Wild Swans

        I looked in my heart while the wild swans went over.
        And what did I see I had not seen before?
        Only a question less or a question more;
        Nothing to match the flight of wild birds flying.
        Tiresome heart, forever living and dying,
        House without air, I leave you and lock your door.
        Wild swans, come over the town, come over
        The town again, trailing your legs and crying!

Edna St. Vincent Millay

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Edna St. Vincent Millay

Lament

Edna St. Vincent Millay, Simple Poetry

Alms

Edna St. Vincent Millay, Simple Poetry

Tavern

Edna St. Vincent Millay, Simple Poetry

To A Poet That Died Young

Edna St. Vincent Millay, Simple Poetry

English

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The Wild Swans At Coole

The trees are in their autumn beauty,
The woodland paths are dry,
Under the October twilight the water
Mirrors a still sky;
Upon the brimming water among the stones
Are nine and fifty swans.

The nineteenth Autumn has come upon me
Since I first made my count;
I saw, before I had well finished,
All suddenly mount
And scatter wheeling in great broken rings
Upon their clamorous wings.

I have looked upon those brilliant creatures,
And now my heart is sore.
Alls changed since I, hearing at twilight,
The first time on this shore,
The bell-beat of their wings above my head,
Trod with a lighter tread.

Unwearied still, lover by lover,
They paddle in the cold,
Companionable streams or climb the air;
Their hearts have not grown ...

William Butler Yeats

Black Swans

As I lie at rest on a patch of clover
In the Western Park when the day is done,
I watch as the wild black swans fly over
With their phalanx turned to the sinking sun;
And I hear the clang of their leader crying
To a lagging mate in the rearward flying,
And they fade away in the darkness dying,
Where the stars are mustering one by one.

O ye wild black swans, 'twere a world of wonder
For a while to join in your westward flight,
With the stars above and the dim earth under,
Through the cooling air of the glorious night.
As we swept along on our pinions winging,
We should catch the chime of a church-bell ringing,
Or the distant note of a torrent singing,
Or the far-off flash of a station light.

From the northern lakes with the reeds and rushes,
Wh...

Andrew Barton Paterson

Alms

        My heart is what it was before,
            A house where people come and go;
        But it is winter with your love,
            The sashes are beset with snow.

        I light the lamp and lay the cloth,
            I blow the coals to blaze again;
        But it is winter with your love,
            The frost is thick upon the pane.

        I know a winter when it comes:
            The leaves are listless on the boughs;
        I watched your love a little while,
            And brought my plants into the house.

        I water them and turn them south,
            I snap the dead brown from the stem;
        But it is winter with your love,--
            I only tend and water them.

        There was a time I stood and watc...

Edna St. Vincent Millay

The Swan Of Dijon

I was in Dijon when the war's wild blast
Was at its loudest; when there was no sound
From dawn to dawn, save soldiers marching past,
Or rattle of their wagons in the street.
When every engine whistle would repeat
Persistently, with meaning tense, profound,
'We carry men to slaughter' or 'we bring
Remnants of men back as war's offering.'

And there in Dijon, the out-gazing eye
Grew weary of the strife-suggesting scene;
But, searching, found one quiet spot hard by
Where war was not; a little lake whereon
Moved leisurely a stately, tranquil swan,
Majestic and imposing, yet serene.

I was in Dijon, when no sound or sight
Woke thoughts of peace, save this one speck of white,
Sailing 'neath skies of menace, unafraid
While silver fountains for his plea...

Ella Wheeler Wilcox

Swans

Night is over the park, and a few brave stars
Look on the lights that link it with chains of gold,
The lake bears up their reflection in broken bars
That seem too heavy for tremulous water to hold.

We watch the swans that sleep in a shadowy place,
And now and again one wakes and uplifts its head;
How still you are, your gaze is on my face,
We watch the swans and never a word is said.

Sara Teasdale

Wild Duck

I

That was a great night we spied upon
See-sawing home,
Singing a hot sweet song to the super-stars
Shuffling off behind the smoke-haze...
Fog-horns sentimentalizing on the river...
Lights dwindling to shining slits
In the wet asphalt...
Purring lights... red and green and golden-whiskered...
Digging daintily pointed claws in the soft mud...
... But you did not know...
As the trains made golden augers
Boring in the darkness...
How my heart kept racing out along the rails,
As a spider runs along a thread
And hauls him in again
To some drawing point...
You did not know
How wild ducks' wings
Itch at dawn...
How at dawn the necks of wild ducks
Arch to the sun
And new-mown air
Trickles sweet in their gullets.

II

Lola Ridge