Fire and Ice: Robert Frost

 

 

 

Robert Frost

 

 

 

FIRE AND ICE

 

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 say that for destruction ice

Is also great

And would suffice.

 

 

 

STOPPING BY WOODS ON A SNOWY EVENING

 

Whose woods these are I think I know.

His house is in the village, though;

He will not see me stopping here

To watch his woods fill up with snow.

 

My little horse must think it queer

To stop without a farmhouse near

Between the woods and frozen lake

The darkest evening of the year.

 

He gives his harness bells a shake

To ask if there is some mistake.

The only other sound's the sweep

Of easy wind and downy flake.

 

The woods are lovely, dark, and deep,

But I have promises to keep,

And miles to go before I sleep,

And miles to go before I sleep.

 

 

 

BIO:  Robert Frost (1874-1963) was an American poet whose rural New England themes captured the hearts and minds of Americans everywhere. He received four Pulitzer Prizes for Poetry and the Congressional Gold Medal during his lifetime. On July 22, 1961, he was named Vermont's Poet Laureate. He is best known for his poem, "The Road Not Taken."         



Hist Whist

 

"hist whist" by e.e. cummings,

illustrated by Deborah Kogan Ray

 

 

hist      whist

little ghostthings

tip-toe

twinkle-toe

 

little twitchy

witches and tingling

goblins

hob-a-nob      hob-a-nob

 

little hoppy happy

toad in tweeds

tweeds

little itchy mousies

 

with scuttling

eyes      rustle and run      and

hidehidehide

whisk

 

whisk      look out for the old woman

with the wart on her nose

what she'll do to yer

nobody knows

 

for she knows the devil      ooch

the devil      ouch

the devil

ach      the great

 

green

dancing

devil

devil

 

devil

devil

 

      wheeEEE

 

(from his collection, chansons innocentes)

 

Edward Estlin Cummings, better known as e.e. cummings, was born in Cambridge, Massachusetts in 1894 and became renowned for his experimentation with poetic language. He died in 1962.

 

 

The Return

 

by Ezra Pound

 

THE RETURN

 

See, they return; ah, see the tentative

Movements, and the slow feet,

The trouble in the pace and the uncertain

Wavering!

 

See, they return, one, and by one,

With fear, as half-awakened;

As if the snow should hesitate

And murmur in the wind,

and half turn back;

These were the "Wing'd-with-Awe,"

inviolable.

 

Gods of the winged shoe!

With them the silver hounds,

sniffing the trace of air!

 

Haie! Haie!

These were the swift to harry;

These the keen-scented;

These were the souls of blood.

 

Slow on the leash,

pallid the leash-men!

 

(1913)

 

THE COMING OF WAR: ACTAEON

 

An image of Lethe,

and the fields

Full of faint light

but golden,

Gray cliffs,

and beneath them

A sea

Harsher than granite,

unstill, never ceasing;

High forms

with the movement of gods,

Perilous aspect;

And one said:

"This is Actaeon."

Actaeon of golden greaves!

Over fair meadows,

Over the cool face of that field,

Unstill, ever moving,

Host of an ancient people,

The silent cortege.

 

(1915)

 

BIO:  Born in Hailey, Idaho on 30 October 1885, Ezra Pound taught at Wabash College for two years, until he became the London editor of "The Little Review." He was immensely interested in travel and poetry, especially Chinese and Japanese poetry. These Eastern influences are clearly discernible in his own poetry, which is known for its clarity, precision, and economy of language. In 1924 he moved to Italy, where he became involved in Mussolini's fascist movement. When he returned to the U.S. in 1945, he was arrested for treason.  Acquitted in 1946, he was declared mentally ill and committed to St. Elizabeth Hospital in Washington, D.C., where he remained until 1958.  Ho profoundly influenced the writing and careers of such noted poets as W.B. Yeats, Robert Frost, William Carlos William, and T.S. Eliot.





THE CHANGING LIGHT

by Lawrence Ferlinghetti

The changing light

                    at San Francisco

          is none of your East Coast light

                    none of your

                              pearly light of Paris

The light of San Francisco

                         is a sea light

                                        an island light

And the light of fog

                    blanketing the hills

          drifting in at night

                         through the Golden Gate

                                        to lie on the city at dawn

And then the halcyon late mornings

          after the fog burns off

               and the sun paints white houses

                                        with the sea light of Greece

               with sharp clean shadows

                    making the town look like

                         it had just been painted

But the wind comes up at four o'clock

                                        sweeping the hills

And then the veil of light of early evening

And then another scrim

                    when the new night fog

                                        floats in

And in that vale of light

                    the city drifts

                              anchorless upon the ocean

From How to Paint Sunlight, Copyright 2000 by Lawrence Ferlinghetti. All Rights Reserved.

BIO: Lawrence Ferlinghetti was a leading member of the "Beat" movement of the 1950s and continues to be an important political activist to this day. A beloved San Francisco icon, he was named San Francisco's Poet Laureate in August 1998. His City Lights Booksellers & Publishers has published works by Charles Bukowski, Allen Ginsberg, and Jack Kerouac. A Coney Island of the Mind, published in 1958, remains his best-known collection of poems.



DO NOT GO GENTLE INTO THAT GOOD NIGHT

by Dylan Thomas

Do not go gentle into that good night,
Old age should burn and rave at close of day;
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Though wise men at their end know dark is right,
Because their words had forked no lightning they
Do not go gentle into that good night.

Good men, the last wave by, crying how bright
Their frail deeds might have danced in a green bay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Wild men who caught and sang the sun in flight,
And learn, too late, they grieved it on its way,
Do not go gentle into that good night.

Grave men, near death, who see with blinding sight
Blind eyes could blaze like meteors and be gay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

And you, my father, there on the sad height,
Curse, bless, me now with your fierce tears, I pray.
Do not go gentle into that good night.
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

BIO:  Dylan Marlais Thomas was born on October 27, 1914 in Swansea, South Wales. His father, an  English literature professor, recited Shakespeare to the young boy, instilling in him a lifelong love of poetry. At the age of 16, Thomas quit school and became a junior reporter for the South Wales Daily Post. In 1932, Thomas quit working to become a full-time poet, winning the Poet's Corner book prize in 1934. His first book, 18 Poems, was released to rave reviews. Thomas loved the poetry of Hopkins, Yeats, Poe, and D.H. Lawrence. Attracted to the ballads of the Romantic tradition, he wrote in lyrical rhythms that evoked deep emotions. He died of complications related to alcoholism on November 9, 1953 in New York City.