Ballade Of An Anti-Puritan, A

They spoke of Progress spiring round,
Of Light and Mrs. Humphry Ward,
It is not true to say I frowned,
Or ran about the room and roared;
I might have simply sat and snored,
I rose politely in the club
And said, "I feel a little bored;
Will someone take me to a pub?"

The new world's wisest did surround
Me; and it pains me to record
I did not think their views profound,
Or their conclusions well assured;
The simple life I can't afford,
Besides, I do not like the grub,
I want a mash and sausage, "scored"
Will someone take me to a pub?

I know where Men can still be found,
Anger and clamorous accord,
And virtues growing from the ground,
And fellowship of beer and board,
And song, that is a sturdy cord,
And hope, that is a hardy shrub,
And goodness, that is God's last word,
Will someone take me to a pub?

                    ENVOI

Prince, Bayard would have smashed his sword
To see the sort of knights you dub,
Is that the last of them, O Lord!
Will someone take me to a pub?

Gilbert Keith Chesterton

Gilbert Keith Chesterton, commonly known as G.K. Chesterton, was an influential English writer, poet, and philosopher. Renowned for his distinctive writing style, lively wit, and thought-provoking essays, Chesterton made significant contributions to literature. He authored numerous books, including the widely acclaimed "Father Brown" series of detective stories. Chesterton's work continues to captivate and inspire readers with its depth, humor, and intellectual richness.

Gilbert Keith Chesterton

Fantasia

Gilbert Keith Chesterton, Simple Poetry

An Alliance

Gilbert Keith Chesterton, Simple Poetry

A Certain Evening

Gilbert Keith Chesterton, Simple Poetry

Modern Elfland

Gilbert Keith Chesterton, 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.

On The Disastrous Spread Of Æstheticism In All Classes.

Impetuously I sprang from bed,
Long before lunch was up,
That I might drain the dizzy dew
From day's first golden cup.



In swift devouring ecstacy
Each toil in turn was done;
I had done lying on the lawn
Three minutes after one.

For me, as Mr. Wordsworth says,
The duties shine like stars;
I formed my uncle's character,
Decreasing his cigars.

But could my kind engross me? No!
Stern Art--what sons escape her?
Soon I was drawing Gladstone's nose
On scraps of blotting paper.



Then on--to play one-fingered tunes
Upon my aunt's piano.
In short, I have a headlong soul,
I much resemble Hanno.

(Forgive the entrance of the not
Too cogent Carthaginian.
It may have been to make a rhyme;

Gilbert Keith Chesterton

The Quest Eternal

O west of all that a man holds dear, on the edge of the Kingdom Come,
Where carriage is far too high for beer, and the pubs keep only rum,
On the sunburnt ways of the Outer Back, on the plains of the darkening scrub,
I have followed the wandering teamster's track, and it always led to a pub.

There's always in man some gift to show, some power he can command,
And mine is the Gift that I always know when a pub is close at hand;
I can pick them out on the London streets, though most of their pubs are queer,
Such solid-looking and swell retreats, with never a sign of beer.

In the march of the boys through Palestine when the noontide fervour glowed,
Over the desert in thirsty line our sunburnt squadrons rode.
They looked at the desert lone and drear, stone ridges and stunted scrub,<...

Andrew Barton Paterson

At The Road-House: In Memory Of Robert Louis Stevenson.

You hearken, fellows? Turned aside
Into the road-house of the past!
The prince of vagabonds is gone
To house among his peers at last.

The stainless gallant gentleman,
So glad of life, he gave no trace,
No hint he even once beheld
The spectre peering in his face;

But gay and modest held the road,
Nor feared the Shadow of the Dust;
And saw the whole world rich with joy,
As every valiant farer must.

I think that old and vasty inn
Will have a welcome guest to-night,
When Chaucer, breaking off some tale
That fills his hearers with delight,

Shall lift up his demure brown eyes
To bid the stranger in; and all
Will turn to greet the one on whom
The crystal lot was last to fall.

Keats of the more than mortal tongue
...

Bliss Carman

Ballade Of Suicide, A

The gallows in my garden, people say,
Is new and neat and adequately tall.
I tie the noose on in a knowing way
As one that knots his necktie for a ball;
But just as all the neighbours, on the wall,
Are drawing a long breath to shout "Hurray!"
The strangest whim has seized me.... After all
I think I will not hang myself to-day.

To-morrow is the time I get my pay,
My uncle's sword is hanging in the hall,
I see a little cloud all pink and grey,
Perhaps the rector's mother will not call,
I fancy that I heard from Mr. Gall
That mushrooms could be cooked another way,
I never read the works of Juvenal,
I think I will not hang myself to-day.

The world will have another washing day;
The decadents decay; the pedants pall;
And H. G. Wells has...

Gilbert Keith Chesterton

Bob Polter

Bob Polter was a navvy, and
His hands were coarse, and dirty too,
His homely face was rough and tanned,
His time of life was thirty-two.

He lived among a working clan
(A wife he hadn't got at all),
A decent, steady, sober man
No saint, however not at all.

He smoked, but in a modest way,
Because he thought he needed it;
He drank a pot of beer a day,
And sometimes he exceeded it.

At times he'd pass with other men
A loud convivial night or two,
With, very likely, now and then,
On Saturdays, a fight or two.

But still he was a sober soul,
A labor-never-shirking man,
Who paid his way upon the whole
A decent English working man.

One day, when at the Nelson's Head,
(For which he may be blamed of you)
A holy m...

William Schwenck Gilbert

Beer.

In those old days which poets say were golden -
(Perhaps they laid the gilding on themselves:
And, if they did, I'm all the more beholden
To those brown dwellers in my dusty shelves,
Who talk to me "in language quaint and olden"
Of gods and demigods and fauns and elves,
Pans with his pipes, and Bacchus with his leopards,
And staid young goddesses who flirt with shepherds:)

In those old days, the Nymph called Etiquette
(Appalling thought to dwell on) was not born.
They had their May, but no Mayfair as yet,
No fashions varying as the hues of morn.
Just as they pleased they dressed and drank and ate,
Sang hymns to Ceres (their John Barleycorn)
And danced unchaperoned, and laughed unchecked,
And were no doubt extremely incorrect.

Yet do I think their t...

Charles Stuart Calverley