Your favourite poem?

[Sam]

I wasn't sure whether to post this in GD or not. But the term 'bullshit' is quite apt for most of myt posts so I suppose it should reside here.

There have been poetry threads in the past but I can't recall a recent one, so why not trot out our favourite poems. Try and paste a copy of the poem in here so others can read it.

My choice is L'après-midi d'un faune by my favourite poet, Stéphane Mallarmé. He's been called untranslatable, even into French but meaning is often secondary to the sounds of the words themselves, the way they clash and resonate by being placed next to each other on the page, and the vague assocations and ephemeral, delicate images that are produced. He said that to name an object is to destory it and supress the enjoyment of the poem - to suggest, that is his ideal.

So here it is (English translations vary enormously, but this one from wikipedia is very good):

   These nymphs that I would perpetuate:

                                       so clear

   And light, their carnation, that it floats in the air
   Heavy with leafy slumbers.

                               Did I love a dream?

   My doubt, night's ancient hoard, pursues its theme
   In branching labyrinths, which being still
   The veritable woods themselves, alas, reveal
   My triumph as the ideal fault of roses.
   Consider...

               if the women of your glosses

   Are phantoms of your fabulous desires!
   Faun, the illusion flees from the cold, blue eyes
   Of the chaster nymph like a fountain gushing tears:
   But the other, all in sighs, you say, compares
   To a hot wind through the fleece that blows at noon?

   No! through the motionless and weary swoon
   Of stifling heat that suffocates the morning,
   Save from my flute, no waters murmuring
   In harmony flow out into the groves;
   And the only wind on the horizon no ripple moves,
   Exhaled from my twin pipes and swift to drain
   The melody in arid drifts of rain,
   Is the visible, serene and fictive air
   Of inspiration rising as if in prayer.

   Relate, Sicilian shores, whose tranquil fens
   My vanity disturbs as do the suns,
   Silent beneath the brilliant flowers of flame:
   "That cutting hollow reeds my art would tame,
   I saw far off, against the glaucous gold
   Of foliage twined to where the springs run cold,
   An animal whiteness languorously swaying;

   To the slow prelude that the pipes were playing,
   This flight of swans -- no! naiads -- rose in a shower
   Of spray..."

               Day burns inert in the tawny hour

   And excess of hymen is escaped away --
   Without a sign, from one who pined for the primal A:
   And so, beneath a flood of antique light,
   As innocent as are the lilies white,
   To my first ardours I wake alone.

   Besides sweet nothings by their lips made known,
   Kisses that only mark their perfidy,
   My chest reveals an unsolved mystery...
   The toothmarks of some strange, majestic creature:
   Enough! Arcana such as these disclose their nature
   Only through vast twin reeds played to the skies,
   That, turning to music all that clouds the eyes,
   Dream, in a long solo, that we amused
   The beauty all around us by confused
   Equations with our credulous melody;
   And dream that the song can make love soar so high
   That, purged of all ordinary fantasies
   Of back or breast -- incessant shapes that rise
   In blindness -- it distills sonorities
   From every empty and monotonous line.

   Then, instrument of flights, Syrinx malign,
   At lakes where you attend me, bloom once more!
   Long shall my discourse from the echoing shore
   Depict those goddesses: by masquerades,
   I'll strip the veils that sanctify their shades;
   And when I've sucked the brightness out of grapes,
   To quell the flood of sorrow that escapes,
   I'll lift the empty cluster to the sky,
   Avidly drunk till evening has drawn nigh,
   And blow in laughter through the luminous skins.

   Let us inflate our MEMORIES, O nymphs.
   "Piercing the reeds, my darting eyes transfix,
   Plunged in the cooling waves, immortal necks,
   And cries of fury echo through the air;
   Splendid cascades of tresses disappear
   In shimmering jewels. Pursuing them, I find
   There, at my feet, two sleepers intertwined,
   Bruised in the languor of duality,
   Their arms about each other heedlessly.
   I bear them, still entangled, to a height
   Where frivolous shadow never mocks the light
   And dying roses yield the sun their scent,
   That with the day our passions might be spent."
   I adore you, wrath of virgins--fierce delight
   Of the sacred burden's writhing naked flight
   From the fiery lightning of my lips that flash
   With the secret terror of the thirsting flesh:
   From the cruel one's feet to the heart of the shy,
   Whom innocence abandons suddenly,
   Watered in frenzied or less woeful tears.
   "Gay with the conquest of those traitorous fears,
   I sinned when I divided the dishevelled
   Tuft of kisses that the gods had ravelled.
   For hardly had I hidden an ardent moan
   Deep in the joyous recesses of one
   (Holding by a finger, that her swanlike pallor
   From her sister's passion might be tinged with colour,
   The little one, unblushingly demure),
   When from my arms, loosened by death obscure,
   This prey, ungrateful to the end, breaks free,
   Spurning the sobs that still transported me."

   Others will lead me on to happiness,
   Their tresses knotted round my horns, I guess.
   You know, my passion, that crimson with ripe seeds,
   Pomegranates burst in a murmur of bees,
   And that our blood, seized by each passing form,
   Flows toward desire's everlasting swarm.
   In the time when the forest turns ashen and gold
   And the summer's demise in the leaves is extolled,
   Etna! when Venus visits her retreat,
   Treading your lava with innocent feet,
   Though a sad sleep thunders and the flame burns cold.
   I hold the queen!

                   Sure punishment...

                                   No, but the soul,

   Weighed down by the body, wordless, struck dumb,
   To noon's proud silence must at last succumb:
   And so, let me sleep, oblivious of sin,
   Stretched out on the thirsty sand, drinking in
   The bountiful rays of the wine-growing star!

   Couple, farewell; I'll see the shade that now you are.

[mook]

Fuck, I've not got the time to be reading all that. You've not got a favourite limerick have you Sam instead.

[Neville Chamberlain]

Ah, but which poems are best when you're ON DRUGS???

Poems are for girls anyway.

[the midnight watch baboon]

I like The Raven, EAP is oft derided as a writer but this is pretty gripping stuff. Plus I don't really know any other poems. Though I did write a wonderful one myself about the Buckinghamshire nature sanctuary Mop End when I was eight.

[Neville Chamberlain]

I like The Raven, EAP is oft derided as a writer but this is pretty gripping stuff.

Oooh, that's great that one is. Is old Edgar often derided as a writer?!? Why on earth for?

[Beagle 2]

My doggie don't wear glasses
So they're lying when they say
A dog looks like its owner
Aren't they

[Ciarán2]

General Bullshit, Sam??!

I hope we get to at least discuss some of these poems.

You've posted a translation, is it really a good one? I'm very skeptical of translated poetry in particular. But what's up there is a lot to take in, there are some beautiful sounds there, but that of course would have sounded different in the original. So you're more an image/ meaning man, are you? It is a lovely poem even in translation though.

My favourite poem changes all the time, but I'll go with this for now.

Bright Star, Would I Were Stedfast as Thou Art

Bright star, would I were stedfast as thou art -
Not in lone splendour hung aloft the night
And watching, with eternal lids apart,
Like nature's patient, sleepless Eremite,
The moving waters at their priestlike task
Of pure ablution round earth's human shores,
Or gazing on the new soft-fallen mask
Of snow upon the mountains and the moors -
No - yet still stedfast, still unchangeable,
Pillowed upon my fair love's ripening breast,
To feel for ever its soft fall and swell,
Awake for ever in a sweet unrest,
Still, still to hear her tender-taken breath,
And so live ever - or else swoon in death.

- John Keats

That's my ideal: to be "pillow'd forever upon my fair love's ripening breast/ To feel forever its soft fall and swell/ Awake forever in a sweet unrest..."

Edit: (Paraphrasing Spinal Tap) You don't want to confuse your "its" and your "it's" when quoting Keats. No, not when quoting Keats, you don't...

[Ciarán2]

I like The Raven, EAP is oft derided as a writer but this is pretty gripping stuff.

Oooh, that's great that one is. Is old Edgar often derided as a writer?!? Why on earth for?

His poetry isn't as good as his prose though is it? Although I do like The Raven.

[Shoulders?-Stomach!]

I like medium-sized poems the best, rather than epics.

As far as translations of texts go, I like Chinese poetry the best. The enforced change in grammatical style does nothing to dampen the spirit of most of them. Check this out for some- the recurring themes of nature, love and honour make them difficult to differentiate, and there's only so many times you can hear about a mountain covered in cloud. But some of the descriptions are otherworldly, indulgent and fantastic..

http://www.chinapage.com/poet-e.html

My favourite poet is Robert Frost who actually has great economy and effortlessly describes nature and personal feelings as two interconnected things. I discovered him through this poem which is my favourite; almost a lullaby- the dying embers of a longer untold story:

Stopping By Woods On a Snowy Evening

Whose woods these are I think I know.
His house is in the village, though;
He will not see me stopping here
To watch his woods fill up with snow.

My little horse must think it queer
To stop without a farmhouse near
Between the woods and frozen lake
The darkest evening of the year.

He gives his harness bells a shake
To ask if there is some mistake.
The only other sound's the sweep
Of easy wind and downy flake.
The woods are lovely, dark, and deep,
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep.

[Cardinal Tit Storm]

Ah, but which poems are best when you're ON DRUGS???

The sky, I thought, is not so grand;
I ’most could touch it with my hand!   
And reaching up my hand to try,   
I screamed to feel it touch the sky.   
I screamed, andâ€"lo!â€"Infinity   
Came down and settled over me;
Forced back my scream into my chest,   
Bent back my arm upon my breast,   
And, pressing of the Undefined   
The definition on my mind,   
Held up before my eyes a glass
Through which my shrinking sight did pass   
Until it seemed I must behold   
Immensity made manifold;

That's some trippy shit right there dude.

Renascence

[the midnight watch baboon]

Well Jim, I remember reading a collection of Poe's short stories which had a prologue where a number of poets and writers- think T.S. Eliot was amongst them- were named as having dissed young Eddie's scribblings in their time. And that new novel based on his life and death, 'The Poe Shadow', spunked a few reviews that weren't particularly positive on Poe and said new book. Each to his own though, 'The Raven' and 'The Tell-Tale Heart' are great reads and feature in The Simpsons. Yup!

[Ciarán2]

My favourite poet is Robert Frost who actually has great economy and effortlessly describes nature and personal feelings as two interconnected things. I discovered him through this poem which is my favourite; almost a lullaby- the dying embers of a longer untold story:

Brilliant, Shoulders. But he is fucking difficult isn't he? He has an essay called "The Figure a Poem Makes" which I recommend to you.

http://www.mrbauld.com/frostfig.html

Her's an example of a really difficult - but short - Frost poem. He's into his undecidables, if you ask me.

The Pasture

I'm going out to clean the pasture spring;
I'll only stop to rake the leaves away
(And wait to watch the water clear, I may):
I sha'n't be gone long. You come too.

I'm going out to fetch the little calf
That's standing by the mother. It's so young,
It totters when she licks it with her tongue.
I sha'n't be gone long. You come too.

- Robert Frost.

On the surface it seems the easiest thing in the world to grasp. But as with all Frost's best work, the closer you look the harder to see it gets. See if you get what I mean.

[Shoulders?-Stomach!]

Mmm, that is an enigmatic poem. I haven't read The Pasture before What's he saying with 'You come too' exactly? You're reading, but you aren't important? It sounds like he's almost annoyed that his poems are being read by other people. Maybe that's just the face of it.

[Saygone]

Know Thyself

by Alexander Pope


Know then thyself, presume not God to scan;
The proper study of mankind is Man.
Placed on this isthmus of a middle state,
A being darkly wise and rudely great:
With too much knowledge for the Sceptic side,
With too much weakness for the Stoic's pride,
He hangs between; in doubt to act or rest,
In doubt to deem himself a God or Beast,
In doubt his mind or body to prefer;
Born but to die, and reasoning but to err;
Alike in ignorance, his reason such
Whether he thinks too little or too much:
Chaos of thought and passion, all confused;
Still by himself abused, or disabused;
Created half to rise and half to fall;
Great lord of all things, yet a prey to all;
Sole judge of truth, in endless error hurled:
The glory, jest, and riddle of the world!

[mothman]

Phew! When I saw someone else had posted something from Renascence, I thought I'd been beaten to it. Anyway, he's my favourite:-

Time does not bring relief; you all have lied
Who told me time would ease me of my pain!
I miss him in the weeping of the rain;
I want him at the shrinking of the tide;
The old snows melt from every mountain-side,
And last year’s leaves are smoke in every lane;
But last year’s bitter loving must remain
Heaped on my heart, and my old thoughts abide!

There are a hundred places where I fear
To go,â€"so with his memory they brim!
And entering with relief some quiet place
Where never fell his foot or shone his face
I say, “There is no memory of him here!”
And so stand stricken, so remembering him!

I also quite like:-

If I were called in
To construct a religion
I should make use of water.

Going to church
Would entail a fording
To dry, different clothes;

My liturgy would employ
Images of sousing,
A furious devout drench,

And I should raise in the east
A glass of water
Where any-angled light
Would congregate endlessly.

and:-

Everyone suddenly burst out singing;
And I was filled with such delight
As prisoned birds must find in freedom,
Winging wildly across the white
Orchards and dark-green fields; onâ€"onâ€"and out of sight.

Everyone’s voice was suddenly lifted;
And beauty came like the setting sun:
My heart was shaken with tears; and horror
Drifted away ... O, but Everyone
Was a bird; and the song was wordless; the singing will never be done.

[Ciarán2]

Mmm, that is an enigmatic poem. I haven't read The Pasture before What's he saying with 'You come too' exactly? You're reading, but you aren't important? It sounds like he's almost annoyed that his poems are being read by other people. Maybe that's just the face of it.

Just to say, I don't have firm answers on this so can only speculate, but hey that's literary criticism for you! I've been studying Frost's poetry for a few years and he gets more and more difficult each time I look at him. Which is partly why I think he's genuinely brilliant. And a modernist, oh yes. Every bit as tough as Joyce or Conrad.

Well who is the "you" in "The Pasture"? The reader? Somebody else present in the scene? What I find interesting about the "You come too" is, at first i thought the poem was saying something like "The countryside is beautiful, come out to the pasture with me and you'll see some beautiful simple pleasures like the water clearing away and the young calves in the field." But on closer attention, the speaker of the poem is going out to work. If you're being invited along, surely you're being asked to work too. You wouldn't just stand around admiring the scene without helping out would you? So maybe it's a demand to work. Maybe you don't want to take up this offer. It sounds like hard work too. Perhaps it's a farmer talking to his son. It isn't necessarily an invite to a guest. If it is, it's a bit of a strange one. Like me saying to you, I'm going off to the kitchen to do the washing up - you come too. That's my take on it anyway.

[mrpants]

I really like Ginsberg's Howl.  It's a long 'un so I won't post it, but here's a link to it - http://members.tripod.com/~Sprayberry/poems/howl.txt

[samadriel]

Very fond of 'The Raven' -- wish I could memorise the lot, maybe I'll manage it one of these days; I've got nothing better to do -- but my favourite is 'in Just' by e. e. cummings.

Code Select Expand




                   in Just-
               spring       when the world is mud-
               luscious the little
               lame baloonman

               whistles       far       and wee

               and eddieandbill come
               running from marbles and
               piracies and it's
               spring

               when the world is puddle-wonderful

               the queer
               old baloonman whistles
               far       and         wee
               and bettyandisbel come dancing

               from hop-scotch and jump-rope and

               it's
               spring
               and

                      the

                              goat-footed

               baloonMan       whistles
               far
               and
               wee


[gigolo aunts aren't gentlemen]

I do like this:

Pastel: Masks and Faces
The light of our cigarettes
Went and came in the gloom:
It was dark in the little room.

Dark, and then, in the dark,
Sudden, a flash, a glow,
And a hand and a ring I know.

And then, through the dark, a flush
Ruddy and vague, the grace
(A rose!) of her lyric face.

and this

Sympathy in White Major
When I drop four cubes of ice
Chimingly in a glass, and add
Three goes of gin, a lemon slice,
And let a ten-ounce tonic void
In foaming gulps until it smothers
Everything else up to the edge,
I lift the lot in private pledge;
He devoted his life to others.

While other people wore like clothes
The human beings in their days
I set myself to bring to those
Who thought I could the lost displays;
It didn’t work for them or me,
But all concerned were nearer thus
(Or so we thought) to all the fuss
Than if we’d missed it separately.

A decent chap, a real good sort,
Straifht as a die, one of the best,
A brick, a trump, a proper sport,
Head and shoulders above the rest;
How many lives would have been duller
Had he not been here below?
Here’s to the whitest man I know â€"
Though white is not my favourite colour.

and hey, here's another one:

Ars Poetica
A poem should be palpable and mute
As a globed fruit

Dumb
As old medallions to the thumb

Silent as the sleeve-worn stone
Of casement ledges where the moss has grown -

A poem should be wordless
As the flight of birds

A poem should be motionless in time
As the moon climbs

Leaving, as the moon releases
Twig by twig the night-entangled trees,

Leaving, as the moon behind the winter leaves,
Memory by memory the mind -

A poem should be motionless in time
As the moon climbs

A poem should be equal to:
Not true

For all the history of grief
An empty doorway and a maple leaf

For love
The leaning grasses and two lights above the sea -

A poem should not mean
But be

[Banana Woofwoof]

William Blake - Auguries of Innocence

To see a world in a grain of sand,
And a heaven in a wild flower,
Hold infinity in the palm of your hand,
And eternity in an hour.

A robin redbreast in a cage
Puts all heaven in a rage.

A dove-house fill'd with doves and pigeons
Shudders hell thro' all its regions.
A dog starv'd at his master's gate
Predicts the ruin of the state.

A horse misused upon the road
Calls to heaven for human blood.
Each outcry of the hunted hare
A fibre from the brain does tear.

A skylark wounded in the wing,
A cherubim does cease to sing.
The game-cock clipt and arm'd for fight
Does the rising sun affright.

Every wolf's and lion's howl
Raises from hell a human soul.

The wild deer, wand'ring here and there,
Keeps the human soul from care.
The lamb misus'd breeds public strife,
And yet forgives the butcher's knife.

The bat that flits at close of eve
Has left the brain that won't believe.
The owl that calls upon the night
Speaks the unbeliever's fright.

He who shall hurt the little wren
Shall never be belov'd by men.
He who the ox to wrath has mov'd
Shall never be by woman lov'd.

The wanton boy that kills the fly
Shall feel the spider's enmity.
He who torments the chafer's sprite
Weaves a bower in endless night.

The caterpillar on the leaf
Repeats to thee thy mother's grief.
Kill not the moth nor butterfly,
For the last judgement draweth nigh.

He who shall train the horse to war
Shall never pass the polar bar.
The beggar's dog and widow's cat,
Feed them and thou wilt grow fat.

The gnat that sings his summer's song
Poison gets from slander's tongue.
The poison of the snake and newt
Is the sweat of envy's foot.

The poison of the honey bee
Is the artist's jealousy.

The prince's robes and beggar's rags
Are toadstools on the miser's bags.
A truth that's told with bad intent
Beats all the lies you can invent.

It is right it should be so;
Man was made for joy and woe;
And when this we rightly know,
Thro' the world we safely go.

Joy and woe are woven fine,
A clothing for the soul divine.
Under every grief and pine
Runs a joy with silken twine.

The babe is more than swaddling bands;
Every farmer understands.
Every tear from every eye
Becomes a babe in eternity;

This is caught by females bright,
And return'd to its own delight.
The bleat, the bark, bellow, and roar,
Are waves that beat on heaven's shore.

The babe that weeps the rod beneath
Writes revenge in realms of death.
The beggar's rags, fluttering in air,
Does to rags the heavens tear.

The soldier, arm'd with sword and gun,
Palsied strikes the summer's sun.
The poor man's farthing is worth more
Than all the gold on Afric's shore.

One mite wrung from the lab'rer's hands
Shall buy and sell the miser's lands;
Or, if protected from on high,
Does that whole nation sell and buy.

He who mocks the infant's faith
Shall be mock'd in age and death.
He who shall teach the child to doubt
The rotting grave shall ne'er get out.

He who respects the infant's faith
Triumphs over hell and death.
The child's toys and the old man's reasons
Are the fruits of the two seasons.

The questioner, who sits so sly,
Shall never know how to reply.
He who replies to words of doubt
Doth put the light of knowledge out.

The strongest poison ever known
Came from Caesar's laurel crown.
Nought can deform the human race
Like to the armour's iron brace.

When gold and gems adorn the plow,
To peaceful arts shall envy bow.
A riddle, or the cricket's cry,
Is to doubt a fit reply.

The emmet's inch and eagle's mile
Make lame philosophy to smile.
He who doubts from what he sees
Will ne'er believe, do what you please.

If the sun and moon should doubt,
They'd immediately go out.
To be in a passion you good may do,
But no good if a passion is in you.

The whore and gambler, by the state
Licensed, build that nation's fate.
The harlot's cry from street to street
Shall weave old England's winding-sheet.

The winner's shout, the loser's curse,
Dance before dead England's hearse.

Every night and every morn
Some to misery are born,
Every morn and every night
Some are born to sweet delight.

Some are born to sweet delight,
Some are born to endless night.

We are led to believe a lie
When we see not thro' the eye,
Which was born in a night to perish in a night,
When the soul slept in beams of light.

God appears, and God is light,
To those poor souls who dwell in night;
But does a human form display
To those who dwell in realms of day.

[boki]

Some come here to shit and stink,
Others come to sit and think.
Me, I've come to scratch my balls,
And read the writing on the walls.

ok, that probably just reveals my ignorance of poetry in general, but there's a certain amount of charm, economy and -given that it is toilet graffiti after all - restraint in there.

[petula dusty]

Thanks bokes! Now you've started a new page and lowered the tone I can post my offering which I rediscovered the other day from a book of comic verse I had when I was about 8. It's fun to say out loud and baby Jimmy finds it quite amusing.

A Dutchman's Dog Story

Dere vhas a leedle vomans once
Who keept a leedle shtore
Und had a leedle puppy dog
Dot shtoodt pefore der door
Und evfery dime der peoples coom
He opened vide him's jaw
Schnip! Schnap! shoost so
Und bite dem

Vun day anoder puppy dog
Coombs running down der shtreet
Oudt of Herr Scneider's sausage shop
Vhere he had shtoled some meat
Und after him der Schneider man -
Der vhind vhas not more fleet
Whir-r-r! Whist! shoost so
Like vinkin'!

Der leedle voman's puppy dog
Vhas lookin' at der fun
Her barkit at der Schneider man
Und right pefore him run
Den fell him down, dot Schneider man
Like shooted mit a gun
Bang! Crash! shoost so
Und voorser

Der puppy dog dot shtoled der meat
Roon'd on und got avhay
Der leedle voman's puppy dog
Der Schneider man did slay
Und make him indo sausages
Dot's vot der peoples say
Chip! Chop! shoost so
Und sell him

Der Moral

Der moral is , don't inderfere
Vhen droubles is aroundt
Der man dot's in der fightin' crowd
Vhill get hurt I'll be pound
Mind your own peesness, dot is pest
In life she vhill be found
Yaw! Yaw! shoost so
I pet you


J T Brown

[boki]

Now you're talking.  Nonsense poetry is ace.  I used to love that stuff when I was a kid. Might go seek some out at the weekend.

[chris87]

This was the first piece of modernist-type writing I actually liked:

Gerard Manley Hopkins
As kingfishers catch fire

As kingfishers catch fire, dragonflies, dráw fláme ;
As tumbled over rim in roundy wells
Stones ring ; like each tucked string tells, each hung bell’s
Bow swung finds tongue to fling out broad its name ;
Each mortal thing does one thing and the same :
Deals out that being indoors each one dwells ;
Selvesâ€"goes itself ; myself it speaks and spells,
Crying Whát I do is me : for that I came.
I say móre : the just man justices ;
Kéeps gráce : thát keeps all his goings graces ;
Acts in God’s eye what in God’s eye he isâ€"
Chrístâ€"for Christ plays in ten thousand places,
Lovely in limbs, and lovely in eyes not his
To the Father through the features of men’s faces.

also great:

William Butler Yeats
THE SECOND COMING
Turning and turning in the widening gyre
The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all convictions, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.
Surely some revelation is at hand;
Surely the Second Coming is at hand.
The Second Coming! Hardly are those words out
When a vast image out of Spiritus Mundi
Troubles my sight: a waste of desert sand;
A shape with lion body and the head of a man,
A gaze blank and pitiless as the sun,
Is moving its slow thighs, while all about it
Wind shadows of the indignant desert birds.
The darkness drops again but now I know
That twenty centuries of stony sleep
Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle,
And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,
Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?

I'm aware they're both fairly religious, but i think, with the right style, a fixation on that can work  well in (some) poetry - especially the revelations-style oddness of the yeats one.

[Anon]

Sadly, someone else has already claimed a favourite of mine in Allen Ginsberg's incredible "Howl".  However, another poem I am rather fond of is this, by Emily Dickinson:

I felt a Funeral, in my Brain,
And Mourners to and fro
Kept treading--treading--till it seemed
That Sense was breaking through--

And when they all were seated,
A Service, like a Drum--
Kept beating--beating--till I thought
My Mind was going numb--

And then I heard them lift a Box
And creak across my Soul
With those same Boots of Lead, again,
Then Space--began to toll,

As all the Heavens were a Bell,
And Being, but an Ear,
And I, and Silence, some strange Race
Wrecked, solitary, here--

And then a Plank in Reason, broke,
And I dropped down, and down--
And hit a World, at every plunge,
And Finished knowing--then--

That, however, is not how I first came across it - instead I first read it in the version edited by James Reeves, who standardised the punctuation and the capitalisation, and as a result even though I know that the above is what she actually wrote, I still have a soft spot for this (perhaps easier for some new to Dickinson) version instead:

I felt a funeral in my brain,
And mourners to and fro
Kept treading, treading, till it seemed
That sense was breaking through.

And when they all were seated,
A service like a drum
Kept beating, beating, till I thought
My mind was going numb.

And then I heard them lift a box
And creak across my soul
With those same boots of lead,
Then space began to toll,

As all the Heavens were a bell,
And being but an ear,
And I and silence some strange race
Wrecked solitary here.

And then a plank in reason broke,
And I dropped down and down-
And hit a world at every plunge,
And finished knowing then.

[Sam]

I'm getting into Henri Michaux at the moment. Here's a poem of his:

They compare
Ceaselessly compare

Badly compose
And decompose all the worse
suddenly sometimes recompose as the windmill wings
then menhirs, never ever moving.

Gaps in spaces

An enormous sow inhabits a good-sized cistern
and many have approached her
Always rumours all around
still has not been evicted.

The stars are so far off we have bowed our heads.

[Little Tommy Titter]

Another from Edna :

My candle burns at both ends
It will not last the night;
But ah, my foes, and oh, my friends -
It gives a lovely light.

[CaledonianGonzo]

Strewth, chris87.  As soon as I saw this thread, those were the exact same two poems that popped into my head to post.  April undoubtedly is the cruellest month.

I particularly like Yeats, though a lot of it works better if you're familiar with his Rosicrucian/Golden Dawn-y views.

Once out of nature I shall never take
My bodily form from any natural thing,
But such a form as Grecian goldsmiths make
Of hammered gold and gold enamelling
To keep a drowsy Emperor awake

Good opening call by Sam, as well, though I take Ciaran's translation points.  Rimbaud suffers the same problem.

Instead, I'll humbly submit The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock.  It's long, so I'll just quote my favourite bit.

And indeed there will be time  
To wonder, “Do I dare?” and, “Do I dare?”  
Time to turn back and descend the stair,  
With a bald spot in the middle of my hairâ€"         40
[They will say: “How his hair is growing thin!”]  
My morning coat, my collar mounting firmly to the chin,  
My necktie rich and modest, but asserted by a simple pinâ€"  
[They will say: “But how his arms and legs are thin!”]  
Do I dare        
Disturb the universe?  
In a minute there is time  
For decisions and revisions which a minute will reverse.  
 
For I have known them all already, known them all:â€"  
Have known the evenings, mornings, afternoons,        
I have measured out my life with coffee spoons;  
I know the voices dying with a dying fall  
Beneath the music from a farther room.  
 So how should I presume?

[Ambient Sheep]

Now you're talking.  Nonsense poetry is ace.  I used to love that stuff when I was a kid. Might go seek some out at the weekend.

My Dad had a book of nonsense poetry by Roger Eckersley, which included the following that I read as a kid and has stuck with me ever since:

Professor Latham
Working at Chatham
Used his brain
Split the atom

There's not an atom
Left of Chatham
And Kent
Is Bent.

Aye thang-yew!  Short and silly, but I love it.

[Ciarán2]

I find Emily Dickinson almost impenetrable (Oo-er matron! etc), and have hit a brick wall writing my thesis on her. An incredibly difficult poet to decipher. Oh well...