I think about this often.

I do not belong here.

Invictus by William Ernst Henley

When I was younger I clung to it’s message of perseverance. It ended up being the first poem that I ever memorized.

Out of the night that covers me
Black as the pit from pole to pole,
I thank whatever gods may be
For my unconquerable soul.

In the fell clutch of circumstance,
I have not winced nor cried aloud.
Under the bludgeonings of chance
My head is bloody, but unbowed.

Beyond this place of wrath and tears
Looms but the Horror of the shade,
And yet the menace of the years
Finds, and shall find, me unafraid.

It matters not how strait the gate,
How charged with punishments the scroll,
I am the master of my fate
I am the captain of my soul.

Dolce et Decorum est - Wilfred Owen. A grim, anti-war masterpiece written by a soldier fighting in the trenches in WW1

Ozymandias - Percy Shelley. A reminder of human transience and hubris

Do Not Go Gentle into That Good Night - Dylan Thomas. Helps me to endure when things seem bleak or hopeless.

https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/44049/a-man-said-to-the-universe

A man said to the universe:
“Sir, I exist!”
“However,” replied the universe,
“The fact has not created in me
A sense of obligation.”

Written in like the 1890s. So straight forward. Feels modern.

It’s not DNS,
There’s no way it’s DNS,
It was DNS

Ozymandias, because it’s one of the very few I’ve read, and I liked it.

I’m partial to To make a prairie by Emily Dickinson:

To make a prairie it takes a clover 
      and one bee,
One clover, and a bee.
And revery.
The revery alone will do,
If bees are few.

I enjoy the simplicity. Also, there’s a great choir setting by Rudolf Escher which I really enjoy.

Where The Sidewalk Ends by Shel Silverstein.

A Supermarket in California by Ginsberg. Idk why it just always has stuck with me

"No te salves " from Mario Benedetti. It’s beautiful in Spanish. Does not translate well to English but here it is

https://pleasansenmarais.tumblr.com/post/575992977

Ulysses by Alfred, Lord Tennyson. It always struck me as both humble and proud and it only becomes more meaningful as I age.

https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/45392/ulysses

Richard Cory

A surprising poem on a dark subject matter. Perhaps one of the best poems that demonstrate how mysterious other people are and how hard it is to truly connect with strangers.

“The View From Halfway Down” by Alison Tifel has always resonated with me:

The weak breeze whispers nothing
The water screams sublime
His feet shift, teeter-totter
Deep breath, stand back, it’s time

Toes untouch the overpass
Soon he’s water bound
Eyes locked shut but peek to see
The view from halfway down

A little wind, a summer sun
A river rich and regal
A flood of fond endorphins
Brings a calm that knows no equal

You’re flying now
You see things much more clear than from the ground
It’s all okay, it would be
Were you not now halfway down

Thrash to break from gravity
What now could slow the drop
All I’d give for toes to touch
The safety back at top

But this is it, the deed is done
Silence drowns the sound
Before I leaped I should’ve seen
The view from halfway down

I really should’ve thought about
The view from halfway down
I wish I could’ve known about
The view from halfway down

Futility by Wilfred Owen.

Im not really too much into poetry, Im more of a song person, so obviously I found about it through a song that uses the poem as lyrics. I think I somewhat relate to to it, the feeling of futility expressed in it, even tho I havent seen the horrors he must have seen. All of his poetry is quite good, and it was written during WWI and from the trenches which makes it way more powerfull and sad IMO

I also like The Sleeper by Edgar A. Poe but that its mostly because I was a bit of a goth kid and its also been turned into a song

Porphyria’s Lover by Robert Browning just rolled around in my head for day after I first read it. It’s really dark but feels so completely human at the same time.

https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/46313/porphyrias-lover