Edwin Arlington Robinson

"No matter what we are, and what we sing, Time finds a withered leaf in every laurel"

"Oh for a poet - for a beacon bright"

"Whenever Richard Cory went down town,We people on the pavement looked at him: He was a gentleman from sole to crown,Clean favored, and imperially slim.And he was always quietly arrayed,And he was always human when he talked;But still he fluttered pulses when he said,"Good-morning," and he glittered when he walked.And he was rich—yes, richer than a king— And admirably schooled in every grace:In fine, we thought that he was everythingTo make us wish that we were in his place.So on we worked, and waited for the light,And went without the meat, and cursed the bread;And Richard Cory, one calm summer night,Went home and put a bullet through his head."

"I shall have more to say when I am dead."

"Your Dollar is your only Word, The wrath of it your only fear. You build it altars tall enough To make you see, but your are blind; You cannot leave it long enough To look before you or behind."

"A thousand golden sheaves were lying there, Shining and still, but not for long to stay— As if a thousand girls with golden hair Might rise from where they slept and go away."

"Are we no greater than the noise we make Along one blind atomic pilgrimage Whereon by crass chance billeted we go Because our brains and bones and cartilage Will have it so?"

"He was himself and he had lost the speed He started with, and he was left behind."

"You have made The cement of your churches out of tears And ashes, and the fabric will not stand."

"The gods are growing old; The stars are singing Golden hair to gray Green leaf to yellow leaf,—or chlorophyl To xanthophyl, to be more scientific."

"We are young And we are friends of time."

"Another poem that I loved first as music, later pondered for what it could tell me about women and men and marriage, was Edwin Arlington Robinson's "Eros Turannos":"