(30 April 1888 - 3 July 1974 / Pulaski Tennessee)

poet John Crowe Ransom
#446 on top 500 poets

Quotations

  • ''Where have I seen before, against the wind,
    These bright virgins, robed and bare of bonnet,

    Flowing with music of their strange quick tongue
    And adventuring with delicate paces by the stream,—
    Myself a child, old suddenly at the scream
    From one of the white throats which it hid among?''
    John Crowe Ransom (1888-1974), U.S. poet. Vision by Sweetwater (l. 11-16). . . Oxford Book of American Verse, The. F. O. Matthiessen, ed. (1950) Oxford University Press.
    4 person liked.
    		4 person did not like.
  • ''Tawny are the leaves turned, but they still hold.
    It is the harvest; what shall this land produce?
    A meager hill of kernels, a runnel of juice.
    Declension looks from our land, it is old.''
    John Crowe Ransom (1888-1974), U.S. poet. Antique Harvesters (l. 1-4). . . Oxford Book of American Verse, The. F. O. Matthiessen, ed. (1950) Oxford University Press.
    3 person liked.
    		3 person did not like.
  • ''The horn, the hounds, the lank mares coursing by
    Under quaint archetypes of chivalry;
    And the fox, lovely ritualist, in flight
    Offering his unearthly ghost to quarry;''
    John Crowe Ransom (1888-1974), U.S. poet. Antique Harvesters (l. 20-23). . . Oxford Book of American Verse, The. F. O. Matthiessen, ed. (1950) Oxford University Press.
    4 person liked.
    		3 person did not like.
  • ''Alas,

    For the tireless heart within the little
    Lady with rod that made them rise
    From their noon apple-dreams, and scuttle
    Goose-fashion under the skies!''
    John Crowe Ransom (1888-1974), U.S. poet. Bells for John Whiteside's Daughter (l. 16-20). . . Oxford Book of American Verse, The. F. O. Matthiessen, ed. (1950) Oxford University Press.
    2 person liked.
    		4 person did not like.
  • ''There was such speed in her little body,
    And such lightness in her footfall,
    It is no wonder her brown study
    Astonishes us all.''
    John Crowe Ransom (1888-1974), U.S. poet. Bells for John Whiteside's Daughter (l. 1-4). . . Oxford Book of American Verse, The. F. O. Matthiessen, ed. (1950) Oxford University Press.
    1 person liked.
    		1 person did not like.
  • ''For I could tell you a story which is true;
    I know a lady with a terrible tongue,
    Blear eyes fallen from blue,
    All her perfections tarnished—and yet it is not long
    Since she was lovelier than any of you.''
    John Crowe Ransom (1888-1974), U.S. poet. Blue Girls (l. 13-17). . . Norton Anthology of Modern Poetry, The. Richard Ellmann and Robert O'Clair, eds. (2d ed., 1988) W. W. Norton & Company.
    2 person liked.
    		0 person did not like.
  • ''The curse of hell upon the sleek upstart
    That got the Captain finally on his back
    And took the red red vitals of his heart
    And made the kites to whet their beaks clack clack.''
    John Crowe Ransom (1888-1974), U.S. poet. Captain Carpenter (l. 61-64). . . Oxford Book of American Verse, The. F. O. Matthiessen, ed. (1950) Oxford University Press.
    2 person liked.
    		1 person did not like.
  • ''I would not knock old fellows in the dust
    But there lay Captain Carpenter on his back
    His weapons were the old heart in his bust
    And a blade shook between rotten teeth alack.''
    John Crowe Ransom (1888-1974), U.S. poet. Captain Carpenter (l. 45-48). . . Oxford Book of American Verse, The. F. O. Matthiessen, ed. (1950) Oxford University Press.
    1 person liked.
    		1 person did not like.
  • ''But where she should have made off like a hind
    The bitch bit off his arms at the elbows.''
    John Crowe Ransom (1888-1974), U.S. poet. Captain Carpenter (l. 23-24). . . Oxford Book of American Verse, The. F. O. Matthiessen, ed. (1950) Oxford University Press.
    1 person liked.
    		1 person did not like.
  • ''Captain Carpenter rose up in his prime
    Put on his pistols and went riding out
    But had got wellnigh nowhere at that time
    Till he fell in with ladies in a rout.''
    John Crowe Ransom (1888-1974), U.S. poet. Captain Carpenter (l. 1-4). . . Oxford Book of American Verse, The. F. O. Matthiessen, ed. (1950) Oxford University Press.
    2 person liked.
    		1 person did not like.

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Captain Carpenter

Captain Carpenter rose up in his prime
Put on his pistols and went riding out
But had got wellnigh nowhere at that time
Till he fell in with ladies in a rout.

It was a pretty lady and all her train
That played with him so sweetly but before
An hour she'd taken a sword with all her main
And twined him of his nose for evermore.

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