Poems

Poems List

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Dorothy Parker
Dorothy Parker

Purposely Ungrammatical Love Song

Purposely Ungrammatical Love Song

There's many and many, and not so far,
Is willing to dry my tears away;
There's many to tell me what you are,
And…

317
Dorothy Parker
Dorothy Parker

Prologue to a Saga

Prologue to a Saga

Maidens, gather not the yew,
Leave the glossy myrtle sleeping;
Any lad was born untrue,
Never a one is fit your weeping.
<…

407
Dorothy Parker
Dorothy Parker

Prayer For A Prayer

Prayer For A Prayer

Dearest one, when I am dead

Never seek to follow me.
Never mount the quiet hill
Where the copper leaves are still,
<…

307
Dorothy Parker
Dorothy Parker

Pour Prendre Conge

Pour Prendre Conge

I'm sick of embarking in dories
Upon an emotional sea.
I'm wearied of playing Dolores
(A role never written for me).

393
Dorothy Parker
Dorothy Parker

Portrait of the Artist

Portrait of the Artist

Oh, lead me to a quiet cell
Where never footfall rankles,
And bar the window passing well,
And gyve my wrists and ankles.

332
Dorothy Parker
Dorothy Parker

Philosophy

Philosophy


If I should labor through daylight and dark,
Consecrate, valorous, serious, true,
Then on the world I may blazon my mark;
And what…

376
Dorothy Parker
Dorothy Parker

Pattern

Pattern


Leave me to my lonely pillow.
Go, and take your silly posies
Who has vowed to wear the willow
Looks a fool, tricked out in roses.

380
Dorothy Parker
Dorothy Parker

Partial Comfort

Partial Comfort

Whose love is given over-well
Shall look on Helen's face in hell,
Whilst those whose love is thin and wise
May view John Knox in Pa…

293
Dorothy Parker
Dorothy Parker

One Perfect Rose

One Perfect Rose

A single flow'r he sent me, since we met.
All tenderly his messenger he chose;
Deep-hearted, pure, with scented dew still wet -
One…

305
Dorothy Parker
Dorothy Parker

Oscar Wilde

Oscar Wilde

If, with the literate, I am
Impelled to try an epigram,
I never seek to take the credit;
We all assume that Oscar said it.

298
Dorothy Parker
Dorothy Parker

On Being A Woman

On Being A Woman

Why is it, when I am in Rome,
I'd give an eye to be at home,
But when on native earth I be,
My soul is sick for Italy?

366
Dorothy Parker
Dorothy Parker

Observation

Observation


If I don't drive around the park,
I'm pretty sure to make my mark.
If I'm in bed each night by ten,
I may get back my looks again…

267
Dorothy Parker
Dorothy Parker

News Item

News Item

Men seldom make passes
At girls who wear glasses.

376
Dorothy Parker
Dorothy Parker

Nocturne

Nocturne


Always I knew that it could not last

(Gathering clouds, and the snowflakes flying),
Now it is part of the golden past

(D…

356
Dorothy Parker
Dorothy Parker

Midnight

Midnight


The stars are soft as flowers, and as near;
The hills are webs of shadow, slowly spun;
No separate leaf or single blade is here-
All …

365
Dorothy Parker
Dorothy Parker

My Own

My Own

Then let them point my every tear,
And let them mock and moan;
Another week, another year,
And I'll be with my own

Who slumber n…

347
Dorothy Parker
Dorothy Parker

Lullaby

Lullaby


Sleep, pretty lady, the night is enfolding you;
Drift, and so lightly, on crystalline streams.
Wrapped in its perfumes, the darkness is hol…

470
Dorothy Parker
Dorothy Parker

Little Words

Little Words

When you are gone, there is nor bloom nor leaf,
Nor singing sea at night, nor silver birds;
And I can only stare, and shape my grief
I…

346
Dorothy Parker
Dorothy Parker

Light Of Love

Light Of Love

Joy stayed with me a night --
Young and free and fair --
And in the morning light
He left me there.


Then Sorrow came …

451
Dorothy Parker
Dorothy Parker

Landscape

Landscape


Now this must be the sweetest place
From here to heaven's end;
The field is white and flowering lace,
The birches leap and bend,

311
Dorothy Parker
Dorothy Parker

Interior

Interior


Her mind lives in a quiet room,
A narrow room, and tall,
With pretty lamps to quench the gloom
And mottoes on the wall.

344
Dorothy Parker
Dorothy Parker

Inventory

Inventory


Four be the things I am wiser to know:
Idleness, sorrow, a friend, and a foe.

Four be the things I’d been better without:
Lov…

370
Dorothy Parker
Dorothy Parker

I Shall Come Back

I Shall Come Back

I shall come back without fanfaronade
Of wailing wind and graveyard panoply;
But, trembling, slip from cool Eternity-
A mild and m…

379
Dorothy Parker
Dorothy Parker

Indian Summer

Indian Summer

In youth, it was a way I had
To do my best to please,
And change, with every passing lad,
To suit his theories.

But now I…

437