Classic and Contemporary Poetry
EARTH, by JOHN GOULD FLETCHER Poet's Biography First Line: Earth, let me speak to you Last Line: Finds the faint evening star. Subject(s): Earth; World | ||||||||
I Earth, let me speak to you, Earth, let me listen to you; Patient, brooding, melancholy; Earth of many harvests. Earth, let me rest upon you, Earth, let me sleep upon you, Deep, dark-bosomed mother, Shaper of my life. Mother of the grass That grows and is mown in a season, Mother of the tree That abides for a hundred years in strength; Mother of the man Whose years fall swiftly as the grass, Whose spirit stands yet as a tree Unshattered by the gales; Womb out of which I emerged, Grave into which I must enter, Hear me, mother of my song; Give reply. In the splendor of the morning Hear my question: "Why are not men made as Gods That they may know the beauty of the earth?" In the weariness of evening Answer low: "I am the ultimate mistress, I open wide my arms that all may come." II Earth of bright harvest fields, Rich, firm-breasted, fertile, yielding Golden grain and gleaming flowers, Song-birds, butterflies; Orchard-bearing earth, Chastely beautiful in the spring; After the dense, dull showers of summer, Glowing in pride, mature; Flaming with scarlet fruit, Heavy, firm, and sweet to the taste; Glowing with wild berries Sharp and bitter; You are the giver of all life, Bountiful, fruitful, worn with years, Offering your body up Still to the casual sun; You are the grave that awaits me, The peace that is greater than life's peace, The curtain of silence that falls Upon the close of the play. III Earth of dark battlefields, Red-soaked burnt earth, crumbling, barren, Earth under which the armies burrowed As into living tombs; Earth that is slashed and rent; Shell-gouged, trench-torn, bruised, and battered, Earth that is desolate, A stark and horrible shape. Weedy, forsaken earth, Stagnant with scummy, rotting pools, Earth where nothing flourishes But the rat, the hawk, the crow; You are the grave of my hopes, You are the sterile harlot Kissing me with the fierce kisses of death That eat my lips and eyes; You are the mother of new life, Torn with the pangs of a monstrous birth, The unforgettable shame Through which we men renew. IV Dust returns to the dust, And spirit goes back into spirit; Who speaks with the tongue of the earth, Earth only can set him free. Of me the winds shall speak When they cry with half-human voices, For me the rains shall complain In their long fallings; Through me the stars shall burn bright Over desolate ruined cities; Through me new cities shall rise, Fair as the ones in my dreams. My tears have dropped on the earth, And the earth has received them. My voice has called out to the earth, Earth's silence will answer my speech. My years turn to seaward now, A river of sorrows, burdened, dark; Fed by the clouds and tempests Of other years. I have buried my hopes in the earth, As a man robbed of all but one treasure Hides that away In the hills; I have looked far away to the future, As a man who at sunset peers Into the cloudy, smouldering west Finds the faint evening star. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...THE BROKEN BALANCE by ROBINSON JEFFERS SUBJECTED EARTH by ROBINSON JEFFERS GEOMETAPHYSICS by MARGARET AVISON NIAGARA by JOHN FREDERICK NIMS SOPHISTICATION by CONRAD AIKEN I SEE CHILE IN MY REARVIEW MIRROR by AGHA SHAHID ALI WASHING OUR HANDS OF THE REST OF AMERICA by MARVIN BELL THE EARTH IS A LIVING THING by LUCILLE CLIFTON ARIZONA POEMS: 2. MEXICAN QUARTER by JOHN GOULD FLETCHER |
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