Harvest
Day is the hero's shield,
Achilles' field,
The light days are the angels.
We the seed.
Against eternal light and gorgon's face
Day is the shield
And we the grass
Native to fields of iron, and skies of brass.
poem by Kathleen Jessie Raine
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The End of Love
Now he is dead
How should I know
My true love's arms
From wind and snow?
No man I meet
In field or house
Though in the street
A hundred pass.
The hurrying dust
Has never a face,
No longer human
In man or woman.
Now he is gone
Why should I mourn
My true love more than mud,
than mud or stone?
poem by Kathleen Jessie Raine
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Lenten Flowers
Primrose, anemone, bluebell, moss
Grow in the Kingdom of the Cross
And the ash-tree's purple bud
Dresses the spear that sheds his blood.
With the thorns that pierce his brow
Soft encircling petals grow
For in each flower the secret lies
Of the tree that crucifies.
Garden by the water clear
All must die who enter here!
poem by Kathleen Jessie Raine
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Paradise Seed
Where is the seed
Of the tree felled,
Of the forest burned,
Or living root
Under ash and cinders?
From woven bud
What last leaf strives
Into life, last
Shrivelled flower?
Is fruit of our harvest,
Our long labour
Dust to the core?
To what far, fair land
Borne on the wind
What winged seed
Or spark of fire
From holocaust
To kindle a star?
poem by Kathleen Jessie Raine
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Storm
God in me is the fury on the bare heath
God in me shakes the interior kingdom of my heaven.
God in me is the fire wherein I burn.
God in me swirling cloud and driving rain
God in me cries a lonely nameless bird
God in me beats my head upon a stone.
God in me the four elements of storm
Raging in the shelterless landscape of the mind
Outside the barred doors of my Goneril heart.
poem by Kathleen Jessie Raine
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Vegetation
O never harm the dreaming world,
the world of green, the world of leaves,
but let its million palms unfold
the adoration of the trees.
It is a love in darkness wrought
obedient to the unseen sun,
longer than memory, a thought
deeper than the graves of time.
The turning spindles of the cells
weave a slow forest over space,
the dance of love, creation,
out of time moves not a leaf,
and out of summer, not a shade.
poem by Kathleen Jessie Raine
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In the Beck
There is a fish, that quivers in the pool,
itself a shadow, but its shadow, clear.
Catch it again and again, it still is there.
Against the flowing stream, its life keeps pace
with death - the impulse and the flash of grace
hiding in its stillness, moves to be motionless.
No net will hold it - always it will return
Where the ripples settle, and the sand -
It lives unmoved, equated with the stream,
As flowers are fit for air, man for his dream.
poem by Kathleen Jessie Raine
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Heroes
This war's dead heroes, who has seen them?
They rise in smoke above the burning city,
Faint clouds, dissolving into sky —
And who sifting the Libyan sand can find
The tracery of a human hand,
The faint impression of an absent mind,
The fade-out of a soldier's day dream?
You'll know your love no more, nor his sweet kisses —
He's forgotten you, girl, and in the idle sun
In long green grass that the east wind caresses
The seed of man is ravished by the corn.
poem by Kathleen Jessie Raine
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Nocturne
Night comes, an angel stands
Measuring out the time of stars,
Still are the winds, and still the hours.
It would be peace to lie
Still in the still hours at the angel's feet,
Upon a star hung in a starry sky,
But hearts another measure beat.
Each body, wingless as it lies,
Sends out its butterfly of night
With delicate wings, and jewelled eyes.
And some upon day's shores are cast,
And some in darkness lost
In waves beyond the world, where float
Somewhere the islands of the blest.
poem by Kathleen Jessie Raine
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Confessions
Wanting to know all
I overlooked each particle
Containing the whole
Unknowable.
Intent on one great love, perfect,
Requited and for ever,
I missed love's everywhere
Small presence, thousand-guised.
And lifelong have been reading
Book after book, searching
For wisdom, but bringing
Only my own understanding.
Forgive me, forgiver,
Whether you be infinite omniscient
Or some unnoticed other
My existence has hurt.
[...] Read more
poem by Kathleen Jessie Raine
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