Herman Ward Poems
As far as intellectual training was concerned, my nine years from seven to sixteen were practically wasted.
Mary A. WardI think the kind of unexpected I really love is when you open books and the actual way of writing is different and interesting. Like reading Virginia Woolf for the first time or Lawrence Durrell for the first time.
Lalla WardTo judge from all Communist papers, magazines and brochures, and from all public assemblies, one might even surmise that a revolt of the poor peasants in Western Europe might break out at any moment!
Herman GorterIn this world, shipmates, sin that pays its way can travel freely, and without passport; whereas Virtue, if a pauper, is stopped at all frontiers.
Herman MelvilleWhen you're a father, you know exactly where your heart really is. There's no question of it, no doubt. That part of your life has no second guessing.
Fred WardYou cannot sift out the poor from the community. The poor are indispensable to the rich.
Henry Ward BeecherIt is not Kafka's fault that his wonderful writings have lately turned into a fad, and are read by people who have neither the ability nor the desire to absorb literature.
Herman HesseThere are certain queer times and occasions in this strange mixed affair we call life when a man takes this whole universe for a vast practical joke, though the wit thereof he but dimly discerns, and more than suspects that the joke is at nobody's expense but his own.
Herman MelvilleObjector
In line at lunch I cross my fork and spoon
to ward off complicity--the ordered life
our leaders have offered us. Thin as a knife,
our chance to live depends on such a sign
while others talk and The Pentagon from the moon
is bouncing exact commands: "Forget your faith;
be ready for whatever it takes to win: we face
annihilation unless all citizens get in line."
I bow and cross my fork and spoon: somewhere
other citizens more fearfully bow
in a place terrorized by their kind of oppressive state.
Our signs both mean, "You hostages over there
will never be slaughtered by my act." Our vows
cross: never to kill and call it fate.
Butterfly
Butterfly, the wind blows sea-ward,
strong beyond the garden-wall!
Butterfly, why do you settle on my
shoe, and sip the dirt on my shoe,
Lifting your veined wings, lifting them?
big white butterfly!
Already it is October, and the wind
blows strong to the sea
from the hills where snow must have
fallen, the wind is polished with
snow.
Here in the garden, with red
geraniums, it is warm, it is warm
but the wind blows strong to sea-ward,
white butterfly, content on my shoe!
Will you go, will you go from my warm
house?
Will you climb on your big soft wings,
black-dotted,
as up an invisible rainbow, an arch
till the wind slides you sheer from the
arch-crest
and in a strange level fluttering you go
out to sea-ward, white speck!
Five O'Clock Shadow
This is the time of day when we in the Mens's ward
Think "one more surge of the pain and I give up the fight."
Whe he who strggles for breath can struggle less strongly:
This is the time of day which is worse than night.
A haze of thunder hangs on the hospital rose-beds,
A doctors' foursome out of the links is played,
Safe in her sitting-room Sister is putting her feet up:
This is the time of day when we feel betrayed.
Below the windows, loads of loving relations
Rev in the car park, changing gear at the bend,
Making for home and a nice big tea and the telly:
"Well, we've done what we can. It can't be long till the end."
This is the time of day when the weight of bedclothes
Is harder to bear than a sharp incision of steel.
The endless anonymous croak of a cheap transistor
Intesifies the lonely terror I feel.
Feeling gratitude and not expressing it is like wrapping a present and not giving it.
William Arthur WardFrom without, no wonderful effect is wrought within ourselves, unless some interior, responding wonder meets it.
Herman MelvilleDisarm, disarm. The sword of murder is not the balance of justice. Blood does not wipe out dishonor, nor violence indicate possession.
Julia Ward HoweThe Church is not a gallery for the exhibition of eminent Christians, but a school for the education of imperfect ones.
Henry Ward BeecherThere is no quality in this world that is not what it is merely by contrast. Nothing exists in itself.
Herman MelvilleBeneath all differences of doctrine or discipline there exists a fundamental agreement as to the simple, absolute essentials in religion.
Julia Ward HoweThe power of hiding ourselves from one another is mercifully given, for men are wild beasts, and would devour one another but for this protection.
Henry Ward BeecherWe can learn much from wise words, little from wisecracks, and less from wise guys.
William Arthur WardWe should so live and labor in our times that what came to us as seed may go to the next generation as blossom, and what came to us as blossom may go to them as fruit. This expresses the true spirit in the love of mankind.
Henry Ward Beecher
