1. I Remember Galileo - written by Gerald Stern
Read 1366 times on American Poems.

I remember Galileo describing the mind
as a piece of paper blown around by the wind,
and I loved the sight of it sticking to a tree,
or jumping into the backseat of a car, 
and for years I watched paper leap through my cities;
but yesterday I saw... (Read full poem)

Seen my lady home las' night, 
Jump back, honey, jump back.
Hel' huh han' an' sque'z it tight,
Jump back, honey, jump back.
Hyeahd huh sigh a little sigh,
Seen a light gleam f'om huh eye,
An' a smile go flittin' by --
Jump back,... (Read full poem)

3. The Investment - written by Robert Frost
From West-Running Brook. Published in 1928. Read 3979 times on American Poems.

Over back where they speak of life as staying
('You couldn't call it living, for it ain't'),
There was an old, old house renewed with paint,
And in it a piano loudly playing.

Out in the plowed ground in the cold a digger,
Among unearthed potatoes... (Read full poem)

Grandma, come back, I forgot
How much lard for these rolls 

Think you can put yourself in the ground
Like plain potatoes and grow in Ohio?
I am damn sick of getting fat like you 

Think you can lie through your Slovak?
Tell filthy stories... (Read full poem)

5. Rain Or Shine - written by Charles Bukowski
Read 1625 times on American Poems.

the vultures at the zoo
(all three of the)
sit very quietly in their
caged tree
and below
on the ground
are chunks of rotten meat.
the vultures are over-full.
our taxes have fed them
well.

we move on to the next
cage.
a man is in there
sitting on... (Read full poem)

Exhilaration is the Breeze
That lifts us from the Ground
And leaves us in another place
Whose statement is not found --

Returns us not, but after time
We soberly descend
A little newer for the term
Upon Enchanted Ground --(Read full poem)

7. She dwelleth in the Ground -- - written by Emily Dickinson
From Complete Poems of Emily Dickinson. Published in 1955. Read 1268 times on American Poems.

She dwelleth in the Ground --
Where Daffodils -- abide --
Her Maker -- Her Metropolis --
The Universe -- Her Maid --

To fetch Her Grace -- and Hue --
And Fairness -- and Renown --
The Firmament's -- To Pluck Her --
And fetch Her Thee -- be mine --(Read full poem)

Birds are flyin' south for winter.
Here's the Weird-Bird headin' north,
Wings a-flappin', beak a-chatterin',
Cold head bobbin' back 'n' forth.
He says, "It's not that I like ice
Or freezin' winds and snowy ground.
It's just... (Read full poem)

9. Birches - written by Robert Frost
From Mountain Interval. Published in 1916. Read 73708 times on American Poems.

When I see birches bend to left and right
Across the lines of straighter darker trees,
I like to think some boy's been swinging them.
But swinging doesn't bend them down to stay.
Ice-storms do that. Often you must have seen them
Loaded with... (Read full poem)

From where I stand the sheep stand still
As stones against the stony hill.

The stones are gray
And so are they.

And both are weatherworn and round,
Leading the eye back to the ground.

Two mingled flocks -
The sheep, the rocks.

And... (Read full poem)

11. Neither Out Far Nor In Deep - written by Robert Frost
From A Further Range. Published in 1936. Read 12964 times on American Poems.

The people along the sand
All turn and look one way.
They turn their back on the land.
They look at the sea all day.

As long as it takes to pass
A ship keeps raising its hull;
The wetter ground like glass
Reflects a standing gull

The land may vary... (Read full poem)

There is nothing, I hold, in the way of work
That a human being may not achieve
If he does not falter, or shrink, or shirk, 
And more than all, if he will believe.

Believe in himself and the power behind
That stands like an aid on a dual... (Read full poem)

13. Our Singing Strength - written by Robert Frost
From New Hampshire. Published in 1923. Read 5218 times on American Poems.

It snowed in spring on earth so dry and warm
The flakes could find no landing place to form.
Hordes spent themselves to make it wet and cold,
And still they failed of any lasting hold.
They made no white impression on the black.
They... (Read full poem)

We too, we too, descending once again
The hills of our own land, we too have heard
Far off --- Ah, que ce cor a longue haleine ---
The horn of Roland in the passages of Spain,
The first, the second blast, the failing third,
And with the third turned... (Read full poem)

15. Out Of Hiding - written by Li-Young Lee
Read 1319 times on American Poems.

Someone said my name in the garden,

while I grew smaller
in the spreading shadow of the peonies,

grew larger by my absence to another,
grew older among the ants, ancient

under the opening heads of the flowers,
new to myself, and... (Read full poem)

No, I will go alone.
I will come back when it's over.
Yes, of course I love you.
No, it will not be long.
Why may you not come with me?—
You are too much my lover.
You would put yourself
Between me and song.

If I go alone,
Quiet and suavely... (Read full poem)

17. Friend, your white beard sweeps the ground - written by Stephen Crane
From The Black Riders & Other Lines. Published in 1905. Read 2890 times on American Poems.

Friend, your white beard sweeps the ground.
Why do you stand, expectant?
Do you hope to see it
In one of your withered days?
With your old eyes
Do you hope to see
The triumphal march of justice?
Do not wait, friend!
Take your white beard
And your... (Read full poem)

The Grower of Trees, the gardener, the man born to farming,
whose hands reach into the ground and sprout
to him the soil is a divine drug.  He enters into death
yearly, and comes back rejoicing.  He has seen the light lie down
in the dung heap,... (Read full poem)

19. Apology To Keats - written by Lee Upton
Read 360 times on American Poems.

How the season surrounds us and mistakes
itself for some other force,
while we may be left wondering:
What was she doing
with our bolt of wishes?
Reverberants
through the ground with the spoils
of acorn, gourd.
One life 
inverted into a swollen... (Read full poem)

Vous êtes sorti sain et sauf des basses 
calomnies, vous avey conquis les coeurs. 

Zola, J'accuse


One was kicked in the stomach 
until he vomited, then 
    made to put back 
into his mouth what they had 
brought forth; when he tried to... (Read full poem)

21. March 26, 1974 - written by Richard Wilbur
Read 849 times on American Poems.

R.Frost 100th B'day

The air was soft, the ground still cold.
In wet dull pastures where I strolled
Was something I could not believe.
Dead grass appeared to slide and heave,
Though still too frozen-flat to stir,
And rocks to twitch, and all... (Read full poem)

You know the brick path in the back of the house,
the one you see from the kitchen window, 
the one that bends around the far end of the garden
where all the yellow primroses are?
And you know how if you leave the path
and walk into the woods you... (Read full poem)

23. Southern Mansion - written by Arna Bontemps
Read 7544 times on American Poems.

Poplars are standing there still as death
And ghosts of dead men
Meet their ladies walking
Two by two beneath the shade
And standing on the marble steps.

There is a sound of music echoing
Through the open door
And in the field there is
Another... (Read full poem)

It is not music, though one has tried music.
It is not nature, though one has tried
The rose, the bluebird, and the bear.
It is not death, though one has often died.

None of these things is there.

In the everywhere that is nowhere
Neither... (Read full poem)

25. Because I could not stop for Death -- - written by Emily Dickinson
From Complete Poems of Emily Dickinson. Published in 1955. Read 45317 times on American Poems.

Because I could not stop for Death --
He kindly stopped for me --
The Carriage held but just Ourselves --
And Immortality.

We slowly drove -- He knew no haste
And I had put away
My labor and my leisure too,
For His Civility --

We passed the... (Read full poem)