Night Poetry 2
Oh! no! I would not love again
E'en had I still the power given;
I would not risk its pain and fears
E'en though its joys were taste of heaven.
A breath may blight the heart we prize;
A whisper weave deceit around it;
And then our heart's most tender chord
Is wounded by the chain that bound it.
'Tis hard to see death's chilling hand
The life-strings of our treasure sever:
But harder still when loving hearts
Are rudely rent apart for ever.
But ah! such griefs are naught to those
That fill the heart where passion burned
Till falsehood burst the mask and showed
That love by heartless scorn returned
poem by John Boyle O'Reilly
Added by Poetry Lover
Comment! | Vote! | Copy!
A Tragedy
A SOFT-BREASTED bird from the sea
Fell in love with the light-house flame;
And it wheeled round the tower on its airiest wing,
And floated and cried like a lovelorn thing;
It brooded all day and it fluttered all night,
But could win no look from the steadfast light.
For the flame had its heart afar,—
Afar with the ships at sea;
It was thinking of children and waiting wives,
And darkness and danger to sailors' lives;
But the bird had its tender bosom pressed
On the glass where at last it dashed its breast.
The light only flickered, the brighter to glow;
But the bird lay dead on the rocks below.
poem by John Boyle O'Reilly
Added by Poetry Lover
Comment! | Vote! | Copy!
Though it Lash the Shallows that Line the Beach
Though it lash the shallows that line the beach,
Afar from the great sea deeps,
There is never a storm whose might can reach
Where the vast leviathan sleeps.
Like a mighty thought in a quiet mind,
In the clear, cold depths he swims;
Whilst above him the pettiest form of his kind
With a dash o'er the surface skims.
There is peace in power: the men who speak
With the loudest tongues do least;
And the surest sign of a mind that is weak
Is its want of the power to rest.
It is only the lighter water that flies
From the sea on a windy day;
And the deep blue ocean never replies
To the sibilant voice of the spray.
poem by John Boyle O'Reilly
Added by Poetry Lover
Comment! | Vote! | Copy!
Under the Surface
AY, smile as you will, with your saintly face!
But I know the line
Of your guard is as weak as a maze of lace:
You may give no sign—
And the devil is never far to seek,
And a rotten peach has a lovely cheek.
As they come in the stream, I say to you:
The lives we jostle are none of them true.
Who seeks with a lamp and glass may find
A nature of honor from core to rind;
But woe to the heart that is formed so true:
It may not reck, and it still must rue
The perjured lip and the bleeding vow.
God keep it blind to the things we know—
To the ghastly scars for the leech's eyes
And the occult lore of the worldly wise.
poem by John Boyle O'Reilly
Added by Poetry Lover
Comment! | Vote! | Copy!
A Dead Man
Trapper died—our hero—and we grieved;
In every heart in camp the sorrow stirred.
'His soul was red!' the Indian cried, bereaved;
'A white man, he!' the grim old Yankee's word.
So, brief and strong, each mourner gave his best—
How kind he was, how brave, how keen to track;
And as we laid him by the pines to rest,
A negro spoke, with tears: 'His heart was black!'
''Island of Destiny! Innisfail! for thy faith is the payment near!
The mine of the future is opened, and the golden veins appear.
Thy hands are white and thy page unstained. Reach out for thy glorious years,
And take them from God as his recompense for thy fortitude and tears.'
poem by John Boyle O'Reilly
Added by Poetry Lover
Comment! | Vote! | Copy!
The Useless Ones
Poets should not reason:
Let them sing!
Argument is treason —
Bells should ring.
Statements none, nor questions;
Gnomic words.
Spirit-cries, suggestions,
Like the birds.
He may use deduction
Who must preach;
He may praise instruction
Who must teach;
But the poet duly
Fills his part
When the song bursts truly
From his heart.
[...] Read more
poem by John Boyle O'Reilly
Added by Poetry Lover
Comment! | Vote! | Copy!
Jacqueminots
I MAY not speak in words, dear, but let my words be flowers,
To tell their crimson secret in leaves of fragrant fire;
They plead for smiles and kisses as summer fields for showers,
And every purple veinlet thrills with exquisite desire.
O, let me see the glance, dear, the gleam of soft confession
You give my amorous roses for the tender hope they prove;
And press their heart-leaves back, love, to drink their deeper passion,
For their sweetest, wildest perfume is the whisper of my love!
My roses, tell her, pleading, all the fondness and the sighing,
All the longing of a heart that reaches thirsting for its bliss;
And tell her, tell her, roses, that my lips and eyes are dying
For the melting of her love-look and the rapture of her kiss.
poem by John Boyle O'Reilly
Added by Poetry Lover
Comment! | Vote! | Copy!
Experience
THE world was made when a man was born,
He must taste for himself the forbidden springs;
He can never take warning from old-fashion'd things;
He must fight as a boy, he must drink as a youth,
Of the friend of his soul; he must laugh to scorn
The hints of deceit in a woman's eyes--
They are clear as the wells of Paradise.
And so he goes on till the world grows old,
Till his toung has grown cautious, his heart has grown cold,
Till the smile leaves his mouth, till the ring leaves his laugh,
And he shirks the bright headache you ask him to quaff.
He grows formal with men, and with women polite,
And distrustful of both when they're out of his sight.
Then he eats for his palate and drinks for his head,
And loves for his pleasure,--and 'tis time he was dead.
poem by John Boyle O'Reilly
Added by Poetry Lover
Comment! | Vote! | Copy!
A Builder's Lesson
'HOW shall I a habit break?'
As you did that habit make.
As you gathered, you must lose;
As you yielded, now refuse.
Thread by thread the strands we twist
Till they bind us neck and wrist;
Thread by thread the patient hand
Must untwine ere free we stand.
As we builded, stone by stone,
We must toil unhelped, alone,
Till the wall is overthrown.
But remember, as we try,
Lighter every test goes by;
Wading in, the stream grows deep
Toward the center's downward sweep;
Backward turn, each step ashore
Shallower is than that before.
Ah, the precious years we waste
[...] Read more
poem by John Boyle O'Reilly
Added by Poetry Lover
Comment! | Vote! | Copy!
Forever
THOSE we love truly never die,
Though year by year the sad memorial wreath,
A ring and flowers, types of life and death,
Are laid upon their graves.
For death the pure life saves,
And life all pure is love; and love can reach
From heaven to earth, and nobler lessons teach
Than those by mortals read.
Well blest is he who has a dear one dead:
A friend he has whose face will never change—
A dear communion that will not grow strange;
The anchor of a love is death.
The blessed sweetness of a loving breath
Will reach our cheek all fresh through weary years.
For her who died long since, ah! waste not tears,
She's thine unto the end.
[...] Read more
poem by John Boyle O'Reilly
Added by Poetry Lover
Comment! | Vote! | Copy!