Silver Poetry and Multimedia Art

Welcome to our new silver poetry and multimedia arts center, which has been designed to explore the artistic side of silver. Silver has traditionally held a great place in the creative arts, as many artists have been drawn to its symbolic nature as well as its lustrous physical characteristics. From poetic expressions involving silver imagery, to actual visual portrayals of silvery landscapes, the cool and reflective nature of silver has provided artistic inspiration to artists throughout human history.

Silver Poetry - Famous Poets and Obsure References

Walter de la Mare, Poet:
Silver

Slowly, silently, now the moon
Walks the night in her silver shoon;
This way, and that, she peers, and sees
Silver fruit upon silver trees;
One by one the casements catch
Her beams beneath the silvery thatch;
Couched in his kennel, like a log,
With paws of silver sleeps the dog;
From their shadowy coat the white breasts peep
Of doves in a silver-feathered sleep;
A harvest mouse goes scampering by,
With silver claws, and silver eye;
And moveless fish in the water gleam,
By silver reeds in a silver stream.

Emily Dickensen, Poet:
As Everywhere of Silver

As Everywhere of Silver
With Ropes of Sand
To keep it from effacing
The Track called Land.

Emily Dickensen, Poet:
The Spider Holds a Silver Ball ( Partial Quote )

The Spider holds a Silver Ball
In unperceived Hands --
And dancing softly to Himself
His Yarn of Pearl -- unwinds...

Emily Dickensen, Poet:
A Planted Life - Diversified

A Planted Life -- diversified
With Gold and Silver Pain
To prove the presence of the Ore
In Particles -- 'tis when

A Value struggle -- it exist --
A Power -- will proclaim
Although Annihilation pile
Whole Chaoses on Him --

Emily Dickensen, Poet:
The Moon was but a Chin of Gold

Moon was but a Chin of Gold
A Night or two ago --
And now she turns Her perfect Face
Upon the World below --

Her Forehead is of Amplest Blonde --
Her Cheek -- a Beryl hewn --
Her Eye unto the Summer Dew
The likest I have known --

Her Lips of Amber never part --
But what must be the smile
Upon Her Friend she could confer
Were such Her Silver Will --

And what a privilege to be
But the remotest Star --
For Certainty She take Her Way
Beside Your Palace Door --

Her Bonnet is the Firmament --
The Universe -- Her Shoe --
The Stars -- the Trinkets at Her Belt --
Her Dimities -- of Blue --

Sylvia Plath, Poet:
Mirror ( Partial Quote )

I am silver and exact. I have no preconceptions.
Whatever I see I swallow immediately
Just as it is, unmisted by love or dislike.

Carl Sandberg, Author & Poet:
Silver Nails

A MAN was crucified. He came to the city a stranger, was accused, and nailed to a cross. He lingered hanging. Laughed at the crowd. "The nails are iron," he said, "You are cheap. In my country when we crucify we use silver nails. . ." So he went jeering. They did not understand him at first. Later they talked about him in changed voices in the saloons, bowling alleys, and churches. It came over them every man is crucified only once in his life and the law of humanity dictates
silver nails be used for the job. A statue was erected to him in a public square. Not having gathered his name when he was among them, they wrote him as John Silvernail on the statue.

Carl Sandberg, Author & Poet:
Silver Winds

DO you know how the dream looms? how if summer misses one of us the two of us miss summer— Summer when the lungs of the earth take a long breath for the change to low contralto singing mornings when the green corn leaves first break through the black loam— And another long breath for the silver soprano melody of the moon songs in the light nights when the earth is lighter than a feather, the iron mountains lighter than a goose down— So I shall look for you in the light nights then, in the laughter of slats of silver under a hill hickory. In the listening tops of the hickories, in the wind motions of the hickory shingle leaves, in the imitations of slow sea water on the shingle silver in the wind— I shall look for you.

Carl Sandberg, Author & Poet:
Night Stuff ( Partial Quote )

LISTEN a while, the moon is a lovely woman, a lonely woman, lost in a silver dress, lost in a circus rider’s silver dress.

Carl Sandberg, Author & Poet:
The Wind Sings Purple in Early Spring ( for Paula )

THE GRIP of the ice is gone now.
The silvers chase purple.
The purples tag silver.
They let out their runners
Here where summer says to the lilies:
“Wish and be wistful,
Circle this wind-hunted, wind-sung water.”

Come along always, come along now.
You for me, kiss me, pull me by the ear.
Push me along with the wind push.
Sing like the whinnying wind.
Sing like the hustling obstreperous wind.

Have you ever seen deeper purple …
this in my wild wind fingers?
Could you have more fun with a pony or a goat?
Have you seen such flicking heels before,
Silver jig heels on the purple sky rim?
Come along always, come along now.

William Butler Yeats, Poet:
Those Dancing Days are Gone

Come, let me sing into your ear;
Those dancing days are gone,
All that silk and satin gear;
Crouch upon a stone,
Wrapping that foul body up
In as foul a rag:
I carry the sun in a golden cup.
The moon in a silver bag.

Curse as you may I sing it through;
What matter if the knave
That the most could pleasure you,
The children that he gave,
Are somewhere sleeping like a top
Under a marble flag?
I carry the sun in a golden cup.
The moon in a silver bag.

I thought it out this very day.
Noon upon the clock,
A man may put pretence away
Who leans upon a stick,
May sing, and sing until he drop,
Whether to maid or hag:
I carry the sun in a golden cup,
The moon in a silver bag.

William Butler Yeats, Poet:
The Ragged Woods ( Partial Quote )

...Or have you heard that sliding silver-shoed
Pale silver-proud queen-woman of the sky,
When the sun looked out of his golden hood? -
O that none ever loved but you and I!

Vachel Linsay, Poet:
The Prarie Battlements - ( To Edgar Lee Masters, with great respect )

HERE upon the prarie
Is our ancestral hall.
Agate is the dome,
Cornelian the wall.
Ghouls are in the cellar,
But fays upon the stairs.
And here lived old King Silver Dreams,
Always at his prayers.

Here lived gray Queen Silver Dreams,
Always signing psalms,
And haughty Grandma Silver Dreams,
Throned with folded palms.
Here played cousin Alice.
Her soul was best of all.
And every fairy loved her,
In our ancestral hall.

Alice has a prarie grave.
The King and Queen lie low,
And aged Grandma Silver Dreams,
Four toombstones in a row.
But still in snow and sunshine
Stands our ancestral hall.

Agate is the dome,
Cornelian the wall.
And legends walk about,
And proverbs, with proud airs.
Ghouls are in the cellar,
But fays upon the stairs.

Vachel Linsay, Poet:
Midnight Rose

THE moon is now an opening flower,
The sky a cliff of blue.
The moon is now a silver rose;
Her pollen is the dew.

Her pollen is the mist that swings
Across her face of dreams:
Her pollen is the April rain,
Filling the April streams.

Her pollen is eternal life,
Endless ambrosial foam.
It feeds the swarming stars and fills
Their hearts with honeycomb.

The earth is but a passion-flower
With blood upon his crown.
And what shall fill his failing veins
And lift his head, bowed down?

This cup of peace, this silver rose
Bending with fairy breath
Shall lift that passion-flower, the earth
A million times from Death!

E. E. Cummings, Poet:
All in green went my love riding ( Partial Quote )

All in green went my love riding
on a great horse of gold
into the silver dawn...

William Blake, Poet:
Evening Star

Thou fair hair'd angel of the evening,
Now, while the sun rests on the mountains light,
Thy bright torch of love; Thy radiant crown
Put on, and smile upon our evening bed!
Smile on our loves; and when thou drawest the
Blue curtains, scatter thy silver dew
On every flower that shuts its sweet eyes
In timely sleep. Let thy west wind sleep on
The lake; speak silence with thy glimmering eyes
And wash the dusk with silver. Soon, full, soon,
Dost thou withdraw; Then, the wolf rages wide,
And the lion glares thro' the dun forest.
The fleece of our flocks are covered with
Thy sacred dew; Protect them with thine influence.

John Keats, Poet:
To Hope ( Partial Quote )

...Let me not see the patriot's high bequest,
Great Liberty! how great in plain attire!
With the base purple of a court oppress'd,
Bowing her head, and ready to expire:
But let me see thee stoop from heaven on wings
That fill the skies with silver glitterings!

And as, in sparkling majesty, a star
Gilds the bright summit of some gloomy cloud;
Brightening the half veil'd face of heaven afar:
So, when dark thoughts my boding spirit shroud,
Sweet Hope, celestial influence round me shed,
Waving thy silver pinions o'er my head!

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Poet:
Endymion

The rising moon has hid the stars;
Her level rays, like golden bars,
Lie on the landscape green,
With shadows brown between.

And silver white the river gleams,
As if Diana, in her dreams,
Had dropt her silver bow
Upon the meadows low.

On such a tranquil night as this,
She woke Endymion with a kiss,
When, sleeping in the grove,
He dreamed not of her love.

Like Dian's kiss, unasked, unsought,
Love gives itself, but is not bought;
Nor voice, nor sound betrays
Its deep, impassioned gaze.

It comes,--the beautiful, the free,
The crown of all humanity,--
In silence and alone
To seek the elected one.

It lifts the boughs, whose shadows deep
Are Life's oblivion, the soul's sleep,
And kisses the closed eyes
Of him, who slumbering lies.

O weary hearts! O slumbering eyes!
O drooping souls, whose destinies
Are fraught with fear and pain,
Ye shall be loved again!

No one is so accursed by fate,
No one so utterly desolate,
But some heart, though unknown,
Responds unto his own.

Responds,--as if with unseen wings,
An angel touched its quivering strings;
And whispers, in its song,
" 'Where hast thou stayed so long?"

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