Modern Poetry: Death and Sorrow
An Anthology of Poems
No one knows the sorrow of our heart, though we express it well. Death is never an easy thing to deal with; even the death of a beloved pet brings much sorrow. Just imagine how terrible it will be to lose a child, brother, sister, parents, friends and even perfect strangers. I have over my life lost many people who were close to me, some have died and others have move far away never to be heard from again. The pain does ease with time but, many years from now there will be times that take you back. Sad memories are always perpetuated on the walls of your heart but we find a way to expose them in eternal sunshine.
As a child growing up in a town where I saw most of the people die, I did not see happiness as important aspect of live because I was always in sorrowful mood. I recall wondering how people die without getting sick or how small sickness can kill people. Now as a young adult I have begun to think more about death and am still trying to answer some of those timeless questions concerning it. Death has become the biggest issue in my life as I age. As a young adult I do understand why people die. I understand why there are deadly diseases that cause people to die suddenly. I have come to released that death in family is painful and that pain can bring us closer. I have learned not to let the pain of dying drive my friends and families away, but I still occasionally look at me as an outsider.
Rarely have I seen the difference between death and sorrow. Sorrow follows when a person die, it is odd for me to hear people say death and sorrow don’t correlate. When I think of death, I think of the old wicked madman on the corner of
I arranged the poems into three sections which are sorrow, death, and death as salvation. Sorrow is the first part of the anthology. One of the first poems I chose for this anthology was Emily Dickinson’s “Only God—detect the sorrow.” I liked how the poet was confident that “Only God detect the sorrow, only God.” Emily’s tone appealed to me because she was certain that there was no one who can detect sorrow but God. This poem is so clear and direct.
Another powerful section of this anthology is Death as Salvation. This section gives hope and encouragement to people who have lost friends, family members, etc. It argues people to see death as a beautiful thing which is part of life and to know that death bring peace. In the poem when I die by Rumi Ghazal, the author compared life to a falling seed. She let the readers to know that when a seed falls on a soil it germinate and that is the same way death is. I think the author believe that when we die we are transformed into something different. This poem is powerful because it encourages readers not to mourn or be sad when someone passes away but instead view death as a positive thing since it transform people to a new paradise or world.
Some of these poems require in-depth thinking in order to get what the poet is saying while other are short, simple and straight to the point. These poems give us kinetic images of dead and sorrow.
My favorite poem is “Peace my heart” by Tagore. The poet is stating that death is a goddess, sweet, and beautiful. It was important for the writer to respect death in his writing. I assume that the writer referring to “your” in his piece is implying to death. “Let the last touch of your hands be gentle like the flower of the night.”
The whole anthology contains 20 poems. The poems are powerful straightforward poems. The first section is about sorrow of losing someone. The second section is about death in general and our attitude toward it and the third one is about death as salvation.
I hope this anthology will open the readers’ eyes to the idea of death and sorrow and the power of death as salvation. It is my hope that you will try and understand what every authors were talking about and just visualize the situation the author were when they wrote their poems.
SECTION 1
SORROW
Only God--detect the Sorrow
Emily Dickinson
Emily Dickinson (1830 - 1886) is one of
Only God--detect the Sorrow--
Only God--
The Jehovahs--are not Babblers--
Unto God--
Unto the Son--Confide it--
Still secure--
God the Spirits Honor--
Just as sure—
http://famouspoetsandpoems.com/poets/emily_dickinson/poems/9410
Friends Forever
Marian Aduako-Appiah
I wrote this poem when my best friend since childhood passed away in 2007. The fear of letting the pain of losing her go has never been easy. I find it hard to make friends again because she was so special to me and I know no one will ever know the pain and agony I have been through ever since losing her.
Friends forever,
I never thought I will lose someone
Whom I share a lot with,
She was like my half-sister,
Sisters, sisters,
that was how er call each other,
I thought I will have her by my side all the time.
studying together was what we did best.
We both had the same dreams of becoming doctor, but now I'm left out,
I can't take it!
Am stake on the
We were friends so that we can smile forever,
but you left me in the darkness of sorrow.
I can't control the tears,
My eyes are like fire,
My face is turning red,
You went away leaving me alone.
Whenever I see myself in the mirror,
I see you too; I know you are with me,
and you will always be with me.
Standing on the mountain tall,
all I can hear is the sound of the colored bird,
I know you are not coming back,
but you are with me.
YOU are with me,
The sun scotching,
The wind blowing the trees,
I miss you,
I will never get to see you again.
We are all making a journey to
The beautiful place, the trees, animals and
how good things are, I think you are having a great time,
So I have to let you go.
I will be with you when my time is up.
Am hurt, and from time to time,
I will remember you, because
YOU are with me.
*NO
In My Mind
Jenn Farrell
I love the feeling that not only inspired the work but the sentiment with which it was written. Any piece of poetry that can instill feeling can ever be anything but good. I like the way the author incorporated emotions in this piece and when I have an imagination of this story I felt the author was not mad in any sense.
Somewhere in my dreams tonight
I'll see you standing there
You look at me with a smile
"Life isn't always fair"
You say you were chosen from his garden
His preciously hand-picked bouquet
"God really need me,
That's why I couldn't stay"
It's said to be that angels
Angels are sent from above
I've always have my angels
My brother- whose heart was filled with love
Whenever the ocean meets the sky
There will be memories of you and I
When I look up at the sky so blue
All I see are visions of you
"While there is a heart in me, you'll be a part of me."
http://www.netpoets.com/poems/death/0521002.htm
A never-ending ocean
Matthew Jewell
The story behind my poem is the tsunami that hit
It tells the story of how people were stranded without any chance of help and the damage that was done.
sewage water
floods a village
through the school
torrential rain
like an ocean
a never-ending ocean
heavy rain
has come again
but worse than before
flooding farmland
killing livestock
like an ocean
a never-ending ocean
water level
has risen high
over walls
reaching the sky
like an ocean
a never-ending ocean
family and friends
lost out at sea
help unavailable
living impossible
like an ocean
a never-ending ocean
sparks flying
people dying
telephone lines
flooded trains
cars all floating
on an ocean
a never-ending ocean
http://www.poem-and-poet.com/sorrow/never-ending-ocean-poem.asp
Rainbow
Marian Aduako-Appiah
It still hard for me to explain the story behind this poem, It was written while I was still in high school in 2006. I came to write this story when a close friend whose parents in the army had a call that her mom was in a car accident. She told me how close they were and how her mom love spring season, so I decided I will make this be a prayer for her and for her to keep a positive attitude that her mom was still with her.
The colors, the shape,
And how they come out during spring time,
Bringing joy and happiness to every child,
Gold the treasure that I always dream about,
It was just in my hands, in the dark.
The shiny color and solid thing like a rock,
Which makes dreams come true was taking by the evil eagle,
To the other side of the rainbow,
How can I get there to take it?
Gold the treasure of my heart,
Rainbow the long color ray,
How will I get there to take it
From the eagle,
The one who seems to get everything,
My lips are sealed,
My palm is dry,
Waiting for the gold to comeback,
My golden eyes are tired of stirring at the most beautiful thing
In the sky, “RAINBOW”
How can I get there to get the gold.
I have being waiting for years,
To go to the other side of the rainbow,
Mommy use to stand next to me,
So that we can view the rainbow,
Now I can recite the colors of the rainbow without seeing it,
But to whom will listen? She is nowhere to be found.
Rainbow the colors that I love,
Stirring at the sky blue and the wet ground,
I knew I was by myself to get to the other side of the rainbow.
Mommy wherever you are I know
That you are helping God to watch over me,
So that I can see the rainbow at all time.
Tears are dropping down my cheeks, like water pouring from a long jar.
I wish I can get to the other side of the rainbow to get you, because you are the gold that I have been looking for.
*No link*
A rhyme with no words
Rachel Hirons
This poem is like remembering a close friend who died and to understand the feeling of losing someone, but it seems language really can fail to describe some things we feel.
I don't want to dance in your honor,
Or drink in your name,
And no-one finds comfort in 'we all feel the same'.
They say things like this happen,
They know how I feel,
God always has a reason,
And if that fails, time will heal.
But I don't know what I should say,
There seems no suitable cliché,
No lyrics that could even touch
A fear or pain that hurts this much...
http://www.poem-and-poet.com/sorrow/rhyme-with-no-words-poem.asp
A baby dying
Stephen Hiron
Seeing my little sister grow up quickly and safely having stopped me from thinking about all those parents in the world who had experience the tragedy of losing a child, the pain they go through, and the questions and anger they have. I think the author might have experience losing a child and he expresses close that child is to her mother. I like this poem because it is short and it rhymes.
Against her breast the infant clings,
in soothing tones she whispers low,
surrounded by familiar things
which fill this sad scenario,
and stooping, cradles, softly sings
in rhythm to the heartbeat slow.
Within this still embrace there dwells
a love too deep for words to tell,
as through the song her sorrow swells
as breath meets breath they say farewell.
The child is pulled towards her breast,
his forehead by her kisses crowned,
and neither one can keep their breath,
and neither think this fact profound,
that lullabies now herald death
and only she now hears the sound.
http://www.poem-and-poet.com/sorrow/baby-dying-poem.asp
And Thou art Dead, as Young and Fair
by Lord Byron (George Gordon)
And thou art dead, as young and fair
As aught of mortal birth;
And form so soft, and charms so rare,
Too soon return'd to Earth!
Though Earth receiv'd them in her bed,
And o'er the spot the crowd may tread
In carelessness or mirth,
There is an eye which could not brook
A moment on that grave to look.
I will not ask where thou liest low,
Nor gaze upon the spot;
There flowers or weeds at will may grow,
So I behold them not:
It is enough for me to prove
That what I lov'd, and long must love,
Like common earth can rot;
To me there needs no stone to tell,
'T is Nothing that I lov'd so well.
Yet did I love thee to the last
As fervently as thou,
Who didst not change through all the past,
And canst not alter now.
The love where Death has set his seal,
Nor age can chill, nor rival steal,
Nor falsehood disavow:
And, what were worse, thou canst not see
Or wrong, or change, or fault in me.
The better days of life were ours;
The worst can be but mine:
The sun that cheers, the storm that lowers,
Shall never more be thine.
The silence of that dreamless sleep
I envy now too much to weep;
Nor need I to repine
That all those charms have pass'd away,
I might have watch'd through long decay.
The flower in ripen'd bloom unmatch'd
Must fall the earliest prey;
Though by no hand untimely snatch'd,
The leaves must drop away:
And yet it were a greater grief
To watch it withering, leaf by leaf,
Than see it pluck'd to-day;
Since earthly eye but ill can bear
To trace the change to foul from fair.
I know not if I could have borne
To see thy beauties fade;
The night that follow'd such a morn
Had worn a deeper shade:
Thy day without a cloud hath pass'd,
And thou wert lovely to the last,
Extinguish'd, not decay'd;
As stars that shoot along the sky
Shine brightest as they fall from high.
As once I wept, if I could weep,
My tears might well be shed,
To think I was not near to keep
One vigil o'er thy bed;
To gaze, how fondly! on thy face,
To fold thee in a faint embrace,
Uphold thy drooping head;
And show that love, however vain,
Nor thou nor I can feel again.
Yet how much less it were to gain,
Though thou hast left me free,
The loveliest things that still remain,
Than thus remember thee!
The all of thine that cannot die
Through dark and dread Eternity
Returns again to me,
And more thy buried love endears
Than aught except its living years.
http://www.poetryfoundation.org/archive/poem.html?id=173078
Beyond Harm
by Sharon Olds
The poem describes the abusive relationship a child was in with her father and how the child begun to love the way his father was.
A week after my father died
suddenly I understood
his fondness for me was safe—nothing
could touch it. In those last months,
his face would sometimes brighten when I would
enter the room, and his wife said
that once, when he was half asleep,
he smiled when she said my name. He respected
my spunk—when they tied me to the chair, that time,
they were tying up someone he respected, and when
he did not speak, for weeks, I was one of the
beings to whom he was not speaking,
someone with a place in his life. The last
week he even said it, once,
by mistake. I walked into his room, and said “How
are you,” and he said, “I love you
too.” From then on, I had
that word to lose. Right up to the last
moment, I could make some mistake, offend him, and with
one of his old mouths of disgust he could re-
skew my life. I did not think of it,
I was helping to take care of him,
wiping his face and watching him.
But then, a while after he died,
I suddenly thought, with amazement, he will always
love me now, and I laughed—he was dead, dead!
http://www.poetryfoundation.org/archive/poem.html?id=27369
Facing It
by Yusef Komunyakaa
My black face fades,
hiding inside the black granite.
I said I wouldn't,
dammit: No tears.
I'm stone. I'm flesh.
My clouded reflection eyes me
like a bird of prey, the profile of night
slanted against morning. I turn
this way—the stone lets me go.
I turn that way—I'm inside
the
again, depending on the light
to make a difference.
I go down the 58,022 names,
half-expecting to find
my own in letters like smoke.
I touch the name Andrew Johnson;
I see the booby trap's white flash.
Names shimmer on a woman's blouse
but when she walks away
the names stay on the wall.
Brushstrokes flash, a red bird's
wings cutting across my stare.
The sky. A plane in the sky.
A white vet's image floats
closer to me, then his pale eyes
look through mine. I'm a window.
He's lost his right arm
inside the stone. In the black mirror
a woman’s trying to erase names:
No, she's brushing a boy's hair.
http://www.poetryfoundation.org/archive/poem.html?id=177382
SECTION 2
DEATH
"Death be not proud, though some have called thee"
John Donne
“Death Be Not Proud” is a powerful declaration against death, in which death is personified as a tyrant without real power “…some have called thee / Mighty and dreadfull, for, thou art not soe” (1-2). The poem continues to dismantle death from something mysterious and feared, to something weak and irrelevant. The speaker’s main polemic is grounded in the beliefs of Christian philosophy, in particular, its promise of eternal life. The poem attacks death from two different angles: a secular angle and a religious angle. The first twelve lines are mostly secular in the sense that a non-Christian can at least follow the argument. The last two lines require a belief in Christianity, and with this belief, comes the more powerful, irrefutable claim, dramatically stated in the words “And death shall be no more; Death, thou shalt die”(14), which pertains to the Christian concept of Eternal Life.
DEATH be not proud, though some have called thee
Mighty and dreadfull, for, thou art not so,
For, those, whom thou think'st, thou dost overthrow,
Die not, poore death, nor yet canst thou kill me.
From rest and sleepe, which but thy pictures bee,
Much pleasure, then from thee, much more must flow,
And soonest our best men with thee doe goe,
Rest of their bones, and soules deliveries.
Thou art slave of Fate, Chance, kings, and desperate men,
And dost with poyson, warre, and sickness dwell,
And poppie, or charmes cna make us sleepe as well,
And better then thy stroake; why swell'st thou then;
One short sleepe past, wee wake eternally,
And death shall be noo more; death, thou shalt die.
http://www.bartleby.com/105/72.html
Part Four: Time and Eternity
Emily Dickinson
XXXI
The poet expresses her sense of humor for this poem making it sort of a joke, but at the same time on a serious note referring to our body as spirit and dust and when we die we become overcoat of clay. Her sentences are short which also express a nervous discharge of energy throughout the poem.
DEATH is a dialogue between
The spirit and the dust.
"Dissolve," says Death. The Spirit, "Sir,
I have another trust."
Death doubts it, argues from the ground.
The Spirit turns away,
Just laying off, for evidence,
An overcoat of clay.
http://www.bartleby.com/113/4031.html
Bitterness of Death
D.H. Lawrence (1885-1930) 1916.
| I | |
| How can you lie so relentless hard | |
| While I wash you with weeping water! | |
| Do you set your face against the daughter | |
| Of life? Can you never discard | 5 |
| Your curt pride’s ban? | |
| | |
| You masquerader! | |
| How can you shame to act this part | |
| Of unswerving indifference to me? | |
| You want at last, ah me! | 10 |
| To break my heart | |
| Evader! | |
| | |
| You know your mouth | |
| Was always sooner to soften | |
| Even than your eyes. | 15 |
| Now shut it lies | |
| Relentless, however often | |
| I kiss it in drouth. | |
| | |
| It has no breath | |
| Nor any relaxing. Where, | 20 |
| Where are you, what have you done? | |
| What is this mouth of stone? | |
| How did you dare | |
| Take cover in death! | |
| | |
| II | 25 |
| The white moon show like a breast revealed | |
| By the slipping shawl of stars. | |
| Could see the small stars tremble | |
| As the heart beneath did wield | |
| Systole, diastole. | 30 |
| | |
| All the lovely macrocosm | |
| Was woman once to you, | |
| Bride to your groom. | |
| No tree in bloom | |
| But it leaned you a new | 35 |
| White bosom. | |
| | |
| And always and ever | |
| Soft as a summering tree | |
| Unfolds from the sky, for your good, | |
| Unfolded womanhood; | 40 |
| Shedding you down as a tree | |
| Sheds its flowers on a river. | |
| | |
| I saw your brows | |
| Set like rocks beside a sea of gloom, | |
| And I shed my very soul down into your thought; | 45 |
| Like flowers I fell, to be caught | |
| On the comforted pool, like bloom | |
| That leaves the boughs. | |
| | |
| III | |
| With a hard face white-enameled, | 50 |
| What are you now? | |
| Do you care no longer how | |
| My heart is trammeled, | |
| Evader? | |
| | |
| Is this you, after all, | 55 |
| Metallic, obdurate | |
| With bowels of steel? | |
| Did you never feel?— | |
| Cold, insensate, | |
| Mechanical! | 60 |
| | |
| Ah, no!—you multiform, | |
| You that I loved, you wonderful, | |
| You who darkened and shone, | |
| You were many men in one; | |
| But never this null | 65 |
| This never-warm! | |
| | |
| Is this the sum of you? | |
| Is it all nought? | |
| Cold, metal-cold? | |
| Are you all told | 70 |
| Here, iron-wrought? | |
| Is this what’s become of you? | |
http://www.bartleby.com/128/32.html
| Dad |
| Judy Burnette This poem is about how the author misses her father. This poem applies to everyone who has loss a father who was really influential in their lives. |
| Dad...so many images come to mind http://www.netpoets.com/poems/death/0319006.htm R.I.P This poem reminds of the time my grandma passed away. It was hard for me to let it go, but as time progressed I learned to live everyday remembering her good works. |
SECTION 3
DEATH AS SALVATION
Peace my heart...
Rabindranath Tagore
The poet of this poem saw death to be beautiful and hold death in a higher esteem.
Peace, my heart, let the time for the parting be sweet.
Let it not be a death but completeness.
Let love melt into memory and pain into songs.
Let the flight through the sky end in the folding of the wings over the nest.
Let the last touch of your hands be gentle like the flower of the night.
Stand still, O Beautiful End, for a moment, and say your last words in silence.
I bow to you and hold up my lamp to light you on your way.
http://allspirit.co.uk/dying.html
from Rennyo's Letters
translated by Hisao Inagaki et al
When I deeply contemplate the transient nature of human life, I realize that,
from beginning to end, life is impermanent like an illusion. We have not yet
heard of anyone who lived ten thousand years. How fleeting is a lifetime!
Who in this world today can maintain a human form for even a hundred years?
There is no knowing whether I will die first or others, whether death will occur
today or tomorrow. We depart one after another more quickly than the dewdrops on
the roots or the tips of the blades of grasses. So it is said. Hence, we may
have radiant faces in the morning, but by evening we may turn into white ashes.
Once the winds of impermanence have blown, our eyes are instantly closed and our
breath stops forever. Then, our radiant face changes its color, and the
attractive countenance like peach and plum blossoms is lost. Family and
relatives will gather and grieve, but all to no avail?
Since there is nothing else that can be done, they carry the deceased out to the
fields, and then what is left after the body has been cremated and has turned
into the
of it all.
Thus the ephemeral nature of human existence is such that death comes to young
and old alike without discrimination. So we should all quickly take to heart the
matter of the greatest importance of the afterlife, entrust ourselves deeply to
Amida Buddha, and recite the nembutsu.
Humbly and respectfully.
http://allspirit.co.uk/dying.html
Because I could not stop for Death
Emily Dickinson
This poem reminds us to be prepared for death. Although talking about death would be scary for those who have no contentment in his/her life. But the poet presents this masterpiece of how to treasure everything; her passion for death would only mean that she valued life. This poem subjugates that death is an elusive yet subtle being. It shows that no matter what you think about life and how busy you are, death is never too busy to stop for you
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 labour and my leisure too,
For His Civility--
We passed the School, where Children strove
At Recess--in the Ring--
We passed the Fields of Gazing Grain--
We passed the Setting Sun--
Or rather--He passed Us--
The Dews drew quivering and chill--
For only Gossamer, my Gown--
My Tippet--only Tulle--
We paused before a House that seemed
A Swelling of the Ground--
The Roof was scarcely visible--
The Cornice--in the Ground--
Since then--'tis Centuries--and yet
Feels shorter than the Day
I first surmised the Horses Heads
Were toward Eternity—
http://allspirit.co.uk/dying.html
Samuel Hoffenstein
This story describes death as a sleep or rest. I think the author wonders why the living cries meanwhile the dead have peace and it is asleep. This story tells us death is a peaceful thing that happens in live and we should not worry about it.
The dead they sleep a long, long sleep;
The dead they rest, and their rest is deep;
The dead have peace, but the living weep.
http://allspirit.co.uk/dying.html
When I die...
RUMI, ghazal number 911,
translated
by Nader Khalili
When I die
when my coffin
is being taken out
you must never think
i am missing this world
don't shed any tears
don't lament or
feel sorry
i'm not falling
into a monster's abyss
when you see
my corpse is being carried
don't cry for my leaving
i'm not leaving
i'm arriving at eternal love
when you leave me
in the grave
don't say goodbye
remember a grave is
only a curtain
for the paradise behind
you'll only see me
descending into a grave
now watch me rise
how can there be an end
when the sun sets or
the moon goes down
it looks like the end
it seems like a sunset
but in reality it is a dawn
when the grave locks you up
that is when your soul is freed
have you ever seen
a seed fallen to earth
not rise with a new life
why should you doubt the rise
of a seed named human
have you ever seen
a bucket lowered into a well
coming back empty
why lament for a soul
when it can come back
like Joseph from the well
when for the last time
you close your mouth
your words and soul
will belong to the world of
no place no time
http://allspirit.co.uk/dying.html
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