OZYMANDIAS I met a traveller from an antique land Who said: Two vast and trunkless legs of stone Stand in the desert ….. Near them, on the sand, Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown, And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command, Tell that its sculptor well those passions read Which yet survive, […]
July
July 7 Roy Campbell
THE ZEBRAS From the dark woods that breathe of fallen showers, This poem is still protected by copyright. Read the rest of The Zebras. Next: Ozymandias Percy Bysshe Shelley
July 6 James Thompson
THE SEASONS Another animal slaking its summer thirst was thus briefly described by James Thompson in his “The Seasons” of 1727; in these lines from:SUMMEROft in this season too the horse, provok’d, While his big sinews, full of spirits, swell, Trembling with vigour, in the heat of blood, Springs the high fence; and, o’er the […]
July 5 D H Lawrence
With Coleridge’s “Ancient Mariner” in mind, the strange fascination exerted by a snake is tellingly recounted in D.H. Lawrence’s poem of that name, written from Taormina in Sicily. SNAKE A snake came to my water-trough On a hot, hot day, and I in pyjamas for the heat, To drink there.In the deep, strange-scented shade of […]
July 4 Samuel Taylor Coleridge
THE RIME OF THE ANCIENT MARINER Frost’s “bright green snake” takes us back to Coleridge’s “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner” with its water-snakes “blue, glossy green, and velvet black”. This ancient mariner, or old navigator, as he was originally called, had incurred the deadly hostility of the spirits of Nature by his wanton killing […]
July 3 Robert Frost
MOWING This poem is still protected by copyright. There was never a sound beside the wood but one, Read the rest of this poem. Next: “Rime of the Ancient Mariner” Samuel Taylor Coleridge
July 2 W J Turner
THE LION Strange spirit with inky hair, This poem is copyright until 19th November 2016. The published poem was not found. Next: “Mowing” Robert Frost
July 1 Edmund Spenser
THE FAERIE QUEENE Then came hot July, boiling like to fire, That all his garments he had cast away; Upon a lion raging yet with ire He boldly rode, and made him to obey: It was the beast that whilom did foray The Nemaean forest, till the Amphitrionide Him slew, and with his hide did […]