Poetry Books
Sort by:
HUSH-a-bye, baby, on the tree top,When the wind blows, the cradle will rock;When the bough bends, the cradle will fall.Down will come baby, cradle, and all. CURRAHOO, curr dhoo,Love me, and I'll love you![] WHEN the days begin to lengthenThe cold begins to strengthen. CANTALOUPES! Cantaloupes! What is the price?Eight for a dollar, and all very nice. PAT-A-CAKE, pat-a-cake, baker's man!Make me...
more...
BYTOWN. CHAPTER I. In '28, on Patrick's Day,At one p.m., there came this wayFrom Richmond, in the dawn of spring,He who doth now the glories singOf ancient Bytown, as 'twas then,A place of busy working men,Who handled barrows and pickaxes,Tamping irons and broadaxes,And paid no Corporation taxes;Who, without license onward carriedAll kinds of trade, but getting married;Stout, sinewy, and...
more...
AFTER HORACE What asks the Bard? He prays for nought But what the truly virtuous crave: That is, the things he plainly ought To have. 'Tis not for wealth, with all the shocks That vex distracted millionaires, Plagued by their fluctuating stocks And shares: While plutocrats their millions new Expend upon each costly whim, A...
more...
by:
Various
PREFACE This book of verse for boys is, I believe, the first of its kind in English. Plainly, it were labour lost to go gleaning where so many experts have gone harvesting; and for what is rarest and best in English Poetry the world must turn, as heretofore, to the several ‘Golden Treasuries’ of Professor Palgrave and Mr. Coventry Patmore, and to the excellent ‘Poets' Walk’ of Mr. Mowbray...
more...
by:
W. E. Christian
MY BUNKIE He's mostly gnarls and freckles and tan, He'd surely come under society's ban, He's a swearin', fightin' cavalryman, But—he's my bunkie. He's weathered the winds of the Western waste. (You, gentle Christian, would call him debased) And he's loved at his ease and married in haste, Has my bunkie. In a...
more...
by:
Anonymous
RIDE A COCK-HORSE Ride a Cock-Horseto Banbury Cross, To see a fine LadyGet on a white Horse, With rings on her fingers,and bells on her toes,She shall have music wherever she goes. A FARMER WENT TROTTINGUPON HIS GREY MARE A Farmer went trotting upon his grey Mare,Bumpety, bumpety, bump!With his...
more...
AN OLD SWEETHEART OF MINE As one who cons at evening o'er an album all alone,And muses on the faces of the friends that he has known,So I turn the leaves of fancy till, in shadowy design,I find the smiling features of an old sweetheart of mine. The lamplight seems to glimmer with a flicker of surprise,As I turn it low to rest me of the dazzle in my eyes,And light my pipe in silence, save a sigh...
more...
by:
Mr. Baskerville
STANDING IN LINEWhen I applied for Plattsburg I stood for hours in lineTo get a piece of paper which they said I had to sign;When I had signed I stood in line (and my, that line was slow!)And asked them what to do with it; they said they didn't know. And when I came to Plattsburg I had to stand in line,To get a Requisition, from five o'clock till nine;I stood in line till night for the...
more...
by:
John La Farge
Scraping across the beach the boats were launched,And as they touched the waves, they seemed to takeNew shape and dignity with that caressOf little lapping ripples round the prow.Uhila led the fleet as one who knewHis right by reason of his age and skill.The little isle seemed now a sleeping maidKirtled in green, the beach her snowy breastVeined with the purple brooks that sought the sea.Uhila watched...
more...
II. THE VALUE OF ROWLEY'S POEMS—PHILOLOGICAL AND LITERARY As imitations of fifteenth-century composition it must be confessed the Rowley poems have very little value. Of Chatterton's method of antiquating something has already been said. He made himself an antique lexicon out of the glossary to Speght's Chaucer, and such words as were marked with a capital O, standing for...
more...