W. H. Auden is one of my favorite poets. This is a sad poem, but it is nonetheless one of the most beautiful expressions of love in poetry.
W. H. Auden
Stop all the clocks, cut off the telephone,
Prevent the dog from barking with a juicy bone,
Silence the pianos and with muffled drum
Bring out the coffin, let the mourners come.
Let aeroplanes circle moaning overhead
Scribbling on the sky the message He Is Dead,
Put crepe bows round the white necks of the public doves,
Let the traffic policemen wear black cotton gloves.
He was my North, my South, my East and West,
My working week and my Sunday rest,
My noon, my midnight, my talk, my song;
I thought that love would last for ever: I was wrong.
The stars are not wanted now: put out every one;
Pack up the moon and dismantle the sun;
Pour away the ocean and sweep up the wood.
For nothing now can ever come to any good.
Wow, that is a very beautiful, sad poem. It brought tears to my eyes. Perhaps because grieving doesn’t stop. I lost my husband in 1976 in a military plane crash, and my partner died 2012 from complications of pneumonia at 58. A good cry is healing.
Awesome!!!KC
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One of my favorites, sad and beautiful all at once. A true tribute to love.
Here are two of my favorites for Valentine’s Day. I used to act out Mother’s Chocolate Valentine with a fancy, empty heart box. It had a few, empty paper candy cups and the poem taped inside the top. It was an idea from a book by a great children’s librarian, Caroline Feller Bauer. I came across Jenny Kissed Me recently, and from first glance, I remembered memorizing it. I realized could you substitute any two syllable name in it. Try that with your sweetie today!
Mother’s Chocolate Valentine
I bought a box of chocolate hearts,
a present for my mother,
they looked so good I tasted one,
and then I tried another.
They both were so delicious
that I ate another four,
and then another couple,
and then half a dozen more.
I couldn’t seem to stop myself,
I nibbled on and on,
before I knew what happened
all the chocolate hearts were gone.
I felt a little guilty,
I was stuffed down to my socks,
I ate my mother’s valentine…
I hope she likes the box.
by Jack Prelutsky
Jenny Kissed Me
Jenny kissed me when we met,
Jumping from the chair she sat in;
Time, you thief, who love to get
Sweets into your list, put that in!
Say I’m weary, say I’m sad,
Say that health and wealth have missed me,
Say I’m growing old, but add,
Jenny kissed me.
James Henry Leigh Hunt
I http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1831203.Caroline_Feller_Bauer_s_New_Handbook_for_Storytellers
I should have written Caroline Feller Bauer, librarian and author.
Here is a poem that I gave to my true love when I wanted to express my love one Valentine’s day.
Emily Dickinson –
It was a quiet way –
He asked if I was his –
I made no answer of the Tongue
But answer of the Eyes –
And then he bore me on
Before his mortal noise
With swiftness, as of Chariots
And distance, as of Wheels.
This World did drop away
As acres from the feet
Of one that leaneth from Balloon
Upon an Ether street.
The Gulf behind was not,
The Continents were new –
Eternity it was before
Eternity was due.
No Seasons were to us –
It was not Night nor Mourn –
But sunrise stopped upon the place
And fastened it in Dawn.
wonderful
What pleasure to find these in one’s in box in the morning! Another:
As I Walked Out One Evening, by W. H. Auden
As I walked out one evening,
Walking down Bristol Street,
The crowds upon the pavement
Were fields of harvest wheat.
And down by the brimming river
I heard a lover sing
Under an arch of the railway:
‘Love has no ending.
‘I’ll love you, dear, I’ll love you
Till China and Africa meet,
And the river jumps over the mountain
And the salmon sing in the street,
‘I’ll love you till the ocean
Is folded and hung up to dry
And the seven stars go squawking
Like geese about the sky.
‘The years shall run like rabbits,
For in my arms I hold
The Flower of the Ages,
And the first love of the world.’
But all the clocks in the city
Began to whirr and chime:
‘O let not Time deceive you,
You cannot conquer Time.
‘In the burrows of the Nightmare
Where Justice naked is,
Time watches from the shadow
And coughs when you would kiss.
‘In headaches and in worry
Vaguely life leaks away,
And Time will have his fancy
To-morrow or to-day.
‘Into many a green valley
Drifts the appalling snow;
Time breaks the threaded dances
And the diver’s brilliant bow.
‘O plunge your hands in water,
Plunge them in up to the wrist;
Stare, stare in the basin
And wonder what you’ve missed.
‘The glacier knocks in the cupboard,
The desert sighs in the bed,
And the crack in the tea-cup opens
A lane to the land of the dead.
‘Where the beggars raffle the banknotes
And the Giant is enchanting to Jack,
And the Lily-white Boy is a Roarer,
And Jill goes down on her back.
‘O look, look in the mirror,
O look in your distress:
Life remains a blessing
Although you cannot bless.
‘O stand, stand at the window
As the tears scald and start;
You shall love your crooked neighbour
With your crooked heart.’
It was late, late in the evening,
The lovers they were gone;
The clocks had ceased their chiming,
And the deep river ran on.
You shall love your crooked neighbour
With your crooked heart.
Now there’s a commandment we Homo ignorans can aspire to live up to. 🙂
Happy Valentine’s Day to Diane and to all the great teachers who visit this blog regularly to learn from her and to share their wisdom.