Year: 2020

“Church Parade” by Osbert Sitwell

"Church Parade"

The flattened sea is harsh and blue—
Lies stiff beneath—one tone, one hue,

While concertina waves unfold
The painted shimmering sands of gold.

Each bird that whirls and wheels on high
Must strangle, stifle in, its cry,

For nothing that's of Nature born
Should seem so on the Sabbath morn.

The terrace glitters hard and white,
Bedaubed and flecked with points of light

That flicker at the passers-by—
Reproachful as a curate's eye.

[ . . . ]

 

Osbert Sitwell's poem "Church Parade" was published in the 1920 Wheels anthology. To read this poem in full in a digitized version of this publication, follow the links below:

Archive.org

Modernist Journals Project

“Soldiers” by F.S. Flint

"Soldiers"
To R.A. 

Brother,

I saw you on a muddy road

in France

pass by with your battalion,

rifle at the slope, full marching order,

arm swinging;

and I stood at ease,

[ . . . ]

F.S. Flint's poem "Soldiers" was published in the 1917 Some Imagist Poets anthology. To read this poem in full in a digitized version of this publication, follow the link(s) below:

HathiTrust - Digitized by the University of Virginia

The Modernist Journals Project

Project Gutenberg (HTML version)

“Childhood Memories” by William Saphier

"Childhood Memories"

Those years are foliage of trees,

their trunks hidden by bushes'

behind them a grey haze topped with silver

hides the swinging steps of my first love

the Danube.

 

On its face

grave steel palaces with smoking torches,

parading monasteries moved slowly to the Black Sea

till the bared branches scratched the north wind.

 

On its bed

a great Leviathan waited

for the ceremonies on the arrival of Messiah

and bobbing small fishes snapped sun splinters

 

for the pleasure of the monster.

Along its shores

red capped little hours danced

with rainbow colored kites,

messengers to heaven.

 

My memory is a sigh

of swallows swinging

through a slow dormant summer

to a timid line on the horizon.

 

William Saphier's poem "Childhood Memories" was published in the third Others anthology in 1920. To read this poem in a digitized version of this publication follow the link(s) below:

Archive.org

“The Ambush” by William Kean Seymour

"The Ambush"

Wild one, wild one, fleeing through the woods,

Your skin is rent with thorns, dark fear is in

your eyes."

 

"A deer was caught by giant snakes with soft and gleaming

hoods:

[ . . . ]

 

William Kean Seymour's poem "The Ambush" was published in the 1920 Wheels anthology. To read this poem in full in a digitized version of this publication, follow the link(s) below:

Archive.org

The Modernist Journals Project

 

“Beauty and Beauty” by Rupert Brooke

"Beauty and Beauty"

When Beauty and Beauty meet
All naked, fair to fair,
The earth is crying-sweet,
And scattering-bright the air,
Eddying, dizzying, closing round,
With soft and drunken laughter;
Veiling all that may befall
After—after—

Where Beauty and Beauty met,
Earth's still a-tremble there,
And winds are scented yet,
And memory-soft the air,
Bosoming, folding glints of light,
And shreds of shadowy laughter;
Not the tears that fill the years
After—after—

Rupert Brooke's poem "Beauty and Beauty" was published in Georgian Poetry, 1913-1915. To read this poem in a digitized version of this publication, follow the link(s) below:

Archive.org

HathiTrust 

Project Gutenberg (text version)

“Vicarious Atonement” by Richard Aldington

"Vicarious Atonement"

This is an old and very cruel god . . .

 

We will endure;

We will try not to wince

When he crushes and rends us.

[ . . . ]

Richard Aldington's poem "Vicarious Atonement" was published in the 1917 Some Imagist Poets anthology. To read this poem in full in a digitized version of this publication, follow the link(s) below:

HathiTrust - Digitized by the University of Virginia

The Modernist Journals Project

Project Gutenberg (HTML version)

“Crowds” by Evelyn Scott

"Crowds"

The sky along the street a gauzy yellow—

The narrow lights burn tall in the twilight.

 

The cool air sags,

Heavy with the thickness of bodies.

[ . . . ]

 

Evelyn Scott's poem "Crowds" was published in 1920 in the third Others anthology. To read this poem in full in a digitized version of this publication, follow the link(s) below:

Archive.org

“Stopping Place” by Edith Sitwell

"Stopping Place"

In highly-varnished noisy heat

As through a lens that does not fit—

The faces jolt in cubes and I

Perceive their odd solidity

And lack of meaning absolute:

For why should noses thus protrude

And to what purpose can relate

Each hair so queerly separate?

Anchored upon the puff of breeze

As shallow as the crude blue seas,

The coloured blocks and cubes of faces

 

[ . . . ]

 

Edith Sitwell's poem "Stopping Place" was published in the 1918 "cycle" of Wheels. To read this poem in full in a digitized version of this publication, follow the link(s) below:

Archive.org

The Modernist Journals Project

“A House” by J.C. Squire

"A House"

Now very quietly, and rather mournfully,

In clouds of hyacinth the sun retires,

And all the stubble-fields that were so warm to him

Keep but in memory their borrowed fires.

 

And I, the traveller, break, still unsatisfied,

From that faint exquisite celestial strand,

And turn and see again the only dwelling-place

In this wide wilderness of darkening land.

 

The house, that house, O now what change has

come to it.

Its crude red-brick facade, its roof of slate;

What imperceptible swift hand has given it

A new, a wonderful, a queenly state?

 

[ . . . ]

 

J.C. Squire's poem "A House" was published in Georgian Poetry 1916-1917. To read this poem in a digitized version of this publication, follow the link(s) below:

Archive.org

Project Gutenberg (HTML version)

 

“Venus Transiens” by Amy Lowell

"Venus Transiens"

Tell me,

Was Venus more beautiful

Than you are,

When she topped

The crinkled waves,

Drifting shoreward

On her plaited shell?

Was Botticelli's vision

Fairer than mine;

And were the painted rosebuds

He tossed his lady,

Of better worth

Than the words I blow about you

To cover your too great loveliness

As with a gauze

Of misted silver?

For me,

You stand poised

In the blue and buoyant air,

Cinctured by bright winds,

Treading the sunlight.

And the waves which precede you

Ripple and stir

The sands at my feet.

 

Amy Lowell's poem "Venus Transiens" was published in the 1915 Some Imagist Poets anthology. To read this poem in a digitized version of this publication, follow the link(s) below:

Archive.org

HathiTrust

The Modernist Journals Project