Poetry Books

TO EMELINE.   would enshrine in silvern songThe charm that bore our souls along,As in the sun-flushed days of summerWe felt the pulsings of nature's throng; When flecks of foam of flying spraySmote white the red sun's torrid ray,Or wimpling fogs toyed with the mountain,Aërial spirits of dew at play; When hovering stars, poised in the blue,Came down and ever closer drew;Or, in the autumn air... more...

JACK and JILL,Went up the hill,To fetch a pail of water,Jack fell down,And broke his crown,And Jill came tumbling after.Then up JACK got,And home did trot,As fast as he could caper;DAME GILL did the job,To plaster his nob,With Vinegar and brown paper.Then JILL came in,And she did grin,To see JACK’S paper plaster,Her mother put her,A fools cap on,For laughing at Jack’s disaster.This made JILL... more...

THE STUDY OF POETRY. BY FRANCIS HOVEY STODDARD. Clever men of action, according to Bacon, despise studies, ignorant men too much admire them, wise men make use of them. "Yet," he says, "they teach not their own use, but that there is a wisdom without them and above them won by observation." These are the words of a man who had been taught by years of studiousness the emptiness of mere... more...

PROEM "SO LET THEM PASS, THESE SONGS OF MINE"   So let them pass, these songs of mine,  Into oblivion, nor repine;  Abandoned ruins of large schemes,  Dimmed lights adrift from nobler dreams,   Weak wings I sped on quests divine,  So let them pass, these songs of mine.  They soar, or sink ephemeral—  I care not greatly which befall!   For if no song I e'er had... more...

Preface Robert Burns was born near Ayr, Scotland, 25th of January, 1759. He was the son of William Burnes, or Burness, at the time of the poet's birth a nurseryman on the banks of the Doon in Ayrshire. His father, though always extremely poor, attempted to give his children a fair education, and Robert, who was the eldest, went to school for three years in a neighboring village, and later, for... more...

FIFTY YEARS & OTHER POEMS FIFTY YEARSO brothers mine, to-day we standWhere half a century sweeps our ken,Since God, through Lincoln's ready hand,Struck off our bonds and made us men.Just fifty years—a winter's day—As runs the history of a race;Yet, as we look back o'er the way,How distant seems our starting place!Look farther back! Three centuries!To where a naked, shivering... more...

INTRODUCTION The Kalevala, or the Land of Heroes, as the word may be freely rendered, is the national epic of Finland, and as that country and its literature are still comparatively little known to English readers, some preliminary explanations are here necessary. On reference to a map of Europe, it will be seen that the north-western portion of the Russian Empire forms almost a peninsula, surrounded,... more...

THE INVINCIBLE ARMADA. She comes, she comes—the burden of the deeps!Beneath her wails the universal sea!With clanking chains and a new god, she sweeps,And with a thousand thunders, unto thee!The ocean-castles and the floating hosts—Ne'er on their like looked the wild water!—WellMay man the monster name "Invincible."O'er shuddering waves she gathers to thy coasts!The horror that... more...

TheButterfly’s Ball and the Grasshopper’s FeastsExcited the spleen of the Birds and the Beasts:For their mirth and good cheer—of the Bee was the theme,And the Gnat blew his horn, as he danc’d in the beam.’Twas humm’d by the Beetle, ’twas buzz’d by the Fly,And sung by the myriads that sport through the sky.The Quadrupeds listen’d with sullen displeasure,But the tenants of air were... more...

ANONYMOUS.1.Madrigal.Love not me for comely grace,For my pleasing eye or face;Nor for any outward part,No, nor for my constant heart:For those may fail or turn to ill,So thou and I shall sever:Keep therefore a true woman's eye,And love me still, but know not why;So hast thou the same reason stillTo doat upon me ever. 2.The Forsaken Merman.Come, dear children, let us away;Down and away below.Now my... more...