  Poetry
This week: Vachel Lindsay Edited by: Stormy Lady  
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| This is poetry from the minds and the hearts of poets on Writing.Com. The poems I am going to be exposing throughout this newsletter are ones that I have found to be, very visual, mood setting and uniquely done. Stormy Lady |
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The Eagle That is Forgotten
by Vachel Lindsay
Sleep softly ... eagle forgotten ... under the stone.
Time has its way with you there, and the clay has its own.
"We have buried him now," thought your foes, and in secret rejoiced.
They made a brave show of their mourning, their hatred unvoiced.
They had snarled at you, barked at you, foamed at you, day after day.
Now you were ended. They praised you ... and laid you away.
The others, that mourned you in silence and terror and truth,
The window bereft of her crust, and the boy without youth,
The mocked and the scorned and the sounded, the lame and the poor,
That should have remembered forever, ... Remember no more.
Where are those lovers of yours, on what name do they call,
The lost, that in armies wept over your funeral pall?
They call on the names of a hundred high-valiant ones,
A hundred white eagles have risen, the sons of your sons,
The zeal in their wings is a zeal that your dreaming began.
The valor that wore out your soul in the service of man.
Sleep softly ... eagle forgotten... under the stone.
Time has its way with you there, and the clay has its own.
Sleep on, O brave-hearted, O wise man that kindled the flame --
To live in mankind is far more than to live in a name,
To live in mankind, far, far more than ... to live in a name
Nicholas Vachel Lindsay was born on November 10, 1879. Vachel was the second child born to Thomas and Kate Frazee Lindsay. Vachel's father was a well known physician and his mother influenced Vachel's artistic side. Though his family was very well off they faced a lot of hardships too. Vachel lost three of his sisters to scarlet fever. His father being a doctor blamed himself for the girls deaths because he was helping so many people in the town that had scarlet fever he left that he brought it home. Vachel went to Springfield Public Schools in the beginning. At the age of eleven he entered Stuart Grammar School of Springfield, which was a private school. He attended Springfield High School, where he was taught by Susan Wilcox. Ms. Wilcox became a great friend to Vachel that friendship continued throughout his life. She was the first person that got to read his poetry.
Thomas Lindsay did not want his son to become a poet and pushed him into studying medicine at Hiram College. He was there for almost three years but knew deep inside he was not meant to be a doctor. Finally His father agreed and Vachel went to the Chicago Art Institute. Over the next five years he studied mostly Egyptian art. Many of his paintings have poems that go with them like, "The Tree of Laughing Bells." Then there was "The Potatoes' Dance" to name a few. His first poem was published in 1913, "General William Booth Enters Heaven". Vachel published"The Congo and Other Poems" in 1914, then "A Handy Guide for Beggars: Especially Those of the Poetic Fraternity; Being Sundry Explorations ..." in 1916.
Vachel Lindsay married Elizabeth Connor on May 20, 1925. Vachel was forty-six and Elizabeth was only twenty-three years old. Their first child was a girl, Susan Doniphan, born on May 28, 1926 and their second was a boy, Nicholas Cave, born on September 16, 1927. During this time Vachel published a collection of poems "The Candle in the Cabin." In 1929 Vachel moved his family back to the house he was born in. Vachel's published "Every Soul is a Circus" that same year.
Vachel gave what was to be his last poetry reading on November 30, 1931 in his hometown of Springfield. Though the reading went well and Vachel's felt that he had finally won over Springfield, he was deeply depressed. His marriage was falling apart and financially he had many debts that he could not pay off. Vachel mental health had become more and more unstable. Then on December 5, 1931 at one in the morning Nicholas Vachel Lindsay took his own life.
On The Garden Wall
by Vachel Lindsay
Oh, once I walked a garden
In dreams. 'Twas yellow grass.
And many orange-trees grew there
In sand as white as glass.
The curving, wide wall-border
Was marble, like the snow.
I walked that wall a fairy-prince
And, pacing quaint and slow,
Beside me were my pages,
Two giant, friendly birds.
Half swan they were, half peacock.
They spake in courtier-words.
Their inner wings a charriot,
Their outer wings for flight,
They lifted me from dreamland.
We bade those trees good-night.
Swiftly above the stars we rode.
I looked below me soon.
The white-walled garden I had ruled
Was one lone flower—the moon.
In Memory of a Child
by Vachel Lindsay
I
The angels guide him now,
And watch his curly head,
And lead him in their games,
The little boy we led.
II
He cannot come to harm,
He knows more than we know,
His light is brighter far
Than daytime here below.
III
His path leads on and on,
Through pleasant lawns and flowers,
His brown eyes open wide
At grass more green than ours.
IV
With playmates like himself,
The shining boy will sing,
Exploring wondrous woods,
Sweet with eternal spring.
V
Yet, he is lost to us,
Far is his path of gold,
Far does the city seem,
Lonely our hearts and old.
Thank you all!
Stormy Lady
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The winner of "Stormy's poetry newsletter & contest" [ASR] is:
| |  | New Me (E)
Contest entry. It does take courage to make a change, but it's worth it.
#2149109 by Dorianne  |
New Me
I am not a victim anymore.
I will walk down the streets
As a proud individual who is not
Unseen like a ghost.
The world will not put me
In a box with unwanted trash
The shell I lived in was left
At the corner of lies and despair
Today I wear my badge of
Innocence with strength and pride
Passersby have nothing to fear
From me or my countenance.
I am not a victim anymore,
Because I am a strong, new woman.
Honorable Mention
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Poetry: February 28, 2018 Issue [#8784]
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