 The Abandoned God, by Eunice Tegens, read for Libervox.org by Larry Wilson. In the cold darkness of eternity he sits, this God who has grown old, his rounded eyes are open in the whir of time, but man who made him has forgotten him. Blue is his graven face, and silver blue his hands, his eyebrows and his silken beard are scarlet as the hope that built him. The yellow dragon on his rotting robes still rears itself majestically, but thread by thread time eats its scales away. And man who made him has forgotten him. For incense now he breathes the homely smell of rice and tea stored in his ante-room. For priests the busy spiders hang festoons between his fingers and nest them in his yellow nails. The darkness broods upon him. The veil that hid the awful face of Godhead from the two impetuous gaze of worshippers serves in decay to hide from deity the living face of man. So God no longer sees his maker. Let us drop the curtain and be gone. I am old too here in eternity. Let's say Kyao. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. In All by Heinrich Ibsen from Brandt. Read for LibriVox.org. No, by delight no breast is riven, word but so, the ill were less. Be passion slave, be pleasure's throw, but be it utterly all in all. Be not today, tomorrow one, another when a year is gone. But be what you are with all your heart, and not by pieces and in part. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. Apples Ripe for Eating by Edgar A. Guest. Read for LibriVox.org by Christine Lehmann, Recita, California. Apples Ripe for Eating and the great fire blazing high, and outside the moon of autumn fairly swimming in the sky. The cellar packed with good things from the vine and field and tree. Oh, the speech of man can't tell it, but it somehow seems to me, with such warmth and cheer around us, we should all burst into song, and store enough of gladness now to last our whole lives long. Apples Ripe for Eating. There's a joy beyond compare, to pay for all our trouble and the burdens we must bear. The bowl upon the table filled with round and rosy cheeks, and enough down in the cellar to last all the winter weeks, so that when the bowl is empty we can fill it up again, and in spite of that we grumble and we bitterly complain. I sometimes sit and wonder as we pack life's fruits away, and hoard them in the cellar for the bleak and wintry day, why the mind of man has never tried to store a stock of cheer in the cellar of his memory for the barren time of year, so that when joy's bowl is emptied and he thinks that life is vain he can seek his hoard of pleasures and just fill it up again. Apples ripe for eating and a stock of them below, for the long cold nights of winter we shall shortly come to know, so that when we need a pleasure that will seem to soothe the soul we can wander to the cellar and fill up the apple bowl, so we could, if we were mindful, when our hearts with grief are sad, refresh our faltering courage with the pleasures we have had. At Verona, by Oscar Wilde, read for LibriVox.org by Rob Marland in Verona. At Verona. How steep the stairs within King's houses are, for exile wearied feet as mine to tread, and oh how salt and bitter is the bread which falls from this hounds' table, better far that I had died in the red ways of war, or that the gate of Florence bear my head than to live thus by all things comraded which seek the essence of my soul to mar. Curse God and die, what better hope than this? He hath forgotten thee in all the bliss of his gold city and eternal day. Nay, peace, behind my prison's blinded bars I do possess what none can take away, my love and all the glory of the stars. End of Poem. This recording is in the Public Domain. Autumn Days by W. E. Hutchinson. Read for LibriVox.org by Christine Layman, Recita, California. When bright-hued leaves from tree and thicket fall, and on the ground their autumn carpets true, and overhead the wild geese honking call, in wedge-shaped column high amid the blue, when from the sagebrush and from mountain high the quail's soft note re-echoes far and wide, when hunter moon hangs crescent in the sky, and wild deer range on rugged mountainside, when old primeval instincts, nature-born, stir in the hunter's blood with lust to kill, and drive him forth with dog and gun at morn, to sheltered blind or runway neath the hill. All these proclaim the glorious autumn days, when nature spends her wealth with lavish hand, and o'er the landscape spreads a purple haze, and waves her magic scepter o'er the land. End of Poem. This recording is in the Public Domain. Autumn by E. Dickinson. Read for LibriVox.org by Christine Layman, Recita, California. The morns are meeker than they were, the nuts are getting brown, the berries cheek is plumper, the rose is out of town, the maple wears a gayer scarf, the field a scarlet gown, lest I should be old-fashioned, I'll put a trinket on. End of Poem. This recording is in the Public Domain. Ave Maria Gratia Plena by Oscar Wilde. Read for LibriVox.org by Rob Marland in Florence. Was this his coming? I had hoped to see a scene of wondrous glory, as was told of some great God who, in a rain of gold, broke open bars and fell on Danai. Or a dread vision, as when semily, sickening for love and unappeased desire, prayed to see God's clear body, and the fire caught her brown limbs and slew her utterly. With such glad dreams I sought this holy place, and now, with wandering eyes and heart, I stand before this supreme mystery of love. Some kneeling girl with passionless pale face, an angel with a lily in his hand, and over both the white wings of a dove. Florence. End of Poem. This recording is in the Public Domain. The Balloon Peddler by Christopher Morley. Read for LibriVox.org by Larry Wilson. Who is the man on Chestnut Street with colored toy balloons? I see him with his airy freight on sunny afternoons, a peddler of such lovely goods, the heart leaps to behold his mass of bubbles, red and green and blue and pink and gold. For sure the noble peddler man hath antique merchandise, his toys that flotent's women air attract might your eyes. Perhaps he is a changeling prince bewitched through some magic moons to tempt us solemn busyfolk with meaningless balloons. Beware, O valiant merchant man, tread cautious on the pave, lest some day come some realist, some haggard soul engrave, a puritan efficientist, who deems thy toys a sin, he'll stock thee madly from behind and prick them with a pin. End of Poem. This recording is in the Public Domain. Before a Court of Justice by Johann Goethe, 1749-1831, read for LibriVox.org. Before a Court of Justice. My father's name ye nare shall be told of my darling unborn life. Shame, shame ye cry on the strumpet bold, yet I'm an honest wife. To whom I'm wedded ye nare shall be told, yet he's both loving and fair. He wears on his neck a chain of gold, and ahead of straw doth he wear. If scorned is vain to seek to repel on me, let the scorn be thrown. I know him well, and he knows me, and to God too, all is known. Sir Parson and Sir Bailiff, again, I pray you, leave me in peace. My child it is, my child twill remain, so let your questioning cease. End of Poem. This recording is in the Public Domain. Blue Squills by Sarah Teasdale, read for LibriVox.org by Bruce Kachuk. How many million aprils came before I ever knew, how white a cherry-bowl could be, a bed of squills, how blue, and many a dancing april, when life is done with me, will lift the blue flame of the flower and the white flame of the tree. O burn me with your beauty then, O hurt me, tree, and flower, lest in the end death try to take even this glistening hour. O shaken flowers, O shimmering trees, O sunlit white and blue, wound me that I, through endless sleep, may bear the scar of you. End of Poem. This recording is in the Public Domain. By the Arno by Oscar Wilde, read for LibriVox.org by Rob Marland. By the Arno in Florence at Dawn. The oleander on the wall grows crimson in the dawning light, though the grey shadows of the night lie yet on Florence like a pawl. The dew is bright upon the hill and bright the blossoms overhead, but, ah, the grasshoppers have fled, the little attic song is still. Only the leaves are gently stirred by the soft breathing of the gale, and in the almond-scented veil the lonely nightingale is heard. The day will make thee silent soon, oh nightingale, sing on for love, while yet upon the shadowy grove splinter the arrows of the moon. Before across the silent lawn in sea-green vest the morning steals, and to love's frightened eyes reveals the long white fingers of the dawn. Fast climbing up the eastern sky to grasp and slay the shuddering night, all careless of my heart's delight, or if the nightingale should die. End of Powin. This recording is in the public domain. THE COCO-PALM by Paul Claudelle Translated by Teresa Francis and William Rose Bene. Read for LibriVox.org by Wes Freeman. Our trees stand upright like men, but motionless, thrusting their roots deep in earth, they flourish with outstretched arms. But here the sacred bonion does not rise as a single stem, for the pendant threads through which it returns, seeking the fruitful soil, make it seem a marvellous temple self-created. Observe only the COCO-PALM. It has no branches. At the apex of the trunk it raises a tuft of fronds. COCO-PALM, the insignia of triumph, aerial in the light, consummate bloom of the crest, its sores expands for joises, and sinks beneath the weight of its own freedom. Through the warm day and the long noon the COCO-PALM expands, and an ecstasy it spreads its happy leaves, like infant heads the coconuts appear, the great green fruit of the tree. Just as the COCO-PALM gesture, revealing its heart, for the lower leaves and folding from out their depth reach pendulum to the earth, and the leaves in the midst spread far on every side, and the leaves above uplifted like the hands of an awkward man, or like one who signals his complete submission, slowly wave and sigh. The trunk is nowhere rigid but ringed, and like to the blades of the grass it is supple and long. It is swayed by the moods of the earth, whether it strains toward the sun, or bends its spreading plumes over swift and turbid rivers, or between the sea and the sky. One night returning along the shore of the sea, assaulted with turbulent foam by the whole deep thundering weight of the Leonine Indian Ocean, beneath the southwestern monsoon, as I followed the shore far strewn with palms like the skeleton wrecks of boats and of lesser and living things, I saw them upon my left. As I walked by that forest, empty beneath its dense woven ceiling, the palms seemed enormous spiders crawling obliquely across the peaceful twilight heaven. Venus like a moon drowned in divinus light flickered a wide reflection in the waters. In a palm tree bent over the sea in the mirrored planet, and its gesture offered its heart to the heavenly fire. I shall often remember that night when, afar, I yearned to return. I saw the leafage hanging in heavy tresses, and across the high feign of the forest, that sky where the storm, setting its feet on the sea, loomed up like a mountain, and how low on the dark horizon the pale pearl of the ocean gleamed. O Ceylon, shall I ever forget thee, thy fruits and thy flowers, and thy people with melting eyes, naked beside those highways that are hued like the mango's flesh. In my rickshaw man's gift of nodding rosy flowers, which he placed on my knees, when, with tears in his eyes, crushed down by sorrow, but nibbling a leaf of cinnamon, I left thee at last beneath thy rainy skies. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. Upon a rock yet uncreate amid a chaos in Coate, an uncreated being sate. Beneath him rock, above him cloud, and the cloud was rock, and the rock was cloud. The rock then growing soft and warm, the cloud began to take a form, a form chaotic, vast and vague, which issued in the cosmic egg. Then the being uncreate on the egg did incubate, and thus became the incubator. And of the egg did alligate, and thus became the alligator. And the incubator was potentate, and the alligator was potentator. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. The Elixir of Love by Madison Cawine Red for LibriVox.org by Colleen McMahon. He held it possible that he who idolizes one that's dead, with that strange liquid instantly might raise them living red, and so he thought, to his mind at last, to live and love the love that's past, the joy without the grief and pain, the dead shall live and love again. For he had loved one till for him her face had grown his spirit part, though dead she seemed to him less dim than men in street and mark. He labored on, for truth to say, and toil alone his pleasure lay, his art through which sometime he thought, back to his arms she would be brought. He kept such tris as phantoms keep, pale distances about his soul, and moved like one who walks asleep, attaining no sure goal. Yet blither than a younger heart at crucible and glass retort he labored, for his love was prism, to irasate toil's egoism. He drained wand drafts from out a cup, a globe of vague and flaming gold, held from the darkness brimming up by something white and cold, yet wreathed faint fingers round its brim, slim flakes of foam and soft and dim, stooped out of fiery bound abysses to print his brow with icy kisses. At last within his trembling hand an ancient flask burnt starry rose, a liquid flame of ruby-fand heart-like with crimson throes, and in the liquid like a flower a star-like face bloomed for an hour, then slowly faded to a skull, with eyes that mocked the beautiful. Though all his life had been so strange, yet stranger now it seemed to be, what was it led him forth to range midgraves and mystery? What led him to that one dim tomb, where he could read within the gloom the name of one who lay within, with all of silence, not of sin? Untainted so it seemed, and made by death's cold kisses still more fair, he found her, raised her, softly laid her raven depths of hair upon his shoulder, and the pearls around her neck and in her curls less pale were than the kingly calm upon his face that showed no qualm. And through the night beneath the moon, across the windy hill, the gloom of forests where the leaves lay strewn he brought her to his room, and in the awfulness of death that filled her wide eyes with its breath, he set her in a carven chair where the still moon could kiss her hair. One moment then he paused to think, then to her lips, all drawn and dead, his strange elixir pressed and, drink, drink life and love, he said, and it drank, the dead drank slow, and in its eyes there came a glow, yet still as stone its body sate, with eyes of hell and lips of hate. Still as fall-frozen ice its face, and thin its voice is drizzled rain, when in its rotting silk and lace it rose and lived again. Its bosom moved not while it spake, nor moved its lips, and half awake its eyes seemed with enchanted sleep, a century long in night's old keep, and stooping or whispered low, a sound like a vibrating wire, or like the hiss of falling snow in fluttering's faint of fire. In me behold you see your toil, in me your love a thing to coil, around your life thus make entire the demon of your dead desire. And where before was quietness was violence of hate and evil, yet all its form seemed passionless a corpse that held a devil. But who shall say the hands were its that made within his throat these pits? They found him dead, and by him one who clasped him close, a skeleton. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. A Fragment by Adam Lindsay Gordon Read for Librevox.org by Dale Grothman. They say that poison-sprinkled flowers are sweeter in perfume, than when untouched by deadly dew they glow in early bloom. They say that men to dim to die have quaff the sweetened wine, with higher relish than the juice of the untampered vine. They say that in the witch's song, though rude and harsh it be, there blends a wild, mysterious strain of weirdest melody. And I believe the devil's voice sinks deeper in our ear than any whisper sent by heaven, however sweet and clear. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. Futility by Wilfred Owen Read for Librevox.org by Dale Grothman. Move him into the sun. Gently its touch woke him once, at home, whispering of fields unsone. Always it woke him, even in France, until this morning and this snow. If anything might rouse him now, the kind old son will know. Think how it wakes the seeds. Woke once the clays of a cold star. Our limbs so dear achieved, our sides full-nerved, still warm, too hard to stir. Was it for this the clay grew tall? O what made fatuous sunbeams toil to break the earth's sleep at all? End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. A Garden by the Sea By William Morris Read for Librevox.org by Bruce Kachok. I know a little garden-clothes, set thick with lily and red rose, where I would wander if I might, from dewy morn to dewy night, and have one with me wandering. And though within it no bird sing, and though no pillard house is there, and though the apple-bows are bear of fruit and blossom, would to God her feet upon the green grass trod, and I beheld them as before. There comes a murmur from the shore, and in the clothes two fair streams are, drawn from the purple hills afar, drawn down unto the restless sea. Dark hills whose heath-bloom feeds no bee. Dark shore no ship has ever seen, tormented by the billows green, whose murmur comes unceasingly, unto the place for which I cry, for which I cry, both day and night, for which I let slip all delight, whereby I grow both deaf and blind, careless to win, unskilled to find, and quick to lose what all men seek. But tottering as I am, and weak, still have I left a little breath to seek within the jaws of death an entrance to that happy place, to seek the unforgotten face once seen, once kissed, once reft from me, a nigh the murmuring of the sea. End of poem This recording is in the public domain. The Happy Hunting Grounds by E. Pauline Johnson, read for LibriVox.org by Bruce Kachuk. Into the rose-gold westland its yellow prairies roll, world of the bison's freedom, home of the Indian soul, roll out all seas in sunlight bathed, your planes wind-tossed and grass-enswayed, farther than vision ranges, farther than eagles fly, stretches the land of beauty, arches the perfect sky, hemmed through the purple mist so far, by peaks that gleam like star on star, fringing the prairie billows, fretting horizons line, darkly green or slumbering, wildernesses of pine, sleeping until the zephyrs throng, to kiss their silence into song, whispers freighted with odor, singing into the air, russet needles as sensors, swing to an altar where the angel's songs are less divine than duo's song, twixt breeze and pine. Laughing into the forest dimples a mountain stream, pure as the air's above it, soft as a summer dream, O lethian spring, thou art only found within this ideal hunting ground. Surely the great hereafter cannot be more than this. Surely we'll see that country after time's farewell kiss. Who would his lovely faith condole, who envies not the Redskins' soul? Sailing into the cloud-land, sailing into the sun, into the crimson portals, a jar when life is done, O dear dead-race, my spirit too would feign sail westward unto you. There is a land far over the Atlantic, well stocked with wealth and in size gigantic. Many moons have waxed and waned since I was there, but I hope to see that land again ere I dive, for I learnt to love the prairieous wide, where often I roamed and myself did hide far from the world. There, living close to nature, working for my bread, my mind did mature. Young was I, and in a foreign land, but yet I was not lonely, and good friends I met. Rough men they were, but their hearts were good, and they did cheer me at the end of a hard day. Once I remember, when with a threshing gang, returning from the fields that these men sang, as though the world was theirs, they were all carefree, and found life good, and they looked after me. Twas round the capfire I heard many a yarn from men who had worked up in the Yukon, panning for gold in the creeks of the still north, where men must be men, and to show their worth, where nature ever rules supreme, undefiled in the great still north, glorious and wild, in isolation far from the world outside, a land for men and for her men have died. Strange tales I heard from men who had traveled far, from Dawson City out to Zanzibar, across many seas each one had worked his way, for though they had money they would not pay. Some there were who'd spend a lifetime in the bush, and told me they preferred it to the crush of city life and all sedentary toil. Nature's children they were, men of the soil. Twas hard work indeed out in the harvest fields, first stooking than pitching the wheat that yields food for millions, for I was of gentle birth, but did my best to show what I was worth. I learned to use my muscles, and the wages were good, and indeed I could write pages about the way men worked to get on their feet once again after they arrived deadbeat. In America a man can always rise up though down, and to no one does despise him, for there all men are equal and are free. The past is dead, and what you are to be is all that counts, and men take you at your worth. They don't ask your rank or query your birth, for it is a land of freedom and fair play, from my heart I say God bless USA. Spike pitching is not quite the easiest work, and it fell to my lot, I did not shirk the job, but I soon was sorely tired, and found that I liked better pitching from the ground, but I held on a while, and too I was proud to work as well as any in the crowd. For that is what we were, just a motley crew, and like the rest I did tobacco-chew. The long days passed, and I too became quite tough, and in my ways I was a little rough, but yet I was happy, healthy, and carefree, and the harvest fields became home to me. Though I could sing more about those happy days, I will wait and see what the public says. After they have read all my stanzas so rough, they may want more, but they may cry enough. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. The Haunted House by Klaus Grot Translated by Kate Freiligrat Read for LibriVox.org by Newgate Novelist By day it looks a cheerful house with panes and windows bright, but soon as twilight dim sets in, tis eerie then by night, then someone steals on slip of soft down passage and by door. But when it length the morning dawns, the sound is heard no more. Tis just as if a woman old were looking all the night for something that she could not find, and searched till morning's light. From out the parlor it comes forth, and wanders all about. It tries each door, and feels each lock, as though the key were out. It fumbles at the kitchen door. It gently lifts the latch, and feels its darkling way about, with many a grope and scratch. Then on it shuffles against the wall and rustles as it goes, and now the stairs begin to creak beneath the ghostly toes, and in the lumbar attic next doth rummage without end, till slams the door with muffled sound. Again it doth descend. The large room hath an iron chain, tis clanked whole hours they say, but all doth vanish when the cock doth crow at break of day. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. Happy Halloween. The Haunted Moor by Klaus Groot, translated by Kate Freiligrat, read for LibriVox.org by Newgate Novelist. What moaned so loud in moor and bush? Sure, tis the wind in reed and rush. Tis neither reed nor night wind sigh. Tis woman's moan and infants cry. You hear it wailing weak and ill, all night you hear it sobbing still, but ere the morning sun comes round it sinks, like mist, into the ground. And when the shepherd sleeps at noon he hears a distant muffled croon so deep, so hollow, soft and low, as mother hushed her child below. It is a restless soul, they say, that flies at morning streak away. It is a soul whose peace is gone, that sadly thus doth make its moan. And when the moor is bleak and bare, and autumn leaves whirl through the air, then flies midst all the uproar wild, a death pale maiden with her child. Upon yon heath there is a moor, there willows grow but scant and poor. Upon yon heath a pool lies drear, there neither frog nor toad you hear. The white sheep grass grows all around, its depth no man as yet did sound, its water sickers green and slow, and only breaks wiles further through. That is the place she threw it in. Now she must haunt it for its sin. She stands and wild her locks doth tear, then she is gone until next year. Autumn is near. The quail doth cry. The cuckoo long half said goodbye. Listen, how loud the moans and clear, it will soon be silent till next year. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. Happy Halloween. I've orders to waken you from your nap, and orders are orders, my little chap, but I hate to do it, because it seems a shame to break in on your blissful dreams. I've sat and watched you a long, long while, and not since I came have you ceased to smile, so it strikes me as wrong to arouse you, boy, from sleep that's so plainly a sleep of joy. To make a big difference tonight, of course, but perhaps you are riding a real live horse. In dreams it's a pleasant and harmless sport, so why should I cruelly cut it short? Maybe you have, for your very own, a piece of pie or an ice cream cone. If that's your amusement, why end it quick? Even food can't possibly make you sick. Orders are orders, and I'm afraid it's trouble for me if they're disobeyed, but I'll bet if the boss could see you, son, she'd put off the duties as I have done. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. She woke by Klaus Grott, translated by Kate Freiligrott, read for LibriVox.org by Newgate novelist. She entered softly in her shroud and held a burning light. She was still paler than her shroud, and as the walls so white, thus came she slowly towards the bed. The curtains drew away. She held the candle to his face and bent down where he lay. Her mouth and eyes were firmly closed, the lashes touched her cheek. No limb she moved, and yet she looked as one who feign would speak. Cold terror crept along his back and froze his blood and bone. He fought to shriek in deadly fear, but lo, his voice was gone. He fought to seize it with his hands, the spectre cold and mute, and felt in all his agony. He stirred nor hand nor foot, and when he woke from out his trance, she went out by the door, as pale as death in graveyard shroud, holding the light before. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. Happy Halloween! The Human Seasons by John Keats Red for LibriVox.org by Winston Tharp Four seasons fill the measure of the year. There are four seasons in the mind of man. He has his lusty spring when fancy clear takes in all beauty with an easy span. He has his summer when luxuriously springs, honeyed cud of youthful thought he loves to ruminate, and by such dreaming high is nearest unto heaven. Quiet coves his soul has in its autumn when his wings he furleth close, contented so to look on mists and idleness to let fair things pass by unheeded as a threshold brook. He has his winter, too, of pale misfeature, or else he would forgo his mortal nature. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. Hit Us in Our Love and Order by Emil Vercharen Red for LibriVox.org by Chad Horner from Liverpool Let us in our love and order let us live so boldly our finest thoughts that they enter wave in harmony with the supreme ecstasy in perfect fervour, because in our kindred souls something more holy than we impure and greater awakens let us clasp hands to worship it three ourselves. It matters not that we have only cries or tears to define it humbly, and that its charm is so rare and powerful that in the enjoyment of it our hearts are nigh to fulfilling us. Even so let us remain, and forever, the mad devotees of this almost implacable love, and the kneeling worshippers of the sudden God who reigns in us so violent and so ardently gentle that He hurts and overwhelms us. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. Light by Zona Gale Red for LibriVox.org by Larry Wilson We do not touch the texture of the light, but one may see with a secret eye the things that are. Then we divine that we need not die to win our heritage of sight, as well this earth as any other star. Waking from dream their trails in alien air, a residue of other suns than these, we know that we have walked an inner way, have met familiars there, and kept our step in exquisite concord, the while we spoke some unremembered word. And over all there lay light whose vibrations ran to other keys than those we woke upon. Light whose long play was dappled color delicately kissed. Strange fires, raid from strange regions of the Lord. Light from the sun behind the sun fell where we went to keep our trist. In sleep and in the solitary dusk there come fine lines of light upon the lowered lids. A flush that lets us in the heart of night and hints dear wonders to be there at home, as if the universal fabric bids its human pattern know that all is light. In snow have we not seen the whiteness mitten through with sudden rays of glory, vague with veils, of some beloved hue that pales to earthly rose and violet and blue. O you who pulse within that light, we know, we know. Soon from without transition night we would come into this our own. Then the dim tune, the which we almost hear, the low key color and the word we have not heard. All these we shall be shown, and invently near to God, breathe for our breath his light. In the poem this recording is in the public domain. A Long Dress by Gertrude Stein Read for LibriVox.org by Wes Freeman What is the current that makes machinery, that makes it crackle? What is the current that presents a long line and a necessary waste? What is this current? What is the wind? What is it? Where is the serene length? It is there, and a dark place is not a dark place, only a white and red are black, only a yellow and green are blue, a pink is scarlet, a bow is every color, a line distinguishes it, a line just distinguishes it. End of Poem This recording is in the public domain. Midges in the Sunshine by Anonymous Read for LibriVox.org by Anita Sloma Martinez If I could see with the midges eye, or think with the midges brain, I wonder what I'd say of the world with all its joy and pain. Would my seven brief hours of mortal life seem as long as seven years as I danced in the flickering sunshine amid my tiny piers? Should I feel the slightest hope or care for the midges yet to be, or think I died before my time if I died at half past three, instead of living till sun of sun on the breath of the summer wind, or deem that the world was made for me and all my little kind? Perhaps if I did I'd know as much of nature's mighty plan, and what it meant for good or ill as that larger midge, a man. End of Poem This recording is in the public domain. The Parting Kiss by Robert Burns Read for LibriVox.org by Chad Horner from LibriVox. Humid seal of soft affections, tenderest pledge of future bliss, dearest tie of young connections, rose first, snow drop, virgin kiss, speaking silence, dumb confession, passion's birth, and infant's play, dove-like fondness, chaste concession, glowing dawn of future day, sorrowing joy, adduced last action, lingering lips, busnidus join, what words can ever speak affections so thrilling and sincere as thine. End of Poem This recording is in the public domain. Perversity by Aileen Kilmer Read for LibriVox.org by Mike Overby, Spokane Washington All my life I have loved where I was not loved, and always those whom I did not love loved me. Only the God who made my wild heart knows why this should be. Oh, I am strange, inscrutable, and proud. You cannot prove me though you try and try. I'll keep your love alive and wondering until you die. End of Poem This recording is in the public domain. Red Riding Hood by James Whitcomb Prilly Read for LibriVox.org by Kudrinov Sweet little mate of the nursery story, eerliest laugh of mine and fun-tile breast. Be something tangible, bloom in thy glory, into existence as doe-art addressed. Huston appeared to me, guileless and good, doe-art so dear to me, Red Riding Hood. As your blue eyes in the marvel of wonder, over the dawn of her blush-breaking out, sensitive nose with a little smile under, trying to hide in a blossoming pote. Couldn't be serious, try as you would, little mysterious Red Riding Hood. Ha, little girl, it is desolate, lonely. Out in this gloomy old forest of life, here are not pansies and buttercups only, rambles and dryers as keen as a knife, and a heart, revenues, trails in the wood, for the male have he must Red Riding Hood. End of Poem This recording is in the public domain. Return by D. H. Lawrence Read for LibriVox.org by Chad Horner from Liverpool Now I am come again, you who have so desired my coming. Why do you look away from me? Why does your cheek burn against me? Have I inspired such anger as sets your mouth unwontantly? Ah, here I sit while you break the music beneath your bow, for broken it is and hurting to hear. Seize them from music. Does anguish of absence bequeath me only a liftness when I draw near? End of Poem This recording is in the public domain. Sir Ralph by Louis Brockman Read for LibriVox.org by Sonja Sir Ralph A who's poor me on bra bra rose Hangs a tween, lift and see Lord Ronald left, can I add wings I'd pull young rose for thee Foo-fifty fathoms abound the fame Foo-fifty abound the strand Sir Ralph he put that bra bra rose And laid it in her white hand O sweet my rose, thou's a silly thing To crown so high a crest To a feckless deed for such a mead To gang on such a quest She turned her bow to Lord Ronald And laid the rose in his breast Whose ride me over this warm water That ridden so deep and strang To pull the mayblossom for young a thorn Loud left Lord Ronald and line Sir Ralph he looped into his cell He shook his goat's state's rain And hot and thick he breathed and quick And pecked and pecked again With either ear laid down in fear Align his bristling mane He spurred him to the water spring His hoofs destruct the fame Stuck still he stood where the wane went Flood break white against his wane O deep, deep struck the cruel spur Till the blood flowed out of pace The wide ways glimmered round his neck As he plunged into the rays The spray drift dashed a boon his head And wet the rider's face They win across that wane water They win the father's strand Sir Ralph he pushed the mayblossom And they win back to land She laughed and took the mayblossom All wet with the salt-salt spray O lightly done is but have one Sir Knight that made did say Loud laughed Lord Ronald The lady smiled She striked his horse's mane Two lightly sped, fair sir, she said Swim me the stream, your lane O louder yet Lord Ronald laughed That lady smiled on him Lord Ronald eyes fair over yon water Gindow do with me swim O louder yet Lord Ronald laughed Nay, mares, she smiled on him Lord Ronald he kissed that small white hand She plucked her hand away O go thou waste, false lord, she says Nay, coward wins my fay O go thou waste, sir Ralph, she says Dainty thee, louting and low For never at night shall be my troth plight Who dares not say me no O ill betide such a pearl lones bright Ye may kiss my hand and go Sir Ralph he cocked his blue bonnet To his ron he turned him round He gripped in his mane And with sheathed sword Smelt heavily on the ground He struck the spray from his yellow beard He looped into his cell I would not kiss that little white hand To save my soul for hell God give you grace for your winsome face O in heaven, he is never dwell O steady, O steady, that lady cries O steady, O woe is me O steady, and be mine only a love And I is purely a love to thee That lady kissed the cries that her breast And louted upon her knee Sir Ralph looped down for his bonny ron He gripped that lady's hand His lift her up from her knee where she knelt Upon the wet, wet strand And twice he kisses that little white hand And twice that brow of snow O the rose blooms fair in her golden hair Here he wins to her lips I throw But a long kiss on those ripe red lips And he fouls on his banded knee Sweet lemon, I is kneel to thee foray Since thou snelt for love of me I is kissed thy feet while the rose is sweet And the burn rinsed to the sea End of poem This recording is in the public domain Smith of the Third Oregon Dies By Mary Carolyn Davies Read for Librebox.org by Winston Tharp Autumn in Oregon is wet as spring And green with little singings in the grass And pheasants flying gold, green and red Great, narrow, lovely things As if an orchid had snatched wings. There are strange birds like blots against a sky Where a sun is dying. Beyond the river where the hills are blurred A cloud like the one word of the two silent sky stirs And there stand black trees on either hand. Autumn in Oregon is wet and new as spring And puts a fever like springs in the cheek That once has touched her dew And it puts longing, too, in eyes that once have seen Her season-flouting green And ears that listen to her strange bird speak. Autumn in Oregon I'll never see those hills again A blur of blue and rain across the old willamette I'll not stir a pheasant as I walk And hear it whir above my head An indolent, trusting thing When all this silly dream is finished here The fellas will go home To wear their fall rose-petals on every street And all the year is like a friendly festival But I shall never watch those hedges drip color Nor see the tall spar of a ship In our old harbor They say that I'm dying Perhaps that's why it all comes back again Autumn in Oregon and pheasants flying End of poem This recording is in the public domain The Song of the Beasts by Rupert Brooke Read for LibriVox.org by Colleen McMahon Song on one night in the cities in the darkness Come away, come away Ye are sober and dull through the common day But now it is night It is shameful night and God is asleep Have you not felt the quick fires That creep through the hungry flesh And the lust of delight And hot secrets of dreams That day cannot say? The house is dumb The night calls out to you Come, ah, come Down the dim stairs Through the creaking door Naked crawling on hands and feet It is meat, it is meat Ye are men no longer but less and more Beast and God Down the lamplest street By little black ways and secret places In the darkness and mire Faint laughter around and evil faces By the star-glint scene Ah, follow with us For the darkness whispers a blind desire And the fingers of night are amorous Keep close as we speed Though mad whispers woo you and hot hands cling And the touch and the smell of bare flesh sting Soft flank by your flank And side brushing side Tonight never heed Unswerving and silent follow with me Till the city ends sheer And the crooked lanes open wide Out of the voices of night Beyond lust and fear To the level waters of moonlight To the level waters quiet and clear To the black, unresting planes of the calling sea End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. The Spider and the Ghost of the Fly by Vache Lindsay Read for LibriVox.org by Thomas Peter. Once I loved a spider When I was born a fly A velvet-footed spider With a gown of rainbow dye She ate my wings and gloated She bound me with a hair She drove me to a parlor Above her winding stair To educate young spiders She took me all apart My ghost came back to haunt her I saw her eat my heart End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. Spirits of the Dead by Edgar Allen Poe Read for LibriVox.org by Thomas Peter. Thy soul shall find itself alone Mid dark thoughts of the grey tombstone Not one of all the crowd Depri into thine hour of secrecy Be silent in that solitude Which is not loneliness For then the spirits of the dead Who stood in life before thee are again In death around thee And their will shall overshadow thee Be still. The night, though clear, shall frown And the stars shall not look down From their high thrones in the heaven With light like hope to mortals given But their red orbs without beam To thy weariness shall seem As a burning and a fever Which would cling to thee forever. Now our thoughts thou shalt not banish Now our visions ne'er to vanish From thy spirit shall they pass no more Like dew drops from the grass. The breeze, the breath of God, is still And the mist upon the hill shadowy, shadowy, yet unbroken Is a symbol and a token. How it hangs upon the trees, a mystery Of mysteries. Swamp Demons by C. A. Butts Read for LibriVox.org by Colleen McMahon. The lights that wank across the sodden moor Like phosphorescent eyes that beckon men To risk fell footsteps in the treacherous fen And sink in loathsome mock without a spore. What ghosts of former days What dread allure abides within this subterranean den Or reaching out snares victims to its ken With wraith-like fingers to apparel shore. Tis told that evil things lurk out of sight With human bones that fester in the ooze. The like tis true, these bones that once Were clothed in fleshly form Now harbored deadly spite against the living. When this swamp still brews within its bubbling depths, the curse men loathed before they turned To leprous things of night. The Queen called for her sentence while the drab Demanded love in the wild hunger-tore. The woman raged to touch the flame once more, but the worn-out emotions could not stab. There were the thousand parts she had to say'd In the three thousand gowns that she had worn. Into the rag-bag each frock found its flight Crumpled and ravished of a film-proud shade, And every script is wandering forlorn Nod by the mirage of an opening night. This recording is in the public domain. Threnody by Ralph Waldo Emerson Read for LibriVox.org by Sonya. Threnody. The south wind brings life, sunshine, and desire, and on every mountain meadow Breeze aromatic fire, but over the dead he has no power, the lost, the lost he cannot restore, And looking over the hills I mourn, the darling who shall not return. I see my empty house, I see my trees repair their boughs, and he, the wondrous child, whose silver-warble wild outvalued every pulsing sound, within the air's cerulean round, the highest synth-thin boy, for whom mourn well might break and April bloom, the gracious boy who did adorn the world wherein, too, he was born, and by his countenance repay the favour of the loving day, has disappeared from the day's eye. Far and wide she cannot find him, my hopes pursue they cannot bind him. Returned this day the south wind surges, and finds young pines and budding birches, but finds not the budding man. Nature, who lost, cannot remake him, fate let him fall, fate can't retake him. Nature, fate, men, him seek in vain. And wither now, my true and wise and sweet, O wither, tend thy feet. I had the right, few days ago, thy steps to watch, thy place to know. How have I forfeited the right? Has thou forgot me in a new delight? I harkened for thy household cheer, O eloquent child, whose voice, an equal messenger, conveyed thy meaning mild. What, though the pains and joys, whereof it spoke with hoys, fitting his age and can, yet fairest dames and bearded men, who heard the sweet request, so gentle, wise and grave, bend it with joy to his behest, and let the world's affairs go by. A while to share his cordial game, or mend his weaker wagon-frame, still plotting how their hungry ear that winsome voice again might hear, for his lips could well pronounce words that were persuasions. Gently's guardians marked Serene, his early hope, his liberal mean, to counsel from his guiding eyes, to make this wisdom earthly wise. I vainly do these eyes recall the school march, each day's festival, when every mourn my bosom glowed, to watch the convoy on the road. The baby in Willow wagon closed, with rolling eyes and face composed, with children forward and behind, like cupids studiously inclined, and he'd achieved and paced beside the center of the troop alight, with sunny face of sweet repose, to guard the babe from fancied foes. The little captain, innocent, took the eye with him as he went. Each village senior paused to scan and speak the lovely caravan. From the window I look out, to mark thy beautiful parade, stately marching in cap and coat, to some tune by fairies played, a music heard by thee alone, to works as noble led thee on. Now love and pride alas, in vain, up and down, their glances strain. The painted sled stands where it stood, the kennel by the corded wood, his scattered sticks to stanch the wall, of the snow-tower, when snow should fall. The ominous hole he dug in the sand, and childhood's castles built or planned, his daily haunts I well discern, the poultry-yard, the shed, the barn, and every inch of garden-ground, paced by the blessed feet around. From the roadside to the brook, wherein too he loved to look. Step to meek fowls by earth they ranged, the wintry garden lies unchanged. The brook into the stream runs on, but the deep-eyed boy is gone. On that shaded day, dark with more clouds than tempests are, when thou didst yield thy innocent breath, in bird-like heavings unto death, night came, and nature had not thee. I said, we are mates in misery. Tomorrow dawned with needless glow, each snow-bird chirped, each fowl must crow, each tremper started, but the feet of the most beautiful and sweet of human youth had left the hill and garden. They were bound and still. There's not a sparrow or a wren, there's not a blade of autumn grain, which the four seasons do not tend, and tides of life and increase land, and every chick of every bird, and weed and rock moss, is preferred. O ostrich-like forgetfulness, O loss of larger in the less, was there no star that could be sent, no watcher in the firmament, no angel from the countless host that loyters round the crystal coast, could stoop to heal that only child, nature's sweet marvel, undefiled, and keep the blossom of the earth, which all her harvests were not worth. Not mine, I never called thee mine, but nature's air, if I repine, and seeing rashly torn and moved, not what I made, but what I loved, grow early old with grief that thou must to the wastes of nature go. This because a general hope was quenched, and all must doubt and grope. For fluttering planets seemed to say, this child should ills of ages stay, by wondrous tongue and guided pen, bring the flown muses back to man. Perchance not he, but nature ailed, the world and not the infant failed. It was not ripe yet to sustain a genius of so fine a strain, who gazed upon the sun and moon, as if he came unto his own, and pregnant with his grander thought, brought the old order into doubt. His beauty once their beauty tried, they could not feed him, and he died, and wandered backward as in scorn, to wade an eon to be born. Ill day which made this beauty waste, plight broken, this high face defaced, some went and came about the dead, and some in books of solace read, some to their friends the tidings say, some went to write, some went to pray. One tarried here, their hurried one, but their heart abode with none. Covertous death bereaved us all, to aggrandize one funeral. The eager fate which carried thee took the largest part of me, for this losing is true dying, this is lordly man's downlying, this his slow but sure reclining, star by star his world resigning. O child of paradise, boy who made dear his father's home, in whose deep eyes men read the welfare of the times to come, I am too much bereft, the world is honored, thou hast left. O truth and nature's costly lie, O trusted broken prophecy, O richest fortune, sourly crossed, born for the future, to the future lost. The deep heart answered, weepest thou, worthy a cause for passion wild, if I had not taken the child, and deemest thou as those who pour with aged eyes, short way before, things beauty vanished from the coast of meta, and thy darling lost, taught he not thee, the man of eld, whose eyes within his eyes beheld, heaven's numerous hierarchy span, the mystic gulf from God to man. To be alone will thou begin, when worlds of lovers hem thee in, tomorrow, when the masks shall fall, that dies in nature's carnival. The pure shells see by their own will, which overflowing love shall fill, this not within the force of fate, the fate conjoined to separate, but thou, my votary, weepest thou. I gave thee sight, where is it now? I thought thy heart beyond the reach of ritual, Bible, or speech, wrote in thy mind's transparent table, as far as the incomunicable, taught thee each private sign to raise, lit by the super-sola blaze, past utterance, and past belief, and past the blasphemy of grief, the mysteries of nature's heart. And though no muse can these impart, throb dine with nature's throbbing breast, and all is clear from east to west. I came to thee as to a friend, dearest, to thee I did not send, tutors, but a joyful eye, innocence that matched the sky, lovely locks, a form of wonder, laughter rich as woodland thunder, that thou mightst entertain apart the richest flowering of all art. And as the great all-loving day, through smallest chambers takes its way, that thou mightst break thy daily bread with prophet, savior, and head, that thou mightst cherish for thine own the riches of sweet Mary's son. Boy, Rabbi, Israel's paragon! And thoughtest thou such guest, who'd in thy hall take up his rest, would rushing life forget her laws, fates glowing revolution pause, high omens ask divine a guess, not to be conned to tediousness, and know my higher gifts unbind, the zone that girts the incarnate mind. When the scanty shores are full, with thoughts perilous whirling pool, when frail nature can know more, then the spirit strikes the hour, my servant death, with solving right, pours finite into infinite. Wilt thou freeze, love's tidal flow, whose dreams through nature circling go, nail the wild star to its trek on the half-climbed zodiac, light is light which radiates, blood is blood which circulates, life is life which generates, and many seeming life is one. Wilt thou transfix, and make it none? Its onward force too starkly penned, in figure, bone, and liniment. Will thou uncalled interrogate, talker, the unreplying fate, nor see the genius of the whole ascendant in the private soul, beckon it when to go and come, self-announced its hour of doom. Fair the soul's recess and shrine, magic built to last the season, masterpiece of love benign, fairer that expansive reason, whose omen this and sign. Will thou not hope thy heart to know what rainbows teach, and sunsets show, verdict which accumulates from lengthening scroll of human fates, voice of earth to earth returned, prayers of saints that inly burned, saying, What is excellent, as God lives is permanent, hearts are dust, hearts' loves remain, hearts' love will meet thee again. Reveal the maker, fetch thy eye up to his style, and manners of the sky, not of adamant and gold, built he heaven, stark and cold, no, but a nest of bending reeds, flowering grass and scented weeds, or like a traveller's fleeing tent, or bow above the tempest bend, build of tears and sacred flames, and virtue reaching to its aims, build of furtherance and pursuing, not of spent deeds, but of doing. Silent rushes the swift lord, through ruined systems still restored, broad sowing, bleak and void to bless, plants with worlds the wilderness, waters with tears of ancient sorrow, apples of Eden ripe to morrow, house and tenant go to ground, lost in God, in Godhead found. They sat and talked of you. Twas here he sat, twas this he said, twas that he used to do. Here is the book wherein he read, the room wherein he dwelt, and he, they said, was such a man, such things he thought and felt. I sat and sat, I did not stir, they talked and talked away. I was as mute as any stone, I had no words to say. They talked and talked, like to a stone my heart grew in my breast. I, who had never seen your face, perhaps I knew you best. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. To Francis S. Osgood, by Edgar Allen Poe. Read for LibriVox.org by Mike Overby, Midland Washington. Thou wouldst be loved, then let thy heart from its present pathway part not. Being everything which now thou art, be nothing which thou art not. So with the world thy gentle ways, thy grace, thy more than beauty, shall be an endless theme of praise and love a simple duty. 1845. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. Two Look at Two, by Robert Frost. Read for LibriVox.org by Winston Tharp. Love and forgetting might have carried them a little further up the mountainside with night so near, but not much further up, they must have halted soon in any case with thoughts of the path back, how rough it was with rock and wash-out and unsafe in darkness. When they were halted by a tumbled wall with barbed wire binding. They stood facing this, spending what outward impulse they still had in one last look the way they must not go, on up the failing path, where if a stone or earth slide moved at night, it moved itself. No footstep moved it. This is all, they sighed, good night towards. But not so. There was more. A doe from roundest spruce stood looking at them across the wall, as nearer the wall as they. She saw them in their field, they and hers. The difficulty of seeing what stood still, like some upended boulder split in two, was in her clouded eyes. They saw no fear there. She seemed to think that to thus they were safe. Then as if they were something that though strange she could not trouble her mind with too long, she sighed and passed unscared along the wall. This, then, is all. What more is there to ask? But no, not yet. A snort to bid them wait. A buck from round the spruce stood looking at them across the wall, as near the wall as they. This was an antlered buck of lusty nostril, not the same doe come back into her place. He viewed them quizzically with jerks of head as if to ask, Why don't you make some motion, or give some sign of life? Because you can't. I doubt if you're as living as you look. Thus till he had them almost feeling dared to stretch a proffering hand and a spell-breaking, then he too passed unscared along the wall. Two had seen two, whichever side you spoke from. This must be all. It was all. Still they stood, a great wave from it going over them, as if the earth in one unlooked for favour had made them certain earth returned their love. And a poem? This recording is in the public domain. What were I love if I were stripped of thee? By James Russell Lowell, read for LibriVox.org by Sonia. What were I love if I were stripped of thee? If thine eyes shut me out, whereby I live, Thou who unto my calmid soul dost give knowledge and truth and holy mystery, wherein truth mainly lies for those who see beyond the earthly, and the fugitive, who in the grandeur of the soul believe, and only in the infinite are free. Without thee I would naked, bleak, and bare, as yon dead sea-lar on the sea-cliffs brow, and nature's teachings, which come to me now, common and beautiful as light and air, would be as fruitless as a stream which still slips through the wheel of some old, ruined mill. 1841 End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. Whitby Abbey by William Layton, read for LibriVox.org by Thomas Peter. Thou relic of a bygone generation, Thou crumbling record of a vanished race, towering aloft in lonely desolation, like the great guardian spirit of the place. Thy walls with age are mouldering, gray and hoary, where thy longed transept lay, the grass waves green, and scarce the remnant of thy former glory, remains to tell us what thou once hast been. Yet here in days of yore, a royal maiden has ministered upon the sacred shrine, and knights and nobles with their symbols laden have joined the orisons and rites divine. Here images of saints in dark-nitched spaces have peered on black-held monks devoid of smiles, and amic-eyed nuns with fair and pensive faces have flitted through the solemn whispering aisles. Here off the sweet strains of an arve Mary have stolen through the twilight, still and clear, and the wild cadence for misery has struck upon the midnight startled ear, and in the frequent pauses of devotion, when silence brooded o'er the prostrate band, was heard the deep-mouthed wailing of the ocean, beating forever on the rocky strand. But all is changed. No more the night wind, stealing through thy dim galleries and vacant nave, will catch the sound of music's measured pealing, and bear it far across the moonlit wave. No more when morning guilds the eastern heaven will early matins rise, or organs swell, and when the first stars gem the brow of even, no more will sound the sweet-toned vesper bell. Thy glory has gone by, and thou art standing in lonely pomp upon thy sea-washed hill, wearing in hoary age a mean commanding, and in thy desolation stately still. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain.