Poems List
Explore poems from our collection
To A Dead Man
To A Dead Man
Over the dead line we have called to you
To come across with a word to us,
Some beaten whisper of what happens
Where you are over the…
Threes
Threes
I was a boy when I heard three red words
a thousand Frenchmen died in the streets
for: Liberty, Equality, Fraternity--I asked
why men …
They All Want to Play Hamlet
They All Want to Play Hamlet
They all want to play Hamlet.
They have not exactly seen their fathers killed
Nor their mothers in a frame-up to kill,
The Year
The Year
I
A storm of white petals,
Buds throwing open baby fists
Into hands of broad flowers.
II
R…
The Shovel Man
The Shovel Man
On the street
Slung on his shoulder is a handle half way across,
Tied in a big knot on the scoop of cast iron
Are the overalls faded…
The Right To Grief
The Right To Grief
To Certain Poets About to Die
Take your fill of intimate remorse, perfumed sorrow,
Over the dead child of a millionaire, <…
The Noon Hour
The Noon Hour
She sits in the dust at the walls
And makes cigars,
Bending at the bench
With fingers wage-anxious,
Changing her sweat for the …
The Mayor of Gary
The Mayor of Gary
I asked the mayor of Gary about the 12-hour day and the 7-day week.
And the mayor of Gary answered more workmen steal time on the job in Gary…
The Has-Been
The Has-Been
A stone face higher than six horses stood five thousand years gazing at the world
seeming to clutch a secret.
A boy passes and throws a nigg…
The Hangman at Home
The Hangman at Home
What does a hangman think about
When he goes home at night from work?
When he sits down with his wife and
Children for a cup of…
The Answer
The Answer
You have spoken the answer.
A child searches far sometimes
Into the red dust
On a dark rose leaf
And so you have gone far
Fo…
Summer Stars
Summer Stars
Bend low again, night of summer stars.
So near you are, sky of summer stars,
So near, a long-arm man can pick off stars,
Pick off what…
Statistics
Statistics
Napoleon shifted,
Restless in the old sarcophagus
And murmured to a watchguard:
"Who goes there?"
"Twenty-one million men, <…
Style
Style
Style--go ahead talking about style.
You can tell where a man gets his style just
as you can tell where Pavlowa got her legs
Soup
Soup
I saw a famous man eating soup.
I say he was lifting a fat broth
Into his mouth with a spoon.
His name was in the newspapers that day
Skyscraper
Skyscraper
By day the skyscraper looms in the smoke and sun and
has a soul.
Prairie and valley, streets of the city, pour people into <…
Shirt
Shirt
My shirt is a token and symbol,
more than a cover for sun and rain,
my shirt is a signal,
and a teller of souls.
I ca…
Sixteen Months
Sixteen Months
On the lips of the child Janet float changing dreams.
It is a thin spiral of blue smoke,
A morning campfire at a mountain lake.
Sea-Wash
Sea-Wash
The sea-wash never ends.
The sea-wash repeats, repeats.
Only old songs? Is that all the sea knows?
Only the old strong songs?
…
Salvage
Salvage
Guns on the battle lines have pounded now a year
between Brussels and Paris.
And, William Morris, when I read your old chapter …
Prayers of Steel
Prayers of Steel
Lay me on an anvil, O God.
Beat me and hammer me into a crowbar.
Let me pry loose old walls.
Let me lift and loosen old foundation…
Ready to Kill
Ready to Kill
Ten minutes now I have been looking at this.
I have gone by here before and wondered about it.
This is a bronze memorial of a famous genera…
Pool
Pool
Out of the fire
Came a man sunken
To less than cinders,
A tea-cup of ashes or so.
And I,
The gold in the house,
Writhe…
Population Drifts
Population Drifts
New-mown hay smell and wind of the plain made her
a woman whose ribs had the power of the hills in
them and her hands were tough for wo…