Walt Whitman, O Captain, My Captain

My Captain does not answer, his lips are pale and still,

My father does not feel my arm, he has no pulse nor will,

The ship is anchor’d safe and sound, its voyage closed and done,

From fearful trip the victor ship comes in with object won;

Andrew Mancinelli, The Fire

I was in that fire,

The room was dark and somber.

I sleep peacefully.

That alarm then rang,

The sound annoying and loud,

But it saved my life.

Anonymous, Peru

There once was a man from Peru

Who had a lot of growing up to do,

He’d ring a doorbell,

then run like hell,

Until the owner shot him with a .22.

Edna St. Vincent Millay, Chaos in 14 Lines

I will put Chaos into fourteen lines

And keep him there; and let him thence escape

If he be lucky; let him twist, and ape

Flood, fire, and demon–his adroit designs

Will strain to nothing in the strict confines

Of this sweet Order, where, in pious rape,

I hold his essence and amorphous shape,

Till he with Order mingles and combines.

Past are the hours, the years, or our duress,

His arrogance, our awful servitude:

I have him. He is nothing more than less

Than something simple not yet understood;

I shall not even force him to confess;

Or answer. I will only make him good.

"The Mermaid"

Oh the ocean waves may roll,

And the stormy winds may blow,

While we poor sailors go skipping aloft

And the land lubbers lay down below, below, below

And the land lubbers lay down below.

"Alexis" by Nicholas Gordon

Alexis seems quite shy and somewhat frail,

Leaning, like a tree averse to light,

Evasively away from her delight.

X-rays, though, reveal a sylvan sprite,

Intense as a bright bird behind her veil,

Singing to the moon throughout the night.

Day

Sun so bright

Twelve hours long

Visually lighted views

Blindness black, dark

Darkness scene

Nights

Brutal beatings beyond the feeling of pain

Understanding this hurt might get me closer to being sane

Love is a myth

Life has become like a work of Stephen King

You don't know what it's like

I am treated like just some "thing"

Never to be kissed, comforted, or loved

Going the rest of my life never to be hugged

"The Song of Hiawatha" by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

By the shore of Gitchie Gumee,

By the shining Big-Sea-Water,

At the doorway of his wigwam,

In the pleasant Summer morning,

Hiawatha stood and waited.