The Monastery Croft.

1

Big-stomached, like friars
Who ogle a nun,
Quaff deep to their bellies' desires
From the old abbey's tun,
Grapes fatten with fires
Warm-filtered from moon and from sun.


2

As a novice who muses,
Lips a rosary tell,
While her thoughts are - a love she refuses?
Nay! mourns as not well:
The ripe apple looses
Its holding to rot where it fell.

Madison Julius Cawein

Madison Julius Cawein was born on March 23, 1865, in Louisville, Kentucky and died on December 8, 1914. Known as the “Keats of Kentucky,” his poetry often focused on nature, mythology, and the lush landscapes of his home state. Throughout his lifetime, Cawein published more than 30 books of poetry. He is remembered for his vivid and descriptive style and his ability to capture the beauty of the natural world. His works provide a window into the pastoral and often mystical world of the late 19th and early 20th centuries.

Madison Julius Cawein

The Gray Sisters

Madison Julius Cawein, Simple Poetry

A Ghost And A Dream

Madison Julius Cawein, Simple Poetry

When Ships Put Out To Sea

Madison Julius Cawein, Simple Poetry

The Shadow

Madison Julius Cawein, Simple Poetry

English

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The Vintager.

Among the fragrant grapes she bows;
Long, violet clusters heap her hands;
About her satyr throats and brows
Flush at her smiled commands.

And from her sun-burnt throat at times,
As bubbles burst on new-made wine,
A happy fit of merry rhymes
Rings down the hills of vine.

From out one heart, remorseless sweet,
She plucked the big-grape passion there;
Trod in the wine-press of her feet,
It grew into despair:

Until she drained its honeyed must,
Which, tingling inward part by part,
Fierce mounted thro' her glowing bust
And centered in her heart.

Madison Julius Cawein

An Antique.

Mildewed and gray the marble stairs
Rise from their balustraded urns
To where a chiseled satyr glares
From a luxuriant bed of ferns;

A pebbled walk that labyrinths
'Twixt parallels of verdant box
To where, broad-based on grotesque plinths,
'Mid cushions of moss-padded rocks,

Rises a ruined pleasure-house,
Of shattered column, broken dome,
Where, reveling in thick carouse,
The buoyant ivy makes its home.

And here from bank, and there from bed,
Down the mad rillet's jubilant lymph,
The lavish violet's odors shed
In breathings of a fountain nymph.

And where, in lichened hoariness,
The broken marble dial-plate
Basks in the Summer's sultriness,
Rich houri roses palpitate.

Voluptuous, languid with perfumes,
As w...

Madison Julius Cawein

The Old Farm

Dormered and verandaed, cool,
Locust-girdled, on the hill;
Stained with weather-wear, and dull-
Streak'd with lichens; every sill
Thresholding the beautiful;

I can see it standing there,
Brown above the woodland deep,
Wrapped in lights of lavender,
By the warm wind rocked asleep,
Violet shadows everywhere.

I remember how the Spring,
Liberal-lapped, bewildered its
Acred orchards, murmuring,
Kissed to blossom; budded bits
Where the wood-thrush came to sing.

Barefoot Spring, at first who trod,
Like a beggermaid, adown
The wet woodland; where the god,
With the bright sun for a crown
And the firmament for rod,

Met her; clothed her; wedded her;
Her Cophetua: when, lo!
All the hill, one breathing blur,
Burst ...

Madison Julius Cawein

The Old Inn

Red-Winding from the sleepy town,
One takes the lone, forgotten lane
Straight through the hills. A brush-bird brown
Bubbles in thorn-flowers, sweet with rain,
Where breezes bend the gleaming grain,
And cautious drip of higher leaves
The lower dips that drip again.
Above the tangled trees it heaves
Its gables and its haunted eaves.

One creeper, gnarled and blossomless,
O'erforests all its eastern wall;
The sighing cedars rake and press
Dark boughs along the panes they sprawl;
While, where the sun beats, drone and drawl
The mud-wasps; and one bushy bee,
Gold-dusty, hurls along the hall
To buzz into a crack. To me
The shadows seem too seared to flee.

Of ragged chimneys martins make
Huge pipes of music; twittering, here
They build a...

Madison Julius Cawein

The Old Farm

Dormered and verandaed, cool,
Locust-girdled, on the hill;
Stained with weather-wear, and dull-
Streak'd with lichens; every sill
Thresholding the beautiful;
I can see it standing there,
Brown above the woodland deep,
Wrapped in lights of lavender,
By the warm wind rocked asleep,
Violet shadows everywhere.
I remember how the Spring,
Liberal-lapped, bewildered its
Acred orchards, murmuring,
Kissed to blossom; budded bits
Where the wood-thrush came to sing.
Barefoot Spring, at first who trod,
Like a beggermaid, adown
The wet woodland; where the god,
With the bright sun for a crown
And the firmament for rod,
Met her; clothed her; wedded her;
Her Cophetua: when, lo!
All the hill, one breathing blur,
Burst in beauty; gleam and glo...

Madison Julius Cawein

Going For The Cows.

        I.

The juice-big apples' sullen gold,
Like lazy Sultans laughed and lolled
'Mid heavy mats of leaves that lay
Green-flatten'd 'gainst the glaring day;
And here a pear of rusty brown,
And peaches on whose brows the down
Waxed furry as the ears of Pan,
And, like Diana's cheeks, whose tan
Burnt tender secresies of fire,
Or wan as Psyche's with desire
Of lips that love to kiss or taste
Voluptuous ripeness there sweet placed.
And down the orchard vistas he, -
Barefooted, trousers out at knee,
Face shadowing from the sloping sun
A hat of straw, brim-sagging broad, -
Came, lowly whistling some vague tune,
Upon the sunbeam-sprinkled road.
Lank in his hand a twig with which
In boyish thoughtlessness he crushed
Rare pennyroyal myri...

Madison Julius Cawein