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Classic and Contemporary Poetry
WALKERS, by HAZEL HALL Poet's Biography
First Line: Strange that she can keep with ease
Last Line: And does not know.
Subject(s): Children; Old Age; Women; Childhood
First Line: Strange that she can keep with ease
Last Line: And does not know.
Subject(s): Children; Old Age; Women; Childhood
A Child on the Street
Strange that she can keep with ease
A pace so free and fleet,
When such relentless destinies
Stalk at her feet.
Strange she does not see the blur
Where their shadows run
With her footfall, sinister
In the sun.
Some are vague as shadow cast
By clouds where long hills dip,
And some sharp like the broken mast
Of a drifted ship.
Still with here incredulous tread
Defying the darkened ground,
She keeps a pace whose echoes shed
Laughing sound.
And still close at her tripping heel
The old shadows stir,
Deepening as they steal
Nearer her.
A Very Old Woman
She passes by though long ago
Time drained the life out of her tread;
She died then, yet she does not know
That she is dead.
Her footsteps are indefinite
With sound, and who are dead should pass
Sandaled as the wind when it
Moves through the grass.
Her shadow twitches on the walk,
And who are not of life should run
Shadowless as a lily's stalk
In full day's sun.
Yet these cling to her--stricken sound
And shadow casting ragged stains;
They drag behind her on the ground
Like broken chains.
It is silence mastering her tread,
Darkness, insidious and slow,
Blotting her imprint ... but she is dead
And does not know.
Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!
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THE THREE CHILDREN by JOSEPHINE JACOBSEN
CHILDREN SELECTING BOOKS IN A LIBRARY by RANDALL JARRELL
COME TO THE STONE ... by RANDALL JARRELL
THE LOST WORLD by RANDALL JARRELL
A SICK CHILD by RANDALL JARRELL
CONTINENT'S END by ROBINSON JEFFERS
ON THE DEATH OF FRIENDS IN CHILDHOOD by DONALD JUSTICE
THE POET AT SEVEN by DONALD JUSTICE