Poetry Books

This is a book of stories. For that reason I have excluded all purely lyrical poems. But the word "stories" has been stretched to its fullest application. It includes both narrative poems, properly so called; tales divided into scenes; and a few pieces of less obvious story-telling import in which one might say that the dramatis personae are air, clouds, trees, houses, streets, and such like... more...

A Dream.I stood far off above the haunts of menSomewhere, I know not, when the sky was dimFrom some worn glory, and the morning hymnOf the gay oriole echoed from the glen.Wandering, I felt earth's peace, nor knew I soughtA visioned face, a voice the wind had caught.I passed the waking things that stirred and gazed,Thought-bound, and heeded not; the waking flowersDrank in the morning mist,... more...

Where Bobby lives there is a hill—A hill so steep and high,'Twould fill the bill for Jack and JillTheir famous act to try Once Bobby's Go-cart broke awayAnd down this hill it kited.The careless Nurse screamed in dismayBut Bobby was delighted He clapped his hands, in manner rude,And laughed in high elation—While, close behind, the Nurse pursuedIn hopeless consternation An Officer slid off... more...

HART-LEAP WELL Hart-Leap Well is a small spring of water, about five miles from Richmond in Yorkshire, and near the side of the road which leads from Richmond to Askrigg. Its name is derived from a remarkable chase, the memory of which is preserved by the monuments spoken of in the second Part of the following Poem, which monuments do now exist as I have there described them.   The Knight had ridden... more...

PREFACE. A Ninth Edition of the following Poems having been called for by the public, the author is induced to say a few words, particularly concerning those which, under the name of Sonnets, describe his personal feelings. They can be considered in no other light than as exhibiting occasional reflections which naturally arose in his mind, chiefly during various excursions, undertaken to relieve, at... more...

Walter Scott was born in Edinburgh, August 15, 1771, of an ancient Scotch clan numbering in its time many a hard rider and good fighter, and more than one of these petty chieftains, half-shepherd and half-robber, who made good the winter inroads into their stock of beeves by spring forays and cattle drives across the English Border. Scott's great-grandfather was the famous "Beardie" of... more...

Song the First Sir Alf he is an Atheling,Both at Stevn and at Ting.    Know ye little Alf? Alf he builds a vessel stout,For he will rove and sail about. Alf he builds a vessel high,The trade of pirate he will try. He draws on the sand a circle mark,And with a bound he gained the bark. Upon the prow Alf foremost stood,And Copenhagen’s koggers view’d. O’er the wide sea he flung a look,He knew the... more...

INTRODUCTION Upon being asked by a Reader whether the verses contained in this book were true.   And is it True? It is not True.And if it were it wouldn’t do,For people such as me and youWho pretty nearly all day longAre doing something rather wrong.Because if things were really so,You would have perished long ago,And I would not have lived to writeThe noble lines that meet your sight,Nor B. T. B.... more...

TO THE READER. Though cooks are often men of pregnant wit,Through niceness of their subject few have writ.’Tis a sage question, if the art of cooksIs lodg’d by nature or attain’d by books?That man will never frame a noble treat,Whose whole dependence lies in some receipt.Then by pure nature everything is spoil’d,—She knows no more than stew’d, bak’d, roast, and boil’d.When art and... more...

IN MEMORIAM: PAULINE JOHNSON I cannot say how deeply it touched me to learn that Pauline Johnson expressed a wish on her death-bed that I, living here in the mother country all these miles away, should write something about her. I was not altogether surprised, however, for her letters to me had long ago shed a golden light upon her peculiar character. She had made herself believe, quite erroneously,... more...