A Suggestion, To C. A. D.

Let the wild red-rose bloom.    Though not to thee
    So delicately perfect as the white
    And unwed lily drooping in the light,
Though she has known the kisses of the bee
    And tells her amorous tale to passers-by
In perfumed whispers and with untaught grace,
Still let the red-rose bloom in her own place;
    She could not be the lily should she try.

Why to the wondrous nightingale cry hush
    Or bid her cease her wild heart-breaking lay,
    And tune her voice to imitate the way
The whip-poor-will makes music, or the thrush?
    All airs of sorrow to one theme belong,
And passion is not copyrighted yet.
Each heart writes its own music.    Why not let
    The nightingale unchided sing her song?

Ella Wheeler Wilcox

Ella Wheeler Wilcox was an American author and poet, born on November 5, 1850, and died on October 30, 1919. She was known for her works expressing optimistic views and moral lessons. Her most famous book was 'Poems of Passion'. Her poem 'Solitude' contains the famous lines, 'Laugh, and the world laughs with you; weep, and you weep alone'. Over her career, Wilcox became popularly known as a 'people's poet'.

Ella Wheeler Wilcox

Two Women

Ella Wheeler Wilcox, Simple Poetry

The River

Ella Wheeler Wilcox, Simple Poetry

Worn Out

Ella Wheeler Wilcox, Simple Poetry

Content And Happiness

Ella Wheeler Wilcox, Simple Poetry

English

Suggested Poems

Explore a curated selection of verses that share themes, styles, and emotional resonance with the poem you've just read.

Two Roses

A humble wild-rose, pink and slender,
    Was plucked and placed in a bright bouquet,
Beside a Jacqueminot's royal splendour,
    And both in my lady's boudoir lay.

Said the haughty bud, in a tone of scorning,
    "I wonder why you are called a rose?
Your leaves will fade in a single morning;
    No blood of mine in your pale cheek glows.

"Your coarse green stalk shows dust of the highway,
    You have no depths of fragrant bloom;
And what could you learn in a rustic byway
    To fit you to lie in my lady's room?

"If called to adorn her warm, white bosom,
    What have you to offer for such a place,
Beside my fragrant and splendid blossom,
    Ripe with colour and rich with grace?"

Said the sweet wild-rose, "Despite your dower
    ...

Ella Wheeler Wilcox

The Muse And The Poet

The Muse said, Let us sing a little song
    Wherein no hint of wrong,
No echo of the great world need, or pain,
    Shall mar the strain.
Lock fast the swinging portal of thy heart;
    Keep sympathy apart.
Sing of the sunset, of the dawn, the sea;
    Of any thing or nothing, so there be
No purpose to thy art.
    Yea, let us make, art for Art's sake.
And sing no more unto the hearts of men,
    But for the critic's pen.
With songs that are but words, sweet sounding words,
    Like joyous jargon of the birds.
Tune now thy lyre, O Poet, and sing on.
    Sing of

The Dawn

The Virgin Night, all languorous with dreams
    Of her beloved Darkness, rose in fear,
    Feeling the presence of another near.
Outside her curtained casement...

Ella Wheeler Wilcox

The Gossips

A rose in my garden, the sweetest and fairest,
    Was hanging her head through the long golden hours;
And early one morning I saw her tears falling,
    And heard a low gossiping talk in the bowers.
The yellow Nasturtium, a spinster all faded,
    Was telling a Lily what ailed the poor Rose:
"That wild roving Bee who was hanging about her,
    Has jilted her squarely, as every one knows.

"I knew when he came, with his singing and sighing,
    His airs and his speeches so fine and so sweet,
Just how it would end; but no one would believe me,
    For all were quite ready to fall at his feet."
"Indeed, you are wrong," said the Lily-belle proudly,
    "I cared nothing for him; he called on me once,
And would have come often, no doubt, if I'd asked him,
    But t...

Ella Wheeler Wilcox

The Gossips

A rose in my garden, the sweetest and fairest,
    Was hanging her head through the long golden hours;
And early one morning I saw her tears falling,
    And heard a low gossiping talk in the bowers.

The yellow Nasturtium, a spinster all faded,
    Was telling a Lily what ailed the poor Rose:
'That wild, roving Bee, who was hanging about her
    Has jilted her squarely, as every one knows.

'I knew when he came, with his singing and sighing,
    His airs and his speeches, so fine and so sweet,
Just how it would end; but no one would believe me,
    For all were quite ready to fall at his feet.'

'Indeed, you are wrong,' said the Lilybelle proudly,
    'I cared nothing for him.    He called on me once
And would have come often, no doubt, if I'd asked him....

Ella Wheeler Wilcox

The Tell-Tale Flowers

And has the Spring's all glorious eye
No lesson to the mind?
The birds that cleave the golden sky--
Things to the earth resigned--
Wild flowers that dance to every wind--
Do they no memory leave behind?

Aye, flowers! The very name of flowers,
That bloom in wood and glen,
Brings Spring to me in Winter's hours,
And childhood's dreams again.
The primrose on the woodland lea
Was more than gold and lands to me.

The violets by the woodland side
Are thick as they could thrive;
I've talked to them with childish pride
As things that were alive:
I find them now in my distress--
They seem as sweet, yet valueless.

The cowslips on the meadow lea,
How have I run for them!
I looked with wild and childish glee
Upon each golden gem:

John Clare

Come Into The Garde, Maud

Come into the garden, Maud,
For the black bat, Night, has flown,
Come into the garden, Maud,
I am here at the gate alone;
And the woodbine spices are wafted abroad,
And the musk of the roses blown.

For a breeze of morning moves,
And the planet of Love is on high,
Beginning to faint in the light that she loves
On a bed of daffodil sky,
To faint in the light of the sun she loves,
To faint in his light, and to die.

All night have the roses heard
The flute, violin, bassoon;
All night has the casement jessamine stirr'd
To the dancers dancing in tune:
Till a silence fell with the waking bird,
And a hush with the setting moon.

I said to the lily, "There is but one
With whom she has heart to be gay.
When will the dancers leave her...

Alfred Lord Tennyson