
"There is an eagle in me that wants to soar, and there is a hippopotamus in me that wants to wallow in the mud." -- Carl Sandburg

"There is an eagle in me that wants to soar, and there is a hippopotamus in me that wants to wallow in the mud." -- Carl Sandburg

A Dream Girl
by Carl Sandburg
You will come one day in a waver of love,
Tender as dew, impetuous as rain,
The tan of the sun will be on your skin,
The purr of the breeze in your murmuring speech,
You will pose with a hill-flower grace.
You will come, with your slim, expressive arms,
A poise of the head no sculptor has caught
And nuances spoken with shoulder and neck,
Your face in pass-and-repass of moods
As many as skies in delicate change
Of cloud and blue and flimmering sun.
Yet,
You may not come, O girl of a dream,
We may but pass as the world goes by
And take from a look of eyes into eyes,
A film of hope and a memoried day.

“I’m an idealist. I don’t know where I’m going, but I’m on my way.” — Carl Sandburg


I’m an idealist. I don’t know where I’m going, but I’m on my way. — Carl Sandburg


At a Window
By Carl Sandburg
Give me hunger,
O you gods that sit and give
The world its orders.
Give me hunger, pain and want,
Shut me out with shame and failure
From your doors of gold and fame,
Give me your shabbiest, weariest hunger!
But leave me a little love,
A voice to speak to me in the day end,
A hand to touch me in the dark room
Breaking the long loneliness.
In the dusk of day-shapes
Blurring the sunset,
One little wandering, western star
Thrust out from the changing shores of shadow.
Let me go to the window,
Watch there the day-shapes of dusk
And wait and know the coming
Of a little love.

Poetry is an echo, asking a shadow to dance.
— Carl Sandburg