Werbung
by Franz Grillparzer (1791-1872)

Mädchen, willst du mir gehören,
So sprich ja, und schlag’ nur ein!
Kann nicht seufzen, kann nicht schwören,
Willst du! – Gut! – Wenn nicht, – mag’s sein!

Gold hab’ ich nicht aufzuweisen,
Aber Lieder zahlen auch;
Will dich loben, will dich preisen,
Wie’s bei Dichtern heit’rer Brauch.

Doch gefällt’s dir, einst zu brechen,
Thu’s mit Maß, und hüte dich!
Lied, das schmeichelt, kann auch stechen,
Dich verletzest du, nicht mich.

Dichters Gram ist bald verschlafen,
Seine Kunst ist todesreich,
Und die Lieder, die dich strafen,
Trösten heilend ihn zugleich.

Views: 36

A Square Poem
By Lewis Carroll (1832-1898)
Reading this poem vertically (the first word of each line, then the second word of each line and so on) yields the same poem as reading it in the normal way.

I often wondered when I cursed,
Often feared where I would be—
Wondered where she’d yield her love,
When I yield, so will she.
I would her will be pitied!
Cursed be love! She pitied me.

Views: 27

My Love Is Like to Ice
By Edmund Spenser(1552-1599)

My love is like to ice, and I to fire:
How comes it then that this her cold so great
Is not dissolved through my so hot desire,
But harder grows the more I her entreat?
Or how comes it that my exceeding heat
Is not allayed by her heart-frozen cold,
But that I burn much more in boiling sweat,
And feel my flames augmented manifold?
What more miraculous thing may be told,
That fire, which all things melts, should harden ice,
And ice, which is congealed with senseless cold,
Should kindle fire by wonderful device?
Such is the power of love in gentle mind,
That it can alter all the course of kind.

Views: 32

The Darkling Thrush
by Thomas Hardy (1840-1928)

I leant upon a coppice gate
      When Frost was spectre-gray,
And Winter’s dregs made desolate
      The weakening eye of day.
The tangled bine-stems scored the sky
      Like strings of broken lyres,
And all mankind that haunted nigh
      Had sought their household fires.

The land’s sharp features seemed to be
      The Century’s corpse outleant,
His crypt the cloudy canopy,
      The wind his death-lament.
The ancient pulse of germ and birth
      Was shrunken hard and dry,
And every spirit upon earth
      Seemed fervorless as I.

At once a voice arose among
      The bleak twigs overhead
In a full-hearted evensong
      Of joy illimited;
An aged thrush, frail, gaunt, and small,
      In blast-beruffled plume,
Had chosen thus to fling his soul
      Upon the growing gloom.

So little cause for carolings
      Of such ecstatic sound
Was written on terrestrial things
      Afar or nigh around.
That I could think there trembled through
      His happy good-night air
Some blessed Hope, whereof he knew
      And I was unaware.

Views: 31

Himna slobodi
by Ivan Gundulič (1589-1638)

O liepa, o draga, o slatka slobodo,
dar u kôm sva blaga višnji nam Bog je dô,
uzroče istini od naše sve slave,
uresu jedini od ove Dubrave,
sva srebra, sva zlata, svi ljudcki životi
ne mogu bit plata tvôj čistoj lipoti!

Views: 27

Little Ball of Yarn
Anonymous folk song
Because today is Distaff Day

One fine day in May, I took a walk one day
Down by my grandfather’s farm
I met a pretty maid and this is what I said
“May I wind up your little ball of yarn?”

I took this pretty maid underneath the shade
Not intending for to do any harm
I took her by surprise and I laid between her thighs
And I winded up her little ball of yarn.

This pretty maid she rose and she pulled on her clothes
And straight to her grandma she did run
And for me, I was never seen as I skipped across the green
After winding up her little ball of yarn.

Come all you young men, never step out after ten
Not intending for to do any harm
For as soon as they lie down, you’ve got to pay your sweet half crown
For the winding of the little ball of yarn.

Come all you young men, take a warning to what I said
Never rise up too early in the morn
For like the blackbird and the thrush
There’ll be someone behind the bush
That will wind up your little ball of yarn.

Views: 32

Fog
by Carl Sandburg (1878-1967)

The fog comes
on little cat feet.

It sits looking
over harbor and city
on silent haunches
and then moves on.

Views: 41

Ring Out, Wild Bells (In Memoriam, section CIV)
by Alfred Lord Tennyson (1809-1892)

Ring out, wild bells, to the wild sky,
      The flying cloud, the frosty light:
      The year is dying in the night;
Ring out, wild bells, and let him die.

Ring out the old, ring in the new,
      Ring, happy bells, across the snow:
      The year is going, let him go;
Ring out the false, ring in the true.

Ring out the grief that saps the mind
      For those that here we see no more;
      Ring out the feud of rich and poor,
Ring in redress to all mankind.

Ring out a slowly dying cause,
      And ancient forms of party strife;
      Ring in the nobler modes of life,
With sweeter manners, purer laws.

Ring out the want, the care, the sin,
      The faithless coldness of the times;
      Ring out, ring out my mournful rhymes
But ring the fuller minstrel in.

Ring out false pride in place and blood,
      The civic slander and the spite;
      Ring in the love of truth and right,
Ring in the common love of good.

Ring out old shapes of foul disease;
      Ring out the narrowing lust of gold;
      Ring out the thousand wars of old,
Ring in the thousand years of peace.

Ring in the valiant man and free,
      The larger heart, the kindlier hand;
      Ring out the darkness of the land,
Ring in the Christ that is to be.

Views: 30

The Thread of Life
by Christina Rossetti (1830-1894)

I

The irresponsive silence of the land,
The irresponsive sounding of the sea,
Speak both one message of one sense to me: —
Aloof, aloof, we stand aloof, so stand
Thou too aloof bound with the flawless band
Of inner solitude; we bind not thee;
But who from thy self-chain shall set thee free?
What heart shall touch thy heart? what hand thy hand? —
And I am sometimes proud and sometimes meek,
And sometimes I remember days of old
When fellowship seemed not so far to seek
And all the world and I seemed much less cold,
And at the rainbow’s foot lay surely gold,
And hope felt strong and life itself not weak.

II

Thus am I mine own prison. Everything
Around me free and sunny and at ease:
Or if in shadow, in a shade of trees
Which the sun kisses, where the gay birds sing
And where all winds make various murmuring;
Where bees are found, with honey for the bees;
Where sounds are music, and where silences
Are music of an unlike fashioning.
Then gaze I at the merrymaking crew,
And smile a moment and a moment sigh
Thinking: Why can I not rejoice with you?
But soon I put the foolish fancy by:
I am not what I have nor what I do;
But what I was I am, I am even I.

III

Therefore myself is that one only thing
I hold to use or waste, to keep or give;
My sole possession every day I live,
And still mine own despite Time’s winnowing.
Ever mine own, while moons and seasons bring
From crudeness ripeness mellow and sanitive;
Ever mine own, till Death shall ply his sieve;
And still mine own, when saints break grave and sing.
And this myself as king unto my King
I give, to Him Who gave Himself for me;
Who gives Himself to me, and bids me sing
A sweet new song of His redeemed set free;
He bids me sing: O death, where is thy sting?
And sing: O grave, where is thy victory?

Views: 39

The Old Familiar Faces
by Charles Lamb (1775-1834)

Where are they gone, the old familiar faces?
I had a mother, but she died, and left me,
Died prematurely in a day of horrors —
All, all are gone, the old familiar faces.

I have had playmates, I have had companions,
In my days of childhood, in my joyful school-days,
All, all are gone, the old familiar faces.

I have been laughing, I have been carousing,
Drinking late, sitting late, with my bosom cronies,
All, all are gone, the old familiar faces.

I loved a love once, fairest among women;
Closed are her doors on me, I must not see her —
All, all are gone, the old familiar faces.

I have a friend, a kinder friend has no man;
Like an ingrate, I left my friend abruptly;
Left him, to muse on the old familiar faces.

Ghost-like, I paced round the haunts of my childhood.
Earth seemed a desart I was bound to traverse,
Seeking to find the old familiar faces.

Friend of my bosom, thou more than a brother,
Why wert not thou born in my father’s dwelling?
So might we talk of the old familiar faces—

How some they have died, and some they have left me,
And some are taken from me; all are departed;
All, all are gone, the old familiar faces.

Views: 47