The Worlds Fifth Empire And Other Poems

Excerpt from The World's Fifth Empire: And Other Poems His first publication the author now offers the reading world, hoping that it will look leniently upon the faults and imperfections but too evident to his own eye. But whatever may be adjudged as to the merits of the poetical composition, the most fastidious cannot but accord commendation for the admirable manner in which the publishers - Messrs. Morton & Co., late Morton & Griswold - have performed their portion of the work. The paper is of the most excellent quality; the typography clear and beautiful, and the binding handsome and substantial. The whole execution is a powerful argument for home patronage. The Poems presented are the productions of one who has written in his leisure hours, at various periods during the last four or five years. He will here remark - and that explanatorily - but upon two of these, - Firstly: "Dar-thula." This is the versification, without the omission or interpolation of any sentiments, of a translation - by James Macpherson, Esq., - of one of Ossian's poems, from the old Gaelic. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.

This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important, and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work was reproduced from the original artifact, and remains as true to the original work as possible. Therefore, you will see the original copyright references, library stamps (as most of these works have been housed in our most important libraries around the world), and other notations in the work. This work is in the public domain in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work. As a reproduction of a historical artifact, this work may contain missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant.

Nearly all of the poems in this collection were written within a period of three months, consecutively, one a day. I deliberately set myself the task of writing a poem a day for as long as I could sustain the effort and keep my creative energy flowing. I had before in my writing career brief periods of intense creativity where I wrote poems every day; for example, when I was finishing my sonnet sequence, Mediterranean Sonnets, I wrote fourteen sonnets in as many days. These are memorable creative episodes because they don’t come often and the poems deriving from such an intense focused activity are always unified and consistent in a qualitative manner, by form and technique, metrics, and poetic pulsion. The imagination grasps things with unusual claritas. These sessions are always pleasurable because—as Seamus Heaney once said to me after he himself had experienced such a period of creativity and productivity—they bolster a bit the poet’s belief in his own genius. Not that genius should be measured by the bucketful, but there is a certain confirmed value in sustained performance. Many poets, of course, have achieved similar and greater feats of poetic muscularity, in the modern era Rilke for one, in writing Sonnets to Orpheus (February 2 – 5, 1922, at Chateau de Muzot in Switzerland), and William Carlos Williams, who wrote something every day for a year for Kora in Hell: Improvisations (1917- September 1918; published in 1920), and this while he was working every day as a pediatrician and general physician in his “other” profession. Williams vowed not to change a word as written; of course this did not happen, as his critical faculties prevailed, as have mine in this collection. I am myself pleased and surprised by how many of these poems stand as first written.

Excerpt from The Empire Builders and Other Poems Said the West to the East of a nation, The fruit of your loins am I, And I claim no other birthright And I own no other tie But the bond that is fixed between us And the blood that is yours and mine Yet nurture the child that is born you, Ere other arms entwine. And the West in his youthful vigor, Wrought earnestly, soon and late, As he planted the seeds of Empire, And knotted the thongs of Fate; And the East in her home at the Gateway Mused long o'er the problem deep, For the harvest was ripe to the sickle But the reapers were fast asleep! And she said, In my western vineyard, Where the hope of my future lies. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.

This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important, and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work was reproduced from the original artifact, and remains as true to the original work as possible. Therefore, you will see the original copyright references, library stamps (as most of these works have been housed in our most important libraries around the world), and other notations in the work.This work is in the public domain in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work.As a reproduction of a historical artifact, this work may contain missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant.