by Sean Dempsey | 05/26/26 There was once a gentle farmer,From troubles borne was he—His eyes were wan, his spirits low;But he’d unload his woe for free. The farmer sighed a grievous sigh,And gazed on through the trees;“Come sit thee upon this stump,And hear the tale from me….” Pippin was a spotted hound,As dear as […]
Poems
Economics of War
War, that most vain and venerated instrument of national pride, does not merely nudge the price of petrol upward, it rends asunder the delicate machinery of trade itself. Ships are halted, roads reduced to rubble, and the humble materials upon which industry depends are spirited away, so that fewer goods are fashioned while the public, […]
Who Possesses the Tender Plant?
by Sean Dempsey Inspired by a true story of dismal woe… Spoke an aged gardener,As he tapped his gentle knee:“By thy green thumb and patient eye,I pray thee, hark to me! A tale of love and loss I’ll tell,Of root and tender leaf,Of a plant I loved more true than man,And lost to mortal grief. […]
Forgive Our Happiness
Sean Dempsey8-18-25 The lanterns burn with pallid light,And the corridors are still;Yet walls divide both joy and blight:Both mercy and its ill. The midnight hush is cold and long,The air with ether sweet;The measured steps of nurses’ throngBeat soft on weary feet. A mother clasps her newborn son!His cry: a trumpet clear.Her weary heart declares […]
Compare and Contrast – Dempsey/TS Eliot
T. S. Eliot’s The Hollow Men and Sean Dempsey’s America, 2023 both confront the spiritual and moral decay of civilization, but they do so from opposite emotional poles. Eliot’s poem is elegiac: a whispered lament for a world hollowed out by inertia and disillusionment. His “stuffed men” drift without agency, trapped in the shadow between […]
The Good Knight
By Sean Dempsey, 07/08/25 The Good Knight He took no oath before her eyes,Nor knelt where others came.He watched the world behind her gate,And never spoke his name. They say he once was something more,A banner, or a flame;But all he kept were ragged threadsAnd shoulders bowed with shame. He waited where the garden ends,Where […]
The Shelter-Door Was Strong and Thick
By Sean Dempsey, 03/31/25 The sun sank low on Lilac Lane;The stars began to peep.And laughter rang from mouths of men Who’d never yet known grief. With meat and wine their hearts were glad—Their tables richly spread.Till sudden came the radio’s cry: “A bomb shall strike,” it said! Then silence fell like Yahweh’s tomb, […]
The Religion of Ideology
Given a lack of meaningful information, Man is blind; he will seek instead to use his intuition, “instincts,” and naked assumptions to form an opinion. This is not wrong, per se; it is a natural reaction to seek to fill gaps in one’s knowledge. When the matter is of great importance, these opinions unfortunately will […]
A Blood-Soaked Lens
Our societal lens has become smudged, cracked, and broken. Through that lens, young boys go fight and die in the mud for our righteous country. “Heroes, all!” Through that lens, the noble flag waves majestically overhead while life leaves their broken and fragile bodies. Boys cough up blood and wilt like dying flowers before a […]
Corporate Lunch Poems (Liberty Mutual)
I wrote the following poems between 2011 – 2014 while working at a corporate “desk job” for the behemoth insurance company, Liberty Mutual. There were probably a few hundred poems written during this short timeframe, but most have been lost (along with a good chunk of my sanity) and scattered to the winds of time. […]









