Old and New Poems

Donald Hall

• Publisher: Mariner Books
• Year: 1990
• ISBN:
  9780547630441
• Topic: Literature
• Subtopic: American Poetry
• Index: Literature

This collection drawn from more than forty years of the poet's work is "a superb introduction to newcomers and a sumptuous offering to familiars" ( Publishers Weekly ). Former US Poet Laureate Donald Hall has been celebrated with numerous awards, including the National Book Critics Circle Award and the National Medal of the Arts. This volume collects some of Hall's finest short poetry written between 1947 and 1990. Here are poems of landscape and love, of dedication and prophecy. "Our delight is in following an exceptional poet's growth and depth as he emerges with a richly playful but consummately serious voice." — Publishers Weekly

Index of Titles and First Lines

A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z

Titles are set in italic type.

A

A bear sleeps in a cellarhole; pine needles, 70

Abraham Lincoln was giggling uncontrollably, 119

Abroad Thoughts front Howe, 29

A coal fire burned in a basket grate, 100

Acorns, 187

Adultery at Forty, 131

A fly sleeps on the field of a green curtain, 144

After fifty years Amelia Earhart’s Lockheed fretted with rust, 213

After the many courses, hot bowls of rice, 141

Against the bright, 178

Against the clapboards and the window panes, 14

Airstrip in Essex 1960, An, 69

Alligator Bride, The, 96

All winter your brute shoulders strained against collars, padding, 158

Although the car radio warned that, 217

And now September burns the careful tree, 6

An oak twig drops, 187

An old Life photograph, 182

Apples, 103

A rock drops in a bucket, 109

As the last light, 168

As they grew older, 75

At Delphi, 11

At Delphi where the eagles climb, 11

At fourteen, parked, 211

“At pet stores in Detroit, you can buy, 116

At the edge of the city the pickerel, 68

At the shower’s head, high over the porcelain moonscape, 131

August, goldenrod blowing. We walk, 127

A woman who lived, 64

B

Back of the dam, under, 123

Baseball Players, The, 178

Beau of the Dead, 80

“Beginning at five o’clock, just before dawn rises, 191

Beside the door, 13

Between pond and sheepbarn, by maples and watery birches, 181

“Between the Clock and the Bed,” 45

Black-faced Sheep, The, 156

Blue Wing, The, 101

Body Politic, The, 27

Bowing he asks her the favor, 25

Brief Lives, 208

By the Exeter Biver, 33

By the road to church, Shaker Village, 49

C

Carlotta’s Confession, 204

Carol, A, 209

Charlotte, “the angel of assass-, 44

Child, The, 65

Child’s Garden, A, 4

Christ Church Meadows, 46

Christmas Eve in Whitneyville, 21

Cider 5¢ A Glass, 197

Clown, The, 47

Coal Fire, The, 100

Coffee Cu...

Table of contents

• Title Page
• Contents
• Copyright
• Dedication
• 1947–1953
• Old Home Week
• Wedding Party
• Love is Like Sounds
• A Child’s Garden
• Some Oddities
• September Ode
• Passage To Worship
• Exile
• At Delphi
• The Columns of The Parthenon
• The Lone Ranger
• A Friend Revisited
• Elegy for Wesley Wells
• 1954–1958
• My Son My Executioner
• Conduct And Work
• The Red Branch
• Christmas Eve In Whitneyville
• The Hole
• Cops and Robbers
• The Sleeping Giant
• Dancers
• No Deposit
• The Body Politic
• A Second Stanza
• To the Loud Wind
• Abroad Thoughts From Home
• Fathers and Sons
• A Small Fig Tree
• Je Suis Une Table
• Shudder
• By the Exeter River
• The Umbrella
• The Hut of the Man Alone
• Oysters and Hermits
• 1934
• Waiting on the Corners
• The Three Movements
• Sestina
• A Set Of Seasons
• “The Scream”
• “Marat’s Death”
• “The Kiss”
• “Between the Clock and The Bed”
• Christ Church Meadows
• The Clown
• President and Poet
• Religious Articles
• The Foundations of American Industry
• The Widows
• Mr. and Mrs. Billings
• The Family
• The Grown-ups
• 1959–1963
• The Long River
• The Snow
• The Farm
• The Poem
• The Tree and The Cloud
• The Idea of Flying
• The Moon
• The Sun
• The Child
• The Kill
• The Sea
• Wells
• The Wreckage
• An Airstrip in Essex 1960
• New Hampshire
• Southwest of Buffalo
• Self-Portrait as a Bear
• Mycenae
• On a Horse Carved in Wood
• Jealous Lovers
• Sleeping
• “Internal and External Forms”
• “King And Queen”
• “Reclining Figure”
• Digging
• “O Flodden Field”
• Cold Water
• The Old Pilot
• Beau of The Dead
• A Village in East Anglia
• Letter to an English Poet
• Stump
• In the Kitchen of the Old House
• The Days
• 1966–1969
• The Man in the Dead Machine
• The Corner
• Swan
• The Alligator Bride
• The Grave The Well
• Sew
• Old Houses
• Pictures of Philippa
• The Coal Fire
• The Blue Wing
• The Repeated Shapes
• Woolworth’s
• Apples
• The Table
• Mount Kearsarge
• 1970–1974
• Gold
• Waters
• The Young Watch Us
• The Dump
• Nose
• No Color Man
• Stones
• The High Pasture
• Stories
• To A Waterfowl
• Poem with One Fact
• The Green Shelf
• FÊte
• The Presidentiad
• Eleanor’s Letters
• The Raisin
• Transcontinent
• White Apples
• The Town Of Hill
• 1975–1978
• Maple Syrup
• The Toy Bone
• Illustration
• Adultery at Forty
• O Cheese
• Kicking The Leaves
• Eating the Pig
• Wolf Knife
• Photographs of China
• On Reaching the Age of Two Hundred
• Flies
• Ox Cart Man
• Stone Walls
• Old Roses
• Traffic
• The Black-faced Sheep
• Names of Horses
• 1979–1986
• Great Day in the Cows’ House
• The Henyard Round
• Whip-poor-will
• New Animals
• The Rocker
• Twelve Seasons
• Scenic View
• Sums
• The Revolution
• Old Timers’ Day
• The Baseball Players
• Granite And Grass
• A Sister on the Tracks
• A Sister by the Pond
• The Day I Was Older
• Acorns
• For an Exchange of Rings
• The Impossible Marriage
• Mr. Wakeville on Interstate 90
• My Friend Felix
• Merle Bascom’s .22
• 1987–1990
• Cider 5¢ a Glass
• Edward’s Anecdote
• Carlotta’s Confession
• Brief Lives
• Our Walk in Yorkshire
• A Carol
• A Grace
• Maundy Thursday’s Candles
• Material
• Moon Clock
• Match
• Persistence of 1937
• Milkers Broken Up
• Notes For Nobody
• Six Naps in One Day
• Tomorrow
• Tubes
• Valley of Morning
• The Coffee Cup
• Speeches
• This Poem
• Praise For Death
• Notes on Old and New Poems
• Index of Titles and First Lines
• Read More from Donald Hall
• About the Author
• Connect with HMH