Elegy Poems
Duino Elegies: The First Elegy
by Rainer Maria Rilke
Who, if I cried out, would hear me among the angels'
hierarchies? and even if one of them suddenly
pressed me against his heart, I would perish
in the embrace of his stronger existence.
For beauty is nothing but the beginning of terror
which we are barely able to endure and are awed
because it serenely disdains to annihilate us.
Each single angel is terrifying.
And so I force myself, swallow and hold back
the surging call of my dark sobbing.
......
Elegy
by Dylan Thomas
Too proud to die; broken and blind he died
The darkest way, and did not turn away,
A cold kind man brave in his narrow pride
On that darkest day, Oh, forever may
He lie lightly, at last, on the last, crossed
Hill, under the grass, in love, and there grow
Young among the long flocks, and never lie lost
Or still all the numberless days of his death, though
......
Elegy In April And September
by Wilfred Owen
Hush, thrush! Hush, missen-thrush, I listen...
I heard the flush of footsteps through the loose leaves,
And a low whistle by the water's brim.
Still! Daffodil! Nay, hail me not so gaily,-
Your gay gold lily daunts me and deceives,
Who follow gleams more golden and more slim.
Look, brook! O run and look, O run!
The vain reeds shook? - Yet search till gray sea heaves,
......
September Song
by Geoffrey Hill
born 19.6.32 - deported 24.9.42
Undesirable you may have been, untouchable
you were not. Not forgotten
or passed over at the proper time.
As estimated, you died. Things marched,
sufficient, to that end.
Just so much Zyklon and leather, patented
terror, so many routine cries.
......
Elegy For Jane
by Theodore Roethke
(My student, thrown by a horse)
I remember the neckcurls, limp and damp as tendrils;
And her quick look, a sidelong pickerel smile;
And how, once started into talk, the light syllables leaped for her.
And she balanced in the delight of her thought,
A wren, happy, tail into the wind,
Her song trembling the twigs and small branches.
The shade sang with her;
The leaves, their whispers turned to kissing,
......
Death in the New Year
by Nkwachukwu Ogbuagu
Our hands are tied, Death
Since you dawned on us this New Year . . .
Shapely bottles of champagnes have shone
And have broken to fragments with the ululation
Of firecrackers that warmed cold and dark wintry skies.
Now, aphonia sets in from unending lamentations.
Headlines, buried by the chilly bones of winter,
Are barren of good tidings.
A chionophile besieges the rim of a sedulous Yuletide
......
Sorrow
by Nkwachukwu Ogbuagu
The webs are obstinate
And refuse a hug of the
Broomsticks, besmirched
By diluted coal tar.
Grey walls fascinate dancing
Grimes before your pupils
Dilating even at daytime
To screen the woes on such
Walls painted by dilemmas
That pruned the vestiges of
......
Elegy for November
by Nkwachukwu Ogbuagu
The shoals below the horrid caverns of a lagoon
usurp all terraces and embankments,
just for the feast on bloodꓽ
crimson atoll
and cremated corals.
Ecclesiastes of the third age is unknown to them —
they who in all seasons,
without respite,
have feasted in flesh and blood,
including that of a famous guru
......
The Silent Land
by Muhammad Umair
I saw you lying in the silent land,
I bent to hold you by the hand;
It was heart-wrenching to not feel you,
Days spent without you are still due.
I took the relation for granted
And nothing else was ever wanted,
I thought we'd stay together forever;
But you turned out to be rather clever---
......
returning home after seventy years
by Kinsley Lee
They drew in foreign power and invaded
The other brothers in the name of liberation.
With the army who changed uniform, they raided
At dawn, suddenly. With difficulty, nation
Defended against an enemy desperately.
The young soldiers’re at the age of twenty.
Elder brother was dead at the battle
Of Youndug, Pohang at the Walker line.
After In-Cheon Operation, they retreated to scuttle.
......
