Beware

I closed my hands upon a moth
        And when I drew my palms apart,
Instead of dusty, broken wings
        I found a bleeding human heart.

I crushed my foot upon a worm
        That had my garden for its goal,
But when I drew my foot aside
        I found a dying human soul.

Dora Sigerson Shorter

Dora Sigerson Shorter was an Irish poet and sculptor born in Dublin in 1866. She was one of the leading figures of the Irish Literary Revival, a movement that aimed to promote Irish literature and culture in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. She was also a close friend of W.B. Yeats and married the writer and journalist Clement King Shorter. Dora's work often dealt with themes of Irish nationalism and folklore, and she published several volumes of poetry before her untimely death in 1918.

Dora Sigerson Shorter

An Irish Blackbird

Dora Sigerson Shorter, Simple Poetry

A New Year

Dora Sigerson Shorter, Simple Poetry

Cupid Slain

Dora Sigerson Shorter, Simple Poetry

Unknown Ideal

Dora Sigerson Shorter, Simple Poetry

English

Suggested Poems

Explore a curated selection of verses that share themes, styles, and emotional resonance with the poem you've just read.

The Suicides Grave

This is the scene of a mans despair, and a souls release
From the difficult traits of the flesh; so, it seeking peace,
A shot rang out in the night; deaths doors were wide;
And you stood alone, a stranger, and saw inside.

Coward flesh, brave soul, which was it?    One feared the world,
The pity of men, or their scorn; yet carelessly hurled
All on the balance of Chance for a state unknown;
Fled the laughter of men for the anger of God-alone.

Perhaps when the hot blood streamed on the daisied sod,
Poor soul, you were likened to Cain, and you fled from God;
Men say you fought hard for your life, when the deed was done;
But your body would rise no more neath this worlds sun.

Id choose-should I do the act-such a night as this,
When the sea throws up white ...

Dora Sigerson Shorter

The Ballad Of The Fairy Thorn-Tree

This is an evil night to go, my sister,
        To the fairy-tree across the fairy rath,
Will you not wait till Hallow Eve is over?
        For many are the dangers in your path!

I may not wait till Hallow Eve is over,
        I shall be there before the night is fled,
For, brother, I am weary for my lover,
        And I must see him once, alive or dead.

Ive prayed to heaven, but it would not listen,
        Ill call thrice in the devils name to-night,
Be it a live man that shall come to hear me,
        Or but a corpse, all clad in snowy white.

* * * * *

She had drawn on her silken hose and garter,
        Her crimson petticoat was kilted high,
She trod her way amid the bog and brambles,
        Until the fairy-tree she stood near-b...

Dora Sigerson Shorter

The White Moth.

If a leaf rustled, she would start:
    And yet she died, a year ago.
How had so frail a thing the heart
    To journey where she trembled so?
And do they turn and turn in fright,
    Those little feet, in so much night?

The light above the poet's head
    Streamed on the page and on the cloth,
And twice and thrice there buffeted
    On the black pane a white-wing'd moth;
'Twas Annie's soul that beat outside
    And 'Open, open, open!' cried:

'I could not find the way to God;
    There were too many flaming suns
For signposts, and the fearful road
    Led over wastes where millions
Of tangled comets hissed and burned--
    I was bewilder'd and I turned.

'O, it was easy then! I knew
    Your window and no star beside.

Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch

The Old Maid

She walks in a lonely garden
        On the path her feet have made,
With high-heeled shoes, gold-buckled,
        And gown of a flowered brocade;

The hair that falls on her shoulders,
        Half-held with a ribbon tie,
Once glowed like the wheat in autumn,
        Now grey as a winter sky.

Time on her brow with rough fingers
        Writes his record of smiles and tears;
And her mind, like a golden timepiece,
        He stopped in the long past years.

At the foot of the lonely garden,
        When she comes to the trysting place
She knew of old, there she lingers,
        With a blush on her withered face.

The children out on the common:
        They climb to the garden wall;
And laugh: He will come to-morrow!
      ...

Dora Sigerson Shorter

The Kine Of My Father

The kine of my rather, they are straying from my keeping;
        The young goats at mischief, but little can I do:
For all through the night did I hear the Banshee keening;
        O youth of my loving, and is it well with you?

All through the night sat my mother with my sorrow;
        Whisht, it is the wind, O one childeen of my heart!
My hair with the wind, and my two hands clasped in anguish;
        Black head of my darling! too long are we apart.

Were your grave at my feet, I would think it half a blessing;
        I could herd then the cattle, and drive the goats away;
Many a Paternoster I would say for your safe keeping;
        I could sleep above your heart, until the dawn of day.

I see you on the prairie, hot with thirst and faint with hunger;

Dora Sigerson Shorter

In A Wood

Hush, tis thy voice!
No, but a bird upon the bough
Romancing to its mate, but where art thou
To bid my heart rejoice?

Tis thy hand, speak!
No, but the branches striking in the wind
Let loose a withered leaf that falls behind
Blown to my cheek.

Hush, thy footfall!
No, tis a streamlet hidden in the fern,
Thus from dawn to dark I wait, I learn
Sorrow is all.

Dora Sigerson Shorter