Wendell P. Bloyd

    They first charged me with disorderly conduct,
    There being no statute on blasphemy.
    Later they locked me up as insane
    Where I was beaten to death by a Catholic guard.
    My offense was this:
    I said God lied to Adam, and destined him
    To lead the life of a fool,
    Ignorant that there is evil in the world as well as good.
    And when Adam outwitted God by eating the apple
    And saw through the lie,
    God drove him out of Eden to keep him from taking
    The fruit of immortal life.
    For Christ's sake, you sensible people,
    Here's what God Himself says about it in the book of Genesis:
    "And the Lord God said, behold the man
    Is become as one of us" (a little envy, you see),
    "To know good and evil" (The all-is-good lie exposed):
    "And now lest he put forth his hand and take
    Also of the tree of life and eat, and live forever:
    Therefore the Lord God sent Him forth from the garden of Eden." (The
    reason I believe God crucified His Own Son
    To get out of the wretched tangle is, because it sounds just like Him. )

Edgar Lee Masters

Edgar Lee Masters was an American poet, biographer, and dramatist. Born in Kansas and raised in Illinois, Masters is best known for his collection of poems entitled "Spoon River Anthology" (1915), which is a series of epitaphs of residents of the fictional small town of Spoon River. His works reflect the everyday lives and frustrations of middle America. Masters also practiced law and wrote biographies for historical figures such as Abraham Lincoln and Mark Twain.

Edgar Lee Masters

Isaiah Beethoven

Edgar Lee Masters, Simple Poetry

Sir Galahad

Edgar Lee Masters, Simple Poetry

When Life Is Real

Edgar Lee Masters, Simple Poetry

St. Deseret

Edgar Lee Masters, 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 Everlasting Gospel

The vision of Christ that thou dost see
Is my visions greatest enemy.
Thine has a great hook nose like thine;
Mine has a snub nose like to mine.
Thine is the Friend of all Mankind;
Mine speaks in parables to the blind.
Thine loves the same world that mine hates;
Thy heaven doors are my hell gates.
Socrates taught what Meletus
Loathd as a nations bitterest curse,
And Caiaphas was in his own mind
A benefactor to mankind.
Both read the Bible day and night,
But thou readst black where I read white.

Was Jesus gentle, or did He
Give any marks of gentility?
When twelve years old He ran away,
And left His parents in dismay.
When after three days sorrow found,
Loud as Sinais trumpet-sound:
No earthly parents I confess
My Heavenly ...

William Blake

St Peter's Denial

What, then, has God to say of cursing heresies,
Which rise up like a flood at precious angels' feet?
A self-indulgent tyrant, stuffed with wine and meat,
He sleeps to soothing sounds of monstrous blasphemies.

The sobs of martyred saints and groans of tortured men
No doubt provide the Lord with rapturous symphonies.
And yet the heavenly hosts are scarcely even pleased
In spite of all the blood men dedicate to them.

Jesus, do you recall the grove of olive trees
Where on your knees, in your simplicity, you prayed
To Him who sat and heard the noise the nailing made
In your live flesh, as villains did their awful deed,

When you saw, spitting on your pure divinity,
Scum from the kitchens, outcasts, guardsmen in disgrace,
And felt the crown of thorns around y...

Charles Baudelaire

Punishment For Pride

When in brave days of old, Theology
Flourished with utmost sap and energy,
A celebrated doctor, it is said,
When he had force-fed some indifferent heads;
Had stirred them in their blackest lethargy
Vaulted himself towards holy ecstasy
By mystic processes he scarcely knew,
A state pure souls alone were welcomed to.
This man who'd tried to grasp beyond his reach,
Flushed with Satanic pride, made bold in speech:
'O little Jesus! I have raised you high!
But if I chose to take the other side,
Thou helpless one, I'd bring thy glory low,
The Christ child an outlandish embryo!'

At once his Reason's sentence had begun.
Shrouded in crepe was this once-blazing sun;
All chaos rolled in this intelligence
Before, a temple, ordered, opulent,
Where he'd held f...

Charles Baudelaire

John Ballard

    In the lust of my strength
    I cursed God, but he paid no attention to me:
    I might as well have cursed the stars.
    In my last sickness I was in agony, but I was resolute
    And I cursed God for my suffering;
    Still He paid no attention to me;
    He left me alone, as He had always done.
    I might as well have cursed the Presbyterian steeple.
    Then, as I grew weaker, a terror came over me:
    Perhaps I had alienated God by cursing him.
    One day Lydia Humphrey brought me a bouquet
    And it occurred to me to try to make friends with God,
    So I tried to make friends with Him;
    But I might as well have tried to make friends with the bouquet.
    Now I was very close to the secret,
    For I really could make friends with the bouquet

Edgar Lee Masters

Thoughts On Jesus Christ's Descent Into Hell.

What wondrous noise is heard around!
Through heaven exulting voices sound,

A mighty army marches on
By thousand millions follow'd, lo,
To yon dark place makes haste to go

God's Son, descending from His throne!
He goes the tempests round Him break,

As Judge and Hero cometh He;
He goes the constellations quake,

The sun, the world quake fearfully.

I see Him in His victor-car,
On fiery axles borne afar,

Who on the cross for us expired.
The triumph to yon realms He shows,
Remote from earth, where star ne'er glows,

The triumph He for us acquired.
He cometh, Hell to extirpate,

Whom He, by dying, wellnigh kill'd;
He shall pronounce her fearful fate

Hark! now the curse is straight fulfill'd.

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

The Gallows

I.

The suns of eighteen centuries have shone
Since the Redeemer walked with man, and made
The fisher's boat, the cavern's floor of stone,
And mountain moss, a pillow for His head;
And He, who wandered with the peasant Jew,
And broke with publicans the bread of shame,
And drank with blessings, in His Father's name,
The water which Samaria's outcast drew,
Hath now His temples upon every shore,
Altar and shrine and priest; and incense dim
Evermore rising, with low prayer and hymn,
From lips which press the temple's marble floor,
Or kiss the gilded sign of the dread cross He bore.

II.

Yet as of old, when, meekly "doing good,"
He fed a blind and selfish multitude,
And even the poor companions of His lot
With their dim earthly vision knew...

John Greenleaf Whittier