
Mother whose heart hung humble as a button
On the bright splendid shroud of your son,
Do not weep.
War is kind.
Stephen Crane
(1871 – 1900)
Do not weep, maiden, for war is kind
from: War is Kind
•fleursdumal.nl magazine
More in: *War Poetry Archive, Archive C-D, Archive C-D, Stephen Crane
Oxford
At home as in no other city, here
summer holds her breath in a dark street
the trees nocturnally scented, lovers like moths
go by silently on the footpaths
and spirits of the young wait,
cannot be expelled, multiply each year.
In the meadows, walks, over the walls
the sunlight, far-travelled, tired and content,
warms the recollections of old men, touching
the hand of the scholar on his book, marching
through quadrangles and arches, at last spent
it leans through the stained windows and falls.
This then is the city of young men, of beginning,
ideas, trials, pardonable follies,
the lightness, seriousness and sorrow of youth.
And the city of the old, looking for truth,
browsing for years, the mind’s seven bellies
filled, become legendary figures, seeming
stones of the city, her venerable towers;
dignified, clothed by erudition and time.
For them it is not a city but an existence;
outside which everything is a pretence:
within, the leisurely immortals dream,
venerated and spared by the ominous hours.
Keith Douglas
(1920 – 1944)
Oxford
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More in: # Classic Poetry Archive, Archive C-D, Archive C-D, Douglas, Keith, WAR & PEACE
Desert Flowers
Living in a wide landscape are the flowers –
Rosenberg I only repeat what you were saying –
the shell and the hawk every hour
are slaying men and jerboas, slaying
the mind: but the body can fill
the hungry flowers and the dogs who cry words
at nights, the most hostile things of all.
But that is not new. Each time the night discards
draperies on the eyes and leaves the mind awake
I look each side of the door of sleep
for the little coin it will take
to buy the secret I shall not keep.
I see men as trees suffering
or confound the detail and the horizon.
Lay the coin on my tongue and I will sing
of what the others never set eyes on.
Keith Douglas
(1920 – 1944)
Desert Flowers
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More in: Archive C-D, Archive C-D, Douglas, Keith, WAR & PEACE
Paris double galère
Depuis le Point-du-Jour jusqu’aux cèdres bibliques
Double galère assise au long du grand bazar,
Et du grand ministère, et du morne alcazar,
Parmi les deuils privés et les vertus publiques ;
Sous les quatre-vingts rois et les trois Républiques,
Et sous Napoléon, Alexandre et César,
Nos pères ont tenté le centuple hasard,
Fidèlement courbés sur tes rames obliques.
Et nous prenant leur place au même banc de chêne,
Nous ramerons des reins, de la nuque, de l’âme,
Pliés, cassés, meurtris, saignants sous notre chaîne ;
Et nous tiendrons le coup, rivés sur notre rame,
Forçats fils de forçats aux deux rives de Seine,
Galériens couchés aux pieds de Notre Dame.
Charles Péguy
(1873 – 1914)
Paris double galère
1913
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More in: # Classic Poetry Archive, Archive O-P, Archive O-P, FDM in Paris, Peguy, Charles, WAR & PEACE
Gedicht über Nachtwirkungen
Noch nicht Tag! Die fratzenhafte Nacht
hat mich Stück für Stück entzweigerissen.
Wehe Striemen drücken mir die Kissen,
jede Falte hat mich wund gemacht.
Und der Träume quälerische Schwere:
Wollust, Ekel, Schmerzen, Tränen, Mord,
treibt mein Herz auf einem dunklen Meere
wie ein purpurrotes Segel fort.
Bin ein zitternd Geflecht von Nerven,
allem Bösen in die Hand gegeben,
Und die Schatten sind wie Messerschärfen,
die von meinem Zucken trunken leben.
Und ich möchte in das Dunkel schrein.
Aber meine Stimme ist nicht mehr.
Wilder Bilder ewige Wiederkehr,
stumm, gestaltlos, haltlos muss ich sein!
Hans Ehrenbaum-Degele
(1889 – 1915)
Gedicht über Nachtwirkungen
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More in: #Experimental Poetry Archive, *War Poetry Archive, - Archive Tombeau de la jeunesse, Archive E-F, Archive E-F, Expressionism, Modernisme
Behold, the grave of a wicked man
Behold, the grave of a wicked man,
And near it, a stern spirit.
There came a drooping maid with violets,
But the spirit grasped her arm.
“No flowers for him,” he said.
The maid wept:
“Ah, I loved him.”
But the spirit, grim and frowning:
“No flowers for him.”
Now, this is it —
If the spirit was just,
Why did the maid weep?
Stephen Crane
(1871 – 1900)
Behold, the grave of a wicked man
• fleursdumal.nl magazine
More in: *War Poetry Archive, Archive C-D, Archive C-D, Stephen Crane
Quatrains
Cœur dur comme une tour,
Ô cœur de pierre,
Donjon de jour en jour
Vêtu de lierre.
De tous liens lié
A cette terre,
Ô cœur humilié,
Cœur solitaire.
Cœur qui as tant crevé
De pleurs secrets,
Buveur inabreuvé,
Cendre et regrets.
Cœur tant de fois baigné
Dans la lumière,
Et tant de fois noyé
Source première.
Ô cœur laissé pour mort
Dans le fossé,
Cœur tu battais encore,
Ô trépassé.
Ô cœur inexploré,
Vaste univers,
Idole décorée,
Jardin d’hiver.
Ô vase de regret
Plein jusqu’aux bords
Du venin d’un remords
Inespéré…
Ô vieil arbre écorcé,
Rongé des vers,
Vieux sanglier forcé,
Ô cœur pervers…
Cœur qui as tant saigné
D’amour, de haine,
Ô cœur mal résigné
De tant de peine.
Cœur tant de fois flétri
Au dur labeur,
Cœur tant de fois fleuri
Aux soirs de mai…
Cœur tant de fois forgé
Sous le marteau,
Cœur tant de fois crevé
Sous le couteau…
Cœur qui a tant rêvé,
Ô cœur charnel,
Ô cœur inachevé
Cœur éternel.
Cœur qui a tant battu,
D’amour, d’espoir,
Ô cœur trouveras-tu
La paix du soir…
Cœur tant de fois pétri,
Ô pain du jour,
Cœur tant de fois meurtri,
Levain d’amour.
Cœur qui a tant battu,
D’amour, de haine,
Cœur tu ne battras plus
De tant de peine.
Cœur dévoré d’amour,
Te tairas-tu,
Ô cœur de jour en jour
Inentendu…
Cœur plein d’un seul regret
Poignant et bref,
Comme un unique fret
Charge une nef.
Cœur plein d’un seul regret
Poignant et sourd,
Comme un fardeau trop lourd
Charge une nef.
Cœur vaisseau démarré
A charge pleine,
Vaisseau désemparé
De sa misaine.
Cœur plein d’un seul amour,
Désaccordé,
Ô cœur de jour en jour
Plus hasardé…
Dans ce noble séjour,
Cœur attardé,
Plein d’un secret si lourd,
Mur lézardé…
Ô cœur exténué,
Péri d’amour,
Ô cœur de jour en jour
Destitué…
Ô peine aux longs cheveux
Couchée au lit
De l’homme que tu veux
Enseveli.
Ô peine aux longs cheveux
Couchée au long
De l’homme juste et bon
Au même lit.
Enseveli sois-tu
Dans cet amour
Et dans cette vertu
Et cette tour.
Loué sois-tu, cœur frêle,
Pour ta rudesse,
Loué sois-tu, cœur grêle,
Pour ta tristesse.
Pour tes renoncements,
Ô dépouillé,
Pour tes abaissements,
Ô cœur souillé.
Cœur tant de fois cloué
Au dur gibet,
Tant de fois bafoué
De quolibets.
Et pardonné sois-tu,
Notre cœur, vil,
Au nom des Trois Vertus,
Ainsi soit-il.
Tu avais tout pourvu,
Ô confident,
Tu avais tout prévu,
Ô provident.
Tu avais tout pourvu,
Fors d’une fièvre,
Tu avais tout prévu,
Fors que deux lèvres…
Tu avais tout pourvu,
Fors une flamme,
Tu avais tout prévu,
Fors une autre âme.
Tu avais fait ton compte,
Ô prévoyant,
Tu n’avais oublié
Qu’un cœur battant…
Charles Péguy
(1873 – 1914)
Quatrains
• fleursdumal.nl magazine
More in: # Classic Poetry Archive, Archive O-P, Archive O-P, Peguy, Charles, WAR & PEACE
Hearing the Battle
July 21, 1861
One day in the dreamy summer,
On the Sabbath hills, from afar
We heard the solemn echoes
Of the first fierce words of war.
Ah, tell me, thou veilèd Watcher
Of the storm and the calm to come,
How long by the sun or shadow
Till these noises again are dumb.
And soon in a hush and glimmer
We thought of the dark, strange fight,
Whose close in a ghastly quiet
Lay dim in the beautiful night.
Then we talk’d of coldness and pallor,
And of things with blinded eyes
That stared at the golden stillness
Of the moon in those lighted skies;
And of souls, at morning wrestling
In the dust with passion and moan,
So far away at evening
In the silence of worlds unknown.
But a delicate wind beside us
Was rustling the dusky hours,
As it gather’d the dewy odors
Of the snowy jessamine-flowers.
And I gave you a spray of the blossoms,
And said: “I shall never know
How the hearts in the land are breaking,
My dearest, unless you go.”
Sarah Morgan Bryan Piatt
(1836–1919)
Hearing the Battle.
(July 21, 1861)
Poem
• fleursdumal.nl magazine
More in: # Classic Poetry Archive, #Editors Choice Archiv, *War Poetry Archive, Archive O-P, Archive O-P, WAR & PEACE
Der Dichter
Es neigte sich die Schar der jungen Knechte
Dem wirren Haar und dem zerschlißnen Rock.
Die Straße weiter taperte die Rechte,
Die Linke hielt sich krampfig fest am Stock.
Scham schlug ihm rot empor: er war betrunken
Und rang mit seinem Weg; und jäh erblaßt
War er im Rinnstein stolpernd hingesunken
Und raffte sich empor in wirrer Hast.
Da kam’s, daß er den Blick nach innen schlug,
Wo er, buntwechselnd wie Geleucht der Meere,
Wuchernder Blumen Fülle in sich trug.
Und atemraubend gab der süße, schwere
Duft seinem Sinn, der wie ein großer Falter
In ihre tiefen Rätselkelche sank,
Seltsamen Traum und schuf ihn zum Gestalter,
Der Lust und Qual in seine Lieder zwang.
So ging er, in sein Fühlen tief versunken,
Betäubt von Fiebern, Künder schwüler Nächte.
Man wich ihm schonend aus: er war betrunken.
Es neigte sich die Schar der jungen Knechte.
Hans Ehrenbaum-Degele
(1889 – 1915)
Der Dichter
Aus: Versensporn
•fleursdumal.nl magazine
More in: #Experimental Poetry Archive, *War Poetry Archive, - Archive Tombeau de la jeunesse, Archive E-F, Archive E-F, Expressionism, Expressionisme, Modernisme
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