Discover the captivating beauty of poetry

Although I can see him still,
The freckled man who goes
To a grey place on a hill
In grey Connemara clothes
At dawn to cast his flies,
It’s long since I began
To call up to the eyes
This wise and simple man.
All day I’d looked in the face
What I had hoped ’twould be
To write for my own race
And the reality;
The living men that I hate,
The dead man that I loved,
The craven man in his seat,
The insolent unreproved,
And no knave brought to book
Who has won a drunken cheer,
The witty man and his joke
Aimed at the commonest ear,
The clever man who cries
The catch-cries of the clown,
The beating down of the wise
And great Art beaten down.

Maybe a twelvemonth since
Suddenly I began,
In scorn of this audience,

When with clanging and with ringing
    Comes the year's initial day,
I can feel the rhythmic swinging
    Of the world upon its way;
And though Right still wears a fetter,
    And though Justice still is blind,
Time's beyond is always better
    Than the paths he leaves behind.

In our eons of existence,
    As we circle through the night,
We annihilate the distance
    'Twixt the darkness and the light.
From beginnings crude and lowly,
    Round and round our souls have trod
Through the circles, winding slowly
    Up to knowledge and to God.

With each century departed
    Some old evil found a tomb,
Some old truth was newly started
    In propitious soil to bloom.
With each epoch some condition
    That has handicapped the...

When have I last looked on
The round green eyes and the long wavering bodies
Of the dark leopards of the moon?
All the wild witches, those most noble ladies,
For all their broom-sticks and their tears,
Their angry tears, are gone.
The holy centaurs of the hills are banished;
I have nothing but the harsh sun;
Heroic mother moon has vanished,
And now that I have come to fifty years
I must endure the timid sun.

“Now, welcome, welcome, masters mine,
Thrice welcome to the noble chase,
Nor earthly sport, nor sport divine,
Can take such honourable place.”
- Ballad of the Wild Huntsman. (Free Translation.)


I remember some words my father said,
When I was an urchin vain;
God rest his soul, in his narrow bed
These ten long years he hath lain.
When I think one drop of the blood he bore
This faint heart surely must hold,
It may be my fancy and nothing more,
But the faint heart seemeth bold.

He said that as from the blood of grape,
Or from juice distilled from the grain,
False vigour, soon to evaporate,
Is lent to nerve and brain,
So the coward will dare on the gallant horse
What he never would dare alone,
Because he exults in a borrowed force,...

Up to the Hall, my lady there'll wear her satin gown,
For little Miss and Master'll be coming down from town.
Oh ay, the childern's coming! The CHILDERN did I say?
Of course, they're man and woman grown, this many and many a day.
But still, my lady's mouth do smile, and squire looks fit to sing,
As Master John and Miss Elaine is coming Mothering.

Then down to Farmer Westacott's, there's doings fine and grand,
Because young Jake is coming home from sea, you understand.
Put into port but yesternight, and when he steps ashore,
'Tis coming home the laddie is, to Somer- set once more.
And so her's baking spicy cakes, and stirring raisins in,
To welcome of her only chick, who's coming Mothering.

And what of we? And ain't we got no childern for to come?
Well, yes! There...

Thy relics, Rowe, to this fair urn we trust,
And sacred place by Dryden's awful dust:
Beneath a rude and nameless stone he lies,
To which thy tomb shall guide inquiring eyes.
Peace to thy gentle shade, and endless rest!
Blest in thy genius, in thy love, too, blest!
One grateful woman to thy fame supplies
What a whole thankless land to his denies.

    Lord Jesus,
    Oh, ease us
    Of Self that oppresses,
    Annoys and distresses
    Body and brain
    With dull pain!
    Thou never,
    Since ever,
    Save one moment only,
    Wast left, or wast lonely:
    We are alone,
    And make moan.

    Far parted,
    Dull-hearted,
    We wander, sleep-walking,
    Mere shadows, dim-stalking:
    Orphans we roam,
    Far from home.

    Oh new man,
    Sole human,
    God's son, and our brother,
    Give each to the other--
    No one left out
    In cold doubt!

    High Father,
    Oh gather
    Thy sons and thy daughters,
    Through fires and through waters,
    Home to the nest
    Of thy breast!

    There under<...

Blithe dreams arise to greet us,
And life feels clean and new,
For the old love comes to meet us
In the dawning and the dew.
O'erblown with sunny shadows,
O'ersped with winds at play,
The woodlands and the meadows
Are keeping holiday.
Wild foals are scampering, neighing,
Brave merles their hautboys blow:
Come! let us go a-maying
As in the Long-Ago.

Here we but peak and dwindle:
The clank of chain and crane,
The whir of crank and spindle
Bewilder heart and brain;
The ends of our endeavour
Are merely wealth and fame,
Yet in the still Forever
We're one and all the same;
Delaying, still delaying,
We watch the fading west:
Come! let us go a-maying,
Nor fear to take the best.

Yet beautiful and spacious
The wis...