The Dead Poets Society

That the powerful play goes on, and you may contribute a verse. What will your verse be?

[deadpoetssociety89]

“Snow is a strange white word;

No ice or frost

Has asked of bud or bird

For Winter’s cost.

Yet ice and frost and snow

From earth to sky

This Summer land doth know;

No man knows why.

In all men’s hearts it is:

Some spirit old

Hath turned with malign kiss

Our lives to mould.

Red fangs have torn His face,

God’s blood is shed:

He mourns from His lone place

His children dead.

O ancient crimson curse!

Corrode, consume;

Give back this universe

Its pristine bloom.”

-Isaac Rosenberg, On Receiving the First News of War

[deadpoetssociety89]

“Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame,

With conquering limbs astride from land to land;

Here at our sea-washed, sunset gates shall stand

A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame

Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name

Mother of Exiles. From her beacon-hand

Glows world-wide welcome; her mild eyes command

The air-bridged harbor that twin cities frame.

“Keep, ancient lands, your storied pomp!” cries she

With silent lips. “Give me your tired, your poor,

Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,

The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.

Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,

I lift my lamp beside the golden door!”

-Emma Lazarus, The New Colossus

[deadpoetssociety89]

“Sometimes I tremble like a storm-swept flower,

And seek to hide my tortured soul from thee,

Bowing my head in deep humility

Before the silent thunder of thy power.

Sometimes I flee before thy blazing light,

As from the specter of pursuing death;

Intimidated lest thy mighty breath,

Windways, will sweep me into utter night.

For oh, I fear they will be swallowed up—

The loves which are to me of vital worth,

My passion and my pleasure in the earth—

And lost forever in thy magic cup!

I fear, I fear my truly human heart

Will perish on the altar-stone of art!”

-Claude McKay, Poetry

[deadpoetssociety89]

“Oh, a word is a gem, or a stone, or a song,

Or a flame, or a two-edged sword;

Or a rose in bloom, or a sweet perfume,

Or a drop of gall is a word.

You may choose your word like a connoisseur,

And polish it up with art,

But the word that sways, and stirs, and stays,

Is the word that comes from the heart.

You may work on your word a thousand weeks,

But it will not glow like one

That all unsought, leaps forth white hot,

When the fountains of feeling run.”

Ella Wheeler Wilcox, The Word

[deadpoetssociety89]

“Fall, leaves, fall; die, flowers, away; Lengthen night and shorten day; Every leaf speaks bliss to me, Fluttering from the autumn tree. I shall smile when wreaths of snow Blossom where the rose should grow; I shall sing when night’s decay Ushers in a drearier day.”

Emily Brontë, Fall Leaves Fall

[deadpoetssociety89]

Pretty women wonder where my secret lies. I’m not cute or built to suit a fashion model’s size But when I start to tell them, They think I’m telling lies. I say, It’s in the reach of my arms The span of my hips, The stride of my step, The curl of my lips. I’m a woman Phenomenally. Phenomenal woman, That’s me. I walk into a room Just as cool as you please, And to a man, The fellows stand or Fall down on their knees. Then they swarm around me, A hive of honey bees. I say, It’s the fire in my eyes, And the flash of my teeth, The swing in my waist, And the joy in my feet. I’m a woman Phenomenally. Phenomenal woman, That’s me. Men themselves have wondered What they see in me. They try so much But they can’t touch My inner mystery. When I try to show them They say they still can’t see. I say, It’s in the arch of my back, The sun of my smile, The ride of my breasts, The grace of my style. I’m a woman Phenomenally. Phenomenal woman, That’s me. Now you understand Just why my head’s not bowed. I don’t shout or jump about Or have to talk real loud. When you see me passing It ought to make you proud. I say, It’s in the click of my heels, The bend of my hair, the palm of my hand, The need of my care, ‘Cause I’m a woman Phenomenally. Phenomenal woman, That’s me.

Maya Angelou, Phenomenal Woman

[deadpoetssociety89]

"In Flanders Fields the poppies blow Between the crosses row on row That mark our place; and in the sky The larks, still bravely singing, fly Scarce heard amid the guns below. We are the dead, short days ago We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow, Loved and were loved and now we lie In Flanders Fields. Take up our quarrel with the foe To you, from failing hands, we throw The torch, be yours to hold it high. If ye break faith with us, who die We shall not sleep, though poppies grow In Flanders Fields

-Lieutenant Colonel John McCrae, M.D., "In Flanders Fields"

[deadpoetssociety89]

To sin by silence, when we should protest, Makes cowards out of men. The human race Has climbed on protest. Had no voice been raised Against injustice, ignorance, and lust, The inquisition yet would serve the law, And guillotines decide our least disputes. The few who dare, must speak and speak again To right the wrongs of many. Speech, thank God, No vested power in this great day and land Can gag or throttle. Press and voice may cry Loud disapproval of existing ills; May criticise oppression and condemn The lawlessness of wealth-protecting laws That let the children and childbearers toil To purchase ease for idle millionaires. Therefore I do protest against the boast Of independence in this mighty land. Call no chain strong, which holds one rusted link. Call no land free, that holds one fettered slave. Until the manacled slim wrists of babes Are loosed to toss in childish sport and glee, Until the mother bears no burden, save The precious one beneath her heart, until God’s soil is rescued from the clutch of greed And given back to labor, let no man Call this the land of freedom.

-Ella Wheeler Wilcox, Protest

[deadpoetssociety89]

Let them not say: we did not see it. We saw. Let them not say: we did not hear it. We heard. Let them not say: they did not taste it. We ate, we trembled. Let them not say: it was not spoken, not written. We spoke, we witnessed with voices and hands. Let them not say: they did nothing. We did not-enough. Let them say, as they must say something: A kerosene beauty. It burned. Let them say we warmed ourselves by it, read by its light, praised, and it burned.

Jane Hirshfield, Let Them Not Say

[deadpoetssociety89]

Out of your whole life give but a moment! All of your life that has gone before, All to come after it,—so you ignore, So you make perfect the present,—condense, In a rapture of rage, for perfection’s endowment, Thought and feeling and soul and sense— Merged in a moment which gives me at last You around me for once, you beneath me, above me— Me—sure that despite of time future, time past,— This tick of our life-time’s one moment you love me! How long such suspension may linger? Ah, Sweet— The moment eternal—just that and no more— When ecstasy’s utmost we clutch at the core While cheeks burn, arms open, eyes shut and lips meet!

Robert Browning, Now

[deadpoetssociety89]

it's okey it's going to change everything passes you'll get through it don't look back learn as you live there'll come a time another day takes away the troubles so hang in there and weather the storm When things get rough just stand still you will find strength when you remember ''it's okey it's going to change everything passes you'll get through it '' The worst times turn to good times everybody knows ends bring new beginnings ''it's okey it's going to change everything passes you'll get through it'' Listen in to the confusion there'll come a time another day will take away your troubles so hang in there and weather the storm

Adryan Rotica, Weather the Storm

[deadpoetssociety89]

Every day brings a ship, Every ship brings a word; Well for those who have no fear, Looking seaward well assured That the word the vessel brings Is the word they wish to hear.

-Ralph Waldo Emerson, Letters

[deadpoetssociety89]

No longer forward Nor behind I look in hope and fear But grateful Take the good I find The best of now and here

-John Greenleaf Whittier, Excerpt from 'Poems Subjective and Reminiscent'

[deadpoetssociety89]

Art thou pale for weariness Of climbing Heaven, and gazing on the earth, Wandering companionless Among the stars that have a different birth,— And ever changing, like a joyless eye That finds no object worth its constancy?

-Percy Bysshe Shelley, To The Moon [fragment]

[deadpoetssociety89]

"Thou still unravish'd bride of quietness, Thou foster-child of silence and slow time, Sylvan historian, who canst thus express A flowery tale more sweetly than our rhyme: What leaf-fring'd legend haunts about thy shape Of deities or mortals, or of both, In Tempe or the dales of Arcady? What men or gods are these? What maidens loth? What mad pursuit? What struggle to escape? What pipes and timbrels? What wild ecstasy? Heard melodies are sweet, but those unheard Are sweeter; therefore, ye soft pipes, play on; Not to the sensual ear, but, more endear'd, Pipe to the spirit ditties of no tone: Fair youth, beneath the trees, thou canst not leave Thy song, nor ever can those trees be bare; Bold Lover, never, never canst thou kiss, Though winning near the goal yet, do not grieve; She cannot fade, though thou hast not thy bliss, For ever wilt thou love, and she be fair! Ah, happy, happy boughs! that cannot shed Your leaves, nor ever bid the Spring adieu; And, happy melodist, unwearied, For ever piping songs for ever new; More happy love! more happy, happy love! For ever warm and still to be enjoy'd, For ever panting, and for ever young; All breathing human passion far above, That leaves a heart high-sorrowful and cloy'd, A burning forehead, and a parching tongue. Who are these coming to the sacrifice? To what green altar, O mysterious priest, Lead'st thou that heifer lowing at the skies, And all her silken flanks with garlands drest? What little town by river or sea shore, Or mountain-built with peaceful citadel, Is emptied of this folk, this pious morn? And, little town, thy streets for evermore Will silent be; and not a soul to tell Why thou art desolate, can e'er return. O Attic shape! Fair attitude! with brede Of marble men and maidens overwrought, With forest branches and the trodden weed; Thou, silent form, dost tease us out of thought As doth eternity: Cold Pastoral! When old age shall this generation waste, Thou shalt remain, in midst of other woe Than ours, a friend to man, to whom thou say'st, "Beauty is truth, truth beauty,--that is all Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know."

John Keats, Ode On A Grecian Urn

[deadpoetssociety89]

From childhood's hour I have not been As others were; I have not seen As others saw; I could not bring My passions from a common spring. From the same source I have not taken My sorrow; I could not awaken My heart to joy at the same tone; And all I loved, I loved alone. Then- in my childhood, in the dawn Of a most stormy life- was drawn From every depth of good and ill The mystery which binds me still: From the torrent, or the fountain, From the red cliff of the mountain, From the sun that round me rolled In its autumn tint of gold, From the lightning in the sky As it passed me flying by, From the thunder and the storm, And the cloud that took the form (When the rest of Heaven was blue) Of a demon in my view.

-Edgar Allan Poe, Alone

[deadpoetssociety89]

Anger in its time and place May assume a kind of grace. It must have some reason in it, And not last beyond a minute. If to further lengths it go, It does into malice grow. 'Tis the difference that we see 'Twixt the serpent and the bee. If the latter you provoke, It inflicts a hasty stroke, Puts you to some little pain, But it never stings again. Close in tufted bush or brake Lurks the poison-swellëd snake Nursing up his cherished wrath; In the purlieux of his path, In the cold, or in the warm, Mean him good, or mean him harm, Whensoever fate may bring you, The vile snake will always sting you.

Charles Lamb, Anger