Great poem Saffron, amazing images of early morning Kingston. Honestly, I would not generally see poets as early morning people but really the early morning is a 'poetic' time of day, is it not? And Oblivion, thanks for your reference to 'ekphrasis' - had to look that one up, quite interesting. Here is a Conor O'Callaghan poem, an achy-brekymissing you kind of poem but I think with some interesting self-reflection ....

Three Six Five Zero

I called up tech and got the voicemail code.
It’s taken me this long to find my feet.
Since last we spoke that evening it has snowed.

Fifty-four new messages. Most are old
and blinking into a future months complete.
I contacted tech to get my voicemail code

to hear your voice, not some bozo on the road
the week of Thanksgiving dubbing me his sweet
and breaking up and bleating how it snowed

the Nashville side of Chattanooga and slowed
the beltway to a standstill. The radio said sleet.
The kid in tech sent on my voicemail code.

I blew a night on lightening the system’s load,
woke to white enveloping the trees, the street
that’s blanked out by my leaving. It had snowed.

Lately others’ pasts will turn me cold.
I heard out every message, pressed delete.
I’d happily forget my voice, the mail, its code.
We spoke at last that evening. Then it snowed.

Conor O'Callaghan

from Meditations in Times of Civil War, by W. B. Yeats

VI. The Stare's Nest by My Window

The bees build in the crevices
Of loosening masonry, and there
The mother birds bring grubs and flies.
My wall is loosening; honey-bees,
Come build in the empty house of the stare.

We are closed in, and the key is turned
On our uncertainty; somewhere
A man is killed, or a house burned,
Yet no clear fact to be discerned:
Come build in he empty house of the stare.

A barricade of stone or of wood;
Some fourteen days of civil war;
Last night they trundled down the road
That dead young soldier in his blood:
Come build in the empty house of the stare.

We had fed the heart on fantasies,
The heart's grown brutal from the fare;
More Substance in our enmities
Than in our love; O honey-bees,
Come build in the empty house of the stare.

My 7 is in a poem that many will know, so I will play a game within a game - guess my poem!

"If seven maids with seven mops
Swept it for half a year.
Do you suppose," the Walrus said,
"That they could get it clear?"
"I doubt it," said the Carpenter,
And shed a bitter tear.

*This should be very easy, as the title is practically in the lines of poetry.

Is it "The Walrus and the Carpenter?" Good find. There should be extra points for numbers within poems.

IN THE SEVEN WOODS

by: William Butler Yeats (1865-1939)

I HAVE heard the pigeons of the Seven Woods
Make their faint thunder, and the garden bees
Hum in the lime-tree flowers; and put away
The unavailing outcries and the old bitterness
That empty the heart. I have forgot awhile
Tara uprooted, and new commonness
Upon the throne and crying about the streets
And hanging its paper flowers from post to post,
Because it is alone of all things happy.
I am contented, for I know that Quiet
Wanders laughing and eating her wild heart
Among pigeons and bees, while that Great Archer,
Who but awaits His hour to shoot, still hangs
A cloudy quiver over Pairc-na-lee.

Well, it's not in the first rank of Yeats' poems, I admit, but it has some good effects. "Pairc-na-lee is one of the seven woods on the estate of Lady Gregory, Yeats' patron. It translates, somewhat confusedly, as "field of calves." Yeats wasn't usually much for nature poetry. This and "Lake Isle of Innisfree" are rare examples.

Of course you are correct. I'm not sure I deserve extra points for the poem, but maybe for the creative way I figured out to find poems with numbers within.

I know this is a well-known, maybe even tired poem but its a pretty good seven poem and I decided to post it before someone else does! Not sure if I like the poem, and I do wonder about a dude who would question a child's judgement in this way .. why not just accept that her dead brother and sister are exactly that - her brother and sister - so they are indeed seven? Oh well, just the way I see it. It is a good 'number poem when you take a closer look - there are seven mentions of 'seven' (if you count the title) and several other numbers appear as well, to wit, eight, five, two and twelve ... that's a lot of numbers for a poem in my estimation. And for number freaks, the total number of numbers = 18 and the title plus the number of stanzas = 18 as well. Coincidence? Maybe Wordsworth was a closet mathematician and poetry was just his day job?

We Are Seven

A simple child...
That lightly draws its breath
And feels its life in every limb,
What should it know of death?

I met a little cottage girl-
She was eight years old, she said;
Her hair was thick with many a curl
That clustered 'round her head.

She had a rustic, woodland air
And she was wildly clad;
Her eyes were fair, and very fair;
Her beauty made me glad.

"Sisters and brothers, little maid,
How many may you be?"
"How many? Seven in all," she said
And wondering looked at me.

"And where are they? I pray you tell."
She answered, "Seven are we;
And two of us at Conway dwell
And two are gone to sea."

"Two of us in the churchyard lie,
My sister and my brother
And in the churchyard cottage, I
Dwell near them with my mother."

"You say that two at Conway dwell
And two are gone to sea,
Yet, ye are seven! I pray you tell,
Sweet maid, how this may be."

Then did the little maid reply,
"Seven boys and girls are we;
Two of us in the churchyard lie,
Beneath the churchyard tree."

"You run about, my little maid,
Your limbs they are alive;
If two are in the churchyard laid
Then ye are only five."

"Their graves are green, they may be seen,"
The little maid replied,
"Twelve steps or more from my mother's door
And they are side by side."

"My stockings there I often knit,
My kerchief there I hem;
And there upon the ground I sit
And sing a song to them."

"And often after sunset, sir,
When it is light and fair
I take my little porringer
And eat my supper there."

"The first that died was sister Jane;
In bed she moaning lay,
Till God released her of her pain
And then she went away."

"So in the churchyard she was laid
And, when the grass was dry
Together round her grave we played,
My brother John and I."

"And when the ground was white with snow
And I could run and slide,
My brother John was forced to go
And he lies by her side."

"How many are you, then," said I,
"If they two are in heaven?"
Quick was the little maid's reply,
"O master! We are seven."

"But they are dead; those two are dead!
Their spirits are in heaven!"
'T was throwing words away; for still
The little maid would have her will
And said... "Nay, we are seven!"

William Wordsworth

I agree with you comments about the poem, Giselle. But, right, it's a famous "7." Compared to the rest of the poetry of Wordsworth's day, this was not that sentimental, but today it is.

Looks like it's time for the number eight (is this Sesame Street?).

Eighth Air Force

If, in an odd angle of the hutment,
A puppy laps the water from a can
Of flowers, and the drunk sergeant shaving
Whistles O Paradiso!--shall I say that man
Is not as men have said: a wolf to man?

The other murderers troop in yawning;
Three of them play Pitch, one sleeps, and one
Lies counting missions, lies there sweating
Till even his heart beats: One; One; One.
O murderers! . . . Still, this is how it's done:

This is a war . . . But since these play, before they die,
Like puppies with their puppy; since, a man,
I did as these have done, but did not die--
I will content the people as I can
And give up these to them: Behold the man!

I have suffered, in a dream, because of him,
Many things; for this last saviour, man,
I have lied as I lie now. But what is lying?
Men wash their hands, in blood, as best they can:
I find no fault in this just man.

Randall Jarrell

Note: a hutment is an encampment of huts.

I have two poems to post for number 8. The extra poem is just because I want to post an E. Dickinson and you will see, it is a little stretch.

Number 8

It was a face which darkness could kill
in an instant
a face as easily hurt
by laughter or light

'We think differently at night'
she told me once
lying back languidly

And she would quote Cocteau

'I feel there is an angel in me' she'd say
'whom I am constantly shocking'

Then she would smile and look away
light a cigarette for me
sigh and rise

and stretch
her sweet anatomy

let fall a stocking
~~Lawrence Ferlinghetti



Now, find the 8 in this poem -

A Bird came down the Walk
by Emily Dickinson


A Bird came down the Walk—
He did not know I saw—
He bit an Angleworm in halves
And ate the fellow, raw,

And then he drank a Dew
From a convenient Grass—
And then hopped sidewise to the Wall
To let a Beetle pass—

He glanced with rapid eyes
That hurried all around—
They looked like frightened Beads, I thought—
He stirred his Velvet Head

Like one in danger, Cautious,
I offered him a Crumb
And he unrolled his feathers
And rowed him softer home—

Than Oars divide the Ocean,
Too silver for a seam—
Or Butterflies, off Banks of Noon
Leap, plashless as they swim.

Good poem. Now to get off topic. I love Sesame Street, or did when my kids were young. One of the counting segments from the early years of SS has a bitty boy of about 3, named John John. John John tells Grover he loves him and Grover says he loves John John, who responds with count this penny. All very cute. All these years later two people form a hip Bluegrassy type band have named themselves Count this Penny. They have a great song called, Big Tall Pines.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HSyY6BkcNu4

Back to poetry; who knew there would be so many numbers imbedded in poems. It seems that numbers actually make frequent appearances in poetry. They are used to form a structure to hang a poem on or used to show movement or create rhythm (which makes sense). I will try to notice when I find examples of these techniques and point them out. One more thing, while searching through all of my books for numbers in poems, I've been reminded of how much I like Now & Then: The Poet's Choice Columns 1997-2000 by Robert Hass. I hightly recomend it. I especially enjoyed the September 12,1999 column.

My kids would hide their eyes when the the 'cream pie' guy on Sesame Street would come on ... "twelve cream pies .... " and then he'd fall down the stairs or whatever. It wasn't a matter of suspense, they knew what was going to happen and so they didn't want to watch. Bird on the Walk is a great Dickinson poem, I enjoy it every time I read it, there is something tentative about the Bird that is endearing ... and it taught me a new word .. 'plashless'. I read over Dickinson a few times but failed to come up with the 8, so now feeling puzzled ?? Please don't tell me its obvious ...

You're right that numbers provide something to hang a poem on .. or maybe a song? I was thinking of Bill Haley, Rock around the Clock (careful, it's an ear worm) ... and that led me to an 'eight' song from one of the best 70's bands of all (in my humble view), so I'm going to take some liberty and cross the bridge from poetry to song for my '8' contribution ...

Pieces Of Eight

It's six O'clock, good morning sounds are everywhere
The warmth of spring, a gentle breeze blows through my hair
I hurry through my life never stopping to see
How beautiful it was meant to be

I'm just a prisoner in a king's disguise
Broken dreams as we shuffle by

It's six O'clock, it's quitting time I'm done for the day
Out on the streets, I overheard a lady say
We now have everything, or so people say
But now this emptiness haunts me every day

We seek the lion's share never knowing why
Come alive spread your wings and fly

Pieces of eight, the search for the money tree
Don't cash your freedoms in for gold
Pieces of eight can't buy you everything
Don't let it turn your heart to stone

Styx

Remember I said it was kind of a cheat. The "8" in ED's poem is not a true "8", but rather a homophone. Enough said for you to find the 8?

Number 9

The Lake Isle of Innisfree
by W. B. Yeats

I will arise and go now, and go to Innisfree,
And a small cabin build there, of clay and wattles made:
Nine bean-rows will I have there, a hive for the honey-bee;
And live alone in the bee-loud glade.

And I shall have some peace there, for peace comes dropping slow,
Dropping from the veils of the morning to where the cricket sings;
There midnight's all a glimmer, and noon a purple glow,
And evening full of the linnet's wings.

I will arise and go now, for always night and day
I hear lake water lapping with low sounds by the shore;
While I stand on the roadway, or on the pavements grey,
I hear it in the deep heart's core.

Today must be a busy day; for I am alone in posting a #9. Who knows, maybe still there will be a late comer. I will post my #10. This is a poem I like very much.

The Oven Bird
By Robert Frost


There is a singer everyone has heard,
Loud, a mid-summer and a mid-wood bird,
Who makes the solid tree trunks sound again.
He says that leaves are old and that for flowers
Mid-summer is to spring as one to ten.
He says the early petal-fall is past
When pear and cherry bloom went down in showers
On sunny days a moment overcast;
And comes that other fall we name the fall.
He says the highway dust is over all.
The bird would cease and be as other birds
But that he knows in singing not to sing.
The question that he frames in all but words
Is what to make of a diminished thing.

Giselle, you're right--that is a good Styx song. I had the idea they were 80s, but it's all a blur. Saffron I thought was going to use a different Yeats. He seemed to stock his poems with a lot of numbers.

The Wild Swans at Coole

THE TREES are in their autumn beauty,
The woodland paths are dry,
Under the October twilight the water
Mirrors a still sky;
Upon the brimming water among the stones 5
Are nine and fifty swans.

The nineteenth Autumn has come upon me
Since I first made my count;
I saw, before I had well finished,
All suddenly mount 10
And scatter wheeling in great broken rings
Upon their clamorous wings.

I have looked upon those brilliant creatures,
And now my heart is sore.
All’s changed since I, hearing at twilight, 15
The first time on this shore,
The bell-beat of their wings above my head,
Trod with a lighter tread.

Unwearied still, lover by lover,
They paddle in the cold, 20
Companionable streams or climb the air;
Their hearts have not grown old;
Passion or conquest, wander where they will,
Attend upon them still.

But now they drift on the still water 25
Mysterious, beautiful;
Among what rushes will they build,
By what lake’s edge or pool
Delight men’s eyes, when I awake some day
To find they have flown away? 30

Another that I found, in complete contrast to the Yeats...

The Temperaments

Nine adulteries, 12 liaisons, 64 fornications and
something approaching a rape
Rest nightly upon the soul of our delicate friend
Florialis,
And yet the man is so quiet and reserved in demeanour
That he passes for both bloodless and sexless.
Bastidides, on the contrary, who both talks and writes
of nothing save copulation,
Has become the father of twins,
But he accomplished this feat at some cost;
He had to be four times cuckold.

Ezra Pound

You are right, DWill. I had intended to use the same Yeats that you posted, but thought instead to use it for 19; 19 being a much harder number to find in a poem. That Ezra Pound is almost shocking to read, but there rings a real truth to it. It has been my experience that sometimes the person who is most vocal about sex (I think it holds for other subjects too) is sometimes the one least engaged in the activity and of course the contrary holds as well.