Snow
Hills that were dark
At sparing-time last night
Now in the dawn-ring
Glimmer cold and white.
Poems on the topic: stillness
Poems on the topic “stillness” on Poets.by.
Irradiations XIII
As I went through the city by day
I saw shadows in sunlight:
But in the night I saw everywhere
Stars within the darkness.
(A coldly fluting breeze:
Dark Pan under the trees.
Low laughter: up the sky
A star like a street-lamp left on high.)
As I went through the city by day
I was hustled by jostling people.
But in the night, the wind of the darkness
Whispered, "Hush!" to my soul.
Echoes
Day-long I hear life's sounds beat like the sea ;
Day-long, day-long
They sweep their deep tide-rhythms over me,
And as a song
Reiterated, fall unmeaningly.
Where once I bent life's echoes to my will,
Day after day
Following wings of sound over the sill
Far, far away.
Now my sick fancy lies inert and still.
Silence that slowly wraps me with the ease
Of dreamed-out sleep.
Quenches the sound of vague realities
Whose echoes keep
Their rhythms like old winds in drying seas.
Before Thought
Dawn paints quaint histories
In pageant on my wall;
Imminent destinies
Concern it not at all.
Quatrains 2
How strange that grass should sing--
Grass is so still a thing....
And strange the swift surprise of snow
So soft it falls and slow.
Birds
I lie beneath a dark green pine
Where sunbeams scarcely ever shine,
And if I'm still as still can be
Shy forest birds come down to me.
Brown thrushes run along the ground,
Goldfinches flit without a sound,
And humming-birds with ruby throats
Alight to smooth their emerald coats.
And when some day alone I lie
Beneath the ever-changing sky,
I'm glad to know the birds will come
To welcome me to my new home.
For I will lie so still that they
Will linger by me all the day,
And lulled at evening by their song
I shall not find the darkness long.
Babes in the Woods
The two little children that died long ago
Away in the woods on the top of a hill--
And a good little robin that knew all about it
Came with strawberry leaves in her bill,
To cover them up, and she kept very quiet
And brought the leaves one at a time, I think.
And some of the leaves would have little holes in them,
And some would be red and pink.
And these little Babes-in-the-Woods that were dead
Must have lain very still, and they heard all the talk
That the bees would be saying to more little bees,
And maybe they even could hear the ants walk.
And they could look out through a crack in the leaves
And see little bushes and some of the sky.
They could see robin coming with leaves in her mouth,
Pastoral
If it were only still!--
With far away the shrill
Crying of a cock;
Or the shaken bell
From a cow's throat
Moving through the bushes;
Or the soft shock
Of wizened apples falling
From an old tree
In a forgotten orchard
Upon the hilly rock!
Oh, grey hill,
Where the grazing herd
Licks the purple blossom,
Crops the spiky weed!
Oh, stony pasture,
Music Within a Mirror
The lake, a silver mirror in a frame of green;
The swans on it but white fancies in a whiter dream.
The enchanted bowl of blue below the rim,
But a goblet with liquid diamonds, filled to the brim.
White within white, a song in a sea,
Painted within a mirror, green hill and tree.
Moveless music, without murmur or moan;
Swan-made curves, its tune, its measure, and tone.
Still Life
Cool your heels on the rail of an observation car.
Let the engineer open her up for ninety miles an hour.
Take in the prairie right and left, rolling land and new
hay crops, swaths of new hay laid in the sun.
A gray village flecks by and the horses hitched in front
of the post-office never blink an eye.
A barnyard and fifteen Holstein cows, dabs of white on
a black wall map, never blink an eye.
A signalman in a tower, the outpost of Kansas City,
keeps his place at a window with the serenity of a
bronze statue on a dark night when lovers pass
whispering.
A Tree Design
A tree is more than a shadow
Blurred against the sky,
More than ink spilled on the fringe
Of white clouds floating by.
A tree is more than an April design
Or a blighted winter bough
Where love and music used to be.
A tree is something in me,
Very still and lonely now.
After a Storm
You walk under the ice trees.
They sway, and crackle.
And arch themselves splendidly
To deck your going.
The white sun flips them into colour
Before you.
They are blue.
And mauve.
And emerald.
They are amber.
And jade.
And sardonyx.
They are silver fretted to flame
And startled to stillness.
Bunched, splintered, iridescent.
You walk under the ice trees
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