‘an afternoon nap’ by Arthur Yap explores the lacunae in the modern education system and how it results in anxiety and stress in students.
the ambitious mother across the road
is at it again. proclaming her goodness
she beats the boy. shouting out his wrongs, with raps
she begins with his mediocre report-book grades.
Saddened by the results of the American civil war, Walt Whitman wrote the elegy, ‘O Captain! My Captain!’ in memory of deceased American President Abraham Lincoln in 1865. The civil war occurred during his lifetime with Whitman a staunch supporter of unionists.
O Captain! my Captain! our fearful trip is done,
The ship has weather’d every rack, the prize we sought is won,
The port is near, the bells I hear, the people all exulting,
While follow eyes the steady keel, the vessel grim and daring;
‘Lampfall’ by Derek Walcott dives deep into an investigation of thought, dreaming, community and connection while also implying that nature and thought are more meaningful than development.
Closest at lampfall
Like children, like the moth-flame metaphor,
The Coleman's humming jet at the sea's edge
‘Who Burns for the Perfection of Paper’ contrasts two forms of labor and encourages the reader to consider the relationship between them.
At sixteen, I worked after high school hours
at a printing plant
that manufactured legal pads:
‘Why did you come’ by Hilda Doolittle is a free-verse poem about love, self-criticism, aging, and the human inability to control judgments and desires.
Why did you come
to trouble my decline?
I am old (I was old till you came);
‘Winterisation’ subtly weaves the processes of preparing for winter and steeling oneself for news of bereavement.
Halloween at the caravan.
All along the strand
sand is rearing up
like smoke from a bush fire.
‘Howl’ is Allen Ginsberg’s best-known poem and is commonly considered his greatest work. It is an indictment of modern society and a celebration of anyone living outside it.
I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by madness, starving hysterical naked,
dragging themselves through the negro streets at dawn looking for an angry fix,
angelheaded hipsters burning for the ancient heavenly connection to the starry dynamo in the machinery of night,
The poem ‘Lepidoptera’ is a metaphorical representation of a mentally ill mind, likened to a broken butterfly wing. The poet is imploring society to support those with mental illness.
On broken butterfly wing,
your crippled mind fluttered into my schoolroom. Failed. And died.
I couldn’t do a thing to stir its organs
of poor maimed sense to life again.
‘Carpet-weavers, Morocco’ is a challenging poem which explores issues such as child labour as well as examining the myriad origins of beauty.
The children are at the loom of another world.
Their braids are oiled and black, their dresses bright.
Their assorted heights would make a melodious chime.
‘Nightscapes’ beautifully captures the feeling of being isolated from nature that is common in urban environments.
If this was Donegal
I wouldn’t be able to breathe
for fear of swallowing stars…
‘A Watery City’ engages with themes of friendship and journeying, significantly how they are affected by the passage of time.
Well if I’d known how many bridges there were in that city
I’d have worried for your soul and I’d never have written
Hope the prose is flowing as effortlessly as the Lee if
I’d considered the sea. I hadn’t reckoned on reversible rivers.
In “Take me anywhere, anywhere;” by Hilda Doolittle, the poet-speaker addresses a lover, expressing the way in which she takes refuge in their affection.
Take me anywhere, anywhere;
I walk into you,
Doge—Venice—
‘Peckham Rye Lane’ by Amy Blakemore is a twenty-five line poem that is separated in stanzas of various lengths, many
The sun, today –
it leaks desperation,
Gunmetal droplets of perspiration
‘The Machinist, Teaching His Daughter to Play the Piano’ by B.H. Fairchild is a free verse poem about how the creative process can connect a father and daughter.
The brown wrist and hand with its raw knuckles and blue nails
packed with dirt and oil, pause in mid-air,
the fingers arched delicately,
‘The Rose That Grew From Concrete’ is a moving celebration of personal resolve against the backdrop of oppressive forces.
Did you hear about the rose that grew
from a crack in the concrete?
Proving nature's law is wrong it
learned to walk with out having feet.
Jean Bleakney’s ‘Consolidation’ is a deeply personal poem about the act of rearranging the cowry shells that the speaker and her children gathered in the past.
Some sunny, empty afternoon
I’ll pool our decade’s worth
and more of cowrie shells
gathered from that gravel patch
Explore ‘Death of a Young Woman,’ where Clarke depicts how a loved one’s death lets a person free from their inward, endless suffering.
He wept for her and for the hard tasks
He had lovingly done, for the short,
Fierce life she had lived in the white bed,
For the burden he had put down for good.
‘Often I Am Permitted to Return to a Meadow’ by Robert Duncan is often regarded as the poet’s best work. It analyzes the poet’s dream of a meadow while also exploring the new technique of projective verse.
as if it were a scene made-up by the mind,
that is not mine, but is a made place,
‘On the Beach at Night Alone’ by Walt Whitman is a powerful poem. In it, Whitman discusses how everything that has ever existed or will ever exist is connected.
A vast similitude interlocks all,
All spheres, grown, ungrown, small, large, suns, moons, planets,
All distances of place however wide,
All distances of time, all inanimate forms,
‘My Mother Would Be a Falconress’ by Robert Duncan explores a son and mother’s relationship through the lens of a falcon breaking free from his handler.
My mother would be a falconress,
And I, her gay falcon treading her wrist,
would fly to bring back
from the blue of the sky to her, bleeding, a prize,
‘In Memory of the Utah Stars’ captures the manner in which memories can provide us with both pleasure and pain.
Each of them must have terrified
his parents by being so big, obsessive
and exact so young, already gone
and leaving, like a big tipper,
‘Poem About My Rights’ by June Jordan is a one-stanza poem revealing a speaker’s thoughts on misogyny, sexism, and racism from their experience. It is celebrated for accurately portraying the struggles of women and men of color in a patriarchial and predominantly white society.
Even tonight and I need to take a walk and clear
my head about this poem about why I can’t
go out without changing my clothes my shoes
my body posture my gender identity my age
‘Sunday’ by Gillian Clarke was inspired by the poet’s personal experience of attempting to enjoy a Sunday morning but then being reminded of all the suffering that’s going on in the world.
Getting up early on a Sunday morning
leaving them sleep for the sake of peace,
the lunch pungent, windows open
‘1968’ describes the aftermath of a raucous Hollywood party. Seidel works into this context a broader critique of sociopolitical realities.
A football spirals through the oyster glow
Of dawn dope and fog in L.A.’s
Bel Air, punted perfectly. The foot
That punted it is absolutely stoned.
‘Air Raid’ by Chinua Achebe is a poem that provides a glimpse into the Nigerian/Biafran Civil War using symbolism and dark humor.
It comes so quickly
the bird of death
from evil forests of Soviet technology
A man crossing the road
‘Another Insane Devotion’ by Gerald Stern is about a man reflecting on his life experiences. His memories, while not always easily understood, help him see the value of the choices he has made.
This was gruesome—fighting over a ham sandwich
with one of the tiny cats of Rome, he leaped
on my arm and half hung on to the food and half
hung on to my shirt and coat.
‘My Grandmother’s Houses’ by Jackie Kay is a thoughtful recollection of youth and a young speaker’s relationship with her eccentric grandmother, who is forced to move homes.
She is on the second floor of a tenement.
From her front room window you see the cemetery.
‘The Snowman on the Moor’ explores the turbulent and abusive relationship between the speaker (presumably Plath herself) and her male spouse.
Stalemated their armies stood, with tottering banners:
She flung from a room
Still ringing with bruit of insults and dishonors
‘City of Orgies’ by Walt Whitman is a poem written by the celebrated American poet Walt Whitman. The poem is a reflection on the city of Manhattan and Whitman’s experiences in the midst of its bustling urban culture.
City of orgies, walks and joys,
City whom that I have lived and sung in your midst will one day
make you illustrious,
Not the pageants of you, not your shifting tableaus, your specta-
cles, repay me,