Cream of the Crop 1/Cream of the Crop 1.iso/WINDOWS/WINPOEM.ARJ/WINPOEM.DAT

Text File | 1992-04-06 | 74KB | 2,533 lines

@T A Thunderstorm in Town

She wore a new "terra-cotta" dress,
And we stayed, because of the pelting storm,
Within the hansom's dry recess,
Though the horse had stopped; yea, motionless
We sat on, snug and warm.

Then the downpour ceased, to my sharp sad pain
And the glass that had screened our forms before
Flew up, and out she sprang to her door:
I should have kissed her if the rain
Had lasted a minute more.

@A Thomas Hardy
#
They say my verse is sad: no wonder;
Its narrow measure spans
Tears of eternity, and sorrow,
Not mine, but man's.

This is for all ill-treated fellows
Unborn and unbegot,
For them to read when they're in trouble
And I am not.

@A A. E. Housman
#
@T On a Day's Stint

And long ere dinner-time I have
Full eight close pages wrote.
What, Duty, hast thou now to crave?
Well done, Sir Walter Scott!

@A Sir Walter Scott
#
@T The Choir Boy

And when he sang in choruses
His voice o'ertopped the rest,
Which is very inartistic,
But the public like that best.

@A Anonymous
#
@T For Johnny

Do not despair
For Johnny-head-air;
He sleeps as sound
As Johnny underground.

Fetch out no shroud
For Johnny-in-the-cloud;
And keep your tears
For him in after years.

Better by far
For Johnny-the-bright-star,
To keep your head,
And see his children fed.

@A John Pudney
#
@T Cock-Crow

Out of the wood of thoughts that grows by night
To be cut down by the sharp axe of light, -
Out of the night, two cocks together crow,
Cleaving the darkness with a silver blow:
And bright before my eyes twin trumpeters stand,
Heralds of splendour, one at either hand,
Each facing each as in a coat of arms:
The milkers lace their boots up at the farms.

@A Edward Thomas
#
@T After Long Silence

Speech after long silence; it is right,
All other lovers being estranged or dead,
Unfriendly lamplight hid under its shade,
The curtains drawn upon unfriendly night,
That we descant and yet again descant
Upon the supreme theme of Art and Song:
Bodily decrepitude is wisdom; young
We loved each other and were ignorant.

@A W. B. Yeats
#
@T Clouds

Down the blue night the unending columns press
In noiseless tumult, break and wave and flow,
Now tread the far South, or lift rounds of snow
Up to the white moon's hidden loveliness.
Some pause in their grave wandering comradeless,
And turn with profound gesture vague and slow,
As who would pray good for the world, but know
Their benediction empty as they bless.

They say that the Dead die not, but remain
Near to the rich heirs of their grief and mirth.
I think they ride the calm mid-heaven, as these,
In wise majestic melancholy train,
And watch the moon, and the still-raging seas,
And men coming and going on the earth.

@A Rupert Brooke
#
@T If I should ever by Chance

If I should ever by chance grow rich
I'll buy Codham, Cockridden, and Childerditch,
Roses, Pyrgo, and Lapwater,
And let them all to my elder daughter.
The rent I shall ask of her will be only
Each year's violets, white and lonely,
The first primroses and orchises -
She must find them before I do, that is.
But if she finds a blossom on furze
Without rent they shall all for ever be hers,
Codham, Cockridden, and Childerditch,
Roses, Pyrgo, and Lapwater, -
I shall give them all to my elder daughter.

@A Edward Thomas
#
@T Adlestrop

Yes, I remember Adlestrop -
The name, because one afternoon
Of heat the express-train drew up there
Unwontedly.  It was late June.

The steam hissed.  Someone cleared his throat.
No one left and no one came
On the bare platform.  What I saw
Was Adlestrop - only the name

And willows, willow-herb, and grass,
And meadowsweet, and haycocks dry,
No whit less still and lonely fair
Than the high cloudlets in the sky.

And for that minute a blackbird sang
Close by, and round him, mistier,
Farther and farther, all the birds
Of Oxfordshire and Gloucestershire.

@A Edward Thomas
#
@T Tall Nettles

Tall nettles cover up, as they have done
These many springs, the rusty harrow, the plough
Long worn out, and the roller made of stone:
Only the elm butt tops the nettles now.

This corner of the farmyard I like most:
As well as any bloom upon a flower
I like the dust on the nettles, never lost
Except to prove the sweetness of a shower.

@A Edward Thomas
#
@T The Cherry Trees

The cherry trees bend over and are shedding
On the old road where all that passed are dead,
Their petals, strewing the grass as for a wedding
This early May morn when there is none to wed.

@A Edward Thomas
#
@T What will they do?

What will they do when I am gone? It is plain
That they will do without me as the rain
Can do without the flowers and the grass
That profit by it and must perish without.
I have but seen them in the loud street pass;
And I was naught to them. I turned about
To see them disappearing carelessly.
But what if I in them as they in me
Nourished what has great value and no price?
Almost I thought that rain thirsts for a draught
Which only in the blossom's chalice lies,
Until that one turned back and lightly laughed.

@A Edward Thomas
#
@T The Lane

Some day, I think, there will be people enough
In Froxfield to pick all the blackberries
Out of the hedges of Green Lane, the straight
Broad lane where now September hides herself
In bracken and blackberry, harebell and dwarf gorse.
Today, where yesterday a hundred sheep
Were nibbling, halcyon bells shake to the sway
Of waters that no vessel ever sailed...
It is a kind of spring: the chaffinch tries
His song. For heat it is like summer too.
This might be winter's quiet. While the glint
Of hollies dark in the swollen hedges lasts -
One mile - and those bells ring, little I know
Or heed if time be still the same, until
The lane ends and once more all is the same.

@A Edward Thomas
#
@T In Memoriam (Easter, 1915)

The flowers left thick at nightfall in the wood
This Eastertide call into mind the men,
Now far from home, who, with their sweethearts, should
Have gathered them and will do never again.

@A Edward Thomas
#
@T Failure

Because God put His adamantine fate
Between my sullen heart and its desire,
I swore that I would burst the Iron Gate,
Rise up, and curse Him on His throne of fire.
Earth shuddered at my crown of blasphemy,
But Love was as a flame about my feet;
Proud up the Golden Stair I strode; and beat
Thrice on the Gate, and entered with a cry -

All the great courts were quiet in the sun,
And full of vacant echoes: moss had grown
Over the glassy pavement, and begun
To creep within the dusty council-halls.
An idle wind blew round an empty throne
And stirred the heavy curtains on the walls.

@A Rupert Brooke
#
@T Sonnet

I said I splendidly loved you; it's not true.
Such long swift tides stir not a land-locked sea.
On gods or fools the high risk falls - on you -
The clean clear bitter-sweet that's not for me.
Love soars from earth to ecstasies unwist.
Love is flung Lucifer-like from Heaven to Hell.
But - there are wanderers in the middle mist,
Who cry for shadows, clutch, and cannot tell
Whether they love at all, or, loving, whom:
An old song's lady, a fool in fancy dress,
Or phantoms, or their own face on the gloom;
For love of Love, or from heart's loneliness.
Pleasure's not theirs, nor pain. They doubt, and sigh,
And do not love at all. Of these am I.

@A Rupert Brooke
#
@T The Hill

Breathless, we flung us on the windy hill,
Laughed in the sun, and kissed the lovely grass.
You said, `Through glory and ecstasy we pass;
Wind, sun, and earth remain, the birds sing still,
When we are old, are old...'  `And when we die
All's over that is ours; and life burns on
Through other lovers, other lips,' said I,
`Heart of my heart, our heaven is now, is won!'

`We are Earth's best, that learnt her lesson here.
Life is our cry. We have kept the faith!' we said;
`We shall go down with unreluctant tread
Rose-crowned into the darkness!' ...Proud we were,
And laughed, that had such brave true things to say,
- And then you suddenly cried, and turned away.

@A Rupert Brooke
#
@T Song

All suddenly the wind comes soft,
And Spring is here again;
And the hawthorn quickens with buds of green,
And my heart with buds of pain.

My heart all Winter lay so numb,
The earth so dead and frore,
That I never thought the Spring would come,
Or my heart wake any more.

But Winter's broken and earth has woken.
And the small birds cry again;
And the hawthorn hedge puts forth its buds,
And my heart puts forth its pain.

@A Rupert Brooke
#
@T The Way that Lovers Use

The way that lovers use is this:
They bow, catch hands, with never a word,
And their lips meet, and they do kiss,
- So I have heard.

They queerly find some healing so,
And strange attainment in the touch;
There is a secret lovers know,
- I have read as much.

And theirs is no longer joy nor smart,
Changing or ending, night or day;
But mouth to mouth, and heart on heart,
- So lovers say.

@A Rupert Brooke
#
@T Song

The way of love was thus.
He was born one winter's morn
With hands delicious,
And it was well with us.

Love came our quiet way,
Lit pride in us, and died in us,
All in a winter's day.
There is no more to say.

@A Rupert Brooke
#
@T Sonnet Reversed

Hand trembling towards hand; the amazing lights
Of heart and eye. They stood on supreme heights.

Ah, the delirious weeks of honeymoon!
Soon they returned, and after strange adventures,
Settled at Balham by the end of June.
Their money was in Can. Pasc. B. Debentures,
And in Antofagastas. Still he went
Cityward daily; still she did abide
At home. And both were really quite content
With work and social pleasures. Then they died.
They left three children (besides George, who drank):
The eldest Jane, who married Mr Bell,
William, the head-clerk in the County Bank,
And Henry, a stock-broker, doing well.

@A Rupert Brooke
#
@T A White Rose

The red rose whispers of passion,
And the white rose breathes of love;
O, the red rose is a falcon,
And the white rose is a dove.

But I send you a cream-white rosebud
With a flush on its petal tips;
For the love that is purest and sweetest
Has a kiss of desire on the lips.

@A John Boyle O'Reilly
#
@T Urceus Exit

I intended an Ode,
And it turn'd to a Sonnet.
It began 'a la mode',
I intended an Ode;
But Rose cross'd the road
In her latest new bonnet;
I intended an Ode;
And it turn'd to a Sonnet.

@A Austin Dobson
#
@T Pippa's Song

The year's at the spring,
And day's at the morn;
Morning's at seven;
The hill-side's dew-pearl'd;
The lark's on the wing;
The snail's on the thorn;
God's in His heaven -
All's right with the world!

@A Robert Browning
#
@T Song

She is not fair to outward view
As many maidens be,
Her loveliness I never knew
Until she smiled on me;
O, then I saw her eye was bright,
A well of love, a spring of light!

But now her looks are coy and cold,
To mine they ne'er reply,
And yet I cease not to behold
The love-light in her eye:
Her very frowns are fairer far
Than smiles of other maidens are.

@A Hartley Coleridge
#
@T Rondeau

Jenny kiss'd me when we met,
Jumping from the chair she sat in;
Time, you thief, who love to get
Sweets into your list, put that in!
Say I'm weary, say I'm sad,
Say that health and wealth have miss'd me,
Say I'm growing old, but add,
Jenny kiss'd me.

@A J. H. Leigh Hunt
#
@T A Drinking Song

Bacchus must now his power resign -
I am the only God of Wine!
It is not fit the wretch should be
In competition set with me,
Who can drink ten times more than he.

Make a new world, ye powers divine!
Stock'd with nothing else but Wine:
Let Wine its only product be,
Let Wine be earth, and air, and sea -
And let that Wine be all for me!

@A Henry Carey
#
I never had a piece of toast
Particularly long and wide,
But fell upon the sanded floor
And always on the buttered side.

@A James Payn
#
@T Summer Evening

The frog, half fearful, jumps across the path,
And little mouse that leaves its hole at eve
Nimbles with timid dread beneath the swath;
My rustling steps awhile their joys deceive,
Till past - and then the cricket sings more strong,
And grasshoppers in merry mood still wear
The short night weary with their fretting song.
Up from behind the mole-hill jumps the hare,
Cheat of his chosen bed, and from the bank
The yellowhammer flutters in short fears
From off its nest hid in the grasses rank,
And drops again when no more noise it hears.
Thus nature's human link and endless thrall,
Proud man, still seems the enemy of all.

@A John Clare
#
@T Diamond Cut Diamond

Two cats
One up a tree
One under the tree
The cat up a tree is he
The cat under the tree is she
The tree is witch elm, just incidentally.
He takes no notice  of she, she takes no notice of he.
He stares at the woolly clouds passing, she stares at the tree.
There's been a lot written about cats, by Old Possum, Yeats and
Company
But not Alfred de Musset or Lord Tennyson or Poe or anybody
Wrote about one cat under, and one cat up, a tree.
God knows why this should be left for me
Except I like cats as cats be
Especially one cat up
And one cat under
A witch elm
Tree.

@A Ewart Milne
#
@T Time and Love

When I have seen by Time's fell hand defaced
The rich proud cost of out-worn buried age;
When sometime lofty towers I see down-razed,
And brass eternal slave to mortal rage;

When I have seen the hungry ocean gain
Advantage on the kingdom of the shore,
And the firm soil win of the watery main,
Increasing store with loss, and loss with store;

When I have seen such interchange of state,
Or state itself confounded to decay,
Ruin hath taught me thus to ruminate -
That Time will come and take my Love away:

- This thought is as a death, which cannot choose
But weep to have that which it fears to lose.

@A William Shakespeare
#
Under the greenwood tree
Who loves to lie with me,
And turn his merry note
Unto the sweet bird's throat -
Come hither, come hither, come hither !
Here shall he see
No enemy
But winter and rough weather.

Who doth ambition shun
And loves to live i' the sun,
Seeking the food he eats
And pleased with what he gets -
Come hither, come hither, come hither!
Here shall he see
No enemy
But winter and rough weather.

@A William Shakespeare
#
@T Absence

Being your slave, what should I do but tend
Upon the hours and times of your desire?
I have no precious time at all to spend
Nor services to do, till you require:

Nor dare I chide the world-without-end hour
Whilst I, my sovereign, watch the clock for you,
Nor think the bitterness of absence sour
When you have bid your servant once adieu:

Nor dare I question with my jealous thought
Where you may be, or your affairs suppose,
But like a sad slave, stay and think of nought
Save, where you are, how happy you make those;-

So true a fool is love, that in your will,
Though you do anything, he thinks no ill.

@A William Shakespeare
#
To me, fair Friend, you never can be old,
For as you were when first your eye I eyed
Such seems your beauty still. Three winters cold
Have from the forests shook three summers' pride;
Three beauteous springs to yellow autumn turn'd
In process of the seasons have I seen,
Three April perfumes in three hot Junes burn'd,
Since first I saw you fresh, which yet are green.

Ah! yet doth beauty, like a dial-hand,
Steal from his figure, and no pace perceived;
So your sweet hue, which methinks still doth stand,
Hath motion, and mine eye may be deceived:

For fear of which, hear this, thou age unbred,-
Ere you were born, was beauty's summer dead.

@A William Shakespeare
#
@T To His Love

Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?
Thou art more lovely and more temperate:
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,
And summer's lease hath all too short a date:

Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,
And often is his gold complexion dimm'd:
And every fair from fair sometime declines,
By chance, or nature's changing course, untrimm'd.

But thy eternal summer shall not fade
Nor lose possession of that fair thou owest;
Nor shall death brag thou wanderest in his shade,
When in eternal lines to time thou growest:

So long as men can breathe, or eyes can see,
So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.

@A William Shakespeare
#
@T Carpe Diem

O Mistress, where are you roaming?
O stay and hear! your true-love's coming
That can sing both high and low;
Trip no further, pretty sweeting,
Journey's end in lovers' meeting -
Every wise man's son doth know.

What is love? 'tis not hereafter;
Present mirth hath present laughter;
What's to come is still unsure;
In delay there lies no plenty,-
Then come kiss me, Sweet-and-twenty,
Youth's a stuff will not endure.

@A William Shakespeare
#
@T A Sea Dirge

Full fathom five thy father lies:
Of his bones are coral made;
Those are peals that were his eyes;
Nothing of him that doth fade
But doth suffer a sea-change
Into something rich and strange.
Sea-nymphs hourly ring his knell;
Hark! now I hear them,-
Ding, dong, bell.

@A William Shakespeare
#
@T On the Tombs in Westminster Abbey

Mortality, behold and fear,
What a change of flesh is here!
Think how many royal bones
Sleep within these heaps of stones;
Here they lie, had realms and lands,
Who now want strength to stir their hands,
Where from their pulpits seal'd with dust
They preach, `In greatness is no trust.'
Here's an acre sown indeed
With the richest royallest seed
That the earth did e'er suck in
Since the first man died for sin:
Here the bones of birth have cried
`Though gods they were, as men they died!'
Here are sands, ignoble things,
Dropt from the ruin'd sides of kings:
Here's a world of pomp and state
Buried in dust, once dead by fate.

@A F. Beaumont
#
@T The Terror of Death

When I have fears that I may cease to be
Before my pen has glean'd my teeming brain,
Before high-piled books, in charact'ry
Hold like rich garners the full-ripen'd grain;

When I behold, upon the night's starr'd face,
Huge cloudy symbols of a high romance,
And think that I may never live to trace
Their shadows, with the magic hand of chance;

And when I feel, fair creature of an hour!
That I shall never look upon thee more,
Never have relish in the fairy power
Of unreflecting love - then on the shore

Of the wide world I stand alone, and think
Till love and fame to nothingness do sink.

@A J. Keats
#
@T Young and Old

When all the world is young, lad,
And all the trees are green;
And every goose a swan, lad,
And every lass a queen;
Then hey for boot and horse, lad,
And round the world away;
Young blood must have its course, lad,
And every dog his day.

When all the world is old, lad,
And all the trees are brown;
And all the sport is stale, lad,
And all the wheels run down;
Creep home, and take your place there,
The spent and maimed among:
God grant you find one face there,
You loved when all was young.

@A C. Kingsley
#
@T Pied Beauty

Glory be to God for dappled things-
For skies of couple-colour as a brindled cow;
For rose-moles all in stipple upon trout that swim;
Fresh-firecoal chestnut-falls; finches' wings;
Landscape plotted and pieced - fold, fallow, and plough;
And all trades, their gear and tackle and trim.

All things counter, original, spare, strange;
Whatever is fickle, freckled (who knows how?)
With swift, slow; sweet, sour; adazzle, dim;
He fathers-forth whose beauty is past change:
Praise Him.

@A Gerard Manley-Hopkins
#
@T The Lake Isle of Innisfree

I will arise, and go to Innisfree,
And a small cabin build there, of clay and wattles made;
Nine bean rows will I have there, a hive for the hiney bee,
And live alone in the bee-loud glade.

And I shall have some peace there, for peace comes dropping slow,
Dropping from the veils of the morning to where the cricket sings;
There midnight's all a-glimmer, and noon a purple glow,
And evening full of the linnet's wings.

I will arise and go now, for always night and day
I hear lake water lapping with low sounds by the shores;
While I stand on the roadway, or on the pavements gray,
I hear it in the deep heart's core.

@A W.B. Yeats
#
@T The Soldier

If I should die, think only this of me:
That there's some corner of a foreign field
That is for ever England. There shall be
In that rich earth a richer dust concealed;
A dust whom England bore, shaped, made aware,
Gave, once, her flowers to love, her ways to roam,
Washed by the rivers, blest by suns of home.

And think, this heart, all evil shed away,
A pulse in the eternal mind, no less
Gives somewhere back the thoughts by England given;
Her sights and sounds; dreams happy as her day;
And laughter, learnt of friends; and gentleness,
In hearts at peace, under an English heaven.

@A Rupert Brooke
#
@T Towers

Protected from the gales, we,
By the line of trees along the bank
From storms that batter Fife
And life here through the changing seasons -
Unchanging, a lonely beauty,
No reason to look to the rush
Beyond the rustle of the bushes.
But through the curtain of our trees,
The distant towers like castle turrets
Gleam by day and shine by night,
Holding, choking
Invisible souls within the shearing concrete height.

@A Julian Smart
#
@T Break of Day

Tis true, 'tis day; what though it be?
O wilt thou therefore rise from me?
Why should we rise, because 'tis light?
Did we lie down, because 'twas night?
Love which in spite of darkness brought us hither,
Should in despite of light keep us together.

Light hath no tongue, but is all eye;
If it could speak as well as spy,
This were the worst, that it could say,
That being well, I fain would stay,
And that I loved my heart and honour so,
That I would not from him, that had them, go.

Must business thee from hence remove?
Oh, that's the worst disease of love,
The poor, the foul, the false, love can
Admit. but not the busied man.
He which hath business, and makes love, doth do
Such wrong, as when a married man doth woo.

@A John Donne
#
@T The Computation

For the first twenty years, since yesterday,
I scarce believed, thou could'st be gone away,
For forty more, I fed on favours past,
And forty on hopes, that thou would'st, they might last.
Tears drowned one hundred, and sighs blew out two,
A thousand, I did neither think, nor do,
Or not divide, all being one thought of you;
Or in a thousand more, forget that too.
Yet call not this long life; but think that I
Am, by being dead, immortal; can ghosts die?

@A John Dunne
#
@T A Red, Red Rose

O, my love's like a red, red rose,
That's newly sprung in June.
O, my love's like the melodie,
That's sweetly play'd in tune.

As fair art thou, my bonnie lass,
So deep in love am I,
And I will love thee still, my Dear,
Till a' the seas gang dry.

Till a' the seas gang dry, my Dear,
And the rocks melt wi' the sun!
O, I will love thee still, my Dear,
While the sands o' life shall run.

And fare thee weel, my only Love,
And fare thee weel a while!
And I will come again, my Love,
Tho' it were ten thousand mile!

@A Robert Burns
#
@T On Charles II

Here lies our sovereign Lord the King,
Whose word no man relies on,
Who never said a foolish thing
Nor ever did a wise one.

@A Earl of Rochester
#
@T The Four Georges

George the First was always reckoned
Vile - but viler George the Second;
And what mortal ever heard
Any good of George the Third?
When from earth the Fourth descended,
God be praised, the Georges ended!

@A W.S. Landor
#
@T Frederick, Prince of Wales

Here lies Fred,
Who was alive, and is dead,
Had it been his father,
I had much rather.
Had it been his brother,
Still better than another.
Had it been his sister,
No one would have missed her.
Had it been the whole generation,
Still better for the nation.
But since 'tis only Fred,
Who was alive, and is dead,
There's no more to be said.

@A W.M. Thackeray
#
@T On an Old Woman

Mycilla dyes her locks, 'tis said,
But 'tis a foul aspersion;
She buys them black, they therefore need
No subsequent immersion.

@A W. Cowper
#
@T An Epitaph on Sir John Vanbrugh (Architect)

Under this stone, reader, survey
Dead Sir John Vanbrugh's house of clay.
Lie heavy on him, earth! for he
Laid many heavy loads on thee.

@A A. Evans
#
@T True Joy in Possession

To have a thing is little,
If you're not allowed to show it,
And to know a thing is nothing
Unless others know you know it.

@A Lord Neaves
#
@T To His Mistress Going To Bed

Come, Madam, come, all rest my powers defy,
Until I labour, I in labour lie.
The foe oft-times having the foe in sight,
Is tired with standing though he never fight.
Off with that girdle, like heaven's zone glistering,
But a far fairer world encompassing.
Unpin that spangled breastplate which you wear,
That th'eyes of busy fools may be stopt there.
Unlace yourself, for that harmonious chime
Tells me from you, that now it is bed time.
Off with that happy busk, which I envy,
That still can be, and still can stand so nigh.
Your gown going off, such beauteous state reveals,
As when from flowry meads the hill's shadow steals.
@P
Off with that wiry coronet and show
The hairy diadem which on you doth grow:
Now off with those shoes, and then safely tread
In this love's hallowed temple, this soft bed.
In such white robes, heaven's angels used to be
Received by men; thou angel bring'st with thee
A heaven like Mahomet's Paradise; and though
Ill spirits walk in white, we easily know,
By this these angels from an evil sprite,
Those set our hairs, but these our flesh upright.

Licence my roving hands, and let them go,
Before, behind, between, above, below.
O my America! my new-found-land,
My kingdom, safeliest when with one man manned,
My mine of precious stones, My empery,
How blest am I in this discovering thee!
To enter in these bonds, is to be free;
Then where my hand is set, my seal shall be.
@P
Full nakedness! All joys are due to thee,
As souls unbodied, bodies unclothed must be,
To taste whole joys.  Gems which you women use
Are like Atlanta's balls, cast in men's views,
That when a fool's eye lighteth on a gem,
His earthly soul may covet theirs, not them.
Like pictures, or like books' gay coverings made
For lay-men, are all women this arrayed;
Themselves are mystic books, which only we
(Whom their imputed grace will dignify)
Must see revealed. Then since that I may know,
As liberally, as to a midwife, show
Thyself: cast all, yea, this white linen hence,
There is no penance due to innocence.

To teach thee, I am naked first; why then
What needst thou have more covering than a man.

@A John Donne
#
@T Cheltenham Waters

Here lie I and my four daughters,
Killed by drinking Cheltenham waters.
Had we but stuck to Epsom salts,
We wouldn't have been in these here vaults.

@A Anonymous
#
@T Hypocrisy

Hypocrisy will serve as well
To propagate a church as zeal;
As persecution and promotion
Do equally advance devotion:
So round white stones will serve, they say,
As well as eggs to make hens lay.

@A Samuel Butler
#
@T The Microbe

The Microbe is so very small
You cannot make him out at all,
But many sanguine people hope
To see him through a microscope.
His jointed tongue that lies beneath
A hundred curious rows of teeth;
His seven tufted tails with lots
Of lovely pink and purple spots,
On each of which a pattern stands,
Composed of forty separate bands;
His eyebrows of a tender green;
All of these have never yet been seen -
But Scientists, who ought to know,
Assures us that they must be so...
Oh! let us never, never doubt
What nobody is sure about!

@A Hilaire Belloc
#
@T Slug

Slugs, soft upon damp carpets of rich food,
Make sullen love with bubbles and with sighs,
Silvery flaccid.  They consider lewd
The use of eyes.

@A John Pudney
#
@T The Doctor Prescribes

A lady lately, that was fully sped
Of all the pleasures of the marriage-bed
Ask'd a physician, whether were more fit
For Venus' sports, the morning or the night?
The good old man made answer, as 'twas meet,
The morn more wholesome, but the night more sweet.
Nay then, i'faith, quoth she, since we have leisure,
We'll to't each morn for health, each night for pleasure.

@A Anonymous
#
@T On Mary Ann

Mary Ann has gone to rest,
Safe at last on Abraham's breast,
Which may be nuts for Mary Ann,
But is certainly rough on Abraham.

@A Anonymous
#
@T Misfortunes never come Singly

Making toast at the fireside,
Nurse fell in the grate and died;
And what makes it ten times worse,
All the toast was burnt with nurse.

@A Harry Graham
#
@T Tender Heartedness

Billy, in one of his nice new sashes,
Fell in the fire and was burnt to ashes;
Now, although the room grows chilly,
I haven't the heart to poke poor Billy.

@A Harry Graham
#
@T Miss Twye

Miss Twye was soaping her breasts in her bath
When she heard behind her a meaning laugh
And to her amazement she discovered
A wicked man in the bathroom cupboard.

@A Gavin Ewart
#
@T The Old Loony of Lyme

There was an old loony of Lyme,
Whose candour was simply sublime;
When they asked, 'Are you there?'
'Yes,' he said, 'but take care,
For I'm never "all there" at a time.'

@A Anonymous
#
@T The Young Lady from Wantage

There was a young lady from Wantage
Of whom the town clerk took advantage.
Said the borough surveyor:
'Indeed you must pay `er.
You've totally altered her frontage.'

@A Anonymous
#
@T The Modern Hiawatha

When he killed the Mudjokivis
Of the skin he made him mittens,
Made them with the fur side inside,
Made them with the skin side outside,
He, to get the warm side inside,
Put the inside skin side outside;
He, to get the cold side outside,
Put the warm side fur side inside.
That's why he put fur side inside,
Why he put the skin side outside,
Why he turned them inside outside.

@A Anonymous
#
@T Is it a Month

Is it a month since I and you
In the starlight of Glen Dubh
Stretched beneath a hazel bough
Kissed from ear and throat to brow,
Since your fingers, neck, and chin
Made the bars that fence me in,
Till Paradise seemed but a wreck
Near your bosom, brow and neck
And stars grew wilder, growing wise,
In the splendour of your eyes!
Since the weasel wandered near
Whilst we kissed from ear to ear
And the wet and withered leaves
Blew about your cap and sleeves,
Till the moon sank tired through the ledge
Of the wet and windy hedge?
And we took the starry lane
Back to Dublin town again.

@A J. M. Synge
@A (1871-1909)
#
@T The Lark in the Clear Air

Dear thoughts are in my mind,
And my soul soars enchanted,
As I hear the sweet lark sing
In the clear air of the day.
For a tender beaming smile
To my hope has been granted,
And tomorrow she shall hear
All my fond heart would say.

I shall tell her all my love,
All my soul's adoration;
And I think she will hear me
And will not say me nay.
It is this that fills my soul
With its joyous elation,
As I hear the sweet lark sing
In the clear air of the day.

@A Samuel Ferguson
@A (1810-1886)
#
@T The Self-Unseeing

Here is the ancient floor,
Footworn and hollowed and thin,
Here was the former door
Where the dead feet walked in.

She sat here in her chair,
Smiling into the fire;
He who played stood there,
Bowing it higher and higher.

Childlike, I danced in a dream;
Blessings emblazoned that day;
Everything glowed with a gleam;
Yet we were looking away!

@A Thomas Hardy
#
@T Cean Dubh Deelish (Darling Black Head)

Put your head, darling, darling, darling,
Your darling black head my heart above;
O mouth of honey, with thyme for fragrance,
Who, with heart in breast, could deny you love?

O many and many a young girl for me is pining,
Letting her locks of gold to the cold wind free,
For me, the foremost of our gay young fellows;
But I'd leave a hundred, pure love, for thee!

Put your head, darling, darling, darling,
Your darling black head my heart above;
O mouth of honey, with thyme for fragrance,
Who, with heart in breast, could deny you love?

@A Samuel Ferguson
@A (1810-1886)
#
@T From 'The Amores'

Ring of mine, made to encircle my pretty mistress's finger,
Valuable only in terms of the giver's love,
Go, and good welcome! May she receive you with pleasure,
Slip you over her knuckle there and then.
May you fit her as well as she fits me, rub snugly
Around her finger, precisely the right size!
Lucky ring to be handled by my mistress!  I'm developing
A miserable jealousy of my own gift.
But suppose I could be the ring, transformed in an instant
By some famous magician's art -
Then, when I felt like running my hand down Corinna's
Dress, and exploring her breasts, I'd work
Myself off her finger (tight squeeze or not) and by crafty
Cunning drop into her cleavage.  Let's say
She was writing a private letter - I'd have to seal it,
@P
And a dry stone sticks on wax:
She's moisten me with her tongue. Pure bliss - provided
I didn't have to endorse any hostile remarks
Against myself. If she wanted to put me away in her
Jewel-box, I'd cling tighter, refuse to budge.
(Don't worry, my sweet, I'd never cause you discomfort,
or burden
Your slender finger with an unwelcome weight.)
Wear me whenever you take a hot shower, don't worry
If water runs under your gem -
Though I fancy the sight of you naked would arise my
passions, leave me
A ring of visibly virile parts...
Pure wishful thinking! On your way, then, little present,
And show her you come with all my love.

@A Ovid
@A (BC 43-AD 17)
#
@T After an Interval

After an interval, reading, here in the midnight,
With the great stars looking on -- all the starts of Orion looking,
And the silent Pleiades -- and the duo looking of Saturn and ruddy Mars;
Pondering, reading my own songs, after a long interval,
(sorrow and death familiar now)
Ere Closing the book, what pride! what joy! to find them
Standing so well the test of death and night,
And the duo of Saturn and Mars!

@A Walt Whitman
#
@T A Last Poem

A last poem, and a last, and yet another --
O, when can I give over?
Must I drive the pen until the blood bursts from my nails
And my breath fails and I shake with fever?
Shall I never hear her whisper softly,
"But this is one written by you only,
And for me only; therefore, love, have done"?

@A Robert Graves
#
I have no pain, dear Mother, now,
But, oh, I am so dry;
So connect me to a brewery,
And leave me there to die.

@A Anonymous
#
@T Found Poem (from the Hound of the Baskervilles)

I stooped, panting, and pressed my pistol
To the dreaful, shimmering head,
But it was useless to press the trigger,
The giant hound was dead.

@A A. Conan Doyle
#
@T Passing through the Carron Iron Works

We cam na here to view your warks,
In hopes to be mair wise,
But only, lest we gang to Hell,
It may be nae surprise.

@A Robert Burns
#
@T Imitation of Pope: A Compliment to the Ladies

Wondrous the Gods, more wondrous are the Men,
More Wondrous Wondrous still the Cock & Hen,
More Wondrous still the Table, Stool & Chair;
But Ah! More wondrous still the Charming Fair.

@A William Blake
#
@T Upon the Nipples of Julia's Breast

Have ye beheld (with much delight)
A red rose peeping through a white?
Or else a cherry (double grac'd)
Within a lily? Centre plac'd?
Or ever mark'd the pretty beam,
A strawberry shows half drown'd in cream?
Or seen rich rubies blushing through
A pure smooth pearl, and orient too?
So like to this, nay all the rest,
Is each neat niplet of her breast.

@A Robert Herrick
#
@T Life

When I consider life, 'tis all a cheat;
Yet, fooled with hope, men favour the deceit;
Trust on, and think tomorrow will repay:
Tomorrow's falser than the former day;
Lies worse; and while it says, we shall be blessed
With some new joys, cut off what we possessed.
Strange cozenage! None would live past years again,
Yet all hope pleasure in what yet remain;
And from the dregs of life think to receive
What the first sprightly running could not give.

@A John Dryden
#
@T To a Yellow Hammer

Poor yellow-breasted little thing,
I would thou had'st been on the wing,
'Ere 'twas my fate on thee to bring
Thy death so soon;
Thou'lt never more be heard to sing
In joyful tune.

Too late I saw thee 'mongst the dust,
Gambling so gay in simple trust,
I knew that with my wheel I must
Thy life destroy;
How cruel quick my rubber crushed
Thee in thy joy.

@A Anonymous
#
@T Wrecked

A girl, a wheel,
A shock, a squeal,
A header, a thump,
A girl in a lump,
A bloomer all torn,
A maiden forlorn.

@A Annymous
#
@T Gather ye Rosebuds

Gather ye rosebuds while ye may,
Old Time is still a-flying;
And this same flower that smiles today
Tomorrow will be dying.

The glorious lamp of heaven, the Sun,
The higher he's a-getting,
The sooner will his race be run,
And nearer he's to setting.

That age is best, which is the first,
When youth and blood are warmer
But being spent, the worse, and worst
Times still succeed the former.

Then be not coy, but use your time,
And while you may, go marry;
For having lost but once your prime,
You may for ever tarry.

@A Robert Herrick
#
@T My Love's a Match

My love's a match in beauty
For every flower that blows,
Her little ear's a lily,
Her velvet cheek a rose;
Her locks like gilly gowans
Hang golden to her knww.
If I were King of Ireland,
My Queen she'd surely be.

Her eyes are fond forget-me-nots,
And no such snow is seen
Upon the heaving hawthorn bush
As crests her bodice green.
The thrushes when she's talking
Sit listening on the tree.
If I were King of Ireland,
My Queen she'd surely be.

@A Alfred P. Graves
#
@T In a Gondola

The moth's kiss, first!
Kiss me as if you made believe
You were not sure, this eve,
How my face, your flower, had pursed
Its petals up; so, here and there
You brush it, till I grow aware
Who wants me, and wide ope I burst.

The bee's kiss, now!
Kiss me as if you enter'd gay
My heart at some noonday,
A bud that dares not disallow
The claim, so all is render'd up,
And passively its shatter'd cup
Over your head to sleep I bow.

@A Robert Browning
#
@T To his Coy Mistress

Had we but worlds enough, and time,
This coyness, Lady, were no crime.
We would sit down and think which way
To walk and pass our long love's day.
Thou by the Indian Ganges' side
Shouldst rubies find: I by the tide
Of Humber would complain. I would
Love you ten years before the Flood,
And you should, if you please, refuse
Till the conversion of the Jews.
My vegetable love should grow
Vaster than empires, and more slow;
An hundred years should go to praise
Thine eyes and on thy forehead gaze;
Two hundred to adore each breast,
But thirty thousand to the rest;
An age at least to every part,
And the last age should show your heart.
For, Lady, you deserve this state,
Nor would I love at a lower rate.
@P
But at my back I always hear
Time's winged chariot hurrying near;
And yonder all before us lie
Deserts of vast eternity.
Thy beauty shall no more be found,
Nor, in thy marble vault, shall sound
My echoing song: then worms shall try
That long preserved virginity,
And your quaint honour turn to dust,
And into ashes all my lust:
The grave's a fine and private place,
But none, I think, do there embrace.
@P
Now therefore, while the youthful hue
Sits on thy skin like morning dew,
And while thy willing soul transpires
At every port with instant fires,
Now let us sport us while we may,
And now, like amorous birds of prey,
Rather at once our time devour
Than languish in his slow-chapt power.
Let us roll all our strength and all
Our sweetness up into one ball,
And tear our pleasures with rough strife
Through the iron gates of life:
Thus, though we cannot make our sun
Stand still, yet we will make him run.

@A Andrew Marvell
#
@T Destiny

Somewhere there waiteth in this world of ours
For one lone soul another lonely soul,
Each choosing each through all the weary hours
And meeting strangely at one sudden goal.
Then blend they, like green leaves with golden flowers,
Into one beautiful and perfect whole;
And life's long night is ended, and the way
Lies open onward to eternal day.

@A Edwin Arnold
#
@T A Stolen Kiss

Now gentle sleep hath closed up those eyes
Which, waking, kept my boldest thoughts in awe;
And free access unto that sweet lip lies,
From whence I long the rosy breath to draw.

Methinks no wrong it were, if I should steal
From those two melting rubies one poor kiss;
None sees the theft that would the theft reveal,
Nor rob I her of aught that she can miss;

Nay, should I twenty kisses take away,
There would be little sign I would do so;
Why then should I this robbery delay?
O, she may wake, and therewith angry grow!

Well, if she do, I'll back restore that one,
And twenty hundred thousand more for loan.

@A George Wither
#
@T How do I love thee?

How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.
I love thee to the depth and breadth and height
My soul can reach, when feeling out of sight
For the ends of Being and ideal Grace.
I love thee to the level of every day's
Most quiet need, by sun and candlelight.
I love thee freely, as men strive for Right;
I love thee purely, as they turn from Praise.
I love thee with the passion put to use
In my old griefs, and with my childhood's faith.
I love thee with a love I seemed to lose
With my lost saints, -- I love thee with the breath,
Smiles, tears, of all my life! -- and, if God choose,
I shall but love thee better after death.

@A Elizabeth Barrett Browning
#
@T Old Man

Old Man, or Lad's-love, -- in the name there's nothing
To one that knows not Lad's-love, or Old Man,
The hoar-green feathery herb, almost a tree,
Growing with rosemary and lavendar.
Even to one that knows it well, the names
Hald decorate, half perplex, the thing it is:
At least, what that is clings not to the names
In spite of time.  And yet I like the names.

The herb itself I like not, but for certain
I love it, as some day the child will love it
Who plucks a feather from the door-side bush
Whenever she goes in or out of the house.
Often she waits there, snipping the tips and shrivelling
The shreds at last on to the path, perhaps
@P
Thinking, perhaps of nothing, till she sniffs
Her finger and runs off. The bush is still
But half as tall as she, though it is as old;
So well she clips it. Not a word she says;
And I can only wonder hwo much hereafter
She will remember, with that bitter scent,
Of garden rows, and ancient damson-trees
Topping a hedge, a bent path to a door,
A low thick bush beside the door, and me
Forbidding her to pick.

As for myself,
Where first I met the bitter scent is lost.
I, too, often shrivel the grey shreds,
Sniff them and think and sniff again and try
Once more to think what it is I am remembering,
Always in vain. I cannot like the scent,
Yet I would rather give up others more sweet,
With no meaning, that this bitter one.
@P
I have mislaid the key. I sniff the spray
And think of nothing; I see and I hear nothing;
Yet seem, too, to be listening, lying in wait
For what I should, yet never can, remember:
No garden appears, no path, no hoar-green bush
Of Lad's-love, or Old Man, no child beside,
Neither father nor mother, nor any playmate;
Only an avenue, dark and nameless, without end.

@A Edward Thomas
#
@T The Manor Farm

The rock-like mud unfroze a little and rills
Ran and sparkled down each side of the road
Under the catkins wagging in the hedge.
But earth would have her sleep out, spite of the sun;
Nor did I value that thin gilding beam
More than a pretty February thing
Till I came down to the old Manor Farm,
And church and yet-tree opposite, in age
Its equal and in size. Small church, great yew,
And farmhouse slept in a Sunday silentness.
The air raised not a straw. The steep farm roof,
With tiles duskily glowing, entertained
The midday sun; and up and down the roof
White pigeons nestled. There was no sound but one.
Three cart-horses were looking over a gate
Drowsily through their forelocks, swiching their tails
Against a fly, a solitary fly.
@P
The Winter's cheek flushed as if he had drained
Spring, Summer, and Autumn at a draught
And smiled quietly. But 'twas not Winter --
Rather a season of bliss unchangeable
Awakened from farm and church where it had lain
Safe under tile and thatch for ages since
This England, Old already, was called Merry.

@A Edward Thomas
#
@T The Unknown Bird

Three lovely notes he whistled, too soft to be heard
If others sang; but others never sang
In the great beech-wood all that May and June.
No one saw him: I alone could hear him
Though many listened. Was it but four years
Ago? or five? He never came again.
Oftenest when I heard him I was alone,
Nor could I ever make another hear.
La-la-la! he called, seeming far-off --
As if a cock crowed past the edge of the world,
As if the bird or I were in a dream.
Yet that he travelled through the trees and soometimes
Neared me, was plain, though somehow distant still
He sounded. All the proof is -- I told men
What I had heard.
@P
I never knew a voice,
Man, beast, or bird, better than this. I told
The naturalists; but neither had they heard
Anything like the notes that did so haunt me
I had them clear by heart and have them still.
Four years, or five, have made no difference. Then
As now that La-la-la! was bodiless sweet:
Sad more than joyful it was, if I must say
'Twas sad only with joy too, too far off
For me to taste it. But I cannot tell
If truly never anything but fair
The days were when he sang, as now they seem.
This surely I know, that I who listened then,
Happy sometimes, sometimes suffering
A heavy body and a heavy heart,
Now straightaway, if I think of it, become
Light as that bird wandering beyond my shore.

@A Edward Thomas
#
@T First known when lost

I never had noticed it until
'Twas gone, -- the narrow copse
Where now the woodman lops
The last of the willows with his bill.

It was not more than a hedge o'ergrown.
One meadow's breadth away
I passed it day by day.
Now the soil is bare as a bone,

And black betwixt two meadows green,
Though fresh-cut faggot ends
Of hazel make some amends
With a gleam as if flowers they had been.

Strange it could have hidden so near!
And now I see as I look
That the small winding brook,
A tributary's tributary rises there.

@A Edward Thomas
#
@T The Owl

Downhill I came, hungry, and yet not starved;
Cold, yet had heat within me that was proof
Against the North wind: tired, yet so that rest
Had seemed the sweetest thing under a roof.

Then at the inn I had food, fire, and rest,
Knowing how hungry, cold and tired was I.
All of the night was quite barred out except
An owl's cry, a most melancholy cry

Shaken out long and clear upon the hill,
No merry note, nor cause of merriment,
But one telling me plain what I escaped
And others could not, that night, as in I went.

And salted was my food, and my repose,
Salted and sobered, too, by the bird's voice
Speaking for all who lay under the stars,
Soldiers and poor, unable to rejoice.

@A Edward Thomas
#
@T But these things also

But these things also are Spring's --
On banks by the roadside the grass
Long-dead that is greyer now
Than all the Winter it was;

The shell of a little snail bleached
In the grass; chip of flint, and mite
Of chalk; and the small bird's dung
In splashes of purest white:

All the white things a man mistakes
For earliest violets
Who seeks through Winter's ruins
Something to pay Winter's debts,

While the North blows, and starling flocks
By chattering on and on
Keeep their spirits up in the mist,
And Spring's here, Winter's not gone.

@A Edward Thomas
#
@T The New House

Now first, as I shut the door,
I was alone
In the new house; and the wind
Began to moan.

Old at once was the house,
And I was old;
My ears were teased with the dread
Of what was foretold,

Nights of storm, days of mist, without end;
Sad days when the sun
Shone in vain: old griefs, and griefs
Not yet begun.

All was foretold me; naught
Could I foresee;
But I learnt how the wind would sound
After these things should be.

@A Edward Thomas
#
@T Lovers

The two men in the road were taken aback.
The lovers came out shading their eyes from the sun,
And never was white so white, or black so black,
As her cheecks and hair. 'There are more things than one
A man might turn into a wood for, Jack,'
Said George; Jack whispered: 'He has not got a gun.
It's a bit too much of a good thing, I say.
They are going the other road, look. And see her run.' --
She ran -- 'What a thing it is, this picking may.'

@A Edward Thomas
#
@T Melancholy

The rain and wind, the rain and wind, raved endlessly.
On me the Summer storm, and fever, and melancholy
Wrought magic, so that if I feared the solitude
Far more I feared all company: too sharp, too rude,
Had been the wisest or the dearest human voice.
What I desired I knew not, but whate'er my choice
Vain it must be, I knew. Yet naught did my despair
But sweeten the strange sweetness, while through the wild air
All day long I heard a distant cuckoo calling
And, soft as dulcimers, sounds of near water falling,
And, softer, and remote as if in history,
Rumours of what had touched my friends, my foes, or me.

@A Edward Thomas
#
@T The Glory

The glory of the beauty of the morning, --
The cuckoo crying over the untouched dew;
The blackbird that has found it, and the dove
That tempts me on to something sweeter than love;
White clouds ranged even and fair as new-mown hay;
The heat, the stir, the sublime vancancy
Of sky meadow and forest and my own heart: --
The glory invites me, yet it leaves me scorning
All I can ever do, all I can be,
Beside the lovely of motion, shape, and hue,
The happiness I fancy fit to dwell
In beauty's presence. Shall I now this day
@P
Begin to seek as far as heaven, as hell,
Wisdom or strength to match this beauty, start
And tread the pale dust pitted with small dark drops,
In hope to find whatever it is I seek,
Hearkening to short-lived happy-seeming things
That we know naught of, in the hazel copse?
Or must I be content with discontent
As larks and swallows are perhaps with wings?
And shall I ask at the day's end once more
What beauty is, and what I can have meant
By happiness? And shall I let all go,
Glad, weary, or both? Or shall I perhaps know
That I was happy oft and oft before,
Awhile forgetting how I am fast pent,
How dreary-swift, with naught to travel to,
Is Time? I cannot bite the day to the core.

@A Edward Thomas
#
@T The Brook

Seated by a brook, watching a child
Chiefly that paddled, I was this beguiled.
Mellow the blackbird sang and sharp the thrush
Not far off in the oak and hazel brush,
Unseen. There was a scent like honeycomb
From mugwort dull. And down upon the dome
Of the stone the card-horse kicks against so oft
A butterfly alighted. From aloft
He took the heat of the sun, and from below,
On the hot stone he perched contented so,
As if never a cart would pass again
That way; as if I were the last of men
And he the first of insects to have earth
And sun together and to know their worth.
@P
I was divided between him and the gleam,
The motion, and the voices, of the stream,
The waters running frizzled over gravel,
Thaat never vanish and for ever travel.
A grey flycatcher silent on a fence
And I sat as if we had been there since
The horseman and the horse lying beneath
The fir-tree-covered barrow on the heath,
The horseman and the horse with silver shoes,
Galloped the downs last. All that I could lose
I lost. And then the child's voice raised the dead.
'No one's been here before' was what she said
And what I felt, yet never should have found
A word for, while I gathered sight and sound.

@A Edward Thomas
#
@T This is no case of petty right or wrong

This is no case of petty right or wrong
That politicians or philosphers
Can judge. I hate not Germans, nor grow hot
With love of Englishmen, to please newspapers.
Beside my hate for one fat patriot
My hatred of the Kaiser is love true :--
A kind of god he is, banging a gong.
But I have not to choose between the two,
Or between justice and injustice. Dinned
With war and argument I read no more
Than in the storm smoking along the wind
Athwart the wood. Two witches' cauldrons roar.
@P
From one the weather shall rise clear and gay;
Out of the other an England beautiful
And like her mother that died yesterday.
Little I know or care if, being dull,
I shall miss something that historians
Can rake out of the ashes when perchance
The phoenix broods serene above their ken.
But with the best and meanest Englishmen
I am one in crying, God save England, lest
We lose what never slaves and cattle blessed.
The ages made here that made us from the dust:
She is all we know and live by, and we trust
She is good and must endure, loving her so:
And as we love ourselves we hate her foe.

@A Edward Thomas
#
@T Helen

And you, Helen, what should I give you?
So many things I would give you
Had I an infinite great store
Offered me and I stood before
To choose. I would give you youth,
All kinds of lovelines and truth,
A clear eye as good as mine,
Lands, waters, flowers, wine,
As many children as your heart
Might wish for, a far better art
Than mine can be, all you have lost
Upon the travelling waters tossed,
Or given to me. If I could choose
Freely in that great treasure-house
Anything from any shelf,
I would give you back yourself,
And power to discriminate
What you want and want it not too late,
Many fair days free from care
And heart to enjoy both foul and fair,
And myself, too, if I could find
Where it lay hidden and it proved kind.

@A Edward Thomas
#
@T Bob's Lane

Women he liked, did shovel-bearded Bob,
Old Farmer Hayward of the Heath, but he
Loved horses. He himself was like a cob,
And leather-coloured. Also he loved a tree.

For the life in them he loved most living things,
But a tree chiefly. All along the lane
He planted elms where now the stormcock sings
That travellers hear from the slow-climbing train.

Till then the track had never had a name
For all its thicket and the nightingales
That should have earned it. No one was to blame.
To name a thing beloved man sometimes fails.

Many years since, Bob Hayward died, and now
None passes there because the mist and the rain
Out of the elms have turned the lane to slough
And gloom, the name alone survives, Bob's Lane.

@A Edward Thomas
#
@T The Poetry of Dress

A sweet disorder in the dress
Kindles in clothes a wantonness :--
A lawn about the shoulders thrown
Into a fine distraction, --
An erring lace, which here and there
Enthrals the crimson stomacher --
A cuff neglectful, and thereby
Ribbands to flow confusedly, --
A winning wave, deserving note,
In the tempestuous petticoat, --
A careless shoe-string, in whose tie
I see a wild civility, --
Do more bewitch me, than when art
Is too precise in evry part.

@A R. Herrick
#
@T The Poetry of Dress

When as in silks my Julia goes
Then, then (methinks) how sweetly flows
That liquefaction of her clothes.

Next, when I cast mine eyes and see
That brave vibration each way free;
O how that glittering taketh me!

@A R. Herrick
#
My Love in her attire doth show her wit,
It doth so well become her:
For every season she hath dressings fit,
For Winter, Spring and Summer.
No beauty she doth miss
When all her robes are on:
But Beauty's self she is
When all her robes are gone.

@A Anonymous
#
@T On a Girdle

That which her slender waist confined
Shall now my joyful temples bind:
No monarch but would give his crown
His arms might do what this has done.

It was my Heaven's extremest sphere,
The pale which held that lovely deer:
My joy, my grief, my hope, my love
Did all within this circle move.

A narrow compass! and yet there
Dwelt all that's good, and all that's fair:
Give me but what this ribband bound,
Take all the rest the Sun goes round.

@A E. Waller
#
@T The Lost Love

She dwelt among the untrodden ways
Beside the springs of Dove;
A maid whom there were none to praise,
And very few to love:

A violet by a mossy stone
Half hidden from the eye!
-- Fair as a star, when only one
Is shining in the sky.

She lived unknown, and few could know
When Lucy ceased to be;
But she is in her grave, and oh,
The difference to me!

@A W. Wordsworth
#
I strove with none, for none was worth my strife;
Nature I loved, and next to Nature, Art;
I warmed both hands before the fire of life
It sinks, and I am ready to depart.

@A W. S. Landor
#
@T The Miller's Daughter

It is the miller's daughter,
And she is grown so dear, so dear,
That I would be the jewel
That trembles in her ear:
For his in ringlets day and night,
I'd touch her neck so warm and white.

And I would be the girdle
About her dainty waist,
And her heart would beat against me
In sorrow and in rest:
And I should know if it beat right,
I'd clasp it round so close and tight.

And I would be the necklace,
And all day long to fall and rise
Upon her balmy bosom,
With her laughter or her sighs,
And I would lie so light, so light,
I scarce should be unclasp'd at night.

@A Lord Tennyson
#
@T Sea-fever

I must down to the seas again, to the lonely sea and the sky,
And all I ask is a tall ship and a star to steer her by,
And the wheel's kick and the wind's song and the white sail's shaking,
And a grey mist on the sea's face and a grey dawn breaking.

I must down to the seas again, for the call of the running tide
Is a wild call and a clear call that may not be denied;
And all I ask is a windy day with the white clouds flying,
And the flung spray and the blown spume, and the sea-gulls crying.

I must down to the seas again, to the vagrant gypsy life,
To the gull's way and the whale's way where the wind's like a whetted knife;
And all I ask is a merry yarn from a laughing fellow-rover,
And a quiet sleep and a sweet dream when the long trick's over.

@A John Masefield
#
@T The Drum

I hate that drum's discordant sound,
Parading round, and round, and round:
To thoughtless youth it pleasure yields,
And lures from cities and from fields,
To sell their liberty for charms
Of tawdry lace, and glittering arms;
And when Ambition's voice commands,
To march, and fight, and fall, in foreign lands.

I hate that drum's discordant sound,
Parading round, and round, and round:
To me it talks of ravag'd plains,
And burning towns, and ruin'd swains,
And mangled limbs, and dying groans,
And widows' tears, and orphans' moans;
And all that Misery's hand bestows,
To fill the catalogue of human woes.

@A John Scott
@A (1730-83)
#
@T Everlasting Mercy

Near Bullen Bank, on Gloucester road
Thy everlasting mercy showed
The ploughman patient on the hill, forever there,
Forever still
Ploughing the hill with steady yoke,
The pine trees lightning-struck and broke.

I've marked the May Hill ploughman stay
There on his hill day after day
Driving his team against the sky
While men and women live and die
And now and then he seems to stoop
To clear the coulter with the scoop
Or touch an ox, to haw or gee,
While Severn's stream goes out to sea.
@P
Near Bullen Bank, on Gloucester road
Thy everlasting mercy showed
The ploughman patient on the hill, forever there,
Forever still
The sea with all her ships and sails,
And that great smokey port in Wales,
And Gloucester tower bright in the sun,
All know that patient wandering one.

@A John Masefield

Johnny Coppin's haunting arrangement of this available from
Red Skye Records, 'English Morning' RSKC 107
#
@T Dawn
(From the train between Bologna and Milan, Second Class)

Opposite me two Germans snore and sweat.
Through sullen swirling gloom we jolt and roar.
We have been here for ever: even yet
A dim watch tells two hours, two aeons, more.
The windows are tight-shut and slimy-wet
With a night's foetor. There are two hours more;
Two hours to dawn and Milan; two hours yet.
Opposite me two Germans sweat and snore...

One of them wakes, and spits, and sleeps again.
The darkness shivers. A wan light through the rain
Strikes on our faces, drawn and white. Somewhere
A new day sprawls; and, inside, the foul air
Is chill, and damp, and fouler than before...
Opposite me two Germans sweat and snore.

@A Rupert Brooke
#
@T The Voice

Safe in the magic of my woods
I lay, and watched the dying light.
Faint in the pale high solitudes,
And washed with rain and veiled by night,

Silver and blue and green were showing.
And the dark woods grew darker still;
And birds were hushed; and peace was growing;
And quietness crept up the hill;

And no wind was blowing...

And I knew
That this was the hour of knowing,
And the night and the woods and you
Were one together, and I should find
Soon in the silence the hidden key
Of all that had hurt and puzzled me --
Why you were you, and the night was kind,
And the woods were part of the heart of me.
@P
And there I waited breathlessly,
Alone; and slowly the holy three,
The three that I loved, together grew
One, in the hour of knowing,
Night, and the woods, and you --

And suddenly
There was an uproar in my woods,
The noise of a fool in mock distress,
Crashing and laughing and blindly going,
Of ignorant feet and a swishing dress,
And a Voice profaning the solitudes.
@P
The spell was broken, the key denied me,
And at length your flat clear voice beside me
Mouthed cheerful clear flat platitudes.

You came and quacked beside me in the wood.
You said, 'The view from here is very good!'
You said, 'It's nice to be alone a bit!'
And, 'How the days are drawing out!' you said.
You said, 'The sunset's pretty, isn't it?'

*              *             *

By God! I wish -- I wish that you were dead!

@A Rupert Brooke
#
@T On a Tired Housewife

Here lies a poor woman who was always tired,
She lived in a house where help wasn't hired;
Her last words on earth were: 'Dear friends, I am going
To where there's no cooking, or washing, or sewing,
For everything there is exact to my wishes,
For where they don't eat there's no washing of dishes.
I'll be where loud anthems will always be ringing,
But having no voice I'll be quit of the singing.
Don't mourn for me now, don't mourn for me never,
I am going to do nothing for ever and ever.'

@A Anonymous
#
@T On Johnny Cole

Here lies Johnny Cole
Who died, on my soul,
After eating a plentiful dinner;
While chewing his crust,
He was turned into dust,
With his crimes undigested - poor sinner.

@A Anonymous
#
@T On a Wag in Mauchline

Lament him, Mauchline husbands a',
He often did assist ye;
For had ye staid whole weeks awa',
Your wives they ne'er had missed ye.

Ye Mauchline bairns, as on ye pass,
To schools in bands thegither,
Oh, tread ye lightly on his grass,
Perhaps he was your father.

@A Robert Burns
#
@T Willie's Epitaph

Little Willie from his mirror
Licked the mercury right off,
Thinking, in his childish error,
It would cure the whooping cough.
At the funeral his mother
Smartly turned to Mrs Brown:
''Twas a chilly day for Willie
When the mercury went down.'

@A Anonymous
#
@T On Mary Ann Lowder

Here lies the body of Mary Ann Lowder,
She burst while drinking a seidlitz powder.
Called from this world to her heavenly rest,
She should have waited till it effervesced.

@A Anonymous
#
@T On Miss Arabella Young

Here lies, returned to clay,
Miss Arabella Young,
Who on the first day of May
Began to hold her tongue.

@A Anonymous
#
@T From The Westminster Drollery, 1671

I saw a peacock with a fiery tail
I saw a blazing comet drop down hail
I saw a cloud wrapped with ivy round
I saw an oak creep upon the ground
I saw a pismire swallow up a whale
I saw the sea brimful of ale
I saw a Venice glass full fifteen feet deep
I saw a well full of men's tears that weep
I saw red eyes all of a flaming fire
I saw a house bigger than the moon and higher
I saw the sun at twelve o'clock at night
I saw the man that saw this wondrous sight.

@A Anonymous
#
@T Epigram

Engraved on the collar which I gave to his
Royal Highness Frederick Prince of Wales:

I am his Highness' dog at Kew
Pray tell me, sir, whose dog are you?

@A Alexander Pope
#
@T A Man of Words

A man of words and not of deeds,
Is like a garden full of weeds;
And when the weeds begin to grow,
It's like a garden full of snow;
And when the snow begins to fall,
It's like a bird upon the wall;
And when the bird away does fly,
It's like an eagle in the sky;
And when the skye begins to roar,
It's like a lion at the door;
And when the door begins to crack,
It's like a stick across your back;
And when your back begins to smart,
It's like a penknife in your heart;
And when your heart begins to bleed,
You're dead, and dead, and dead indeed.

@A Anonymous
#
@T The Voice of the Lobster

''Tis the voice of the Lobster; I heard him declare,
"You have baked me too brown, I must sugar my hair."
As a duck with its eyelids, so he with his nose
Trims his belt and his buttons, and turns out his toes.
When the sands are all dry, he is gay as a lark,
And will talk in contemptuous tones of the Shark:
But, when the tide rises and sharks are around,
His voice has a timid and tremuous sound.

'I passed by his garden, and marked, with one eye,
How the Owl and the Panther were sharing a pie:
The Panther took pie-crust, and gravy, and meat,
While the Owl had the dish as its share of the treat.
When the pie was all finished, the Owl, as a boon,
Was kindly permitted to pocket the spoon:
While the Panther received knife and fork with a growl,
And concluded the banquet by --'

@A Lewis Carroll
#
@T Lines by a Humanitarian

Be lenient with lobsters, and ever kind to crabs,
And be not disrespectful to cuttle-fish or dabs;
Chase not the Cochin-China, chaff not the ox obese,
And babble not of feather-beds in company with geese.
Be tender with the tadpole, and let the limpet thrive,
Be merciful to mussels, don't skin your eels alive;
When talking to a turtle don't mention calipee --
Be always kind to animals wherever you may be.

@A Anonymous
#
@T The Common Cormorant

The common cormorant or shag
Lays eggs inside a paper bag.
The reason you will see no doubt
It is to keep the lightning out.
But what these unobservant birds
Have never noticed is that herds
Of wandering bears may come with buns
And steal the bags to hold the crumbs.

@A Anonymous
#
@T Imitation of Chaucer

Women ben full of Ragerie,
Yet swinken not sans secresie
Thilke Moral shall ye understand,
From Schoole-boy's Tale of fayre Irelond:
Which to the Fennes hath him betake,
To filch the gray Ducke fro the Lake.
Right then, there passen by the Way
His Aunt, and eke her Daughters tway.
Ducke in his Trowses hath he hent,
Not to be spied of Ladies gent.
'But ho! our Nephew,' (crieth one)
'Ho,' quoth another, 'Cozen John';
And stoppen, and laugh, and callen out, --
This sely Clerk full low doth lout:
@P
They asken that, and talken this,
'Lo here is Coz, and here is Miss.'
But, as he glozeth with Speeches soote,
The Ducke sore tickleth his Erse-root:
Fore-piece and buttons all-to-brest,
Forth thrust a white neck, and red crest.
'Te-he,' cry'd Ladies; Clerke nought spake:
Miss star'd; and gray Ducke crieth Quake.
'O Moder, Moder' (quoth the daughter)
'Be thilke same thing Maids longen a'ter?
'Better is to pyne on coals and chalke,
'Then trust on Mon, whose yerde can talke.'

@A Alexander Pope
#
@T Sonnet

Live with me, and be my love,
And we will all the pleasures prove
That hills and valleys, dales and fields,
And all the craggy mountains yields.

There will we sit upon the rocks,
And see the shepherds feed their flocks,
By shallow rivers, by whose falls
Melodious birds sing madrigals.

There will I make thee a bed of roses,
With a thousand fragrant posies,
A cap of flowers, and a kirtle
Embroider'd all with leaves of myrtle.

A belt of straw and ivy buds,
With coral clasps and amber studs;
And if these pleasures may thee move,
Then live with me and be my love.

LOVE'S ANSWER

If that the world and love were young,
And truth in every shepherd's tongue,
These pretty pleasures might me move
To live with thee and be thy love.

@A William Shakespeare
#
@T O No, John!

On yonder hill there stands a creature;
Who she is I do not know.
I'll go and court her for her beauty,
She must answer yes or no.
O no, John! No, John! No, John! No!

On her bosom are bunches of posies,
On her breast where flowers grow;
If I should chance to touch that posy,
She must answer yes or no.
O no, John! No, John! No, John! No!

Madam I am come for to court you,
If your favour I can gain;
If you will but entertain me,
Perhaps then I might come again.
O no, John! No, John! No, John! No!

My husband was a Spanish captain,
Went to sea a month ago;
The very last time we kissed and parted,
Bid me always answer no.
O no, John! No, John! No, John! No!
@P
Madam in your face is beauty,
In your bosom flowers grow;
In your bedroom there is pleasure,
Shall I view it, yes or no?
O no, John! No, John! No, John! No!

Madam shall I tie your garter,
Tie it a little above your knee;
If my hands should slip a little farther,
Would you think it amiss of me?
O no, John! No, John! No, John! No!

My love and I went to bed together,
There we lay till cocks did crow;
Unclose your arms my dearest jewel,
Unclose your arms and let me go.
O no, John! No, John! No, John! No!

@A Old English Folk Song
#
@T Unfortunate

Heart, you are as restless as a paper scrap
That's tossed down dusty pavements by the wind;
Saying, 'She is most wise, patient and kind.
Between the small hands folded in her lap
Surely a shamed head may bow down at length,
And find forgiveness where the shadows stir
About her lips, and wisdom in her strength,
Peace in her peace. Come to her, come to her!' . . .

She will not care. She'll smile to see me come,
So that I think all Heaven in flower to fold me.
She'll give me all I ask, kiss me and hold me,
And open wide upon that holy air
The gates of peace, and take my tiredness home,
Kinder than God. But, heart, she will not care.

@A Rupert Brooke
#
@T The Busy Heart

Now that we've done our best and worst, and parted,
I would fill my mind with thoughts that will not rend.
(O heart, I do not dare go empty-hearted)
I'll think of Love in books, Love without end;
Women with child, content; and old men sleeping;
And wet strong ploughlands, scarred for certain grain;
And babes that weep, and so forget their weeping;
And the young heavens, forgetful after rain;
And evening hush, broken by homing wings;
And Song's nobility, and Wisdom holy,
That live, we dead. I would think of a thousand things,
Lovely and durable, and taste them slowly,
One after one, like tasting a sweet food.
I have need to busy my heart with quietude.

@A Rupert Brooke
#
@T Love

Love is a breach in the walls, a broken gate,
Where that comes in that shall not go again;
Love sells the proud heart's citadel to Fate.
They have known shame, who love unloved. Even then
When two mouths, thirsty each for each, find slaking,
And agony's forgot, and hushed the crying
Of credulous hearts, in heaven -- such are but taking
Their own poor dreams within their arms, and lying
Each in his lonely night, each with a ghost.
Some share that night. But they know, love grows colder,
Grows false and dull, that was sweet lies at most.
Astonishment is no more in hand or shoulder,
But darkens, and dies out from kiss to kiss.
All this love; and all love is but this.

@A Rupert Brooke
#
@T One Day

Today I have been happy. All the day
I held the memory of you, and wove
Its laughter with the dancing light o' the spray,
And sowed the sky with tiny clouds of love,
And sent you following the white waves of sea,
And crowned your head with fancies, nothing worth,
Stray buds from that old dust of misery,
Being glad with a new foolish quiet mirth.

So lightly I played with those dark memories,
Just as a child, beneath the summer skies,
Plays hour by hour with a strange shining stone,
For which (he knows not) towns were fire of old,
And love has been betrayed, and murder done,
And great kings turned to a little bitter mould.

@A Rupert Brooke
#
@T Doubts

When she sleeps, her soul, I know,
Goes a wanderer on the air,
Wings where I may never go,
Leaves her lying, still and fair,
Waiting, empty, laid aside,
Like a dress upon a chair...
This I know, and yet I know
Doubts that will not be denied.

For if the soul be not in place,
What has laid trouble in her face?
And, sits there nothing ware and wise
Behind the curtains of her eyes,
What is it, in the self's eclipse,
Shadows, soft and passingly,
About the corners of her lips,
The smile that is essential she?

And if the spirit be not there,
Why is fragrance in the hair?

@A Rupert Brooke