Portal:Poetry

Kubla Khan /ˌkʊblə ˈkɑːn/ is a poem written by Samuel Taylor Coleridge, completed in 1797 and published in 1816. According to Coleridge's Preface to Kubla Khan, the poem was composed one night after he experienced an opium-influenced dream after reading a work describing Xanadu, the summer palace of the Mongol ruler and Emperor of China Kublai Khan. Upon waking, he set about writing lines of poetry that came to him from the dream until he was interrupted by a person from Porlock. The poem could not be completed according to its original 200–300 line plan as the interruption caused him to forget the lines. He left it unpublished and kept it for private readings for his friends until 1816 when, on the prompting by George Gordon Byron, it was published.

Some of Coleridge's contemporaries denounced the poem and questioned his story about its origin. It was not until years later that critics began to openly admire the poem. Most modern critics now view Kubla Khan as one of Coleridge's three great poems, with The Rime of the Ancient Mariner and Christabel. The poem is considered one of the most famous examples of Romanticism in English poetry. A copy of the manuscript is a permanent exhibit at the British Museum in London. (Full article...)

Anna Andreyevna Gorenko Russian: Анна Андреевна Горенко, IPA: [ˈanə ɐnˈdrʲejɪvnə gɐˈrʲenkə] ^ⓘ; Ukrainian: Анна Андріївна Горенко</ref> (June 23 [O.S. June 11] 1889 – March 5, 1966), better known by the pen name Anna Akhmatova (Russian: Анна Ахматова, IPA: [ɐxˈmatəvə]), was a Russian modernist poet, one of the most acclaimed writers in the Russian canon.

Akhmatova's work ranges from short lyric poems to intricately structured cycles, such as Requiem (1935–40), her tragic masterpiece about the Stalinist terror. Her style, characterised by its economy and emotional restraint, was strikingly original and distinctive to her contemporaries. The strong and clear leading female voice struck a new chord in Russian poetry. Her writing can be said to fall into two periods – the early work (1912–25) and her later work (from around 1936 until her death), divided by a decade of reduced literary output. Her work was condemned and censored by Stalinist authorities and she is notable for choosing not to emigrate, and remaining in Russia, acting as witness to the atrocities around her. Her perennial themes include meditations on time and memory, and the difficulties of living and writing in the shadow of Stalinism. (Full article...)

• ... that a line from the 1899 poem "Sympathy" provided the title for Maya Angelou's autobiography I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings?
• ... that the name of the band Zuriaake is a metaphor for the Chinese poet Qu Yuan, who drowned himself due to his hatred of the government?
• ... that computer science professor Ruth Aylett performed with a robot poet in the Edinburgh Free Fringe?
• ... that Saudi Arabian poet Hamad al-Hajji lost three members of his family during his childhood and later suffered from schizophrenia until he died at the age of 49 after a lung disease?
• ... that Dolores Cabrera y Heredia, a Spanish Romantic poet and novelist, was a prominent member of Hermandad Lírica (Lyrical Sisterhood)?
• ... that Manuel Carpio's 1849 poem is the earliest literary depiction of the weeping ghost La Llorona?

Eight Sonnets: Sonnet 1 by Edna St. Vincent Millay

When you, that at this moment are to me Dearer than words on paper, shall depart, And be no more the warder of my heart, Whereof again myself shall hold the key; And be no more, what now you seem to be, The sun, from which all excellencies start In a round nimbus, nor a broken dart Of moonlight, even, splintered on the sea; I shall remember only of this hour– And weep somewhat, as now you see me weep– The pathos of your love, that, like a flower, Fearful of death yet amorous of sleep, Droops for a moment and beholds, dismayed, The wind whereon its petals shall be laid.