The Je ne sçay quoi. A Song
by William Whitehead (1715-1785)

Yes, I’m in love, I feel it now,
      And Cælia has undone me;
And yet I’ll swear I can’t tell how
      The pleasing plague stole on me.

’Tis not her face that love creates,
      For there no graces revel;
’Tis not her shape, for there the fates
      Have rather been uncivil.

’Tis not her air, for sure in that
      There’s nothing more than common;
And all her sense is only chat
      Like any other woman.

Her voice, her touch, might give th’ alarm—
      ’Twas both perhaps, or neither;
In short, ’twas that provoking charm
      Of Cælia altogether.

Views: 34

A Dark Day
by Dante Gabriel Rossetti (1828-1882)

The gloom that breathes upon me with these airs
      Is like the drops which strike the traveller’s brow
      Who knows not, darkling, if they bring him now
Fresh storm, or be old rain the covert bears.
Ah! bodes this hour some harvest of new tares,
      Or hath but memory of the day whose plough
      Sowed hunger once,—the night at length when thou,
O prayer found vain, didst fall from out my prayers?
How prickly were the growths which yet how smooth,
      Along the hedgerows of this journey shed,
Lie by Time’s grace till night and sleep may soothe!
      Even as the thistledown from pathsides dead
Gleaned by a girl in autumns of her youth,
      Which one new year makes soft her marriage-bed.

Views: 33

Spring
by Christopher Smart (1722-1771)

Now the winds are all composure.
      But the breath upon the bloom,
Blowing sweet o’er each inclosure
      Grateful off’rings of perfume.

Tansy, calaminth and daisies
      On the river’s margin thrive;
And accompany the mazes
      Of the stream that leaps alive.

Muse, accordant to the season.
      Give the numbers life and air;
When the sounds and objects reason
      In behalf of praise and pray’r.

All the scenes of nature quicken
      By the genial spirit fann’d;
And the painted beauties thicken.
      Colour’d by the master’s hand.

Earth her vigour repossessing
      As the blasts are held in ward,
Blessing heap’d and press’d on blessing.
      Yield the measure of the Lord.

Beeches, without order seemly,
      Shade the flow’rs of annual birth,
And the lily smiles supremely,
      Mention’d by the Lord on earth.

Couslips seize upon the fallow,
      And the cardamine in white,
Where the corn-flow’rs join the mallow,
      Joy and health, and thrift unite.

Study sits beneath her arbour,
      By the bason’s glossy side;
While the boat from out its harbour
      Exercise and pleasure guide-

Pray’r and praise be mine employment,
      Without grudging or regret;
Lasting life, and long enjoyment
      Are not here, and are not yet.

Hark! aloud, the black-bird whistles,
      With surrounding fragrance blest,
And the goldfinch in the thistles
      Makes provision for her nest.

Ev’n the hornet hives his honey,
      Bluecap builds his stately dome,
And the rocks supply the coney
      With a fortress and an home.

Views: 45

Mental Cases
by Wilfred Owen (1893-1918)

Who are these? Why sit they here in twilight?
Wherefore rock they, purgatorial shadows,
Drooping tongues from jaws that slob their relish,
Baring teeth that leer like skulls’ tongues wicked?
Stroke on stroke of pain,—but what slow panic,
Gouged these chasms round their fretted sockets?
Ever from their hair and through their hand palms
Misery swelters. Surely we have perished
Sleeping, and walk hell; but who these hellish?

—These are men whose minds the Dead have ravished.
Memory fingers in their hair of murders,
Multitudinous murders they once witnessed.
Wading sloughs of flesh these helpless wander,
Treading blood from lungs that had loved laughter.
Always they must see these things and hear them,
Batter of guns and shatter of flying muscles,
Carnage incomparable and human squander
Rucked too thick for these men’s extrication.

Therefore still their eyeballs shrink tormented
Back into their brains, because on their sense
Sunlight seems a bloodsmear; night comes blood-black;
Dawn breaks open like a wound that bleeds afresh.
—Thus their heads wear this hilarious, hideous,
Awful falseness of set-smiling corpses.
—Thus their hands are plucking at each other;
Picking at the rope-knouts of their scourging;
Snatching after us who smote them, brother,
Pawing us who dealt them war and madness.

Views: 57

Au Lecteur
by Charles Baudelaire (1821-1867)

La sottise, l’erreur, le péché, la lésine,
Occupent nos esprits et travaillent nos corps,
Et nous alimentons nos aimables remords,
Comme les mendiants nourrissent leur vermine.

Nos péchés sont têtus, nos repentirs sont lâches;
Nous nous faisons payer grassement nos aveux,
Et nous rentrons gaîment dans le chemin bourbeux,
Croyant par de vils pleurs laver toutes nos taches.

Sur l’oreiller du mal c’est Satan Trismégiste
Qui berce longuement notre esprit enchanté,
Et le riche métal de notre volonté
Est tout vaporisé par ce savant chimiste.

C’est le Diable qui tient les fils qui nous remuent!
Aux objets répugnants nous trouvons des appas;
Chaque jour vers l’Enfer nous descendons d’un pas,
Sans horreur, à travers des ténèbres qui puent.

Ainsi qu’un débauché pauvre qui baise et mange
Le sein martyrisé d’une antique catin,
Nous volons au passage un plaisir clandestin
Que nous pressons bien fort comme une vieille orange.

Serré, fourmillant, comme un million d’helminthes,
Dans nos cerveaux ribote un peuple de Démons,
Et, quand nous respirons, la Mort dans nos poumons
Descend, fleuve invisible, avec de sourdes plaintes.

Si le viol, le poison, le poignard, l’incendie,
N’ont pas encor brodé de leurs plaisants dessins
Le canevas banal de nos piteux destins,
C’est que notre âme, hélas! n’est pas assez hardie.

Mais parmi les chacals, les panthères, les lices,
Les singes, les scorpions, les vautours, les serpents,
Les monstres glapissants, hurlants, grognants, rampants,
Dans la ménagerie infâme de nos vices,

Il en est un plus laid, plus méchant, plus immonde!
Quoiqu’il ne pousse ni grands gestes ni grands cris,
Il ferait volontiers de la terre un débris
Et dans un bâillement avalerait le monde;

C’est l’Ennui! — L’œil chargé d’un pleur involontaire,
Il rêve d’échafauds en fumant son houka.
Tu le connais, lecteur, ce monstre délicat,
— Hypocrite lecteur, — mon semblable, — mon frère!

Views: 43

We Are Sevem
by William Wordsworth (1770-1850)

———A simple Child,
That lightly draws its breath,
And feels its life in every limb,
What should it know of death?

I met a little cottage Girl:
She was eight years old, she said;
Her hair was thick with many a curl
That clustered round her head.

She had a rustic, woodland air,
And she was wildly clad:
Her eyes were fair, and very fair;
—Her beauty made me glad.

“Sisters and brothers, little Maid,
How many may you be?”
“How many? Seven in all,” she said,
And wondering looked at me.

“And where are they? I pray you tell.”
She answered, “Seven are we;
And two of us at Conway dwell,
And two are gone to sea.

“Two of us in the church-yard lie,
My sister and my brother;
And, in the church-yard cottage, I
Dwell near them with my mother.”

“You say that two at Conway dwell,
And two are gone to sea,
Yet ye are seven! I pray you tell,
Sweet Maid, how this may be.”

Then did the little Maid reply,
“Seven boys and girls are we;
Two of us in the church-yard lie,
Beneath the church-yard tree.”

“You run about, my little Maid,
Your limbs they are alive;
If two are in the church-yard laid,
Then ye are only five.”

“Their graves are green, they may be seen,”
The little Maid replied,
“Twelve steps or more from my mother’s door,
And they are side by side.

“My stockings there I often knit,
My kerchief there I hem;
And there upon the ground I sit,
And sing a song to them.

“And often after sun-set, Sir,
When it is light and fair,
I take my little porringer,
And eat my supper there.

“The first that died was sister Jane;
In bed she moaning lay,
Till God released her of her pain;
And then she went away.

“So in the church-yard she was laid;
And, when the grass was dry,
Together round her grave we played,
My brother John and I.

“And when the ground was white with snow,
And I could run and slide,
My brother John was forced to go,
And he lies by her side.”

“How many are you, then,” said I,
“If they two are in heaven?”
Quick was the little Maid’s reply,
“O Master! we are seven.”

“But they are dead; those two are dead!
Their spirits are in heaven!”
’Twas throwing words away; for still
The little Maid would have her will,
And said, “Nay, we are seven!”

Views: 42

Jolly Good Ale and Old
by William Stevenson (1530?-1575)
because today is National Beer Day

I cannot eat but little meat,
         My stomach is not good;
But sure I think that I can drink
         With him that wears a hood.
Though I go bare, take ye no care,
         I nothing am a-cold;
I stuff my skin so full within
         Of jolly good ale and old.
                     Back and side go bare, go bare;
                     Both foot and hand go cold;
                     But, belly, God send thee good ale enough,
                     Whether it be new or old.

I love no roast but a nut-brown toast,
         And a crab laid in the fire;
A little bread shall do me stead;
         Much bread I not desire.
No frost nor snow, no wind, I trow,
         Can hurt me if I wold;
I am so wrapp’d and thoroughly lapp’d
         Of jolly good ale and old.
                     Back and side go bare, go bare;
                     Both foot and hand go cold;
                     But, belly, God send thee good ale enough,
                     Whether it be new or old.

And Tib, my wife, that as her life
         Loveth well good ale to seek,
Full oft drinks she till ye may see
         The tears run down her cheek:
Then doth she trowl to me the bowl
         Even as a maltworm should,
And saith, ’Sweetheart, I took my part
         Of this jolly good ale and old.’
                     Back and side go bare, go bare;
                     Both foot and hand go cold;
                     But, belly, God send thee good ale enough,
                     Whether it be new or old.

Now let them drink till they nod and wink,
         Even as good fellows should do;
They shall not miss to have the bliss
         Good ale doth bring men to;
And all poor souls that have scour’d bowls
         Or have them lustily troll’d,
God save the lives of them and their wives,
         Whether they be young or old.
                     Back and side go bare, go bare;
                     Both foot and hand go cold;
                     But, belly, God send thee good ale enough,
                     Whether it be new or old.

Views: 31

Elegy to the Memory of an Unfortunate Lady
by Alexander Pope (1688-1744)

What beck’ning ghost, along the moonlight shade
Invites my steps, and points to yonder glade?
’Tis she!—but why that bleeding bosom gored,
Why dimly gleams the visionary sword?
O, ever beauteous, ever friendly! tell,
Is it, in Heav’n, a crime to love too well?
To bear too tender or too firm a heart,
To act a lover’s or a Roman’s part?
Is there no bright reversion in the sky
For those who greatly think, or bravely die?
Why bade ye else, ye Pow’rs! her soul aspire
Above the vulgar flight of low desire?
Ambition first sprung from your blest abodes;
The glorious fault of angels and of gods;
Thence to their images on earth it flows,
And in the breasts of kings and heroes glows.
Most souls, ’tis true, but peep out once an age,
Dull sullen pris’ners in the body’s cage:
Dim lights of life, that burn a length of years,
Useless, unseen, as lamps in sepulchres;
Like Eastern kings a lazy state they keep,
And close confined to their own palace, sleep.
From these perhaps (ere Nature bade her die)
Fate snatch’d her early to the pitying sky.
As into air the purer spirits flow,
And sep’rate from their kindred dregs below,
So flew the soul to its congenial place,
Nor left one virtue to redeem her race.
But thou, false guardian of a charge too good!
Thou, mean deserter of thy brother’s blood!
See on these ruby lips the trembling breath,
These cheeks now fading at the blast of Death:
Cold is that breast which warm’d the world before,
And those love-darting eyes must roll no more.
Thus, if eternal Justice rules the ball,
Thus shall your wives, and thus your children fall;
On all the line a sudden vengeance waits,
And frequent herses shall besiege your gates.
There passengers shall stand, and pointing say
(While the long fun’rals blacken all the way),
’Lo! these were they whose souls the Furies steel’d
And cursed with hearts unknowing how to yield.’
Thus unlamented pass the proud away,
The gaze of fools, and pageant of a day!
So perish all whose breast ne’er learn’d to glow
For others’ good, or melt at others’ woe!
What can atone (O ever-injured shade!)
Thy fate unpitied, and thy rites unpaid?
No friend’s complaint, no kind domestic tear
Pleased thy pale ghost, or graced thy mournful bier.
By foreign hands thy dying eyes were closed,
By foreign hands thy decent limbs composed,
By foreign hands thy humble grave adorn’d,
By strangers honour’d, and by strangers mourn’d!
What tho’ no friends in sable weeds appear,
Grieve for an hour, perhaps, then mourn a year,
And bear about the mockery of woe
To midnight dances, and the public show?
What tho’ no weeping Loves thy ashes grace,
Nor polish’d marble emulate thy face?
What tho’ no sacred earth allow thee room,
Nor hallow’d dirge be mutter’d o’er thy tomb?
Yet shall thy grave with rising flow’rs be drest,
And the green turf lie lightly on thy breast:
There shall the morn her earliest tears bestow,
There the first roses of the year shall blow;
While angels with their silver wings o’ershade
The ground now sacred by thy reliques made.
So peaceful rests, without a stone, a name,
What once had beauty, titles, wealth, and fame.
How loved, how honour’d once, avails thee not,
To whom related, or by whom begot;
A heap of dust alone remains of thee,
’Tis all thou art, and all the proud shall be!
Poets themselves must fall, like those they sung,
Deaf the praised ear, and mute the tuneful tongue.
Ev’n he, whose soul now melts in mournful lays,
Shall shortly want the gen’rous tear he pays;
Then from this closing eyes thy form shall part,
And the last pang shall tear thee from his heart;
Life’s idle business at one gasp be o’er,
The Muse forgot, and thou beloved no more!

Views: 124

Sapphics
by Algernon Charles Swinburne (1837-1909)

All the night sleep came not upon my eyelids,
Shed not dew, nor shook nor unclosed a feather,
Yet with lips shut close and with eyes of iron
⁠         Stood and beheld me.

Then to me so lying awake a vision
Came without sleep over the seas and touched me,
Softly touched mine eyelids and lips; and I too,
⁠         Full of the vision,

Saw the white implacable Aphrodite,
Saw the hair unbound and the feet unsandalled
Shine as fire of sunset on western waters;
⁠         Saw the reluctant

Feet, the straining plumes of the doves that drew her,
Looking always, looking with necks reverted,
Back to Lesbos, back to the hills whereunder
⁠         Shone Mitylene;

Heard the flying feet of the Loves behind her
Make a sudden thunder upon the waters,
As the thunder flung from the strong unclosing
⁠         Wings of a great wind.

So the goddess fled from her place, with awful
Sound of feet and thunder of wings around her;
While behind a clamour of singing women
⁠         Severed the twilight.

Ah the singing, ah the delight, the passion!
All the Loves wept, listening; sick with anguish,
Stood the crowned nine Muses about Apollo;
⁠         Fear was upon them,

While the tenth sang wonderful things they knew not.
Ah the tenth, the Lesbian! the nine were silent,
None endured the sound of her song for weeping;
⁠         Laurel by laurel,

Faded all their crowns; but about her forehead,
Round her woven tresses and ashen temples
White as dead snow, paler than grass in summer,
⁠         Ravaged with kisses,

Shone a light of fire as a crown for ever.
Yea, almost the implacable Aphrodite
Paused, and almost wept; such a song was that song.
⁠         Yea, by her name too

Called her, saying, “Turn to me, O my Sappho;”
Yet she turned her face from the Loves, she saw not
Tears for laughter darken immortal eyelids,
⁠         Heard not about her

Fearful fitful wings of the doves departing,
Saw not how the bosom of Aphrodite
Shook with weeping, saw not her shaken raiment,
⁠         Saw not her hands wrung;

Saw the Lesbians kissing across their smitten
Lutes with lips more sweet than the sound of lute-strings,
Mouth to mouth and hand upon hand, her chosen,
⁠         Fairer than all men;

Only saw the beautiful lips and fingers,
Full of songs and kisses and little whispers,
Full of music; only beheld among them
⁠         Soar, as a bird soars

Newly fledged, her visible song, a marvel,
Made of perfect sound and exceeding passion,
Sweetly shapen, terrible, full of thunders,
⁠         Clothed with the wind’s wings.

Then rejoiced she, laughing with love, and scattered
Roses, awful roses of holy blossom;
Then the Loves thronged sadly with hidden faces
⁠         Round Aphrodite,

Then the Muses, stricken at heart, were silent;
Yea, the gods waxed pale; such a song was that song.
All reluctant, all with a fresh repulsion,
⁠         Fled from before her.

All withdrew long since, and the land was barren,
Full of fruitless women and music only.
Now perchance, when winds are assuaged at sunset,
⁠         Lulled at the dewfall,

By the grey sea-side, unassuaged, unheard of,
Unbeloved, unseen in the ebb of twilight,
Ghosts of outcast women return lamenting,
⁠         Purged not in Lethe,

Clothed about with flame and with tears, and singing
Songs that move the heart of the shaken heaven,
Songs that break the heart of the earth with pity,
⁠         Hearing, to hear them.

Views: 27

That Nature is a Heraclitean Fire and of the comfort of the Resurrection
by Gerard Manley Hopkins (1844-1889)

Cloud-Puffball, torn tufts, tossed pillows | flaunt forth, then chevy on an air-
built thoroughfare: heaven-roysterers, in gay-gangs | they throng; they glitter in marches.
Down roughcast, down dazzling whitewash, | wherever an elm arches,
Shivelights and shadowtackle in long | lashes lace, lance, and pair.
Delightfully the bright wind boisterous | ropes, wrestles, beats earth bare
Of yestertempest’s creases; in pool and rut peel parches
Squandering ooze to squeezed | dough, crust, dust; stanches, starches
Squadroned masks and manmarks | treadmire toil there
Footfretted in it. Million-fuelèd, | nature’s bonfire burns on.
But quench her bonniest, dearest | to her, her clearest-selvèd spark
Man, how fast his firedint, | his mark on mind, is gone!
Both are in an unfathomable, all is in an enormous dark
Drowned. O pity and indig | nation! Manshape, that shone
Sheer off, disseveral, a star, | death blots black out; nor mark
⁠                              Is any of him at all so stark
But vastness blurs and time | beats level. Enough! the Resurrection,
A heart’s-clarion! Away grief’s gasping, | joyless days, dejection.
⁠                              Across my foundering deck shone
A beacon, an eternal beam. | Flesh fade, and mortal trash
Fall to the residuary worm; | world’s wildfire, leave but ash:
⁠                              In a flash, at a trumpet crash,
I am all at once what Christ is, | since he was what I am, and
This Jack, joke, poor potsherd, | patch, matchwood, immortal diamond,
⁠                              Is immortal diamond.

Views: 20