Read Ebook: American Poetry 1922: A Miscellany by Aiken Conrad Contributor Fletcher John Gould Contributor Frost Robert Contributor H D Hilda Doolittle Contributor Kreymborg Alfred Contributor Lindsay Vachel Contributor Lowell Amy Contributor Millay Edna St Vincent Contributor Oppenheim James Contributor

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Ebook has 269 lines and 37012 words, and 6 pages

AMY LOWELL

ROBERT FROST

CARL SANDBURG

VACHEL LINDSAY

JAMES OPPENHEIM

ALFRED KREYMBORG

SARA TEASDALE

LOUIS UNTERMEYER

JOHN GOULD FLETCHER

JEAN STARR UNTERMEYER

H. D.

CONRAD AIKEN

EDNA ST. VINCENT MILLAY

AMY LOWELL

LILACS

Lilacs, False blue, White, Purple, Color of lilac, Your great puffs of flowers Are everywhere in this my New England. Among your heart-shaped leaves Orange orioles hop like music-box birds and sing Their little weak soft songs; In the crooks of your branches The bright eyes of song sparrows sitting on spotted eggs Peer restlessly through the light and shadow Of all Springs. Lilacs in dooryards Holding quiet conversations with an early moon; Lilacs watching a deserted house Settling sideways into the grass of an old road; Lilacs, wind-beaten, staggering under a lopsided shock of bloom Above a cellar dug into a hill. You are everywhere. You were everywhere. You tapped the window when the preacher preached his sermon, And ran along the road beside the boy going to school. You stood by pasture-bars to give the cows good milking, You persuaded the housewife that her dish-pan was of silver And her husband an image of pure gold. You flaunted the fragrance of your blossoms Through the wide doors of Custom Houses-- You, and sandal-wood, and tea, Charging the noses of quill-driving clerks When a ship was in from China. You called to them: "Goose-quill men, goose-quill men, May is a month for flitting," Until they writhed on their high stools And wrote poetry on their letter-sheets behind the propped-up ledgers. Paradoxical New England clerks, Writing inventories in ledgers, reading the "Song of Solomon" at night, So many verses before bedtime, Because it was the Bible. The dead fed you Amid the slant stones of graveyards. Pale ghosts who planted you Came in the night time And let their thin hair blow through your clustered stems. You are of the green sea, And of the stone hills which reach a long distance. You are of elm-shaded streets with little shops where they sell kites and marbles, You are of great parks where every one walks and nobody is at home. You cover the blind sides of greenhouses And lean over the top to say a hurry-word through the glass To your friends, the grapes, inside.

Lilacs, False blue, White, Purple, Color of lilac, You have forgotten your Eastern origin, The veiled women with eyes like panthers, The swollen, aggressive turbans of jeweled Pashas. Now you are a very decent flower, A reticent flower, A curiously clear-cut, candid flower, Standing beside clean doorways, Friendly to a house-cat and a pair of spectacles, Making poetry out of a bit of moonlight And a hundred or two sharp blossoms.

Maine knows you, Has for years and years; New Hampshire knows you, And Massachusetts And Vermont. Cape Cod starts you along the beaches to Rhode Island; Connecticut takes you from a river to the sea. You are brighter than apples, Sweeter than tulips, You are the great flood of our souls Bursting above the leaf-shapes of our hearts, You are the smell of all Summers, The love of wives and children, The recollection of the gardens of little children, You are State Houses and Charters And the familiar treading of the foot to and fro on a road it knows. May is lilac here in New England, May is a thrush singing "Sun up!" on a tip-top ash-tree, May is white clouds behind pine-trees Puffed out and marching upon a blue sky. May is a green as no other, May is much sun through small leaves, May is soft earth, And apple-blossoms, And windows open to a South wind. May is a full light wind of lilac From Canada to Narragansett Bay.

Lilacs, False blue, White, Purple, Color of lilac, Heart-leaves of lilac all over New England, Roots of lilac under all the soil of New England, Lilac in me because I am New England, Because my roots are in it, Because my leaves are of it, Because my flowers are for it, Because it is my country And I speak to it of itself And sing of it with my own voice Since certainly it is mine.

TWENTY-FOUR HOKKU ON A MODERN THEME

Again the larkspur, Heavenly blue in my garden. They, at least, unchanged.

How have I hurt you? You look at me with pale eyes, But these are my tears.

Morning and evening-- Yet for us once long ago Was no division.

I hear many words. Set an hour when I may come Or remain silent.

In the ghostly dawn I write new words for your ears-- Even now you sleep.

This then is morning. Have you no comfort for me Cold-colored flowers?

My eyes are weary Following you everywhere. Short, oh short, the days!

When the flower falls The leaf is no more cherished. Every day I fear.

Even when you smile Sorrow is behind your eyes. Pity me, therefore.

Laugh--it is nothing. To others you may seem gay, I watch with grieved eyes.

Take it, this white rose. Stems of roses do not bleed; Your fingers are safe.

As a river-wind Hurling clouds at a bright moon, So am I to you.

Watching the iris, The faint and fragile petals-- How am I worthy?

Down a red river I drift in a broken skiff. Are you then so brave?

Night lies beside me Chaste and cold as a sharp sword. It and I alone.

Last night it rained. Now, in the desolate dawn, Crying of blue jays.

Foolish so to grieve, Autumn has its colored leaves-- But before they turn?

Afterwards I think: Poppies bloom when it thunders. Is this not enough?

Love is a game--yes? I think it is a drowning: Black willows and stars.

When the aster fades The creeper flaunts in crimson. Always another!

Turning from the page, Blind with a night of labor, I hear morning crows.

A cloud of lilies, Or else you walk before me. Who could see clearly?

Sweet smell of wet flowers Over an evening garden. Your portrait, perhaps?

Staying in my room, I thought of the new Spring leaves. That day was happy.

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