Poems from your favorite poets

Byrnzie

Arthur Rimbaud - My Bohemian Life

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6RfciuHL53Q

I would take to the road with my hands in my torn coat pockets;
my overcoat too was becoming an ideal;
I walked beneath the sky, Oh Muse!
I was your devotee;

What splendid loves I dreamed of then!
My only pair of trousers
had a big hole in them. --

Dreamy Tom Thumb,
I sowed rhymes along the way.
My tavern was at the Sign of the Great Bear.
In the sky my stars made a gentle rustling.

And I listened to them, sitting on the road-sides
on those clear September evenings
I felt drops of dew on my forehead
like vigorous wine

and there, making poems amid fantastical shadows,
I would stretch out and pluck like lyre strings,
the laces of my tattered boots,
one foot up close to my heart!

vogonpoetbythelake

American Indian Poetry
Songs from the SouthWest

SONG OF THE RACE

Many people have gathered together,
I am ready to start in the race,
And the Swallow with beating wings
Cools me in readiness for the word.

Far in the west stands the Black mountain
Around which our racers ran at noon.
Who is this man runnig with me,
The shadow of whose hands I see?


SONG OF STRANGENESS

Singing to the gods in supplication;
Singing to the gods in supplication,
Thus my magic power is uplifted.
My power is uplifted as I sing,

Harlots hither running come;
Harlots hither running come,
Holding blue flowers as they run.
Talking in whispers they file along.

Along the crooked trail going west.
To the land of rainbows I'm going,
Swinging my arms as I journey on.

NAME SONG

The ceremonial reeds are lifted;
The ceremonial reeds are lifted.
Ma-akahi has killed an Apache,
And we meet together here in war paint
To collect hair trophies with their power.
Hivayomi has taken a captive,
And the magic of his bow dies with him.

PUBERTY SONG

Come, hurry forth, hurry forth
Already the echoing sounds
Of darkness are heard around.

The Virgin is not sleepy,
She is wakeful through the night.

The Saguaro lies there broken;
And my fallen feathers rise
O'er the top of Table Mountain.

The boy stirred the rumbling stones;
The woman heard and could not sleep.
And my toe nails are broken.

The branches of darkness fell,
Cutting my feathers as I passed.


SONG OF THE MAGIC OF DAWN

On the top of Mohatuk
There are many clouds standing
On the top of Mohatuk
Many fog clouds are rising.
The bitter wind blows on us;
The bitter wind blows on us.
As we sing with many bows.
Though I am a Navitco,
I hear you talk about me.
I thrust my head through the sky
And with it I run away.

Cut sticks, cut sticks, cut sticks straight.

FETISH SONG

We commence the fetish song;
We commence the fetish song.
It is difficult but I try;
The night grows very noisy.

The fetish song arises;
The fetish song arises.
To it the crazed women run;
To it the crazed women run.

Pity me! Oh, pity me!
And strip away my disease;
Now strip away my disease;
Clear it away by singing.
I'm going to the singing;
It is leading to the mountain,
Running to Sievat mountain.

LIGHTNING SONG

See the destructive lightning
Going to kill the distant tree.
It is going, my younger brother,
To split the distant tree.

Around the mountain I carry
My poor younger brother;
Carry him around the mountain
And then stand before it.

The lightning like reddish snakes
Tries to lash and shiver the trees.
The lightning tries to strike them,
But it fails and they still stand.

Through the roaring darkness I run,
Carrying my poor younger brother;
From the top of the sky the lightning
Shoots, and strikes nearby.

FROM AMERICAN INDIAN POETRY

As I sing this song here with you I can not help shedding tears. I have never sung it before except as I stood looking upon the little child and praying for it in my heart. There is no little child here, but you are writing all these things down that they may not be lost and that our children may know what their fathers believed and practiced in this ceremony. So, as I sing, I am calling to Tirawa atius to send down his breath upon you, to give you strength and long life. I am praying for you with all my spirit.

TAHIRUSSAWICHI
Native Keeper of Sacred Rites

Byrnzie

Charles Bukowski - Well, That's Just The Way It Is...

Sometimes when everything seems at
Its worst
When all conspires
And gnaws
And the hours, days, weeks
Years
Seem wasted –
Stretched there upon my bed
In the dark
Looking up at the ceiling
I get what many will consider an
Obnoxious thought :
It’s still nice to be Bukowski

catefrances

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s6ns_6_Yc_U

I know you
You were too short
You had bad skin
You couldn't talk to them very well
Words didn't seem to work
They lied when they came out of your mouth

You tried so hard to understand them
You wanted to be part of what was happening
You saw them having fun
And it seemed like such a mystery
Almost magic

Made you think that there was something wrong with you
You'd look in the mirror and try to find it
You thought that you were ugly
And that everyone was looking at you

So you learned to be invisible
To look down
To avoid conversation

The hours, days, weekends
Ah, the weekend nights alone
Where were you?
In the basement?
In the attic?
In your room?
Working some job - just to have something to do.
Just to have a place to put yourself
Just to have a way to get away from them
A chance to get away from the ones that made you feel
so strange and ill at ease inside yourself

Did you ever get invited to one of their parties?
You sat and wondered if you would go or not
For hours you imagined the scenarios that might transpire
They would laugh at you
If you would know what to do
If you'd have the right things on
If they would notice that you came from a different planet

Did you get all brave in your thoughts?
Like you going to be able to go in there and deal with it
and have a great time.
Did you think that you might be the life of the party?
That all these people were gonna talk to you and you
would find out that you were wrong?
That you had a lot of friends and you weren't so
strange after all?

Did you end up going?
Did they mess with you?
Did they single you out?
Did you find out that you were invited because they
thought you were so weird?

Yeah, I think I know you
You spent a lot of time full of hate
A hate that was pure sunshine
A hate that saw for miles
A hate that kept you up at night
A hate that filled your every waking moment
A hate that carried you for a long time

Yes, I think I know you
You couldn't figure out what they saw in the way they lived

Home was not home
Your room was home
A corner was home
The place they weren't, that was home

I know you

You're sensitive and you hide it because you fear
getting stepped on one more time
It seems that when you show a part of yourself that is
the least bit vulnerable someone takes advantage of you
One of them steps on you

They mistake kindliness for weakness
But you know the difference
You've been the brunt of their weakness for years
And strength is something you know a bit about because
you had to be strong to keep yourself alive

You know yourself very well now
And you don't trust people
You know them too well

You try to find that special person
Someone you can be with
Someone you can touch
Someone you can talk to
Someone you don't feel so strange around
And you find that they don't really exist
You feel closer to people on movie screens

Yeah, I think I know you
You spend a lot of time daydreaming
And people have made comment to that effect
Telling you that you're self involved, and self centred

But they don't know, do they?
About the long night shifts alone
About the years of keeping yourself company
All the nights you wrapped your arms around yourself
so you could imagine someone holding you
The hours of indecision, self doubt
The intense depression
The blinding hate
The rage that made you stagger
The devastation of rejection

Well, maybe they do know
But if they do, they sure do a good job of hiding it
It astounds you how they can be so smooth
How they seem to pass through life as if life itself
was some divine gift
And it infuriates you to watch yourself with your
apparent skill at finding every way possible to screw it up

For you life is a long trip
Terrifying and wonderful
Birds sing to you at night
The rain and the sun the changing seasons are true friends
Solitude is a hard won ally, faithful and patient

Yeah, I think I know you

mysticweed

'in a strange game i saw myself as you knew me
when the change came and you had a chance to see through me
though the other side is just the same
you can tell my dream is real
because i love you . . .

though we rush ahead to save our time
we are only what we feel
and i love you . . ."

Neil Young
On The Way Home

OffSheGoes35

.

rollings

OffSheGoes35 wrote:

somewhere i have never travelled,gladly beyond
by E. E. Cummings


somewhere i have never travelled,gladly beyond
any experience,your eyes have their silence:
in your most frail gesture are things which enclose me,
or which i cannot touch because they are too near

your slightest look easily will unclose me
though i have closed myself as fingers,
you open always petal by petal myself as Spring opens
(touching skilfully,mysteriously)her first rose

or if your wish be to close me, i and
my life will shut very beautifully ,suddenly,
as when the heart of this flower imagines
the snow carefully everywhere descending;

nothing which we are to perceive in this world equals
the power of your intense fragility:whose texture
compels me with the color of its countries,
rendering death and forever with each breathing

(i do not know what it is about you that closes
and opens;only something in me understands
the voice of your eyes is deeper than all roses)
nobody,not even the rain,has such small hands

love.e. it

he's my favorite too

Byrnzie

Arthur Rimbaud - At The Green Inn

A week of walking had torn my boots to shreds.
I finally got to Charleroi and came
to The Green Inn.
I ordered bread,
and butter, and a piece of half-cold ham.

I felt good, stretched out my legs under
the table and looked at the silly tapestries
hanging on the wall. And what a wonder,
When a girl with huge tits and shining eyes
- Hell, a kiss would never scare her off! -
entered the room.

She laughed as she brought me the bread and butter
And a fancy platter of ham, pink and white,
with a little garlic, and filled my mug with beer,
which a ray of fading sunlight turned to gold.


(October 1870)

7RayZ

That poem is funny, all i can do is picture a very old dimly lit tavern for travelers with Ale 'ed, greasy and seedy.

I picked up a old 50's poetry book with hand carved linoleum block prints in it @ a resale shop called "A Walk With Me" by Gwen Frostic:

here is just an excerpt:

Follow the path of a stone ...
that rolls long the beach

Follow the flight of and eagle
as he soars above ...

Follow the trail of wind ...
that blows through the top of the trees

Follow the song of a thrush ....
when evening comes to earth

Follow God's moon in the heavens ...
till it sinks below the lake


... and your heart will be filled with wonder .....
and your years will be ever inspired ....

---

Here is another by Ursula K Le Guin

The Elders at the Falls

I heard this story.
They stood all day with their backs turned.
They stood there just above the river
all the long day with their backs turned
to what was happening.
Like the chorus in ancient tragedies,
not the heroes but the old people
who do not see the battle,
the sacrifice, the murder,
they stood and listened to the messenger,
the voice that tells the story.
The voice they listened to
that had spoken all their lives
and all the lives before them
telling its story, their story, that great voice
Celilo
grew smaller, became less,
became quieter,
all day, until
at twilight
it was silent.

They turned around then.
They turned and looked at the flat lake of silence.

7RayZ

I just heard the reading of The Shepherd by Fredrick Forsyth.

A story about a pilot navigating through the fog without any instruments who is going home for Christmas.


Hilariously i switched the channel accidentally during the reading and rudolph the red nose reindeer came on. Anyway read the story for a bit of inspiration about getting through the fog put the analogy to work for your own life.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j2_bLEqmBi0

rollings

Charles Bukowski "I'm In Love"

she's young, she said,
but look at me,
I have pretty ankles,
and look at my wrists, I have pretty
wrists
o my god,
I thought it was all working,
and now it's her again,
every time she phones you go crazy,
you told me it was over
you told me it was finished,
listen, I've lived long enough to become a
good woman,
why do you need a bad woman?
you need to be tortured, don't you?
you think life is rotten if somebody treats you
rotten it all fits,
doesn't it?
tell me, is that it? do you want to be treated like a
piece of shit?
and my son, my son was going to meet you.
I told my son
and I dropped all my lovers.
I stood up in a cafe and screamed
I'M IN LOVE,
and now you've made a fool of me. . .
I'm sorry, I said, I'm really sorry.
hold me, she said, will you please hold me?
I've never been in one of these things before, I said,
these triangles. . .
she got up and lit a cigarette, she was trembling all
over.she paced up and down,wild and crazy.she had
a small body.her arms were thin,very thin and when
she screamed and started beating me I held her
wrists and then I got it through the eyes:hatred,
centuries deep and true.I was wrong and graceless and
sick.all the things I had learned had been wasted.
there was no creature living as foul as I
and all my poems were
false.

bowerymission

ooooo, i love Bukowski! thanks for that, Rollings!


Spleen

J'ai plus de souvenirs que si j'avais mille ans.

Un gros meuble à tiroirs encombré de bilans,
De vers, de billets doux, de procès, de romances,
Avec de lourds cheveux roulés dans des quittances,
Cache moins de secrets que mon triste cerveau.
C'est une pyramide, un immense caveau,
Qui contient plus de morts que la fosse commune.
— Je suis un cimetière abhorré de la lune,
Où comme des remords se traînent de longs vers
Qui s'acharnent toujours sur mes morts les plus chers.
Je suis un vieux boudoir plein de roses fanées,
Où gît tout un fouillis de modes surannées,
Où les pastels plaintifs et les pâles Boucher
Seuls, respirent l'odeur d'un flacon débouché.

Rien n'égale en longueur les boiteuses journées,
Quand sous les lourds flocons des neigeuses années
L'ennui, fruit de la morne incuriosité,
Prend les proportions de l'immortalité.
— Désormais tu n'es plus, ô matière vivante!
Qu'un granit entouré d'une vague épouvante,
Assoupi dans le fond d'un Sahara brumeux;
Un vieux sphinx ignoré du monde insoucieux,
Oublié sur la carte, et dont l'humeur farouche
Ne chante qu'aux rayons du soleil qui se couche.

— Charles Baudelaire


Souvenirs?
More than I if I had lived a thousand years!

No chest of drawers crammed with documents,
love-letters, wedding-invitations, wills,
a lock of someone's hair rolled up in a deed,
hides so many secrets as my brain.
This branching catacombs, this pyramid
contains more corpses than the potter's field:
I am a graveyard that the moon abhors,
where long worms like regrets come out to feed
most ravenously on my dearest dead.
I am an old boudoir where a rack of gowns,
perfumed by withered roses, rots to dust;
where only faint pastels and pale Bouchers
inhale the scent of long-unstoppered flasks.

Nothing is slower than the limping days
when under the heavy weather of the years
Boredom, the fruit of glum indifference,
gains the dimension of eternity...
Hereafter, mortal clay, you are no more
than a rock encircled by a nameless dread,
an ancient sphinx omitted from the map,
forgotten by the world, and whose fierce moods
sing only to the rays of setting suns.

Translation by Richard Howard

vogonpoetbythelake

The Lost Lagoon

It is dusk on the Lost Lagoon,
And we two dreaming the dusk away,
Beneath the drift of a twilight gray--
Beneath the drowse of an ending day
And the curve of a golden moon.

It is dark on the Lost Lagoon,
And gone are the depths of haunting blue,
The grouping gulls, and the old canoe,
The singing firs, and the dusk and--you,
And gone is the golden moon.

O lure of the Lost Lagoon--
I dream tonight that my paddle blurs
The purple shade where the seaweed stirs--
I hear the call of the singing firs
In the hush of the golden moon.


American Indian Poetry--Interpretations

voidofman

Know
Now
No
O
No
Now
Know

(My dad wrote this)

Byrnzie

Walt Whitman - Song of Myself

1

I CELEBRATE myself, and sing myself,
And what I assume you shall assume,
For every atom belonging to me as good belongs to you.

I loafe and invite my soul,
I lean and loafe at my ease observing a spear of summer grass.

My tongue, every atom of my blood, form'd from this soil, this air,
Born here of parents born here from parents the same, and their
parents the same,
I, now thirty-seven years old in perfect health begin,
Hoping to cease not till death.

Creeds and schools in abeyance,
Retiring back a while sufficed at what they are, but never forgotten,
I harbor for good or bad, I permit to speak at every hazard,
Nature without check with original energy.

2

Houses and rooms are full of perfumes, the shelves are crowded with
perfumes,
I breathe the fragrance myself and know it and like it,
The distillation would intoxicate me also, but I shall not let it.

The atmosphere is not a perfume, it has no taste of the
distillation, it is odorless,
It is for my mouth forever, I am in love with it,
I will go to the bank by the wood and become undisguised and naked,
I am mad for it to be in contact with me.

The smoke of my own breath,
Echoes, ripples, buzz'd whispers, love-root, silk-thread, crotch and
vine,
My respiration and inspiration, the beating of my heart, the passing
of blood and air through my lungs,
The sniff of green leaves and dry leaves, and of the shore and
dark-color'd sea-rocks, and of hay in the barn,

The sound of the belch'd words of my voice loos'd to the eddies of
the wind,
A few light kisses, a few embraces, a reaching around of arms,
The play of shine and shade on the trees as the supple boughs wag,
The delight alone or in the rush of the streets, or along the fields
and hill-sides,
The feeling of health, the full-noon trill, the song of me rising
from bed and meeting the sun.

Have you reckon'd a thousand acres much? have you reckon'd the
earth much?
Have you practis'd so long to learn to read?
Have you felt so proud to get at the meaning of poems?

Stop this day and night with me and you shall possess the origin of
all poems,
You shall possess the good of the earth and sun, (there are millions
of suns left,)
You shall no longer take things at second or third hand, nor look
through the eyes of the dead, nor feed on the spectres in
books,
You shall not look through my eyes either, nor take things from me,
You shall listen to all sides and filter them from your self.

3

I have heard what the talkers were talking, the talk of the
beginning and the end,
But I do not talk of the beginning or the end.

There was never any more inception than there is now,
Nor any more youth or age than there is now,
And will never be any more perfection than there is now,
Nor any more heaven or hell than there is now.

Urge and urge and urge,
Always the procreant urge of the world.

Out of the dimness opposite equals advance, always substance and
increase, always sex,
Always a knit of identity, always distinction, always a breed of
life.
To elaborate is no avail, learn'd and unlearn'd feel that it is so.

Sure as the most certain sure, plumb in the uprights, well
entretied, braced in the beams,
Stout as a horse, affectionate, haughty, electrical,
I and this mystery here we stand.

Clear and sweet is my soul, and clear and sweet is all that is not
my soul.

Lack one lacks both, and the unseen is proved by the seen,
Till that becomes unseen and receives proof in its turn.

Showing the best and dividing it from the worst age vexes age,
Knowing the perfect fitness and equanimity of things, while they
discuss I am silent, and go bathe and admire myself.

Welcome is every organ and attribute of me, and of any man hearty
and clean,
Not an inch nor a particle of an inch is vile, and none shall be
less familiar than the rest.

I am satisfied - I see, dance, laugh, sing;
As the hugging and loving bed-fellow sleeps at my side through the
night, and withdraws at the peep of the day with stealthy
tread,
Leaving me baskets cover'd with white towels swelling the house with
their plenty,
Shall I postpone my acceptation and realization and scream at my
eyes,
That they turn from gazing after and down the road,
And forthwith cipher and show me to a cent,
Exactly the value of one and exactly the value of two, and which is
ahead?

the wolf

Arthur Rimbaud., "A Season In Hell".

It's far to long to post here. Do yourself a favor, buy it, its like 9 bucks, or find it online. Borrow it from the library. It very possibly could be the greatest piece of long form poetry ever written. IMHO.

Byrnzie

Song of the Open Road
By Walt Whitman

1
Afoot and light-hearted I take to the open road,
Healthy, free, the world before me,
The long brown path before me leading wherever I choose.

Henceforth I ask not good-fortune, I myself am good-fortune,
Henceforth I whimper no more, postpone no more, need nothing,
Done with indoor complaints, libraries, querulous criticisms,
Strong and content I travel the open road.

The earth, that is sufficient,
I do not want the constellations any nearer,
I know they are very well where they are,
I know they suffice for those who belong to them.

(Still here I carry my old delicious burdens,
I carry them, men and women, I carry them with me wherever I go,
I swear it is impossible for me to get rid of them,
I am fill’d with them, and I will fill them in return.)

2
You road I enter upon and look around, I believe you are not all that is here,
I believe that much unseen is also here.

Here the profound lesson of reception, nor preference nor denial,
The black with his woolly head, the felon, the diseas’d, the illiterate person, are not denied;
The birth, the hasting after the physician, the beggar’s tramp, the drunkard’s stagger, the laughing party of mechanics,
The escaped youth, the rich person’s carriage, the fop, the eloping couple,

The early market-man, the hearse, the moving of furniture into the town, the return back from the town,
They pass, I also pass, any thing passes, none can be interdicted,
None but are accepted, none but shall be dear to me.

3
You air that serves me with breath to speak!
You objects that call from diffusion my meanings and give them shape!
You light that wraps me and all things in delicate equable showers!
You paths worn in the irregular hollows by the roadsides!
I believe you are latent with unseen existences, you are so dear to me.

You flagg’d walks of the cities! you strong curbs at the edges!
You ferries! you planks and posts of wharves! you timber-lined sides! you distant ships!

You rows of houses! you window-pierc’d façades! you roofs!
You porches and entrances! you copings and iron guards!
You windows whose transparent shells might expose so much!
You doors and ascending steps! you arches!
You gray stones of interminable pavements! you trodden crossings!
From all that has touch’d you I believe you have imparted to yourselves, and now would impart the same secretly to me,
From the living and the dead you have peopled your impassive surfaces, and the spirits thereof would be evident and amicable with me.

4
The earth expanding right hand and left hand,
The picture alive, every part in its best light,
The music falling in where it is wanted, and stopping where it is not wanted,
The cheerful voice of the public road, the gay fresh sentiment of the road.

O highway I travel, do you say to me Do not leave me?
Do you say Venture not—if you leave me you are lost?
Do you say I am already prepared, I am well-beaten and undenied, adhere to me?

O public road, I say back I am not afraid to leave you, yet I love you,
You express me better than I can express myself,
You shall be more to me than my poem.

I think heroic deeds were all conceiv’d in the open air, and all free poems also,
I think I could stop here myself and do miracles,
I think whatever I shall meet on the road I shall like, and whoever beholds me shall like me,
I think whoever I see must be happy.

5
From this hour I ordain myself loos’d of limits and imaginary lines,
Going where I list, my own master total and absolute,
Listening to others, considering well what they say,
Pausing, searching, receiving, contemplating,
Gently,but with undeniable will, divesting myself of the holds that would hold me.
I inhale great draughts of space,
The east and the west are mine, and the north and the south are mine.

I am larger, better than I thought,
I did not know I held so much goodness.

All seems beautiful to me,
I can repeat over to men and women You have done such good to me I would do the same to you,
I will recruit for myself and you as I go,
I will scatter myself among men and women as I go,
I will toss a new gladness and roughness among them,
Whoever denies me it shall not trouble me,
Whoever accepts me he or she shall be blessed and shall bless me.

6
Now if a thousand perfect men were to appear it would not amaze me,
Now if a thousand beautiful forms of women appear’d it would not astonish me.

Now I see the secret of the making of the best persons,
It is to grow in the open air and to eat and sleep with the earth.

Here a great personal deed has room,
(Such a deed seizes upon the hearts of the whole race of men,
Its effusion of strength and will overwhelms law and mocks all authority and all argument against it.)

Here is the test of wisdom,
Wisdom is not finally tested in schools,
Wisdom cannot be pass’d from one having it to another not having it,
Wisdom is of the soul, is not susceptible of proof, is its own proof,
Applies to all stages and objects and qualities and is content,
Is the certainty of the reality and immortality of things, and the excellence of things;
Something there is in the float of the sight of things that provokes it out of the soul.

Now I re-examine philosophies and religions,
They may prove well in lecture-rooms, yet not prove at all under the spacious clouds and along the landscape and flowing currents.

Here is realization,
Here is a man tallied—he realizes here what he has in him,
The past, the future, majesty, love—if they are vacant of you, you are vacant of them.

Only the kernel of every object nourishes;
Where is he who tears off the husks for you and me?
Where is he that undoes stratagems and envelopes for you and me?

Here is adhesiveness, it is not previously fashion’d, it is apropos;
Do you know what it is as you pass to be loved by strangers?
Do you know the talk of those turning eye-balls?....

Byrnzie

Ben Okri - An African Elegy

We are the miracles that God made
To taste the bitter fruit of Time.
We are precious.
And one day our suffering
Will turn into the wonders of the earth.

There are things that burn me now
Which turn golden when I am happy.
Do you see the mystery of our pain?
That we bear the poverty
And are able to sing and dream sweet things.

And that we never curse the air when it is warm
Or the fruit when it tastes so good
Or the lights that bounce gently on the waters?
We bless the things even in our pain.
We bless them in silence.

That is why our music is so sweet.
It makes the air remember.
There are secret miracles at work
That only Time will bring forth.
I too have heard the dead singing.

And they tell me that
This life is good
They tell me to live it gently
With fire, and always with hope.
There is wonder here

And there is surprise
In everything the unseen moves.
The ocean is full of songs.
The sky is not an enemy.
Destiny is our friend.

justam

I like this African Elegy Byrnzie. :thumbup:

rollings

Byrnzie wrote:

Song of the Open Road
By Walt Whitman

1

(Still here I carry my old delicious burdens,
I carry them, men and women, I carry them with me wherever I go,
I swear it is impossible for me to get rid of them,
I am fill’d with them, and I will fill them in return.)

2
You road I enter upon and look around, I believe you are not all that is here,
I believe that much unseen is also here.

3

You rows of houses! you window-pierc’d façades! you roofs!
You porches and entrances! you copings and iron guards!
You windows whose transparent shells might expose so much!
You doors and ascending steps! you arches!
You gray stones of interminable pavements! you trodden crossings!

6

Here is the test of wisdom,
Wisdom is not finally tested in schools,
Wisdom cannot be pass’d from one having it to another not having it,
Wisdom is of the soul, is not susceptible of proof, is its own proof,
Applies to all stages and objects and qualities and is content,
Is the certainty of the reality and immortality of things, and the excellence of things;
Something there is in the float of the sight of things that provokes it out of the soul.

Now I re-examine philosophies and religions,
They may prove well in lecture-rooms, yet not prove at all under the spacious clouds and along the landscape and flowing currents.

Here is realization,
Here is a man tallied—he realizes here what he has in him,
The past, the future, majesty, love—if they are vacant of you, you are vacant of them.

I thouroughly enjoyed this poem, thank you Byrnzie.

The above quoted lines were especially poignant, in my opinion