[Netty]

Mine is 'The Raven' By Edgar Allen Poe

http://www.comnet.ca/~forrest/raven.html

Its a bit long. I dont really have a favourite line, I think the whole thing ties in neatly with itself.

My favourite from the Pellinor Books is the one at the start of Part Three of the Riddle.

[alison]

That MacLeish poem is a classic. Poe's great - I've been haunted by his poem Annabel Lee (http://bau2.uibk.ac.at/sg/poe/works/poetry/annabel.html) since I first read it!

I don't really have a favourite poem (or I have too many to list...)

I have always loved William Blake (check out this page (http://www.tate.org.uk/britain/exhibitions/blakeinteractive/))

And I am very fond of the German lyric poet Rainer Maria Rilke. I've translated his great poem sequence, The Duino Elegies - some are online here (http://www.thedrunkenboat.com/rilke.html) and here (http://www.flashpointmag.com/croggon.htm).

[Netty]

omg Annabel Lee was really sad! I think that Poe had a very traumatic love life...poor man.

William Blake sounds familiar, im trying to figure out where ive heard him before. It might have been in english, it was a poem about two stones in the desert in the shape of a face that a wanderer came upon...something about a really evil king...*shakes head* I cant remember, its probably not even written by him. :confused: :confused:

[tchang]

Netty, I think you are thinking of another poem I really like. It's a poem called Ozymandias by Percy Bysshe Shelley, and goes like this:

I met a traveller from an antique land
Who said: Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert . . . Near them, on the sand,
Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown,
And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command,
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,
The hand that mocked them, and the heart that fed:
And on the pedestal these words appear:
"My name is Ozymandias, king of kings:
Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!"
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare,
The lone and level sands stretch far away.

I love the irony of the comparison between what's carved on the pedestal and the "lone and level sands" that stretches far away. It reminds of another line I really like, which goes something like, "What is a someone / what is a no one / Man is the dream of a shade."

I have to say that Blake is a poet I can never quite understand. Tyger has great imagery, but what does it mean?! (I know, I know, I am the person who just quoted "A poem should not mean, but be" as a favorite line. But still, the only Blake lines that ever gave me a chill is at the beginning of Auguries of Innocence (To see a World in a Grain of Sand / And a Heaven in a Wild Flower / Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand / And Eternity in an hour.) And I don't understand the rest of that poem either....

I'll have to check out Rilke. It's a sad commentary on the U.S. educational system that I am completely ignorant of non-English poems / poets. It must be hard to translate poems though. When I was in elementary school in Taiwan we used to study the great Tang Dynasty poetry. I have seen some of them translated into English, but I don't have nearly the same visceral reaction to the translations as I do to the originals.

[yodee]

Hmmm...poems by William Blake my favourites are probably The Tiger and The Immortal and I like most poems by Robert Browning The Laboratory and My Last Duchess are two of my favourites

[Suzie]

can u put a link in for the immortal coz i cant find it any where

[alison]

I read a piece once by a Chinese poet (Yang Lian) on translating poems by Tu Fu. I don't know how anyone translates from Chinese. It's hard enough between European languages, and we don't have the visual aspect that Chinese poetry has. And some things are not translateable.

I love Blake because his poems are so full of incredible energy and awe at existence. He was quite crazy; when he was alive he was just regarded as a madman. He's also a great artist: the best way to read hi s poems is in facsimile editions of his original books, which he designed himself. Probably my favourite poem of his is The Marriage of Heaven and Hell (http://www.levity.com/alchemy/blake_ma.html) . (And Poe had quite a tragic life - as some poets did - though not all!)

Ozymandias is just GREAT to say out loud. While we're on the Romantics, another great poem - especially for fantasy addicts - is Kubla Khan (http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/stc/Coleridge/poems/Kubla_Khan.html) by Coleridge. I know this one by heart, and sometimes say it to myself when I'm walking along. Which is a bit embarrassing if you happen to bump into someone.

[Netty]

Netty, I think you are thinking of another poem I really like. It's a poem called Ozymandias by Percy Bysshe Shelley,

A ha!! Thankyou very much!! That poem was exactly the one I was thinking of. We read it in english class at one stage and ive always remembered bits and pieces of it... :D Ozymandias...you can get that confused with Nebuchadnezzar...cant you?

Auguries of Innocence sounds very familiar to me...I think its quoted in Tomb Raider...hmm *thinks* The Marriage of Heaven and Hell is an interesting poem...I didnt understand much of it...I think I need to read it when I have the brains to ponder all these things.

I have never really read poems from oriental artists. Though there are some books by korean poets lying around but I dont think I could read them. Apparently its easy to write Korean...but I guess thats no use if you only know a little bit.

How about traditional bush ballads...Banjo Paterson is one of my favourites. I just cant get enough of Clandy of the Overflow and Man from Snowy River. :D

[yodee]

can u put a link in for the immortal coz i cant find it any where

It's from The Book of Los:
http://www.bibliomania.com/0/2/81/192/frameset.html

The Rime of the ancient mariner comes to mind when I think of Coleridge because of the feelings of guilt together with the joy of the wedding. I've read Kubla Khan and I agree with you alison its a cool poem.

[Becks]

At school I read a poem,by William Blake, called The angel. We had to rite a speech on it, I hate speeches and I was put in a group with ppl i hated. I was in a group of three it was six at first but we got seperated....we had 2 listen 2 all the speeches... and william Blakes poetry. Im not that keen on William Blakes poetry, but its got a hidden meaning 2 it...hasnt it????

Im not keen on poetry tho.....God I hope that Im not annoyin any1 coz im just talking crap!!!!