May I Feel Said He - E.E Cummings

may i feel said he

(i'll squeal said she

just once said he)

it's fun said she

(may i touch said he

how much said she

a lot said he)

why not said she

(let's go said he

not too far said she

what's too far said he

where you are said she)

may i stay said he

(which way said she

like this said he

if you kiss said she

may i move said he

is it love said she)

if you're willing said he

(but you're killing said she

but it's life said he

but your wife said she

now said he)

ow said she

(tiptop said he

don't stop said she

oh no said he)

go slow said she

(cccome?said he

ummm said she)

you're divine! said he

(you are Mine said she)

- The rhythm of the poem echoes the rhythm of the sex, very erotic!

Time Does Not Bring Relief - Edna St. Vincent Millay

Time does not bring relief; you all have lied

Who told me time would ease me of my pain!

I miss him in the weeping of the rain;

I want him at the shrinking of the tide;
The old snows melt from every mountain-side,

And last year's leaves are smoke in every lane;

But last year's bitter loving must remain

Heaped on my heart, and my old thoughts abide!
There are a hundred places where I fear

To go, ... so with his memory they brim!

And entering with relief some quiet place

Where never fell his foot or shone his face.
I say, "There is no memory of him here!"

And so stand stricken, so remembering him!

- I think this is so well-written, especially the final lines where she goes somewhere that he has never been...believing this will bring some kind of relief. However, she does this consciously and thus thinks of him in the process of doing it and so remembers him in her conscious effort to try and forget him! I think there is irony of 'remembering to forget' here! Great!

Give Yourself A Hug - Grace Nichols

Give yourself a hug
when you feel unloved
Give yourself a hug
when people put on airs
to make you feel a bug
Give yourself a hug
when everyone seems to give you
a cold-shoulder shrug
Give yourself a hug –
a big big hug
And keep on singing
‘Only one in a million like me
Only one in a million-billion-trillion-zillion
like me.’

- I love this 'feel good' poem, its so easy to forget that your a tiny little miracle in the universe...this poem reminds me there's only one of me!

If I Can Stop One Heart From Breaking - Emily Dickinson

If I can stop one heart from breaking,

I shall not live in vain;

If I can ease one life the aching,

Or cool one pain,

Or help one fainting robin

Unto his nest again,

I shall not live in vain.

- In the beginning of the poem nothing is wrong quite yet - "If I can stop"- meaning if she can prevent one heart from breaking, as the poem progresses Dickinson talks of 'easing' and 'cooling' pain so there becomes an awareness that you can't stop a heart from breaking...to help a fainting robin unto his nest suggests helping someone get back to being themselves and catching them before they fall. She would like to be able to stop a heart from breaking - however equally feels just as purposeful by soothing someones broken heart...

Valentine - Wendy Cope

My heart has made its mind up

And I'm afraid it's you.

Whatever you've got lined up,

My heart has made its mind up

And if you can't be signed up

This year, next year will do.

My heart has made its mind up

And I'm afraid it's you.

- I love the rhythm of this poem, very witty, I love how her heart seems to have its own mind. It really is a battle sometimes between the head and the heart when it comes to love. She almost sounds like she's rationalising with her heart - yet she knows her heart is a force to be reckoned with - hence the repeated lines "My heart has made its mind up and I'm afraid it's you." Like it or not - the heart rules the head!

Fire and Ice - Robert Frost

Some say the world will end in fire;

Some say in ice.

From what I've tasted of desire

I hold with those who favor fire.

But if it had to perish twice,

I think I know enough of hate

To know that for destruction ice

Is also great

And would suffice.

- 'Fire' is desire, 'Ice' is hate. Both emotions are equally destructive - however Frost would side with those who favour fire...because he feels desire is more necessary to humanity than hate. Both emotions are strong enough to destroy. Good.

Love Poem - Vicki Feaver

Sharing one umbrella,

We have to hold each other,

Round the waist to keep together,

You ask me why I'm smiling-

It's because I'm thinking,

I want it to rain forever.

- Very beautiful. After I had read this poem I saw a couple under and umbrella holding each other and laughing...I actually cried! I'm such a woman!

A Wish for My Children - Evangeline Paterson

On this doorstep I stand

year after year

to watch you going

and think: May you not

skin your knees. May you

not catch your fingers

in car doors. May

your hearts not break.

May tide and weather

wait for your coming

and may you grow strong

to break

all webs of my weaving.

- I quite simply just like this poem, especially the ending "may you grow strong and break all the webs of my weaving". Paterson is saying that although she wants her child(dren) to be protected from worldly dangers - she also wants them to become strong enough to explore and experience the world...

Notes - Paul Engle

Butterfly trembles when the wind blows.

You walk near me.

The dog barks at the loud moon.

When you come to me,I speak softly, softly,

Until we are silent together.

For two hundred years

This pine tree has been trained to grow sideways.

I have known you only one week,

But I bend as you walk toward me.

- I love Engles analogy of how he bends towards the object of his affection in the same way as a tree which has spent years growing bends. He suggests that sometimes the connection we have with someone can be so natural (like a tree that grows in the wood) and also that it can feel like you've know that peron forever, no matter how long it has been (two hundred years or one week!) - you will bend in a way you yourself may not even understand...

Loss - Wendy Cope

The day he moved was terrible-

That evening she went through hell.

His absence wasn't a problem

But the corkscrew had gone as well.

- I think this is sharp and witty, I love how flippant she is, saying it is more of a problem that she can't have wine, rather than that she misses him!

Sometimes - Sir Edwin Arnold

Somewhere there waiteth in this world of ours

For one lone soul, another lonely soul-

Each chasing each through all the weary hours,

And meeting strangely at one sudden goal;

Then blend they- like green leaves with golden flowers,

Into one beautiful and perfect whole-

And life's long night is ended, and the way

Lies open onward to eternal day.

- How beautiful! I love the way he says each soul is chasing the other. I think thats true love when two people feel that same way about each other and they blend into one...

Che Fece… Il Gran Rifiuto - C.P Cavafy

For some people the day comes

when they have to declare the great Yes

or the great No. It’s clear at once who has the Yes

ready within him; and saying it,

he goes from honor to honor, strong in his conviction.

He who refuses does not repent. Asked again,

he’d still say no. Yet that no—the right no—

drags him down all his life.

- The title translated means "Who made...the great refusal". I really like this though I'm struggling slightly with it. I would say the "right no" is about doing what appears to be the right thing - if we ALWAYS do we will be dragged down our whole lives by not listening to our hearts. Sometimes we have to take a chance and declare the great YES...from this we become stronger...

Lines Composed in a Wood on a Windy Day - Anne Bronte

My soul is awakened, my spirit is soaring

And carried aloft on the wings of the breeze;

For above and around me the wild wind is roaring,

Arousing to rapture the earth and the seas.

The long withered grass in the sunshine is glancing,

The bare trees are tossing their branches on high;

The dead leaves beneath them are merrily dancing,

The white clouds are scudding across the blue sky

I wish I could see how the ocean is lashing

The foam of its billows to whirlwinds of spray;

I wish I could see how its proud waves are dashing,

And hear the wild roar of their thunder to-day!

- I love this totally beautiful genuine appreciation of nature and a sense of her being 'at one'.

Drinking Song - James Kenneth Stephen

There are people, I know, to be found,

Who say, and apparently think,

That sorrow and care may be drowned

By a timely consumption of drink.

Does not man, these enthusiasts ask,

Most nearly approach the divine,

When engaged in the soul-stirring task

Of filling his body with wine?

Have not beggars been frequently known,

When satisfied, soaked, and replete,

To imagine their bench was a throne

And the civilised world at their feet?

Lord Byron has finely described

The remarkably soothing effect

Of liquor, profusely imbibed,

On a soul that is shattered and wrecked.

In short, if your body or mind

Or your soul or your purse come to grief,

You need only get drunk, and you'll find

Complete and immediate relief.

For myself, I have managed to do

Without having recourse to this plan,

So I can't write a poem for you,

And you'd better get someone who can.

- I love how Stephen observes the changes that take place when people drink - beggars believe their bench is a throne, a shattered soul becomes enlightened by the profound effect of alcohol. I percieve the ending as quite witty - he is being sarcastic saying he hasn't had to resort to drink therefore he cannot be as profound and insightful as someone who drinks...yet he wrote the poem!

Vitae summa brevis spem nos vetat incohare longam - Ernest Dowson

They are not long, the weeping and the laughter,

Love and desire and hate:

I think they have no portion in us after

We pass the gate.

They are not long, the days of wine and roses:

Out of a misty dream

Our path emerges for a while, then closes

Within a dream.

- The title translated is "The brief sum of life forbids us the hope of enduring long". I'm into all different kinds of poetry for all different kinds of reasons. I will always feel compelled to add poetry which deals with the issues of life and death - especially those which highlight that life is just too short.

The Golden Rules of Conduct - William Shakespeare

Give thy thoughts no tongue,

Nor any unproportion'd thought his act.

Be thou familiar, but by no means vulgar.

Those friends thou hast, and their adoption tries,

Grapple them to thy soul with hopes of steel;

But do not dull thy palm with entertainment

Of each new-hatched, unfledged comrade. Beware

Of entrance to a quarrel, but being in,

Bear't that the opposed may beware of thee,

Give every man thy ear, but few thy voice:

Take each man's censure, but reserve thy judgment.

Costly thy habit as thy purse can buy,

But not express'd in fancy; rich, not gaudy;

For the apparel oft proclaims the man,

And they in France of the best rank and station

Are most select and generous thief in that.

Neither a borrower nor a lender be;

For loan oft loses both itself and friend,

And borrowing dulls the edge of husbandry.

This above all: to thine own self be true.

And it must follow, as the night the day,

Thou canst not then be false to any man.

- This monologue is taken from Hamlet. In my opinion it could almost be the original version of 'If' by Kipling. It carries strong messages about the ways in which one should live life. I love "This above all: to thine own self be true" - I believe as long as you are true to yourself you can't go wrong or be false to anyone else.

Poetry - Pablo Neruda

And it was at that age ... Poetry arrived
in search of me. I don't know, I don't know where
it came from, from winter or a river.
I don't know how or when,
no they were not voices, they were not
words, nor silence,
but from a street I was summoned,
from the branches of night,
abruptly from the others,
among violent firesor returning alone,
there I was without a face
and it touched me.

I did not know what to say, my mouth
had no way
with names,
my eyes were blind,
and something started in my soul,
fever or forgotten wings,
and I made my own way,
deciphering
that fire,
and I wrote the first faint line,
faint, without substance, pure
nonsense,
pure wisdom
of someone who knows nothing,
and suddenly I saw
the heavens
unfastened
and open,
planets,
palpitating plantations,
shadow perforated,
riddled
with arrows, fire and flowers,
the winding night, the universe.

And I, infinitesimal being,
drunk with the great starry
void,
likeness, image of
mystery,
felt myself a pure part
of the abyss,
I wheeled with the stars,
my heart broke loose on the wind.

- I only need one word to describe how I feel about this poem...GENIUS!

i carry your heart with me - E.E Cummings

i carry your heart with me(i carry it in
my heart)i am never without it(anywhere
i go you go,my dear; and whatever is done
by only me is your doing,my darling)
i fear
no fate(for you are my fate,my sweet)i want
no world(for beautiful you are my world,my true)
and it's you are whatever a moon has always meant
and whatever a sun will always sing is you

here is the deepest secret nobody knows
(here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud
and the sky of the sky of a tree called life;which grows
higher than the soul can hope or mind can hide)
and this is the wonder that's keeping the stars apart

i carry your heart(i carry it in my heart)

- What a romantic poem, the epitome of true love.

Leisure - William Henry Davies

What is this life if, full of care,

We have no time to stand and stare.

No time to stand beneath the boughs

And stare as long as sheep or cows.

No time to see, when woods we pass,

Where squirrels hide their nuts in grass.

No time to see, in broad daylight,

Streams full of stars like skies at night.

No time to turn at Beauty’s glance,

And watch her feet, how they can dance.

No time to wait till her mouth can

Enrich that smile her eyes began.

A poor life this if, full of care,

We have no time to stand and stare.

- Pretty well-known poem, why? Because its bloody good. It points out that we are always rushing around - so busy in life that we don't take time to appreciate nature and the beauty of the universe. We are full of care for so many other things that we don't stop and just be 'at one' for a while. It makes me think of the famous John Lennon quote "Life is what happens when you're making other plans"...

Days - Philip Larkin

What are days for?

Days are where we live.

They come, they wake us

Time and time over.

They are to be happy in:

Where can we live but days?



Ah, solving that question

Brings the priest and the doctor

In their long coats

Running over the fields.



- As always Larkin uses such simple language and yet makes me think about something pretty complex. "Days are where we live!" - amazingly straightforward yet thought-provoking. When attempting to solve the riddle of life and being philiosophical we run the risk of people thinking there is something wrong with us.