|
|
Classic and Contemporary Poetry
A NOCTURNE AT GREENWICH, by VICTOR GUSTAVE PLARR Poet's Biography First Line: Far out, beyond my window, in the gloom Last Line: Out yonder in the gloom. Subject(s): Cities; Night; Rivers; Ships & Shipping; Urban Life; Bedtime | |||
Far out, beyond my window, in the gloom Nightly I see thee loom, Thou vast black city. Oh, but night is kind, Here where Thames' waters wind, To the grim formless features of thy face. They do assume such grace In the deep darkness, starred through leagues of night, With long streets, fringed with light, Or with the lanthorns of the ships that aye Ascend the water-way, Coasting from East and West, and North and South, To this, Earth's harbour-mouth. Up from the darkness echoes sleepily The shipman's wandering cry, Or, like a wild beast's call heard in a dream, The siren's undulant scream Whistles the darkling midnight through and through, While with her labouring screw Some dim leviathan of ships drops down Past storied Greenwich town, Showing her swiftly-gliding starboard light, Green 'gainst the wide dark night. Past the great hospital she drops, and past The marshes, still and vast, Below the lines of Woolwich and the lines Of Bostal's shadowy pines, On to that world of Saxon brine and fen, Old races, vanished men, Where Thames, from heron-haunted shores set free, Merges in northern sea. Here, in my chamber, 'mong my books, at peace, I watch thee without cease, Thou ancient stream, mysterious as the sky Which starless glooms on high. About me, on the volume-peopled wall, The famed old authors all Sleep their just sleep, and in the hearth's clear beams Dante's medallion gleams, And Brutus and great Tully o'er the shelves Commune among themselves. This silent music of what once hath been Suits well with that night scene: Nay, its essential sweetness sweeter grows, Because that river flows Through northern midnight, big with life and doom, Out yonder in the gloom. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...THE BREATH OF NIGHT by RANDALL JARRELL HOODED NIGHT by ROBINSON JEFFERS NIGHT WITHOUT SLEEP by ROBINSON JEFFERS WORKING OUTSIDE AT NIGHT by DENIS JOHNSON POEM TO TAKE BACK THE NIGHT by JUNE JORDAN COOL DARK ODE by DONALD JUSTICE POEM TO BE READ AT 3 A.M by DONALD JUSTICE ROUND ABOUT MIDNIGHT by BOB KAUFMAN EPITAPHIUM CITHARISTRIAE by VICTOR GUSTAVE PLARR |
| |