Life From The Lifeless

Robinson Jeffers 1887 (Allegheny) – 1962 (Carmel-by-the-Sea)



Spirits and illusions have died,
The naked mind lives
In the beauty of inanimate things.

Flowers wither, grass fades, trees wilt,
The forest is burnt;
The rock is not burnt.

The deer starve, the winter birds
Die on their twigs and lie
In the blue dawns in the snow.

Men suffer want and become
Curiously ignoble; as prosperity
Made them curiously vile.

But look how noble the world is,
The lonely-flowing waters, the secret-
Keeping stones, the flowing sky.

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Submitted on May 13, 2011

Modified on April 05, 2023

24 sec read
428

Quick analysis:

Scheme XXX XAA XBX XXX XXB
Closest metre Iambic tetrameter
Characters 450
Words 81
Stanzas 5
Stanza Lengths 3, 3, 3, 3, 3

Robinson Jeffers

John Robinson Jeffers was an American poet, known for his work about the central California coast. more…

All Robinson Jeffers poems | Robinson Jeffers Books

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    Who wrote the poem ״Invictus״?
    A William Ernest Henley
    B Oscar Wilde
    C Sylvia Plath
    D Thomas Hardy