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Stephen Vincent Benet's Poetry, by first line

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  • The Drug-Shop, Or, Endymion In Edmonstoun
    Night falls; the great jars glow against the dark,
    Dark green, dusk red, and, like a coiling snake,
    447 lines
  • Rain After A Vaudeville Show
    The last pose flickered, failed. The screen's dead white
    Glared in a sudden flooding of harsh light
    30 lines
  • The City Revisited
    The grey gulls drift across the bay
    Softly and still as flakes of snow
    56 lines
  • Going Back To School
    The boat ploughed on. Now Alcatraz was past
    And all the grey waves flamed to red again
    31 lines
  • Nos Immortales
    Perhaps we go with wind and cloud and sun,
    Into the free companionship of air;
    14 lines
  • Young Blood
    He woke up with a sick taste in his mouth
    And lay there heavily, while dancing motes
    45 lines
  • The Quality Of Courage
    Black trees against an orange sky,
    Trees that the wind shook terribly,
    184 lines
  • Alexander VI Dines With The Cardinal Of Capua
    Next, then, the peacock, gilt
    With all its feathers. Look, what gorgeous dyes
    60 lines
  • The Breaking Point
    It was not when temptation came,
    Swiftly and blastingly as flame,
    35 lines
  • Lonely Burial
    There were not many at that lonely place,
    Where two scourged hills met in a little plain.
    14 lines
  • Dinner In A Quick Lunch Room
    Soup should be heralded with a mellow horn,
    Blowing clear notes of gold against the stars;
    14 lines, 1 comment
  • The Hemp
    (A Virginia Legend.)
    The Planting of the Hemp.
    157 lines
  • Poor Devil!
    Well, I was tired of life; the silly folk,
    The tiresome noises, all the common things
    24 lines
  • Ghosts Of A Lunatic Asylum
    Here, where men's eyes were empty and as bright
    As the blank windows set in glaring brick,
    16 lines
  • The White Peacock
    (France -- Ancient Regime.)
    I.
    125 lines, 1 comment
  • Colors
    (For D. M. C.)
    The little man with the vague beard and guise
    15 lines
  • The Lover In Hell
    Eternally the choking steam goes up
    From the black pools of seething oil. . . .
    67 lines
  • Winged Man
    The moon, a sweeping scimitar, dipped in the stormy straits,
    The dawn, a crimson cataract, burst through the eastern gates,
    37 lines, 1 comment
  • Music
    My friend went to the piano; spun the stool
    A little higher; left his pipe to cool;
    27 lines
  • The Innovator
    (A Pharaoh Speaks.)
    I said, "Why should a pyramid
    21 lines
  • Love In Twilight
    There is darkness behind the light -- and the pale light drips
    Cold on vague shapes and figures, that, half-seen loom
    20 lines
  • The Fiddling Wood
    Gods, what a black, fierce day! The clouds were iron,
    Wrenched to strange, rugged shapes; the red sun winked
    54 lines
  • Portrait Of A Boy
    After the whipping he crawled into bed,
    Accepting the harsh fact with no great weeping.
    24 lines
  • Portrait Of A Baby
    He lay within a warm, soft world
    Of motion. Colors bloomed and fled,
    55 lines, 1 comment
  • The General Public
    Ah, did you once see Shelley plain?" -- Browning.
    "Shelley? Oh, yes, I saw him often then
    43 lines
  • Road And Hills
    I shall go away
    To the brown hills, the quiet ones,
    58 lines
  • Elegy For An Enemy
    (For G. H.)
    Say, does that stupid earth
    57 lines
  • The Ballad Of William Sycamore [1790-1871]
    My father, he was a mountaineer,
    His fist was a knotty hammer;
    76 lines, 2 comments
  • The Congressmen Came Out To See Bull Run
    The congressmen came out to see Bull Run,
    The congressmen who like free shows and spectacles.
    86 lines
  • Three Day's Ride
    "FROM Belton Castle to Solway side,
    Hard by the bridge, is three days' ride."
    133 lines
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