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: 43

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

On Newton
by Alexander Pope (1688-1744)

Nature, and Nature’s laws lay hid in night.
God said, Let Newton be! and all was light.

Views: 41

Dover Beach
by Matthew Arnold (1822-1888)

The sea is calm to-night.
The tide is full, the moon lies fair
Upon the straits; on the French coast, the light
Gleams and is gone; the cliffs of England stand,
Glimmering and vast, out in the tranquil bay.
Come to the window, sweet is the night-air!
Only, from the long line of spray
Where the sea meets the moon-blanched sand,
Listen! you hear the grating roar
Of pebbles which the waves draw back, and fling,
At their return, up the high strand,
Begin and cease, and then again begin,
With tremulous cadence slow, and bring
The eternal note of sadness in.

Sophocles long ago
Heard it on the Ægean, and it brought
Into his mind the turbid ebb and flow
Of human misery: we
Find also in the sound a thought,
Hearing it by this distant northern sea.

The sea of faith
Was once, too, at the full, and round earth’s shore
Lay like the folds of a bright girdle furled.
But now I only hear
Its melancholy, long, withdrawing roar,
Retreating, to the breath
Of the night-wind, down the vast edges drear
And naked shingles of the world.

Ah, love, let us be true
To one another! for the world, which seems
To lie before us like a land of dreams,
So various, so beautiful, so new,
Hath really neither joy, nor love, nor light,
Nor certitude, nor peace, nor help for pain;
And we are here as on a darkling plain
Swept with confused alarms of struggle and flight,
Where ignorant armies clash by night.

Views: 68

The Time Draws Near the Birth of Christ
In Memorian, Section XXVIII
by Alfred, Lord Tennyson (1809-1892)

The time draws near the birth of Christ:
      The moon is hid; the night is still;
      The Christmas bells from hill to hill
Answer each other in the mist.

Four voices of four hamlets round,
      From far and near, on mead and moor,
      Swell out and fail, as if a door
Were shut between me and the sound:

Each voice four changes on the wind,
      That now dilate, and now decrease,
      Peace and goodwill, goodwill and peace,
Peace and goodwill, to all mankind.

This year I slept and woke with pain,
      I almost wish’d no more to wake,
      And that my hold on life would break
Before I heard those bells again:

But they my troubled spirit rule,
      For they controll’d me when a boy;
      They bring me sorrow touch’d with joy,
The merry merry bells of Yule.

Views: 45

Ancient Music
by Ezra Pound (1885-1972)

Winter is icumen in,
Lhude sing Goddamm,
Raineth drop and staineth slop,
And how the wind doth ramm!
Sing: Goddamm.
Skiddeth bus and sloppeth us,
An ague hath my ham.
Freezeth river, turneth liver,
Damm you; Sing: Goddamm.
Goddamm, Goddamm, ’tis why I am, Goddamm,
So ‘gainst the winter’s balm.
Sing goddamm, damm, sing goddamm,
Sing goddamm, sing goddamm, DAMM.

Views: 28

Death
by Emily Brontë (1818-1848)

Death! that struck when I was most confiding
         In my certain faith of joy to be—
Strike again, Time’s withered branch dividing
         From the fresh root of Eternity!

Leaves, upon Time’s branch, were growing brightly,
         Full of sap, and full of silver dew;
Birds beneath its shelter gathered nightly;
         Daily round its flowers the wild bees flew.

Sorrow passed, and plucked the golden blossom;
         Guilt stripped off the foliage in its pride;
But, within its parent’s kindly bosom,
         Flowed for ever Life’s restoring tide.

Little mourned I for the parted gladness,
         For the vacant nest and silent song—
Hope was there, and laughed me out of sadness;
         Whispering, “Winter will not linger long!”

And, behold! with tenfold increase blessing,
         Spring adorned the beauty-burdened spray;
Wind and rain and fervent heat, caressing,
         Lavished glory on that second May!

High it rose—no winged grief could sweep it;
         Sin was scared to distance with its shine;
Love, and its own life, had power to keep it
         From all wrong—from every blight but thine!

Cruel Death! The young leaves droop and languish;
         Evening’s gentle air may still restore—
No! the morning sunshine mocks my anguish—
         Time, for me, must never blossom more!

Strike it down, that other boughs may flourish
         Where that perished sapling used to be;
Thus, at least, its mouldering corpse will nourish
         That from which it sprung—Eternity.

Views: 47

If All the Voices of Man
by Horace L. Traubel (1858-1919)

If all the voices of man called out warning you, and you could not join your voice with their voices,
If all the faces of men were turned one way and you met them face to face, you going another—
You still must not be persuaded to capitulation; you will remember that the road runs east as well as west.

Views: 129