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Carol Of Words [Walt Whitman]



Walt Whitman

EARTH, round, rolling, compact--suns, moons, animals--all these are
words to be said;
Watery, vegetable, sauroid advances--beings, premonitions, lispings
of the future,
Behold! these are vast words to be said.

Were you thinking that those were the words--those upright lines?
those curves, angles, dots?
No, those are not the words--the substantial words are in the ground
and sea,
They are in the air--they are in you.

Were you thinking that those were the words--those delicious sounds
out of your friends' mouths?
No, the real words are more delicious than they.

Human bodies are words, myriads of words;
In the best poems re-appears the body, man's or woman's, well-shaped,
natural, gay, 10
Every part able, active, receptive, without shame or the need of
shame.


Air, soil, water, fire--these are words;
I myself am a word with them--my qualities interpenetrate with
theirs--my name is nothing to them;
Though it were told in the three thousand languages, what would air,
soil, water, fire, know of my name?

A healthy presence, a friendly or commanding gesture, are words,
sayings, meanings;
The charms that go with the mere looks of some men and women, are
sayings and meanings also.


The workmanship of souls is by the inaudible words of the earth;
The great masters know the earth's words, and use them more than the
audible words.

Amelioration is one of the earth's words;
The earth neither lags nor hastens; 20
It has all attributes, growths, effects, latent in itself from the
jump;
It is not half beautiful only--defects and excrescences show just as
much as perfections show.

The earth does not withhold, it is generous enough;
The truths of the earth continually wait, they are not so conceal'd
either;
They are calm, subtle, untransmissible by print;
They are imbued through all things, conveying themselves willingly,
Conveying a sentiment and invitation of the earth--I utter and utter,
I speak not, yet if you hear me not, of what avail am I to you?
To bear--to better--lacking these, of what avail am I?


Accouche! Accouchez! 30
Will you rot your own fruit in yourself there?
Will you squat and stifle there?

The earth does not argue,
Is not pathetic, has no arrangements,
Does not scream, haste, persuade, threaten, promise,
Makes no discriminations, has no conceivable failures,
Closes nothing, refuses nothing, shuts none out,
Of all the powers, objects, states, it notifies, shuts none out.


The earth does not exhibit itself, nor refuse to exhibit itself--
possesses still underneath;
Underneath the ostensible sounds, the august chorus of heroes, the
wail of slaves, 40
Persuasions of lovers, curses, gasps of the dying, laughter of young
people, accents of bargainers,
Underneath these, possessing the words that never fail.

To her children, the words of the eloquent dumb great mother never
fail;
The true words do not fail, for motion does not fail, and reflection
does not fail;
Also the day and night do not fail, and the voyage we pursue does not
fail.


Of the interminable sisters,
Of the ceaseless cotillions of sisters,
Of the centripetal and centrifugal sisters, the elder and younger
sisters,
The beautiful sister we know dances on with the rest.
With her ample back towards every beholder, 50
With the fascinations of youth, and the equal fascinations of age,
Sits she whom I too love like the rest--sits undisturb'd,
Holding up in her hand what has the character of a mirror, while her
eyes glance back from it,
Glance as she sits, inviting none, denying none,
Holding a mirror day and night tirelessly before her own face.


Seen at hand, or seen at a distance,
Duly the twenty-four appear in public every day,
Duly approach and pass with their companions, or a companion,
Looking from no countenances of their own, but from the countenances
of those who are with them,
From the countenances of children or women, or the manly
countenance, 60
From the open countenances of animals, or from inanimate things,
From the landscape or waters, or from the exquisite apparition of the
sky,
From our countenances, mine and yours, faithfully returning them,
Every day in public appearing without fail, but never twice with the
same companions.


Embracing man, embracing all, proceed the three hundred and sixty-
five resistlessly round the sun;
Embracing all, soothing, supporting, follow close three hundred and
sixty-five offsets of the first, sure and necessary as they.


Tumbling on steadily, nothing dreading,
Sunshine, storm, cold, heat, forever withstanding, passing, carrying,
The Soul's realization and determination still inheriting,
The fluid vacuum around and ahead still entering and dividing, 70
No balk retarding, no anchor anchoring, on no rock striking,
Swift, glad, content, unbereav'd, nothing losing,
Of all able and ready at any time to give strict account,
The divine ship sails the divine sea.


Whoever you are! motion and reflection are especially for you;
The divine ship sails the divine sea for you.

Whoever you are! you are he or she for whom the earth is solid and
liquid,
You are he or she for whom the sun and moon hang in the sky,
For none more than you are the present and the past,
For none more than you is immortality. 80


Each man to himself, and each woman to herself, such is the word of
the past and present, and the word of immortality;
No one can acquire for another--not one!
Not one can grow for another--not one!

The song is to the singer, and comes back most to him;
The teaching is to the teacher, and comes back most to him;
The murder is to the murderer, and comes back most to him;
The theft is to the thief, and comes back most to him;
The love is to the lover, and comes back most to him;
The gift is to the giver, and comes back most to him--it cannot fail;
The oration is to the orator, the acting is to the actor and actress,
not to the audience; 90
And no man understands any greatness or goodness but his own, or the
indication of his own.


I swear the earth shall surely be complete to him or her who shall be
complete!
I swear the earth remains jagged and broken only to him or her who
remains jagged and broken!
I swear there is no greatness or power that does not emulate those of
the earth!
I swear there can be no theory of any account, unless it corroborate
the theory of the earth!
No politics, art, religion, behavior, or what not, is of account,
unless it compare with the amplitude of the earth,
Unless it face the exactness, vitality, impartiality, rectitude of
the earth.


I swear I begin to see love with sweeter spasms than that which
responds love!
It is that which contains itself--which never invites, and never
refuses.

I swear I begin to see little or nothing in audible words! 100
I swear I think all merges toward the presentation of the unspoken
meanings of the earth!
Toward him who sings the songs of the Body, and of the truths of the
earth;
Toward him who makes the dictionaries of words that print cannot
touch.


I swear I see what is better than to tell the best;
It is always to leave the best untold.

When I undertake to tell the best, I find I cannot,
My tongue is ineffectual on its pivots,
My breath will not be obedient to its organs,
I become a dumb man.

The best of the earth cannot be told anyhow--all or any is best; 110
It is not what you anticipated--it is cheaper, easier, nearer;
Things are not dismiss'd from the places they held before;
The earth is just as positive and direct as it was before;
Facts, religions, improvements, politics, trades, are as real as before;
But the Soul is also real,--it too is positive and direct;
No reasoning, no proof has establish'd it,
Undeniable growth has establish'd it.


This is a poem--a carol of words--these are hints of meanings,
These are to echo the tones of Souls, and the phrases of Souls;
If they did not echo the phrases of Souls, what were they then? 120
If they had not reference to you in especial, what were they then?

I swear I will never henceforth have to do with the faith that tells
the best!
I will have to do only with that faith that leaves the best untold.


Say on, sayers!
Delve! mould! pile the words of the earth!
Work on--(it is materials you must bring, not breaths;)
Work on, age after age! nothing is to be lost;
It may have to wait long, but it will certainly come in use;
When the materials are all prepared, the architects shall appear.

I swear to you the architects shall appear without fail! I announce
them and lead them; 130
I swear to you they will understand you, and justify you;
I swear to you the greatest among them shall be he who best knows
you, and encloses all, and is faithful to all;
I swear to you, he and the rest shall not forget you--they shall
perceive that you are not an iota less than they;
I swear to you, you shall be glorified in them.

Carol Of Occupations [Walt Whitman]



Walt Whitman

COME closer to me;
Push close, my lovers, and take the best I possess;
Yield closer and closer, and give me the best you possess.

This is unfinish'd business with me--How is it with you?
(I was chill'd with the cold types, cylinder, wet paper between us.)

Male and Female!
I pass so poorly with paper and types, I must pass with the contact
of bodies and souls.

American masses!
I do not thank you for liking me as I am, and liking the touch of
me--I know that it is good for you to do so.


This is the carol of occupations; 10
In the labor of engines and trades, and the labor of fields, I find the developments,
And find the eternal meanings.

Workmen and Workwomen!
Were all educations, practical and ornamental, well display'd out of
me, what would it amount to?
Were I as the head teacher, charitable proprietor, wise statesman,
what would it amount to?
Were I to you as the boss employing and paying you, would that
satisfy you?

The learn'd, virtuous, benevolent, and the usual terms;
A man like me, and never the usual terms.

Neither a servant nor a master am I;
I take no sooner a large price than a small price--I will have my
own, whoever enjoys me; 20
I will be even with you, and you shall be even with me.

If you stand at work in a shop, I stand as nigh as the nighest in the
same shop;
If you bestow gifts on your brother or dearest friend, I demand as
good as your brother or dearest friend;
If your lover, husband, wife, is welcome by day or night, I must be
personally as welcome;
If you become degraded, criminal, ill, then I become so for your
sake;
If you remember your foolish and outlaw'd deeds, do you think I
cannot remember my own foolish and outlaw'd deeds?
If you carouse at the table, I carouse at the opposite side of the
table;
If you meet some stranger in the streets, and love him or her--why I
often meet strangers in the street, and love them.

Why, what have you thought of yourself?
Is it you then that thought yourself less? 30
Is it you that thought the President greater than you?
Or the rich better off than you? or the educated wiser than you?

Because you are greasy or pimpled, or that you were once drunk, or a
thief,
Or diseas'd, or rheumatic, or a prostitute--or are so now;
Or from frivolity or impotence, or that you are no scholar, and never
saw your name in print,
Do you give in that you are any less immortal?


Souls of men and women! it is not you I call unseen, unheard,
untouchable and untouching;
It is not you I go argue pro and con about, and to settle whether you
are alive or no;
I own publicly who you are, if nobody else owns.

Grown, half-grown, and babe, of this country and every country, in-
doors and out-doors, one just as much as the other, I see, 40
And all else behind or through them.

The wife--and she is not one jot less than the husband;
The daughter--and she is just as good as the son;
The mother--and she is every bit as much as the father.

Offspring of ignorant and poor, boys apprenticed to trades,
Young fellows working on farms, and old fellows working on farms,
Sailor-men, merchant-men, coasters, immigrants,
All these I see--but nigher and farther the same I see;
None shall escape me, and none shall wish to escape me.

I bring what you much need, yet always have, 50
Not money, amours, dress, eating, but as good;
I send no agent or medium, offer no representative of value, but
offer the value itself.

There is something that comes home to one now and perpetually;
It is not what is printed, preach'd, discussed--it eludes discussion
and print;
It is not to be put in a book--it is not in this book;
It is for you, whoever you are--it is no farther from you than your
hearing and sight are from you;
It is hinted by nearest, commonest, readiest--it is ever provoked by
them.

You may read in many languages, yet read nothing about it;
You may read the President's Message, and read nothing about it
there;
Nothing in the reports from the State department or Treasury
department, or in the daily papers or the weekly papers, 60
Or in the census or revenue returns, prices current, or any accounts
of stock.


The sun and stars that float in the open air;
The apple-shaped earth, and we upon it--surely the drift of them is
something grand!
I do not know what it is, except that it is grand, and that it is
happiness,
And that the enclosing purport of us here is not a speculation, or
bon-mot, or reconnoissance,
And that it is not something which by luck may turn out well for us,
and without luck must be a failure for us,
And not something which may yet be retracted in a certain
contingency.

The light and shade, the curious sense of body and identity, the
greed that with perfect complaisance devours all things, the
endless pride and out-stretching of man, unspeakable joys and
sorrows,
The wonder every one sees in every one else he sees, and the wonders
that fill each minute of time forever,
What have you reckon'd them for, camerado? 70
Have you reckon'd them for a trade, or farm-work? or for the profits
of a store?
Or to achieve yourself a position? or to fill a gentleman's leisure,
or a lady's leisure?

Have you reckon'd the landscape took substance and form that it might
be painted in a picture?
Or men and women that they might be written of, and songs sung?
Or the attraction of gravity, and the great laws and harmonious
combinations, and the fluids of the air, as subjects for the
savans?
Or the brown land and the blue sea for maps and charts?
Or the stars to be put in constellations and named fancy names?
Or that the growth of seeds is for agricultural tables, or
agriculture itself?

Old institutions--these arts, libraries, legends, collections, and
the practice handed along in manufactures--will we rate them so
high?
Will we rate our cash and business high?--I have no objection; 80
I rate them as high as the highest--then a child born of a woman and
man I rate beyond all rate.

We thought our Union grand, and our Constitution grand;
I do not say they are not grand and good, for they are;
I am this day just as much in love with them as you;
Then I am in love with you, and with all my fellows upon the earth.

We consider bibles and religions divine--I do not say they are not
divine;
I say they have all grown out of you, and may grow out of you still;
It is not they who give the life--it is you who give the life;
Leaves are not more shed from the trees, or trees from the earth,
than they are shed out of you.


When the psalm sings instead of the singer; 90
When the script preaches instead of the preacher;
When the pulpit descends and goes, instead of the carver that carved
the supporting desk;
When I can touch the body of books, by night or by day, and when they
touch my body back again;
When a university course convinces, like a slumbering woman and child
convince;
When the minted gold in the vault smiles like the night-watchman's
daughter;
When warrantee deeds loafe in chairs opposite, and are my friendly
companions;
I intend to reach them my hand, and make as much of them as I do of
men and women like you.

The sum of all known reverence I add up in you, whoever you are;
The President is there in the White House for you--it is not you who
are here for him;
The Secretaries act in their bureaus for you--not you here for
them; 100
The Congress convenes every Twelfth-month for you;
Laws, courts, the forming of States, the charters of cities, the
going and coming of commerce and mails, are all for you.

List close, my scholars dear!
All doctrines, all politics and civilization, exurge from you;
All sculpture and monuments, and anything inscribed anywhere, are
tallied in you;
The gist of histories and statistics as far back as the records
reach, is in you this hour, and myths and tales the same;
If you were not breathing and walking here, where would they all be?
The most renown'd poems would be ashes, orations and plays would be
vacuums.

All architecture is what you do to it when you look upon it;
(Did you think it was in the white or gray stone? or the lines of the
arches and cornices?) 110

All music is what awakes from you when you are reminded by the
instruments;
It is not the violins and the cornets--it is not the oboe nor the
beating drums, nor the score of the baritone singer singing
his sweet romanza--nor that of the men's chorus, nor that of
the women's chorus,
It is nearer and farther than they.


Will the whole come back then?
Can each see signs of the best by a look in the looking-glass? is
there nothing greater or more?
Does all sit there with you, with the mystic, unseen Soul?

Strange and hard that paradox true I give;
Objects gross and the unseen Soul are one.

House-building, measuring, sawing the boards;
Blacksmithing, glass-blowing, nail-making, coopering, tin-roofing,
shingle-dressing, 120
Ship-joining, dock-building, fish-curing, ferrying, flagging of side-
walks by flaggers,
The pump, the pile-driver, the great derrick, the coal-kiln and
brick-kiln,
Coal-mines, and all that is down there,--the lamps in the darkness,
echoes, songs, what meditations, what vast native thoughts
looking through smutch'd faces,
Iron-works, forge-fires in the mountains, or by the river-banks--men
around feeling the melt with huge crowbars--lumps of ore, the
due combining of ore, limestone, coal--the blast-furnace and
the puddling-furnace, the loup-lump at the bottom of the melt
at last--the rolling-mill, the stumpy bars of pig-iron, the
strong, clean-shaped T-rail for railroads;
Oil-works, silk-works, white-lead-works, the sugar-house, steam-saws,
the great mills and factories;
Stone-cutting, shapely trimmings for façades, or window or door-
lintels--the mallet, the tooth-chisel, the jib to protect the
thumb,
Oakum, the oakum-chisel, the caulking-iron--the kettle of boiling
vault-cement, and the fire under the kettle,
The cotton-bale, the stevedore's hook, the saw and buck of the
sawyer, the mould of the moulder, the working-knife of the
butcher, the ice-saw, and all the work with ice,
The implements for daguerreotyping--the tools of the rigger,
grappler, sail-maker, block-maker,
Goods of gutta-percha, papier-maché, colors, brushes, brush-making,
glazier's implements, 130

O you robust, sacred!
I cannot tell you how I love you;
All I love America for, is contained in men and women like you.

The veneer and glue-pot, the confectioner's ornaments, the decanter
and glasses, the shears and flat-iron,
The awl and knee-strap, the pint measure and quart measure, the
counter and stool, the writing-pen of quill or metal--the
making of all sorts of edged tools,
The brewery, brewing, the malt, the vats, every thing that is done by
brewers, also by wine-makers, also vinegar-makers,
Leather-dressing, coach-making, boiler-making, rope-twisting,
distilling, sign-painting, lime-burning, cotton-picking--
electro-plating, electrotyping, stereotyping,
Stave-machines, planing-machines, reaping-machines, ploughing-
machines, thrashing-machines, steam wagons,
The cart of the carman, the omnibus, the ponderous dray;
Pyrotechny, letting off color'd fire-works at night, fancy figures
and jets;
Beef on the butcher's stall, the slaughter-house of the butcher, the
butcher in his killing-clothes,
The pens of live pork, the killing-hammer, the hog-hook, the
scalder's tub, gutting, the cutter's cleaver, the packer's
maul, and the plenteous winter-work of pork-packing;
Flour-works, grinding of wheat, rye, maize, rice--the barrels and the
half and quarter barrels, the loaded barges, the high piles on
wharves and levees; 140
The men, and the work of the men, on railroads, coasters, fish-boats,
canals;
The daily routine of your own or any man's life--the shop, yard,
store, or factory;
These shows all near you by day and night--workman! whoever you are,
your daily life!
In that and them the heft of the heaviest--in them far more than you
estimated, and far less also;
In them realities for you and me--in them poems for you and me;
In them, not yourself--you and your Soul enclose all things,
regardless of estimation;
In them the development good--in them, all themes and hints.

I do not affirm what you see beyond is futile--I do not advise you to
stop;
I do not say leadings you thought great are not great;
But I say that none lead to greater, than those lead to. 150


Will you seek afar off? you surely come back at last,
In things best known to you, finding the best, or as good as the
best,
In folks nearest to you finding the sweetest, strongest, lovingest;
Happiness, knowledge, not in another place, but this place--not for
another hour, but this hour;
Man in the first you see or touch--always in friend, brother, nighest
neighbor--Woman in mother, lover, wife;
The popular tastes and employments taking precedence in poems or any
where,
You workwomen and workmen of These States having your own divine and
strong life,
And all else giving place to men and women like you.

Camps Of Green [Walt Whitman]



Walt Whitman

NOT alone those camps of white, O soldiers,
When, as order'd forward, after a long march,
Footsore and weary, soon as the light lessen'd, we halted for the
night;
Some of us so fatigued, carrying the gun and knapsack, dropping
asleep in our tracks;
Others pitching the little tents, and the fires lit up began to
sparkle;
Outposts of pickets posted, surrounding, alert through the dark,
And a word provided for countersign, careful for safety;
Till to the call of the drummers at daybreak loudly beating the
drums,
We rose up refresh'd, the night and sleep pass'd over, and resumed
our journey,
Or proceeded to battle. 10

Lo! the camps of the tents of green,
Which the days of peace keep filling, and the days of war keep
filling,
With a mystic army, (is it too order'd forward? is it too only
halting awhile,
Till night and sleep pass over?)

Now in those camps of green--in their tents dotting the world;
In the parents, children, husbands, wives, in them--in the old and
young,
Sleeping under the sunlight, sleeping under the moonlight, content
and silent there at last,
Behold the mighty bivouac-field, and waiting-camp of all,
Of corps and generals all, and the President over the corps and
generals all,
And of each of us, O soldiers, and of each and all in the ranks we
fought, 20
(There without hatred we shall all meet.)

For presently, O soldiers, we too camp in our place in the bivouac-
camps of green;
But we need not provide for outposts, nor word for the countersign,
Nor drummer to beat the morning drum.

By The Bivouac's Fitful Flame [Walt Whitman]



Walt Whitman

BY the bivouac's fitful flame,
A procession winding around me, solemn and sweet and slow;--but first
I note,
The tents of the sleeping army, the fields' and woods' dim outline,
The darkness, lit by spots of kindled fire--the silence;
Like a phantom far or near an occasional figure moving;
The shrubs and trees, (as I lift my eyes they seem to be stealthily
watching me;)
While wind in procession thoughts, O tender and wondrous thoughts,
Of life and death--of home and the past and loved, and of those that
are far away;
A solemn and slow procession there as I sit on the ground,
By the bivouac's fitful flame. 10

By Broad Potomac's Shore [Walt Whitman]



Walt Whitman

BY broad Potomac's shore--again, old tongue!
(Still uttering--still ejaculating--canst never cease this babble?)
Again, old heart so gay--again to you, your sense, the full flush
spring returning;
Again the freshness and the odors--again Virginia's summer sky,
pellucid blue and silver,
Again the forenoon purple of the hills,
Again the deathless grass, so noiseless, soft and green,
Again the blood-red roses blooming.


Perfume this book of mine, O blood-red roses!
Lave subtly with your waters every line, Potomac!
Give me of you, O spring, before I close, to put between its
pages! 10
O forenoon purple of the hills, before I close, of you!
O smiling earth--O summer sun, give me of you!
O deathless grass, of you!

Brother Of All, With Genesrous Hand (Walt Whitman)



Walt Whitman

BROTHER of all, with generous hand,
Of thee, pondering on thee, as o'er thy tomb, I and my Soul,
A thought to launch in memory of thee,
A burial verse for thee.

What may we chant, O thou within this tomb?
What tablets, pictures, hang for thee, O millionaire?
--The life thou lived'st we know not,
But that thou walk'dst thy years in barter, 'mid the haunts of
brokers;
Nor heroism thine, nor war, nor glory.

Yet lingering, yearning, joining soul with thine, 10
If not thy past we chant, we chant the future,
Select, adorn the future.


Lo, Soul, the graves of heroes!
The pride of lands--the gratitudes of men,
The statues of the manifold famous dead, Old World and New,
The kings, inventors, generals, poets, (stretch wide thy vision,
Soul,)
The excellent rulers of the races, great discoverers, sailors,
Marble and brass select from them, with pictures, scenes,
(The histories of the lands, the races, bodied there,
In what they've built for, graced and graved, 20
Monuments to their heroes.)


Silent, my Soul,
With drooping lids, as waiting, ponder'd,
Turning from all the samples, all the monuments of heroes.

While through the interior vistas,
Noiseless uprose, phantasmic (as, by night, Auroras of the North,)
Lambent tableaux, prophetic, bodiless scenes,
Spiritual projections.

In one, among the city streets, a laborer's home appear'd,
After his day's work done, cleanly, sweet-air'd, the gaslight
burning, 30
The carpet swept, and a fire in the cheerful stove.

In one, the sacred parturition scene,
A happy, painless mother birth'd a perfect child.

In one, at a bounteous morning meal,
Sat peaceful parents, with contented sons.

In one, by twos and threes, young people,
Hundreds concentering, walk'd the paths and streets and roads,
Toward a tall-domed school.

In one a trio, beautiful,
Grandmother, loving daughter, loving daughter's daughter, sat, 40
Chatting and sewing.

In one, along a suite of noble rooms,
'Mid plenteous books and journals, paintings on the walls, fine
statuettes,
Were groups of friendly journeymen, mechanics, young and old,
Reading, conversing.

All, all the shows of laboring life,
City and country, women's, men's and children's,
Their wants provided for, hued in the sun, and tinged for once with
joy,
Marriage, the street, the factory, farm, the house-room, lodging-
room,
Labor and toil, the bath, gymnasium, play-ground, library,
college, 50
The student, boy or girl, led forward to be taught;
The sick cared for, the shoeless shod--the orphan father'd and
mother'd,
The hungry fed, the houseless housed;
(The intentions perfect and divine,
The workings, details, haply human.)


O thou within this tomb,
From thee, such scenes--thou stintless, lavish Giver,
Tallying the gifts of Earth--large as the Earth,
Thy name an Earth, with mountains, fields and rivers.

Nor by your streams alone, you rivers, 60
By you, your banks, Connecticut,
By you, and all your teeming life, Old Thames,
By you, Potomac, laving the ground Washington trod--by you Patapsco,
You, Hudson--you, endless Mississippi--not by you alone,
But to the high seas launch, my thought, his memory.


Lo, Soul, by this tomb's lambency,
The darkness of the arrogant standards of the world,
With all its flaunting aims, ambitions, pleasures.

(Old, commonplace, and rusty saws,
The rich, the gay, the supercilious, smiled at long, 70
Now, piercing to the marrow in my bones,
Fused with each drop my heart's blood jets,
Swim in ineffable meaning.)

Lo, Soul, the sphere requireth, portioneth,
To each his share, his measure,
The moderate to the moderate, the ample to the ample.

Lo, Soul, see'st thou not, plain as the sun,
The only real wealth of wealth in generosity,
The only life of life in goodness?

Bivouac on a Mountain Side (Walt Whitman)



Walt Whitman

I see before me now a traveling army halting,
Below a fertile valley spread, with barns and the orchards of summer,
Behind, the terraced sides of a mountain, abrupt, in places rising high,
Broken, with rocks, with clinging cedars, with tall shapes dingily seen,
The numerous camp-fires scatter'd near and far, some away up on the mountain,
The shadowy forms of men and horses, looming, large-sized, flickering,
And over all the sky--the sky! far, far out of reach, Studded, breaking out, the eternal stars.

Behold This Swarthy Face (Walt Whitman)



Walt Whitman

BEHOLD this swarthy face--these gray eyes,
This beard--the white wool, unclipt upon my neck,
My brown hands, and the silent manner of me, without charm;
Yet comes one, a Manhattanese, and ever at parting, kisses me lightly
on the lips with robust love,
And I, on the crossing of the street, or on the ship's deck, give a
kiss in return;
We observe that salute of American comrades, land and sea,
We are those two natural and nonchalant persons.

Behavior (Walt Whitman)



Walt Whitman

BEHAVIOR--fresh, native, copious, each one for himself or herself,
Nature and the Soul expressed--America and freedom expressed--In it
the finest art,
In it pride, cleanliness, sympathy, to have their chance,
In it physique, intellect, faith--in it just as much as to manage an
army or a city, or to write a book--perhaps more,
The youth, the laboring person, the poor person, rivalling all the
rest--perhaps outdoing the rest,
The effects of the universe no greater than its;
For there is nothing in the whole universe that can be more effective
than a man's or woman's daily behavior can be,
In any position, in any one of These States.

Beginning My Studies (Walt Whitman)



Walt Whitman

BEGINNING my studies, the first step pleas'd me so much,
The mere fact, consciousness--these forms--the power of motion,
The least insect or animal--the senses--eyesight--love;
The first step, I say, aw'd me and pleas'd me so much,
I have hardly gone, and hardly wish'd to go, any farther,
But stop and loiter all the time, to sing it in extatic songs.

Gwin King of Norway (William Blake)



William Blake

Come, kings, and listen to my song:
When Gwin, the son of Nore,
Over the nations of the North
His cruel sceptre bore;
The nobles of the land did feed
Upon the hungry poor;
They tear the poor man's lamb, and drive
The needy from their door.

`The land is desolate; our wives
And children cry for bread;
Arise, and pull the tyrant down!
Let Gwin be humblèd!'

Gordred the giant rous'd himself
From sleeping in his cave;
He shook the hills, and in the clouds
The troubl'd banners wave.

Beneath them roll'd, like tempests black,
The num'rous sons of blood;
Like lions' whelps, roaring abroad,
Seeking their nightly food.

Down Bleron's hills they dreadful rush,
Their cry ascends the clouds;
The trampling horse and clanging arms
Like rushing mighty floods!

Their wives and children, weeping loud,
Follow in wild array,
Howling like ghosts, furious as wolves
In the bleak wintry day.

`Pull down the tyrant to the dust,
Let Gwin be humblèd,'
They cry, `and let ten thousand lives
Pay for the tyrant's head.'

From tow'r to tow'r the watchmen cry,
`O Gwin, the son of Nore,
Arouse thyself! the nations, black
Like clouds, come rolling o'er!'

Gwin rear'd his shield, his palace shakes,
His chiefs come rushing round;
Each, like an awful thunder cloud,
With voice of solemn sound:

Like rearèd stones around a grave
They stand around the King;
Then suddenly each seiz'd his spear,
And clashing steel does ring.

The husbandman does leave his plough
To wade thro' fields of gore;
The merchant binds his brows in steel,
And leaves the trading shore;

The shepherd leaves his mellow pipe,
And sounds the trumpet shrill;
The workman throws his hammer down
To heave the bloody bill.

Like the tall ghost of Barraton
Who sports in stormy sky,
Gwin leads his host, as black as night
When pestilence does fly,

With horses and with chariots--
And all his spearmen b 1000 old
March to the sound of mournful song,
Like clouds around him roll'd.

Gwin lifts his hand--the nations halt;
`Prepare for war!' he cries--
Gordred appears!--his frowning brow
Troubles our northern skies.

The armies stand, like balances
Held in th' Almighty's hand;--
`Gwin, thou hast fill'd thy measure up:
Thou'rt swept from out the land.'

And now the raging armies rush'd
Like warring mighty seas;
The heav'ns are shook with roaring war,
The dust ascends the skies!

Earth smokes with blood, and groans and shakes
To drink her children's gore,
A sea of blood; nor can the eye
See to the trembling shore!

And on the verge of this wild sea
Famine and death doth cry;
The cries of women and of babes
Over the field doth fly.

The King is seen raging afar,
With all his men of might;
Like blazing comets scattering death
Thro' the red fev'rous night.

Beneath his arm like sheep they die,
And groan upon the plain;
The battle faints, and bloody men
Fight upon hills of slain.

Now death is sick, and riven men
Labour and toil for life;
Steed rolls on steed, and shield on shield,
Sunk in this sea of strife!

The god of war is drunk with blood;
The earth doth faint and fail;
The stench of blood makes sick the heav'ns;
Ghosts glut the throat of hell!

O what have kings to answer for
Before that awful throne;
When thousand deaths for vengeance cry,
And ghosts accusing groan!

Like blazing comets in the sky
That shake the stars of light,
Which drop like fruit unto the earth
Thro' the fierce burning night;

Like these did Gwin and Gordred meet,
And the first blow decides;
Down from the brow unto the breast
Gordred his head divides!

Gwin fell: the sons of Norway fled,
All that remain'd alive;
The rest did fill the vale of death,
For them the eagles strive.

The river Dorman roll'd their blood
Into the northern sea;
Who mourn'd his sons, and overwhelm'd
The pleasant south country.

Grey Monk, The (William Blake)



William Blake

"I die, I die!" the Mother said,
"My children die for lack of bread.
What more has the merciless Tyrant said?"
The Monk sat down on the stony bed.

The blood red ran from the Grey Monk's side,
His hands and feet were wounded wide,
His body bent, his arms and knees
Like to the roots of ancient trees.

His eye was dry; no tear could flow:
A hollow groan first spoke his woe.
He trembled and shudder'd upon the bed;
At length with a feeble cry he said:

"When God commanded this hand to write
In the studious hours of deep midnight,
He told me the writing I wrote should prove
The bane of all that on Earth I lov'd.

My Brother starv'd between two walls,
His Children's cry my soul appalls;
I mock'd at the rack and griding chain,
My bent body mocks their torturing pain.

Thy father drew his sword in the North,
With his thousands strong he marched forth;
Thy Brother has arm'd himself in steel
To avenge the wrongs thy Children feel.

But vain the Sword and vain the Bow,
They never can work War's overthrow.
The Hermit's prayer and the Widow's tear
Alone can free the World from fear.

For a Tear is an intellectual thing,
And a Sigh is the sword of an Angel King,
And the bitter groan of the Martyr's woe
Is an arrow from the Almighty's bow.

The hand of Vengeance found the bed
To which the Purple Tyrant fled;
The iron hand crush'd the Tyrant's head
And became a Tyrant in his stead."

Garden of Love, The (William Blake)



William Blake

I laid me down upon a bank,
Where Love lay sleeping;
I heard among the rushes dank
Weeping, weeping.

Then I went to the heath and the wild,
To the thistles and thorns of the waste;
And they told me how they were beguiled,
Driven out, and compelled to the chaste.

I went to the Garden of Love,
And saw what I never had seen;
A Chapel was built in the midst,
Where I used to play on the green.

And the gates of this Chapel were shut
And "Thou shalt not," writ over the door;
So I turned to the Garden of Love
That so many sweet flowers bore.

And I saw it was filled with graves,
And tombstones where flowers should be;
And priests in black gowns were walking their rounds,
And binding with briars my joys and desires.

From Milton: And did those feet (William Blake)



William Blake

And did those feet in ancient time
Walk upon England's mountains green?
And was the holy Lamb of God
On England's pleasant pastures seen?

And did the Countenance Divine
Shine forth upon our clouded hills?
And was Jerusalem builded here,
Among these dark Satanic Mills?

Bring me my Bow of burning gold:
Bring me my Arrows of desire:
Bring me my Spear:O clouds unfold!
Bring me my Chariot of fire!

I will not cease from Mental Fight,
Nor shall my Sword sleep in my hand,
Till we have built Jerusalem
In England's green & pleasant Land.

French Revolution, The (excerpt) [William Blake]



William Blake

84 Thee the ancientest peer, Duke of Burgundy, rose from the monarch's right hand, red as wines
85 From his mountains; an odor of war, like a ripe vineyard, rose from his garments,
86 And the chamber became as a clouded sky; o'er the council he stretch'd his red limbs,
87 Cloth'd in flames of crimson; as a ripe vineyard stretches over sheaves of corn,
88 The fierce Duke hung over the council; around him crowd, weeping in his burning robe,
89 A bright cloud of infant souls; his words fall like purple autumn on the sheaves:
90 "Shall this marble built heaven become a clay cottage, this earth an oak stool and these mowers
91 From the Atlantic mountains mow down all this great starry harvest of six thousand years?
92 And shall Necker, the hind of Geneva, stretch out his crook'd sickle o'er fertile France
93 Till our purple and crimson is faded to russet, and the kingdoms of earth bound in sheaves,
94 And the ancient forests of chivalry hewn, and the joys of the combat burnt for fuel;
95 Till the power and dominion is rent from the pole, sword and sceptre from sun and moon,
96 The law and gospel from fire and air, and eternal reason and science
97 From the deep and the solid, and man lay his faded head down on the rock
98 Of eternity, where the eternal lion and eagle remain to devour?
99 This to prevent--urg'd by cries in day, and prophetic dreams hovering in night,
100 To enrich the lean earth that craves, furrow'd with plows, whose seed is departing from her--
101 Thy nobles have gather'd thy starry hosts round this rebellious city,
102 To rouze up the ancient forests of Europe, with clarions of cloud breathing war,
103 To hear the horse neigh to the drum and trumpet, and the trumpet and war shout reply.
104 Stretch the hand that beckons the eagles of heaven; they cry over Paris, and wait
105 Till Fayette point his finger to Versailles; the eagles of heaven must have their prey!"
106 He ceas'd, and burn'd silent; red clouds roll round Necker; a weeping is heard o'er the palace.
107 Like a dark cloud Necker paus'd, and like thunder on the just man's burial day he paus'd;
108 Silent sit the winds, silent the meadows, while the husbandman and woman of weakness
109 And bright children look after him into the grave, and water his clay with love,
110 Then turn towards pensive fields; so Necker paus'd, and his visage was covered with clouds.

111 The King lean'd on his mountains, then lifted his head and look'd on his armies, that shone
112 Through heaven, tinging morning with beams of blood; then turning to Burgundy, troubled:
113 "Burgundy, thou wast born a lion! My soul is o'ergrown with distress.
114 For the nobles of France, and dark mists roll round me and blot the writing of God
115 Written in my bosom. Necker rise! leave the kingdom, thy life is surrounded with snares.
116 We have call'd an Assembly, but not to destroy; we have given gifts, not to the weak;
117 I hear rushing of muskets, and bright'ning of swords, and visages redd'ning with war,
118 Frowning and looking up from brooding villages and every dark'ning city.
119 Ancient wonders frown over the kingdom, and cries of women and babes are heard,
120 And tempests of doubt roll around me, and fierce sorrows, because of the nobles of France.
121 Depart! answer not! for the tempest must fall, as in years that are passed away."

Four Zoas, The (excerpt) [William Blake]



William Blake

1.1 "What is the price of Experience? do men buy it for a song?
1.2 Or wisdom for a dance in the street? No, it is bought with the price
1.3 Of all that a man hath, his house, his wife, his children.
1.4 Wisdom is sold in the desolate market where none come to buy,
1.5 And in the wither'd field where the farmer plows for bread in vain.

1.6 It is an easy thing to triumph in the summer's sun
1.7 And in the vintage and to sing on the waggon loaded with corn.
1.8 It is an easy thing to talk of patience to the afflicted,
1.9 To speak the laws of prudence to the houseless wanderer,
1.10 To listen to the hungry raven's cry in wintry season
1.11 When the red blood is fill'd with wine and with the marrow of lambs.

1.12 It is an easy thing to laugh at wrathful elements,
1.13 To hear the dog howl at the wintry door, the ox in the slaughter house moan;
1.14 To see a god on every wind and a blessing on every blast;
1.15 To hear sounds of love in the thunder storm that destroys our enemies' house;
1.16 To rejoice in the blight that covers his field, and the sickness that cuts off his children,
1.17 While our olive and vine sing and laugh round our door, and our children bring fruits and flowers.

1.18 Then the groan and the dolor are quite forgotten, and the slave grinding at the mill,
1.19 And the captive in chains, and the poor in the prison, and the soldier in the field
1.20 When the shatter'd bone hath laid him groaning among the happier dead.

1.21 It is an easy thing to rejoice in the tents of prosperity:
1.22 Thus could I sing and thus rejoice: but it is not so with me."

2.1 "Compel the poor to live upon a crust of bread, by soft mild arts.
2.2 Smile when they frown, frown when they smile; and when a man looks pale
2.3 With labour and abstinence, say he looks healthy and happy;
2.4 And when his children sicken, let them die; there are enough
2.5 Born, even too many, and our earth will be overrun
2.6 Without these arts. If you would make the poor live with temper,
2.7 With pomp give every crust of bread you give; with gracious cunning
2.8 Magnify small gifts; reduce the man to want a gift, and then give with pomp.
2.9 Say he smiles if you hear him sigh. If pale, say he is ruddy.
2.10 Preach temperance: say he is overgorg'd and drowns his wit
2.11 In strong drink, though you know that bread and water are all
2.12 He can afford. Flatter his wife, pity his children, till we can
2.13 Reduce all to our will, as spaniels are taught with art."

3.1 The sun has left his blackness and has found a fresher morning,
3.2 And the mild moon rejoices in the clear and cloudless night,
3.3 And Man walks forth from midst of the fires: the evil is all consum'd.
3.4 His eyes behold the Angelic spheres arising night and day;
3.5 The stars consum'd like a lamp blown out, and in their stead, behold
3.6 The expanding eyes of Man behold the depths of wondrous worlds!
3.7 One Earth, one sea beneath; nor erring globes wander, but stars
3.8 Of fire rise up nightly from the ocean; and one sun
3.9 Each morning, like a new born man, issues with songs and joy
3.10 Calling the Plowman to his labour and the Shepherd to his rest.
3.11 He walks upon the Eternal Mountains, raising his heavenly voice,
3.12 Conversing with the animal forms of wisdom night and day,
3.13 That, risen from the sea of fire, renew'd walk o'er the Earth;
3.14 For Tharmas brought his flocks upon the hills, and in the vales
3.15 Around the Eternal Man's bright tent, the little children play
3.16 Among the woolly flocks. The hammer of Urthona sounds
3.17 In the deep caves beneath; his limbs renew'd, his Lions roar
3.18 Around the Furnaces and in evening sport upon the plains.
3.19 They raise their faces from the earth, conversing with the Man:

3.20 "How is it we have walk'd through fires and yet are not consum'd?
3.21 How is it that all things are chang'd, even as in ancient times?"

Fly, The (William Blake)



William Blake

Little Fly,
Thy summer's play
My thoughtless hand
Has brushed away.

Am not I
A fly like thee?
Or art not thou
A man like me?

For I dance
And drink, and sing,
Till some blind hand
Shall brush my wing.

If thought is life
And strength and breath
And the want
Of thought is death;

Then am I
A happy fly,
If I live,
Or if I die.

Fair Elanor (William Blake)



William Blake

The bell struck one, and shook the silent tower;
The graves give up their dead: fair Elenor
Walk'd by the castle gate, and lookèd in.
A hollow groan ran thro' the dreary vaults.
She shriek'd aloud, and sunk upon the steps,
On the cold stone her pale cheeks. Sickly smells
Of death issue as from a sepulchre,
And all is silent but the sighing vaults.

Chill Death withdraws his hand, and she revives;
Amaz'd, she finds herself upon her feet,
And, like a ghost, thro' narrow passages
Walking, feeling the cold walls with her hands.

Fancy returns, and now she thinks of bones
And grinning skulls, and corruptible death
Wrapp'd in his shroud; and now fancies she hears
Deep sighs, and sees pale sickly ghosts gliding.

At length, no fancy but reality
Distracts her. A rushing sound, and the feet
Of one that fled, approaches--Ellen stood
Like a dumb statue, froze to stone with fear.

The wretch approaches, crying: `The deed is done;
Take this, and send it by whom thou wilt send;
It is my life--send it to Elenor:--
He's dead, and howling after me for blood!

`Take this,' he cried; and thrust into her arms
A wet napkin, wrapp'd about; then rush'd
Past, howling: she receiv'd into her arms
Pale death, and follow'd on the wings of fear.

They pass'd swift thro' the outer gate; the wretch,
Howling, leap'd o'er the wall into the moat,
Stifling in mud. Fair Ellen pass'd the bridge,
And heard a gloomy voice cry `Is it done?'

As the deer wounded, Ellen flew over
The pathless plain; as the arrows that fly
By night, destruction flies, and strikes in darkness.
She fled from fear, till at her house arriv'd.

Her maids await her; on her bed she falls,
That bed of joy, where erst her lord hath press'd:
`Ah, woman's fear!' she cried; `ah, cursèd duke!
Ah, my dear lord! ah, wretched Elenor!

`My lord was like a flower upon the brows
Of lusty May! Ah, life as frail as flower!
O ghastly death! withdraw thy cruel hand,
Seek'st thou that flow'r to deck thy horrid temples?

`My lord was like a star in highest heav'n
Drawn down to earth by spells and wickedness;
My lord was like the opening eyes of day
When western winds creep softly o'er the flowers;

`But he is darken'd; like the summer's noon
Clouded; fall'n like the stately tree, cut down;
The breath of heaven dwelt among his leaves.
O Elenor, weak woman, fill'd with woe!'

Thus having spoke, she raisèd up her head,
And saw the bloody napkin by her side,
Which in her arms she brought; and now, tenfold
More terrifièd, saw it unfold itself.

Her eyes were fix'd; the bloody cloth unfolds,
Disclosing to her sight the murder'd head
Of her dear lord, all ghastly pale, clotted
With gory blood; it groan'd, and thus it spake:

`O Elenor, I am thy husband's head,
Who, sleeping on the stones of yonder tower,
Was 'reft of life by the accursèd duke!
A hirèd villain turn'd my sleep to death!

`O Elenor, beware the cursèd duke;
O give not him thy hand, now I am dead;
He seeks thy love; who, coward, in the night,
Hirèd a villain to bereave my life.'

She sat with dead cold limbs, stiffen'd to stone;
She took the gory head up in her arms;
She kiss'd the pale lips; she had no tears to shed;
She hugg'd it to her breast, and groan'd her last.

Eternity (William Blake)



William Blake

He who binds to himself a joy
Does the winged life destroy;
But he who kisses the joy as it flies
Lives in eternity's sun rise.

England! awake! awake! awake! (William Blake)



William Blake

England! awake! awake! awake!
Jerusalem thy Sister calls!
Why wilt thou sleep the sleep of death
And close her from thy ancient walls?

Thy hills and valleys felt her feet
Gently upon their bosoms move:
Thy gates beheld sweet Zion's ways:
Then was a time of joy and love.

And now the time returns again:
Our souls exult, and London's towers
Receive the Lamb of God to dwell
In England's green and pleasant bowers.

Address To The Scholars Of The Village School (William Wordsworth)



William Wordsworth

I come, ye little noisy Crew,
Not long your pastime to prevent;
I heard the blessing which to you
Our common Friend and Father sent.
I kissed his cheek before he died;
And when his breath was fled,
I raised, while kneeling by his side,
His hand:--it dropped like lead.
Your hands, dear Little-ones, do all
That can be done, will never fall
Like his till they are dead.
By night or day blow foul or fair,
Ne'er will the best of all your train
Play with the locks of his white hair,
Or stand between his knees again.
Here did he sit confined for hours;
But he could see the woods and plains,
Could hear the wind and mark the showers
Come streaming down the streaming panes.
Now stretched beneath his grass-green mound
He rests a prisoner of the ground.
He loved the breathing air,
He loved the sun, but if it rise
Or set, to him where now he lies,
Brings not a moment's care.
Alas! what idle words; but take
The Dirge which for our Master's sake
And yours, love prompted me to make.
The rhymes so homely in attire
With learned ears may ill agree,
But chanted by your Orphan Quire
Will make a touching melody.

DIRGE

Mourn, Shepherd, near thy old grey stone;
Thou Angler, by the silent flood;
And mourn when thou art all alone,
Thou Woodman, in the distant wood!

Thou one blind Sailor, rich in joy
Though blind, thy tunes in sadness hum;
And mourn, thou poor half-witted Boy!
Born deaf, and living deaf and dumb.

Thou drooping sick Man, bless the Guide
Who checked or turned thy headstrong youth,
As he before had sanctified
Thy infancy with heavenly truth.

Ye Striplings, light of heart and gay,
Bold settlers on some foreign shore,
Give, when your thoughts are turned this way,
A sigh to him whom we deplore.

For us who here in funeral strain
With one accord our voices raise,
Let sorrow overcharged with pain
Be lost in thankfulness and praise.

And when our hearts shall feel a sting
From ill we meet or good we miss,
May touches of his memory bring
Fond healing, like a mother's kiss.

BY THE SIDE OF THE GRAVE SOME YEARS AFTER

LONG time his pulse hath ceased to beat
But benefits, his gift, we trace--
Expressed in every eye we meet
Round this dear Vale, his native place.

To stately Hall and Cottage rude
Flowed from his life what still they hold,
Light pleasures, every day, renewed;
And blessings half a century old.

Oh true of heart, of spirit gay,
Thy faults, where not already gone
From memory, prolong their stay
For charity's sweet sake alone.

Such solace find we for our loss;
And what beyond this thought we crave
Comes in the promise from the Cross,
Shining upon thy happy grave.

A Wren's Nest (William Wordsworth)



William Wordsworth

AMONG the dwellings framed by birds
In field or forest with nice care,
Is none that with the little Wren's
In snugness may compare.

No door the tenement requires,
And seldom needs a laboured roof;
Yet is it to the fiercest sun
Impervious, and storm-proof.

So warm, so beautiful withal,
In perfect fitness for its aim,
That to the Kind by special grace
Their instinct surely came.

And when for their abodes they seek
An opportune recess,
The hermit has no finer eye
For shadowy quietness.

These find, 'mid ivied abbey-walls,
A canopy in some still nook;
Others are pent-housed by a brae
That overhangs a brook.

There to the brooding bird her mate
Warbles by fits his low clear song;
And by the busy streamlet both
Are sung to all day long.

Or in sequestered lanes they build,
Where, till the flitting bird's return,
Her eggs within the nest repose,
Like relics in an urn.

But still, where general choice is good,
There is a better and a best;
And, among fairest objects, some
Are fairer than the rest;

This, one of those small builders proved
In a green covert, where, from out
The forehead of a pollard oak,
The leafy antlers sprout;

For She who planned the mossy lodge,
Mistrusting her evasive skill,
Had to a Primrose looked for aid
Her wishes to fulfill.

High on the trunk's projecting brow,
And fixed an infant's span above
The budding flowers, peeped forth the nest
The prettiest of the grove!

The treasure proudly did I show
To some whose minds without disdain
Can turn to little things; but once
Looked up for it in vain:

'Tis gone---a ruthless spoiler's prey,
Who heeds not beauty, love, or song,
'Tis gone! (so seemed it) and we grieved
Indignant at the wrong.

Just three days after, passing by
In clearer light the moss-built cell
I saw, espied its shaded mouth;
And felt that all was well.

The Primrose for a veil had spread
The largest of her upright leaves;
And thus, for purposes benign,
A simple flower deceives.

Concealed from friends who might disturb
Thy quiet with no ill intent,
Secure from evil eyes and hands
On barbarous plunder bent,

Rest, Mother-bird! and when thy young
Take flight, and thou art free to roam,
When withered is the guardian Flower,
And empty thy late home,

Think how ye prospered, thou and thine,
Amid the unviolated grove
Housed near the growing Primrose-tuft
In foresight, or in love.

A Whirl-Blast from Behind the Hill (William Wordsworth)



William Wordsworth

A Whirl-Blast from behind the hill
Rushed o'er the wood with startling sound;
Then--all at once the air was still,
And showers of hailstones pattered round.
Where leafless oaks towered high above,
I sat within an undergrove
Of tallest hollies, tall and green;
A fairer bower was never seen.
From year to year the spacious floor
With withered leaves is covered o'er,
And all the year the bower is green.
But see! where'er the hailstones drop
The withered leaves all skip and hop;
There's not a breeze--no breath of air--
Yet here, and there, and everywhere
Along the floor, beneath the shade
By those embowering hollies made,
The leaves in myriads jump and spring,
As if with pipes and music rare
Some Robin Good-fellow were there,
And all those leaves, in festive glee,
Were dancing to the minstrelsy.

A Slumber Did My Spirit Seal (William Wordsworth)



William Wordsworth

A slumber did my spirit seal
I had no human fears:
She seemed a thing that could not feel
The touch of earthly years.

No motion has she now, no force;
She neither hears nor sees;
Rolled round in earth's diurnal course,
With rocks, and stones, and trees.

A Poet's Epitaph (William Wordsworth)



William Wordsworth

Art thou a Statist in the van
Of public conflicts trained and bred?
--First learn to love one living man;
'Then' may'st thou think upon the dead.

A Lawyer art thou?--draw not nigh!
Go, carry to some fitter place
The keenness of that practised eye,
The hardness of that sallow face.

Art thou a Man of purple cheer?
A rosy Man, right plump to see?
Approach; yet, Doctor, not too near,
This grave no cushion is for thee.

Or art thou one of gallant pride,
A Soldier and no man of chaff?
Welcome!--but lay thy sword aside,
And lean upon a peasant's staff.

Physician art thou? one, all eyes,
Philosopher! a fingering slave,
One that would peep and botanise
Upon his mother's grave?

Wrapt closely in thy sensual fleece,
O turn aside,--and take, I pray,
That he below may rest in peace,
Thy ever-dwindling soul, away!

A Moralist perchance appears;
Led, Heaven knows how! to this poor sod:
And he has neither eyes nor ears;
Himself his world, and his own God;

One to whose smooth-rubbed soul can cling
Nor form, nor feeling, great or small;
A reasoning, self-sufficing thing,
An intellectual All-in-all!

Shut close the door; press down the latch;
Sleep in thy intellectual crust;
Nor lose ten tickings of thy watch
Near this unprofitable dust.

But who is He, with modest looks,
And clad in homely russet brown?
He murmurs near the running brooks
A music sweeter than their own.

He is retired as noontide dew,
Or fountain in a noon-day grove;
And you must love him, ere to you
He will seem worthy of your love.

The outward shows of sky and earth,
Of hill and valley, he has viewed;
And impulses of deeper birth
Have come to him in solitude.

In common things that round us lie
Some random truths he can impart,--
The harvest of a quiet eye
That broods and sleeps on his own heart.

But he is weak; both Man and Boy,
Hath been an idler in the land;
Contented if he might enjoy
The things which others understand.

--Come hither in thy hour of strength;
Come, weak as is a breaking wave!
Here stretch thy body at full length;
Or build thy house upon this grave.

Sonnet CXLI (William Shakespeare)



William Shakespeare

In faith, I do not love thee with mine eyes,
For they in thee a thousand errors note;
But 'tis my heart that loves what they despise,
Who in despite of view is pleased to dote;

Sonnet CXL (William Shakespeare)



William Shakespeare

Be wise as thou art cruel; do not press
My tongue-tied patience with too much disdain;
Lest sorrow lend me words and words express
The manner of my pity-wanting pain.
If I might teach thee wit, better it were,
Though not to love, yet, love, to tell me so;
As testy sick men, when their deaths be near,
No news but health from their physicians know;
For if I should despair, I should grow mad,
And in my madness might speak ill of thee:
Now this ill-wresting world is grown so bad,
Mad slanderers by mad ears believed be,
That I may not be so, nor thou belied,
Bear thine eyes straight, though thy proud heart go wide.

Sonnet CXIX (William Shakespeare)



William Shakespeare

What potions have I drunk of Siren tears,
Distill'd from limbecks foul as hell within,
Applying fears to hopes and hopes to fears,
Still losing when I saw myself to win!
What wretched errors hath my heart committed,
Whilst it hath thought itself so blessed never!
How have mine eyes out of their spheres been fitted
In the distraction of this madding fever!
O benefit of ill! now I find true
That better is by evil still made better;
And ruin'd love, when it is built anew,
Grows fairer than at first, more strong, far greater.
So I return rebuked to my content
And gain by ill thrice more than I have spent.

Sonnet CXIV (William Shakespeare)



William Shakespeare

Or whether doth my mind, being crown'd with you,
Drink up the monarch's plague, this flattery?
Or whether shall I say, mine eye saith true,
And that your love taught it this alchemy,
To make of monsters and things indigest
Such cherubins as your sweet self resemble,
Creating every bad a perfect best,
As fast as objects to his beams assemble?
O,'tis the first; 'tis flattery in my seeing,
And my great mind most kingly drinks it up:
Mine eye well knows what with his gust is 'greeing,
And to his palate doth prepare the cup:
If it be poison'd, 'tis the lesser sin
That mine eye loves it and doth first begin.

Sonnet CXIII (William Shakespeare)



William Shakespeare

Since I left you, mine eye is in my mind;
And that which governs me to go about
Doth part his function and is partly blind,
Seems seeing, but effectually is out;
For it no form delivers to the heart
Of bird of flower, or shape, which it doth latch:
Of his quick objects hath the mind no part,
Nor his own vision holds what it doth catch:
For if it see the rudest or gentlest sight,
The most sweet favour or deformed'st creature,
The mountain or the sea, the day or night,
The crow or dove, it shapes them to your feature:
Incapable of more, replete with you,
My most true mind thus makes mine eye untrue.

Sonnet CXII (William Shakespeare)



William Shakespeare

Your love and pity doth the impression fill
Which vulgar scandal stamp'd upon my brow;
For what care I who calls me well or ill,
So you o'er-green my bad, my good allow?
You are my all the world, and I must strive
To know my shames and praises from your tongue:
None else to me, nor I to none alive,
That my steel'd sense or changes right or wrong.
In so profound abysm I throw all care
Of others' voices, that my adder's sense
To critic and to flatterer stopped are.
Mark how with my neglect I do dispense:
You are so strongly in my purpose bred
That all the world besides methinks are dead.

Sonnet CXI: O, for my sake do you with Fortune chide (William Shakespeare)



William Shakespeare

O, for my sake do you with Fortune chide,
The guilty goddess of my harmful deeds,
That did not better for my life provide
Than public means which public manners breeds.
Thence comes it that my name receives a brand,
And almost thence my nature is subdu'd
To what it works in, like the dyer's hand.
Pity me then and wish I were renew'd;
Whilst, like a willing patient, I will drink
Potions of eisel 'gainst my strong infection;
No bitterness that I will bitter think,
Nor double penance, to correct correction.
Pity me then, dear friend, and I assure ye
Even that your pity is enough to cure me.

Sonnet CXI (William Shakespeare)



William Shakespeare

O, for my sake do you with Fortune chide,
The guilty goddess of my harmful deeds,
That did not better for my life provide
Than public means which public manners breeds.
Thence comes it that my name receives a brand,
And almost thence my nature is subdued
To what it works in, like the dyer's hand:
Pity me then and wish I were renew'd;
Whilst, like a willing patient, I will drink
Potions of eisel 'gainst my strong infection
No bitterness that I will bitter think,
Nor double penance, to correct correction.
Pity me then, dear friend, and I assure ye
Even that your pity is enough to cure me.

Sonnet CX (William Shakespeare)



William Shakespeare

Alas, 'tis true I have gone here and there
And made myself a motley to the view,
Gored mine own thoughts, sold cheap what is most dear,
Made old offences of affections new;
Most true it is that I have look'd on truth
Askance and strangely: but, by all above,
These blenches gave my heart another youth,
And worse essays proved thee my best of love.
Now all is done, have what shall have no end:
Mine appetite I never more will grind
On newer proof, to try an older friend,
A god in love, to whom I am confined.
Then give me welcome, next my heaven the best,
Even to thy pure and most most loving breast.

Sonnet CVIII (William Shakespeare)



William Shakespeare

What's in the brain that ink may character
Which hath not figured to thee my true spirit?
What's new to speak, what new to register,
That may express my love or thy dear merit?
Nothing, sweet boy; but yet, like prayers divine,
I must, each day say o'er the very same,
Counting no old thing old, thou mine, I thine,
Even as when first I hallow'd thy fair name.
So that eternal love in love's fresh case
Weighs not the dust and injury of age,
Nor gives to necessary wrinkles place,
But makes antiquity for aye his page,
Finding the first conceit of love there bred
Where time and outward form would show it dead.

Poets of Biography List Page 1

1. Alfred, Lord Tennyson
2. Allen Ginsberg
3. Anne Sexton
4. Charls Bukowski
5. Christina Rossetti
6. Dante Gabriel Rossetti
7. Dorothy Parker
8. Dylan Thomas
9. Edgar Allan Poe
10. Edward Estlin Cummings
11. Elizabeth Bishop
12. Emily Dickinson
13. Gwendolyn Brooks
14. Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
15. John Keats
16. Khalil Gibran
17. Langston Hughes
18. Maya Angelou
19. Ogden Nash
20. Pablo Neruda
21. Percy Bysshe Shelley
22. Philip Larkin
23. Rabindranath Tagore
24. Rainer Maria Rilke
25. Roald Dahl
26. Robert Browning
27. Robert Burns
28. Robert Frost
29. Rupert Brooke
30. Seamus Heaney
31. Shel Silverstein
32. Sylvia Plath
33. Ted Hughes
34. Walt Whitman
35. William Blake
36. William Shakespeare
37. William Wordsworth
38. William Carlos William
39. Edna St. Vincent Millay
40. Tupac Shakur
41. Adrienne Rich
42. Hilary Mantel
43. William Stafford
44. William Cullen Bryant
45. William Henry Davies
46. William Ernest Henley
47. William Morris
48. William Cowper
49. William Allingham
50. William Topaz McGonagall


The Truth the Dead Know (Anne Sexton)



Anne Sexton

Gone, I say and walk from church,
refusing the stiff procession to the grave,
letting the dead ride alone in the hearse.
It is June. I am tired of being brave.

We drive to the Cape. I cultivate
myself where the sun gutters from the sky,
where the sea swings in like an iron gate
and we touch. In another country people die.

My darling, the wind falls in like stones
from the whitehearted water and when we touch
we enter touch entirely. No one's alone.
Men kill for this, or for as much.

And what of the dead? They lie without shoes
in the stone boats. They are more like stone
than the sea would be if it stopped. They refuse
to be blessed, throat, eye and knucklebone.