Poetry Books

The Hill   Where are Elmer, Herman, Bert, Tom and Charley,  The weak of will, the strong of arm, the clown, the boozer, the fighter?  All, all are sleeping on the hill.   One passed in a fever,  One was burned in a mine,  One was killed in a brawl,  One died in a jail,  One fell from a bridge toiling for children and wife—  All, all are sleeping, sleeping, sleeping on the hill.... more...

MAY-DAY.   Daughter of Heaven and Earth, coy Spring,With sudden passion languishing,Maketh all things softly smile,Painteth pictures mile on mile,Holds a cup with cowslip-wreaths,Whence a smokeless incense breathes.Girls are peeling the sweet willow,Poplar white, and Gilead-tree,And troops of boysShouting with whoop and hilloa,And hip, hip three times three.The air is full of whistlings bland;What... more...

THE HOMES OF ENGLANDThe stately homes of England!How beautiful they stand,Amidst their tall ancestral trees,O'er all the pleasant land!The deer across their greensward boundThrough shade and sunny gleam;And the swan glides by them with the soundOf some rejoicing stream.The merry homes of England!Around their hearths by night,What gladsome looks of household loveMeet in the ruddy light!The blessed... more...

INTRODUCTION We remember Samuel Wesley (1662-1735), if at all, as the father of a great religious leader. In his own time he was known to many as a poet and a writer of controversial prose. His poetic career began in 1685 with the publication of Maggots, a collection of juvenile verses on trivial subjects, the preface to which, a frothy concoction, apologizes to the reader because the book is neither... more...

“Let us buy,”Said Sally Fry,“Something nice,”Said Betsy Price,“What shall it be,”Said Kitty Lee,“A nice plum cake,”Said Lucy Wake. Which will you have, the doll, or Noah’s Ark? said mother to Mary one day. The doll, if you please, I think I will take, for then I can prettily play. One day John said, as he made his bow,“Mamma, are you at leisure now?Tell me, for much I wish to... more...

INTRODUCTION LIFE OF BROWNING Robert Browning was born in Camberwell, London, May 7, 1812. He was contemporary with Tennyson, Dickens, Thackeray, Lowell, Emerson, Hawthorne, Darwin, Spencer, Huxley, Dumas, Hugo, Mendelssohn, Wagner, and a score of other men famous in art and science. Browning's good fortune began with his birth. His father, a clerk in the Bank of England, possessed ample means for... more...

THE FOX JUMPS OVER THE PARSON’S GATE   The Huntsman blows his horn in the morn, When folks goes hunting, oh! When folks goes hunting, oh! When folks goes hunting, oh! The Huntsman blows his horn in the morn, When folks goes hunting, oh!         The Fox jumps over the Parson’s gate, And the Hounds all after him go, And the Hounds all after him go, And the Hounds all after him go.   But all my... more...

"ALL'S WELL"IThe illimitable leaping of the sea,The mouthing of his madness to the moon,The seething of his endless sorcery,His prophecy no power can attune,Swept over me as, on the sounding prowOf a great ship that steered into the stars,I stood and felt the awe upon my browOf death and destiny and all that mars.IIThe wind that blew from Cassiopeia castWanly upon my ear a rune that... more...

In Macao. A Story from the "Grasshopper's Library." I was seated one pleasant day in the garden, which was given to the city of Macao by the Marcos family, near the grotto sacred to the poet Camoens, when a Portuguese priest came from among the wilderness of flowers and sat beside me. He spoke English with a pleasant accent and we read Bowring's effusion together, as it is engraved on... more...

1. THE ARGUMENT OF HIS BOOK I sing of brooks, of blossoms, birds, and bowers,Of April, May, of June, and July-flowers;I sing of May-poles, hock-carts, wassails, wakes,Of bride-grooms, brides, and of their bridal-cakes.I write of Youth, of Love;—and have accessBy these, to sing of cleanly wantonness;I sing of dews, of rains, and, piece by piece,Of balm, of oil, of spice, and ambergris.I sing of times... more...