What is your favorite poem?

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Do you have a favorite poem that you enjoy? If so, who wrote it and why does it resonate with you? Feel free to share it (or even ones which you have written). My favorite is El Dorado by Edgar Allan Poe.

El Dorado

Gaily bedight,
A gallant night
In sunshine and in shadow,
Had journeyed long,
Singing a song,
In search of El Dorado.
But he grew old --
This knight so bold --
And -- o'er his heart a shadow
Fell as he found
No spot of ground
That looked like El Dorado.
And, as his strength
Failed him at length,
He met a pilgrim shadow --
"Shadow," said he,
"Where can it be --
This land of El Dorado?"
"Over the Mountains
Of the Moon,
Down the Valley of the Shadow,
Ride, boldly ride,"
The shade replied --
"If you seek for El Dorado."

To me, this poem signifies man's eternal search for wisdom and knowledge, and that the actual attainment of such is not so important (if even possible), as the journey itself.

What if by Benjamin Zephaniah

The Waking-Theodore Roethke

I wake to sleep, and take my waking slow.
I feel my fate in what I cannot fear.
I learn by going where I have to go.

We think by feeling. What is there to know?
I hear my being dance from ear to ear.
I wake to sleep, and take my waking slow.

Of those so close beside me, which are you?
God bless the Ground! I shall walk softly there,
And learn by going where I have to go.

Light takes the Tree; but who can tell us how?
The lowly worm climbs up a winding stair;
I wake to sleep, and take my waking slow.

Great Nature has another thing to do
To you and me, so take the lively air,
And, lovely, learn by going where to go.

This shaking keeps me steady. I should know.
What falls away is always. And is near.
I wake to sleep, and take my waking slow.
I learn by going where I have to go.
^

also this small bit from Wallace Stevens Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird

I do not know which to prefer,
The beauty of inflections
Or the beauty of innuendoes,
The blackbird whistling
Or just after.

I have a few favourite poems. This one is Dulce et decorum est by Wilfred Owen who is my favourite poet.

Bent double, like old beggars under sacks,
Knock-kneed, coughing like hags, we cursed through sludge,
Till on the haunting flares we turned our backs
And towards our distant rest began to trudge.
Men marched asleep. Many had lost their boots
But limped on, blood-shod. All went lame; all blind;
Drunk with fatigue; deaf even to the hoots
Of tired, outstripped Five-Nines that dropped behind.

Gas! Gas! Quick, boys! – An ecstasy of fumbling,
Fitting the clumsy helmets just in time;
But someone still was yelling out and stumbling,
And flound'ring like a man in fire or lime . . .
Dim, through the misty panes and thick green light,
As under a green sea, I saw him drowning.
In all my dreams, before my helpless sight,
He plunges at me, guttering, choking, drowning.

If in some smothering dreams you too could pace
Behind the wagon that we flung him in,
And watch the white eyes writhing in his face,
His hanging face, like a devil's sick of sin;
If you could hear, at every jolt, the blood
Come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs,
Obscene as cancer, bitter as the cud
Of vile, incurable sores on innocent tongues,
My friend, you would not tell with such high zest
To children ardent for some desperate glory,
The old Lie; Dulce et Decorum est
Pro patria mori.

The Second Coming. WB Yeats.

Turning and turning in the widening gyre
The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.

Surely some revelation is at hand;
Surely the Second Coming is at hand.
The Second Coming! Hardly are those words out
When a vast image out of Spiritus Mundi
Troubles my sight: somewhere in sands of the desert
A shape with lion body and the head of a man,
A gaze blank and pitiless as the sun,
Is moving its slow thighs, while all about it
Reel shadows of the indignant desert birds.
The darkness drops again; but now I know
That twenty centuries of stony sleep
Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle,
And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,
Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?

gemstone123 wrote:

My favorite Poem is "For Ever" By Fabio Fiallo. It is a writer from the Dominican Republic. It is in spanish and as you must know, translating a poem is very hard. Anyway here it goes:

Cuando esta frágil copa de mi vida,
que de hermosuras rebosó el destino,
en la revuelta bacanal del mundo
ruede en pedazos, no lloréis, amigos.

Haced de un rincón del Cementerio,
sin cruz ni mármol, mi postrer asilo,
después, ¡oh! mis alegres camaradas,
seguid vuestro camino.

Allí, solo, mi amada misteriosa,
bajo el sudario inmenso del olvido,
¡cuán corta encontraré la noche eterna
para soñar contigo!

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i am not much interested in poems, but i think that "desiderata" is very significant to me.

i like the song version of it that was sung by "les crane" in 1971 (i was not born then but it was on the radio for long enough for me to hear it when i was a child).

i have got the original "desiderata" song on my drive, and it's sound quality is excellent (considering it was recorded in 1971).

i can not post that song anywhere, because when i try, "wmg" censors it and it is removed.

but i found an example on youtube that is the same version of that poem/song i like. it is poor quality audio, but it is a representative of the clean version of the song i have.

please listen to the words but do not watch the irrelevant video. instead, please read the lyrics i posted under the youtube video while listening to the song.
it is a shame that this is the only sample available that i can show you of the the song. it is very poor sound quality.
anyway this is not really a poem, but more prose. it is one of the few things from other people that ever made it into my core.


[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pw-hGKruOYQ[/youtube]

You are a child of the universe, no less than the trees or the stars.
You have a right.......

Desiderata. Desiderata. Desiderata.
Go placidly amid the noise and haste,
and remember what peace there may be in silence.
As far as possible without surrender,
Be on good terms with all persons.
Speak your truth quietly and clearly, and listen to others -
Even the dull and ignorant, they too have their story.
Avoid loud and aggressive persons - they are vexations to the spirit.
If you compare yourself with others, you may become vain and bitter,
For always there will be greater and lesser persons than yourself.

You are a child of the universe.
No less than the trees and the stars, you have a right to be here.
And whether or not it is clear to you,
No doubt the universe is unfolding as it should.

Enjoy your achievements as well as your plans.
Keep interested in your own career -
However humble, it is a real possession in the changing fortunes of time.
Exercise caution in your business affairs,
for the world is full of trickery.
But let this not blind you to what virtue there is.
Many persons strive for high ideals,
and everywhere life is full of heroism.
Be yourself.
Especially do not feign affection, neither be cynical about love.
For in the face of all aridity and disenchantment,
It is as perenial as the grass.
Take kindly the council of the years,
Gracefully surrendering the things of youth.
Nurture strength of spirit to shield you in sudden misfortune,
But do not distress yourself with imaginings -
Many fears are borne of fatigue and loneliness.
Beyond a wholesome discipline, be gentle with yourself.

You are a child of the universe.
No less than the trees and the stars, you have a right to be here.
And whether or not it is clear to you,
No doubt the universe is unfolding as it should.

Therefore, be at peace with God, whatever you conceive him to be.
And whatever your labors and aspirations,
in the noisy confusion of life,
Keep peace with your soul.
With all its sham, drudgery, and broken dreams,
it is still a beautiful world.
Be careful. Strive to be happy.

I have two.

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Year after year
The monkey's mask
Reveals the monkey.

Basho

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To wait an hour is long
If love be just beyond

To wait forever is short
If love reward the end.

Emily Dickinson

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Another one I like...

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Poor boy
Leaves moon-viewing
For rice-grinding.

Basho

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One of my all time favourites from Rupert Brooke, who died of a mosquito bite in 1915.
I always thought from an early age that the manner of his death was kind of ironic.

I'm not huge into poetry, but there is one poem of epochal importance to me: Patrick Kavanagh's Advent.

Must get into Poe, I like that one, very intriguing


My own personal favorite is JOHN CLARE, if you love the countrside and appreciate the beauty of simple things he will soon have you under his spell. He was a field labourer in his early life and he loved outdoor solitutude so deeply and observing nature that he spent what little spare time he had resting in the fields, scribbling away. The way he wrote was lulling and gorgeous and I know exactly what he is talking about and it makes me wonder if he was AS as well or just similar in nature. His life is quite sad though as he spent most of his later years in an asylum after his childhood sweetheart gave him the cold shoulder and he failed to "make" it as a published poet. The fact that he talks to trees in some of them is reassuring as I thought I was the only weirdo who did that.

AN INVITE TO ETERNITY

Wilt thou go with me, sweet maid
Say, maiden, wilt thou go with me
Through the valley-depths of shade
Of night and dark obscurity
Where the path has lost its way
Where the sun forgets the day
Where there's nor life nor light to see
Sweet maiden, wilt thou go with me

Where stones will turn to flooding streams
Where plains will rise like ocean waves
Where life will fade like visioned dreams
And mountains darken into caves
Say, maiden, wilt thou go with me
Through this sad non-identity
Where parents live and are forgot
And sisters live and know us not

Say, maiden, wilt thou go with me
In this strange death of life to be
To live in death and be the same
Without this life or home or name
At once to be and not to be
That was and is not - yet to see
Things pass like shadows, and the sky
Above, below, around us lie