Poetry Books

THE VOICE THAT SINGS The voice that sings across the night   Of long forgotten days and things,Is there an ear to hear aright   The voice that sings? It is as when a curfew rings   Melodious in the dying light,A sound that flies on pulsing wings. And faded eyes that once were bright   Brim over, as to life it bringsThe echo of a dead delight,   The voice that sings. In vain you fervently... more...

LIFE OF LOWELL In Cambridge there are two literary shrines to which visitors are sure to find their way soon after passing the Harvard gates, "Craigie House," the home of Longfellow and "Elmwood," the home of Lowell. Though their hallowed retirement has been profaned by the encroachments of the growing city, yet in their simple dignity these fine old colonial mansions still bespeak the... more...

TO NEW YORKFor maid and lad New York is fairy land,Delightful charms in gorgeous brilliant lure!Our youth do struggle on ambition's tour.They meet life's challenge with true heart and hand.Forgotten trails are marked with scar and wand;A blasted rock and broken twigs assureThe traveler that others fought the moor,And sailed the stormy breakers, crossed the sandTo build the city on a granite... 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...

1At Palaiseau, there liv’d a maid,In form and features mild;The stings of conscience never prey’d,On this devoted child.She serv’d a wealthy farmer there,An honest soul was he;Her comforts were his only care,And all he wish’d to see. 3His wife was of another mould,And prematurely smart;Hasty, and rash, with that a scold,Yet still a feeling heart. One summers eve’, her labor done,She sat in... more...

THE QUALITY OF THE WORKS OF EDWARD DOYLE The quality of Edward Doyle's work was appraised by Ella Wheeler Wilcox in the following article by Mrs. Wilcox which appeared in the New York Evening Journal and the San Francisco Examiner, in 1905: Shut your eyes and bind them with a black cloth and try for one hour to see how cheerful you can be. Then imagine yourself deprived for life of the light of... more...

THE SISTERS' TRAGEDY A. D. 1670   AGLAE, a widow  MURIEL, her unmarried sister.   IT happened once, in that brave land that lies  For half the twelvemonth wrapt in sombre skies,  Two sisters loved one man. He being dead,  Grief loosed the lips of her he had not wed,  And all the passion that through heavy years  Had masked in smiles unmasked itself in tears.  No purer love may... more...

INTRODUCTION. After the publication of his "Table Talk" and other poems in March, 1782, William Cowper, in his quiet retirement at Olney, under Mrs. Unwin's care, found a new friend in Lady Austen. She was a baronet's widow who had a sister married to a clergyman near Olney, with whom Cowper was slightly acquainted. In the summer of 1781, when his first volume was being printed,... more...

PART I PUPPYHOOD "What other nature yours than of a child Whose dumbness finds a voice mighty to call, In wordless pity, to the souls of all, Whose lives I turn to profit, and whose mute And constant friendship links the man and brute?" Still half in dream, upon the stair I hearA patter coming nearer and more near,And then upon my chamber doorA gentle tapping,For dogs, though proud, are... more...

WOODEN SHIPSThey are remembering forests where they grew,—The midnight quiet, and the giant dance;And all the murmuring summers that they knewAre haunting still their altered circumstance.Leaves they have lost, and robins in the nest,Tug of the goodly earth denied to ships,These, and the rooted certainties, and rest,—To gain a watery girdle at the hips.Only the wind that follows ever aft,They greet... more...