A Mocking-Bird

Listen to: 

A Mocking-Bird (:45)

by Witter Bynner 

performed by Bob Gonzalez, rhapsode

An arrow, feathery, alive,

He darts and sings,—

Then with a sudden skimming dive

Of striped wings

He finds a pine and, debonair,

Makes with his mate

All birds that ever rested there

Articulate.

The whisper of a multitude

Of happy wings

Is round him, a returning brood,

Each time he sings.

Though heaven be not for them or him

Yet he is wise,

And daily tiptoes on the rim

Of paradise.

Reconciliation

Listen to:

Reconciliation (:59)

by William Butler Yeats 

William Butler Yeats was born on this day in 1865

performed by Bob Gonzalez, rhapsode

Some may have blamed you that you took away
The verses that could move them on the day
When, the ears being deafened, the sight of the eyes blind 

With lightning you went from me, and I could find 

Nothing to make a song about but kings,
Helmets, and swords, and half-forgotten things
That were like memories of you—but now
We’ll out, for the world lives as long ago;
And while we’re in our laughing, weeping fit,
Hurl helmets, crowns, and swords into the pit.
But, dear, cling close to me; since you were gone,
My barren thoughts have chilled me to the bone.

The Poet's Possession

Listen to: 

The Poet's Possession (:39)

by Archibald Lampman 

performed by Bob Gonzalez, rhapsode

    Think not, oh master of the well-tilled field,

    This earth is only thine; for after thee,

    When all is sown and gathered and put by,

    Comes the grave poet with creative eye,

    And from these silent acres and clean plots,

    Bids with his wand the fancied after-yield,

    A second tilth and second harvest, be,

    The crop of images and curious thoughts.

The Rain

Listen to: 

The Rain (:42)

William H. Davies 

performed by Bob Gonzalez, rhapsode

I hear leaves drinking Rain;

I hear rich leaves on top

Giving the poor beneath

Drop after drop;

'Tis a sweet noise to hear

These green leaves drinking near.

And when the Sun comes out,

After this Rain shall stop,

A wondrous Light will fill

Each dark, round drop;

I hope the Sun shines bright;

'Twill be a lovely sight.

The Dandelion

Listen to: 

The Dandelion (:46)

Vachel Lindsay 

performed by Bob Gonzalez, rhapsode

O dandelion, rich and haughty,

King of village flowers!

Each day is coronation time,

You have no humble hours.

I like to see you bring a troop

To beat the blue-grass spears,

To scorn the lawn-mower that would be

Like fate's triumphant shears.

Your yellow heads are cut away,

It seems your reign is o'er.

By noon you raise a sea of stars

More golden than before.

Tell-Tale

Listen to: 

Tell-Tale (1:06)

by Oliver Herford 

performed by Bob Gonzalez, rhapsode

The Lily whispered to the Rose:

"The Tulip's fearfully stuck up.

You'd think to see the creature's pose,

She was a golden altar-cup.

There's method in her boldness, too;

She catches twice her share of Dew."

The Rose into the Tulip's ear

Murmured: "The Lily is a sight;

Don't you believe she powders, dear,

To make herself so saintly white?

She takes some trouble, it is plain,

Her reputation to sustain."

Said Tulip to the Lily white:

"About the Rose—what do you think?—

Her color? Should you say it's quite—

Well, quite a natural shade of pink?"

"Natural!" the Lily cried. "Good Saints!

Why, everybody knows she paints!"

Sonnet

Listen to: 

Sonnet (1:06)

John Masefield 

performed by Bob Gonzalez, rhapsode

It may be so; but let the unknown be. 

We, on this earth, are servants of the sun.

Out of the sun comes all the quick in me,

His golden touch is life to everyone.

His power it is that makes us spin through space,

His youth is April and his manhood bread,

Beauty is but a looking on his face,

He clears the mind, he makes the roses red.

What he may be, who knows? But we are his,

We roll through nothing round him, year by year,

The withering leaves upon a tree which is

Each with his greed, his little power, his fear.

What we may be, who knows? But everyone

Is dust on dust a servant of the sun. 

The Need of Being Versed in Country Things

Listen to: 

The Need of Being Versed in Country Things (1:24)

by Robert Frost 

performed by Bob Gonzalez, rhapsode

The house had gone to bring again

To the midnight sky a sunset glow.

Now the chimney was all of the house that stood,

Like a pistil after the petals go.

The barn opposed across the way,

That would have joined the house in flame

Had it been the will of the wind, was left

To bear forsaken the place’s name.

No more it opened with all one end

For teams that came by the stony road

To drum on the floor with scurrying hoofs

And brush the mow with the summer load.

The birds that came to it through the air

At broken windows flew out and in,

Their murmur more like the sigh we sigh

From too much dwelling on what has been.

Yet for them the lilac renewed its leaf,

And the aged elm, though touched with fire;

And the dry pump flung up an awkward arm;

And the fence post carried a strand of wire.

For them there was really nothing sad.

But though they rejoiced in the nest they kept,

One had to be versed in country things

Not to believe the phoebes wept.

Let Me Live Out My Years

Listen to: 

Let Me Live Out My Years (:55)

by John G. Neihardt 

performed by Bob Gonzalez, rhapsode

Let me live out my years in heat of blood!

Let me die drunken with the dreamer’s wine!

Let me not see this soul-house built of mud

Go toppling to the dust—a vacant shrine.

243

Let me go quickly, like a candle light

Snuffed out just at the heyday of its glow.

Give me high noon—and let it then be night!

Thus would I go.

And grant that when I face the grisly Thing,

My song may trumpet down the gray Perhaps.

Let me be as a tune-swept fiddlestring

That feels the Master Melody—and snaps!

In the Subway

Listen to: 

In the Subway (1:04)

by Louis Untermeyer 

performed by Bob Gonzalez, rhapsode

Chaos is tamed and ordered as we ride;

The rock is rent, the darkness flung aside

And all the horrors of the deep defied.

A coil of wires, a throb, a sudden spark—

And on a screaming meteor we embark

That hurls us past the cold and breathless dark.

The centuries disclose their secret graves—

Riding in splendor through a world of waves

The ancient elements become our slaves.

Uncanny fancies whisper to and fro;

Terror and Night surround us here below,

And through the house of Death we come and go...

And here, oh wildest glimpse of all, I see

The score of men and women facing me

Reading their papers calmly, leisurely.