Here are some poems written by W. H. Auden.
O Tell Me The Truth About Love
Some say that love's a little boy,
And some say it's a bird.
Some say it makes the word go round,
And some say that's absurd.
And when I asked the man next-door,
He looked as id he knew,
His wife got very cross indeed,
And said it wouldn't do.
Does it look like a pair of pyjamas,
Or the ham in a temperance hotel?
Does it odour remind one of llamas,
Or has it a comforting smell?
Is it prickly to tough as a hedge is,
Or soft as eiderdown fluff?
Is it sharp or quite smooth at the edges?
O tell me the truth about love?
Our history books refer to it
In cryptic little notes,
It's quite a common topic on
The Transatlantic boats;
I've found the subject mentioned in
Accounts of suicides,
And even seen it scribbled on
The backs of railway-guides.
Does it howl like a hungry Alsatian,
Or boom like a military band?
Could one give a first-rate imitation
On a saw or Steinway Grand?
is its singing at parties a riot?
Does it only like classical stuff?
Will it stop when one wants to be quiet?
O tell me the truth about love.
I looked inside the summer-house;
It wasn't ever there:
I tried the Thames at Maidenhead,
And Brighton's bracing air.
I don't know what the blackbird sang,
Or what the tulip said;
But it wasn't in the chicken-run,
Or underneath the bed.
Can it pull extroadinary faces?
Is it usually sick on a swing?
Does it spend all its time at the races,
Or fiddling with pieces of string?
Has it views of its own about money?
Does it think Patriotism enough?
Are its stories vulgar but funny?
O tell me the truth about love.
When it comes, will it come without warning
Just as I am picking my nose?
Will it knock on my door in the morning,
Or tread in the bus on my toes?
Will it come like a change in the weather?
Will its greeting be courteous or rough?
Will it alter my life altogether?
O tell me the truth about love.
Song
Fish in the unruffled lakes
Their swimming colours wear,
Swans in the winter air
A white perfection have,
And the great lion walks
Through the innocent grove;
Lion, fish and swan
Act, and are gone
Upon Time's toppling wave.
We, till shadowed days are done,
We must weep and sing
Duty's conscious wrong,
The Devil in the clock,
The goodness carefully worn
For atonement or for luck;
We must lose our loves,
On each beast and bird that moves
Turn an envious look.
Sighs for folly done and said
Twists our narrow days,
But I must bless,I must praise
That you, my swan, who have
All the gifts that to the swan
Impulsive Nature gave,
The majesty and pride,
Last night should add
Your voluntary love.
Underneath an Abject Willow
Underneath an abject willow,
Lover, sulk no more:
Act from thought should quickly follow.
What is thinking for?
Your unique and moping station
Proves you cold;
Stand up and fold
Your map of desolation.
Bells that toll across the meadows
From the sombre spire
Toll for these unloving shadows
Love does not require.
All that lives may love; why longer
Bow to loss
With arms cross?
Strike and you shall conquer.
Geese in flocks above you flying.
Their direction know,
Icy brooks beneath you flowing,
To their ocean go.
Dark and dull is your distraction:
Walk then, come,
No longer numb
Into your satisfaction.
Calypso
Driver drive faster and make a good run
Down the Springfield Line under the the shining sun.
Fly like an aeroplane, don't pull up short
Till you break for Grand Central Station, New York.
for there in the middle of that waiting-hall
Should be standing the one that I love the best of all.
If he's not there to meet me when I get to town
I'll stand on the side-walk with tears rolling down.
For he is the one that I love to look on,
The acme kindness and perfection.
He presses my hand and says he loves me,
Which I find an admirable peculiarity.
The woods are bright green on both sides of the line;
The trees have their loves though they're different from mine.
But the poor far old banker in the sun-parlor car
Has no one to love him except his cigar.
If I were the Head of the Church or the State,
I'd powder my nose and just tell them to wait.
For love's more important and powerful than
Even a priest or politician.
Lullaby
Lay your sleeping head, my love,
Human on my faithless arm;
Time and fevers burn away
Individuals beauty rom
Thoughtful children, and the grave
Proves the child ephemeral:
But in my arms till the day break of day
Let the living creaturelie,
Mortal, guilty, but to me
The entirely beautiful.
Soul and body have no bounds:
To lovers as they lie upon
Her tolerant enchanted slope
In their ordinary swoon,
Grave the vision of Venus sends
Of supernatural sympathy,
Universal love and hope;
Whie an abstract insight wakes
Among the glaciers and rocks
The hermit's carnal ecstasy.
Certainty, fidelity
On the stroke of midnight pass
Like vibrations of a bell
And fashionable madmen raise
Their pedantic boring cry;
Every farthing of the cost,
All the dreaded cards foretell,
Shall be paid, but from this night
Not a whisper, nor a thought,
Not a kiss not look be lost.
Beauty, midnight, vision dies:
Let the winds of dawn that blow
Softly round your dreaming head
Such a day of welcome show
Eye and knocking heart may bless,
Find our mortal world enough;
Noons of dryness find you fed
By the involuntary powers,
Nights of insult let you pass
Watched by every human love.
At Last the Secret Is Out
At Last the Secret Is Out,
as it always must come in the end.
The delicious story is ripe
to tell to the intimate friend;
Over the tea-cups and in the square
the tongue has its desire;
Still waters run deep, my dear,
there's never smoke without fire.
Behind the corpse in the reservoir,
behind the ghost on the links,
Behind the lady who dances
and the man who madly drinks,
Under the look of fatigue,
the attack of a migraine and the sigh
There is always another story,
there is more than meets the eye.
For the clear voice suddenly signing,
High up in the convent wall,
The scent of the elder bushes,
the sporting prints in the hall,
The croquet matches in the summer,
the handshake,the cough, the kiss,
There is always a wicked secret,
a private reason for this.
Funeral Blues
Stop all the clocks, cut off the telephone,
Prevent the dog from barking with a juicy bone,
Silence the pianos and with muffled drum
Bring out the coffin, let the mourners come.
Let aeroplanes circle moaning overhead
Scribbling on the sky the message He Is Dead,
Put crepe bows round the white necks of the public doves,
Let the traffic policeman wear black cotton gloves.
He was my North, my South, my east and West,
My working week and my Sunday rest,
My noon, my midnight, my talk, my song:
I thought that love would last for ever: I was wrong.
The stars are not wanted now: put out every one;
Pick up the moon and dismantle the sun;
Pour away the ocean and sweep up the wood;
For nothing now can ever come to any good.