Contemplation would make a good life, keep it strict, only
The eyes of a desert skull drinking the sun,
Too intense for flesh, lonely
Exultations of white bone;
Pure action would make a good life, let it be sharp-
Set between the throat and the knife.
A man who knows death by heart
Is the man for that life.
In pleasant peace and security
How suddenly the soul in a man begins to die.
He shall look up above the stalled oxen
Envying the cruel falcon,
And dig under the straw for a stone
To bruise himself on.
562
The Cruel Falcon
Robinson Jeffers
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Poem topics: death, heart, lonely, peace, sun, soul, white, knife, pure, security, sharp, skull, bone, throat, suddenly, stone, action, desert, intense, good, Print This Poem , Rhyme Scheme
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