Best Wickedness Poems

No stir in the air, no stir in the sea,
The Ship was still as she could be;
Her sails from heaven received no motion,
Her keel was steady in the ocean.
...

A green and silent spot, amid the hills,
A small and silent dell ! O'er stiller place
No singing sky-lark ever poised himself.
...

I.
THE FATHER.

FATHER of Heaven, and Him, by whom
...

The bell struck one, and shook the silent tower;
The graves give up their dead: fair Elenor
Walk'd by the castle gate, and lookèd in.
A hollow groan ran thro' the dreary vaults.
...

The clock of my days winds down.
The cat eats sparrows outside my window.
Once, she brought me a small rabbit
which we devoured together, under
...

In the prologue to the Masnavi Rumi hailed Love and its sweet madness that heals all infirmities, and he exhorted the reader to burst the bonds to silver and gold to be free. The Beloved is all in all and is only veiled by the lover. Rumi identified the first cause of all things as God and considered all second causes subordinate to that. Human minds recognize the second causes, but only prophets perceive the action of the first cause. One story tells of a clever rabbit who warned the lion about another lion and showed the lion his own image in a well, causing him to attack it and drown. After delivering his companions from the tyrannical lion, the rabbit urges them to engage in the more difficult warfare against their own inward lusts. In a debate between trusting God and human exertion, Rumi quoted the prophet Muhammad as saying, "Trust in God, yet tie the camel's leg."8 He also mentioned the adage that the worker is the friend of God; so in trusting in providence one need not neglect to use means. Exerting oneself can be giving thanks for God's blessings; but he asked if fatalism shows gratitude.

God is hidden and has no opposite, not seen by us yet seeing us. Form is born of the formless but ultimately returns to the formless. An arrow shot by God cannot remain in the air but must return to God. Rumi reconciled God's agency with human free will and found the divine voice in the inward voice. Those in close communion with God are free, but the one who does not love is fettered by compulsion. God is the agency and first cause of our actions, but human will as the second cause finds recompense in hell or with the Friend. God is like the soul, and the world is like the body. The good and evil of bodies comes from souls. When the sanctuary of true prayer is revealed to one, it is shameful to turn back to mere formal religion. Rumi confirmed Muhammad's view that women hold dominion over the wise and men of heart; but violent fools, lacking tenderness, gentleness, and friendship, try to hold the upper hand over women, because they are swayed by their animal nature. The human qualities of love and tenderness can control the animal passions. Rumi concluded that woman is a ray of God and the Creator's self.
...

Birth is not from sin
Birth is from the best love;
from the faithful love of two biological soul;
From the gushing liquid I'm; as if an aquatic animal
...

I

A traveller on the skirt of Sarum's Plain
Pursued his vagrant way, with feet half bare;
...

I am really shocked to behold the pink city
Blood when flows near by the green field
From the ill fatted souls of their mother’s womb
Tear when turns red eyes yet steeped in sorrows
...

Queen Guinevere had fled the court, and sat
There in the holy house at Almesbury
Weeping, none with her save a little maid,
A novice: one low light betwixt them burned
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Contained in this world is one specific hatred
Colour and ethnicity; these differences denigrated
Before I was born, I knew I was already hated
‘Cause of the colour of my skin, constantly humiliated.
...

She lay, skin down in the moist dirt,
the canebrake rustling
with the whispers of leaves, and
...

Surreptitiously,
they came
ten assassins,
by boat
...

A storm was coming, but the winds were still,
And in the wild woods of Broceliande,
Before an oak, so hollow, huge and old
It looked a tower of ivied masonwork,
...

From noiseful arms, and acts of prowess done
In tournament or tilt, Sir Percivale,
Whom Arthur and his knighthood called The Pure,
Had passed into the silent life of prayer,
...

Undoubtedly he will relent, and turn
From his displeasure; in whose look serene,
When angry most he seemed and most severe,
What else but favour, grace, and mercy, shone?
...

Inscribed to Robert Aiken, Esq.

Let not Ambition mock their useful toil,
Their homely joys and destiny obscure;
...

Master.
Come my servant, follow me,
According to thy place;
And surely God will be with thee,
And send the heav'nly grace.
...

PROLOGUE

There's something in a flying horse,
There's something in a huge balloon;
...

ROSALIND, HELEN, and her Child.

SCENE. The Shore of the Lake of Como.
...

Thus they in lowliest plight repentant stood
Praying, for from the Mercie-seat above
Prevenient Grace descending had remov'd
The stonie from thir hearts, and made new flesh
...

dear beloved
time flies unheeded
our days apart stretched
our love tormented
...

Phoebus, sitting one day in a laurel-tree's shade,
Was reminded of Daphne, of whom it was made,
For the god being one day too warm in his wooing,
She took to the tree to escape his pursuing
...

BOOK I

Tell me, O muse, of that ingenious hero who travelled far and wide
...

1
Today, recovering from influenza,
I begin, having nothing worse to do,
This autobiography that ends a
...

Once I searched for salvation
With my blind mind and sinful heart
Through the breast of a secluded land
But salvation was smiling,
...

From God he's a backslider,
Of ways he loves the wider;
With wickedness a sider,
More venom than a spider.
...

Nothing is worthwhile or worthy to find;
Everything is futile, like chasing the wind.

The breathless sun chases the darkness since ages
...

My Master Bukton, when of Christ our King
Was asked, What is truth or soothfastness?
He not a word answer'd to that asking,
As who saith, no man is all true, I guess;
...

A ship that bears much sail, and little ballast, is easily
overset; and that man, whose head hath great abilities, and his
heart little or no grace, is in danger of foundering.
The finest bread has the least bran; the purest honey, the
...

Inscribed to Robert Aiken, Esq.

Let not Ambition mock their useful toil,
Their homely joys and destiny obscure;
...

Yet one Song more! one high and solemn strain
Ere PAEAN! on thy temple's ruined wall
I hang the silent harp: there may its strings,
When the rude tempest shakes the aged pile,
...

This is a day of happiness, sweet peace,
And heavenly sunshine; upon which conven'd
In full assembly fair, once more we view,
And hail with voice expressive of the heart,
...

There they are, my fifty men and women
Naming me the fifty poems finished!
Take them, Love, the book and me together;
...

HOW very hard it is to be
A Christian! Hard for you and me,
—Not the mere task of making real
That duty up to its ideal,
...

There is a day
It is unlike all others
The day when my God
makes himself known to his enemies
...

Aug. 12. 1653.


Jehovah to my words give ear
...

'How beautiful this night! the balmiest sigh,
Which vernal zephyrs breathe in evening's ear,
Were discord to the speaking quietude
...

You were hailed
As the Pearl of the Orient Seas
A precious gem
That never ceases to amaze.
...

Bricks heaped upon lumber,
Laid upon lungs to extricate
Evil from thoughts perceived
To have turned from God.
...

You got your seat
Without any drop of sweat
Relied on your grandfather
Your namesake
...

High on a gorgeous seat, that far out-shone
Henley's gilt tub, or Flecknoe's Irish throne,
Or that where on her Curlls the public pours,
...

But, learning now that they would have her speak,
She threw her wet hair backward from her brow,
Her hand close to her mouth touching her cheek,
...

Illustrious fathers of the human race,
Of you, the song of your afflicted sons
...

Muses of Sicily, essay we now
A somewhat loftier task! Not all men love
Coppice or lowly tamarisk: sing we woods,
...

Aug. 14. 1653.
Upon The Words Of Chush The Benjamite Against Him.
...

Now when they came to the ford of the full-flowing river Xanthus,
begotten of immortal Jove, Achilles cut their forces in two: one
half he chased over the plain towards the city by the same way that
the Achaeans had taken when flying panic-stricken on the preceding day
...

In the wild confusion of my life, I see your face
A kind countenance making bright my days
Through rugged tracks when I stumble along
I feel an unseen hand holding me strong
...

Simply beautiful, all these things You've made,
Warmth of the sun along with cool of the shade,
Whom to give legs to walk, whom to give wings,
Yes! You are Lord of Lords and King of Kings,
...

Look mercyfully down O Lord
& wash us from our sinn
Cleanse us from wicked deeds without
from wicked thoughts within
...

I
A night the half-moon was like a dancing-girl,
No, like a drunkard's last half-dollar
Shoved on the polished bar of the eastern hill-range,
...

Far and away from the talons of greed
Their conscienceless faces remain
The green back-the root of their evil
Their wickedness-a most profane bane!
...

Scatter The Creeping Vapor-Stench, Away
Expose The Wake of Eerie, Fog and Shadows
And Nightshade and Fiends, and Vile-Beasts That Bay
Begone, to Taboo, Grounds, Unhallowed …
...

Stopt by the storm, that long in sullen black
From the south-west stained its encroaching track,
Haymakers, hustling from the rain to hide,
...

SCENE I.
An Ante-chamber in the Castle.
Enter LUDOLPH and SIGIFRED.
Ludolph. No more advices, no more cautioning:
...

SCENE I.
The Country.
Enter ALBERT.
Albert. O that the earth were empty, as when Cain
...

Love is just a sapling in my heart
with pale leaves trembling
on its brittle branches
...

Dramatis Personae
...

Now, if thou wouldst inherit righteousness,
And so sanctification possess

In body, soul, and spirit, then thou must
...

By chance, I heard the belle complain,
The one we called the Armouress,
Longing to be a girl again,
Talking like this, more or less:
...

In the old wars of the world there were camp-followers,
Women of ancient sins who gave themselves for hire,
Women of weak wills and strong desire.
...

As 'tis appointed men should die,
So judgment is the next
That meets them most assuredly;
For so saith holy text.
...

Two in the Garden of Eden
who had everything to lose
the bounty of all creation
save one fruit forbidden to choose
...

How long, O Prince of Peace, how long? We sicken of the shame
Of this wild war that wraps the world, a roaring dragon-flame
...

Weak nation is
the sole architect
of strong warlordism
...

Mourner, that dost deserve thy mournfulness,
Call thyself punished, call the earth thy hell;
Say, 'God is angry, and I earned it well-
...

Then Ulysses tore off his rags, and sprang on to the broad
pavement with his bow and his quiver full of arrows. He shed the
arrows on to the ground at his feet and said, "The mighty contest is
at an end. I will now see whether Apollo will vouchsafe it to me to
...

esides what I said of the Four Last Things,
And of the weal and woe that from them springs;

An after-word still runneth in my mind,
...

I
From Frederick Graham

Mother, I smile at your alarms!
...

Yellow leaves, how fast they flutter—woodland hollows thickly strewing,
Where the wan October sunbeams scantly in the mid-day win,
While the dim gray clouds are drifting, and in saddened hues imbuing
All without and all within!
...

O Lady Fortune! 't is to thee I call,
Dwelling at Antium, thou hast power to crown
The veriest clod with riches and renown,
...

A special dish with the fish!

But,
...

1 How doth the city sit solitary,
that was full of people!
How is she become as a widow!
She that was great among the nations,
...

Whistle under the water,
Make the water bubble to the tones of the flute.
I call the bluebirds song into the water:
Wee-kee! Wee-kee-kee!
...

At the coming up of Phoebus the all-luminous charioteer,
Double-visaged stand the mountains in imperial multitudes,
...

(Jeremiah, xxxi. 18-20)

My God, till I received Thy stroke,
How like a beast was I!
...

OH, listen to the tale of MISTER WILLIAM, if you please,
Whom naughty, naughty judges sent away beyond the seas.
He forged a party's will, which caused anxiety and strife,
Resulting in his getting penal servitude for life.
...

Thus having heard from Gerizzim, I shall
Next come to Ebal, and you thither call,

Not there to curse you, but to let you hear
...

My God, till I received Thy stroke,
How like a beast was I!
So unaccustom'd to the yoke,
So backward to comply.
...

Part First
Ancient
True Thomas lay on Huntlie bank;
A ferlie he spied wi' his ee;
...

Ants Roaming Around,
Ants roaming about in search of Food for their colony;
With the muse of Positiveness ahead of them,
Able to live according to the lines of nature,
...

O goddess, who rules our lovely Antium,
always ready to lift up our mortal selves,
from humble position, or alter
proud triumphs to funeral processions,
...

I often wonder whether you
Think sometimes of that Bishop, who
From black but balmy Rum-ti-Foo
Last summer twelvemonth came.
...

Of all the youths I ever saw
None were so wicked, vain, or silly,
So lost to shame and Sabbath law,
As worldly TOM, and BOB, and BILLY.
...

1918 -- Ille autem iterum negavit.


The first time that Peter denied his Lord
...

Weary at heart and extremely ill
Was PALEY VOLLAIRE of Bromptonville,
In a dirty lodging, with fever down,
Close to the Polygon, Somers Town.
...

In times when princes cancelled nature's law,
And declarations which themselves did draw;
When children used their parents to dethrone,
...

Contention of Sa’di with a Disputant concerning Wealth and Poverty

I saw a man in the form but not with the character of a dervish, sitting in an assembly, who had begun a quarrel; and, having opened the record of complaints, reviled wealthy men, alleging at last that the hand of power of dervishes to do good was tied and that the foot of the intention of wealthy men to do good was broken.
...

Now wouldst thou have a heart that tender is,
A heart that forward is to close with bliss;

A heart that will impressions freely take
...

They call themselves Warriors...
But believe drugs and greed are their core
A conspiracy(ring) of like minded for too many years
Who always seem to want much, much more;
...

What is it with this deceit:
...

Come all ye Christian people, unto my tale give ear,
'Tis about a base consperracy, as quickly shall appear;
...

Sir Hudibras his passing worth,
The manner how he sallied forth;
His arms and equipage are shown;
...

WHEN on the West broke light from out the East,
Then from the splendour and the shame of Rome--
Renouncing wealth and pleasure, game and feast,
...

Romans, though you’re guiltless, you’ll still expiate
your fathers’ sins, till you’ve restored the temples,
and the tumbling shrines of all the gods,
and their images, soiled with black smoke.
...

Mercury (since, taught by you, his master,
Amphion could move the stones, with his singing),
and you, tortoise shell, clever at making your
seven strings echo,
...

Whoever associates with bad people will see no good.

If an angel associates with a demon
He will learn from him fear, fraud and hypocrisy.
...

not to the dark and vague
the mountain and the river,
not to the wickedness
the Sun and the Moon
...

From life we learn many a valuable truth
But alas! Some dismiss it as mere froth

While life itself is a riddle
Remember, Death is an inexorable puzzle
...

Naked before the glass she said,
“I see my body as no man has,
Nor any shall unless I wed
...