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Classic and Contemporary Poetry
TOWARDS DEMOCRACY: PART 4. WHEN I LOOK UPON YOUR FACES, by EDWARD CARPENTER Poet's Biography
First Line: Children, dear children, when I look upon your faces
Last Line: Its mystic intimation.
Subject(s): Children; Childhood
First Line: Children, dear children, when I look upon your faces
Last Line: Its mystic intimation.
Subject(s): Children; Childhood
CHILDREN, dear children, when I look upon your faces Lo! all the hidden
griefs, the sorrows and the vain imaginings,
The longings, and the desperate struggles and hatreds,
The jealousies, angers—and the sudden joys, breaking the heart's doors
open—
Pass in dumb show before me.
Like figures in a dream I see them there gesticulating—behind a veil,
in silence.
And still you move to your daily ways and works, seeming so
unconcerned—as I to mine—
And still the waves of Time wash down between us,
And soon shall wash even you and all your dreams
Into the void—and mine.
But even so, dear children, I forebode
Deliverance;
Some better thing than all our dreams and longings:
One Life—and all these images in their strange procession,
Its mystic intimation.
Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!
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THE THREE CHILDREN by JOSEPHINE JACOBSEN
CHILDREN SELECTING BOOKS IN A LIBRARY by RANDALL JARRELL
COME TO THE STONE ... by RANDALL JARRELL
THE LOST WORLD by RANDALL JARRELL
A SICK CHILD by RANDALL JARRELL
CONTINENT'S END by ROBINSON JEFFERS
ON THE DEATH OF FRIENDS IN CHILDHOOD by DONALD JUSTICE
THE POET AT SEVEN by DONALD JUSTICE
AS A MOULD FOR SOME FAIR FORM by EDWARD CARPENTER