Comfort

Say! You've struck a heap of trouble -
Bust in business, lost your wife;
No one cares a cent about you,
You don't care a cent for life;
Hard luck has of hope bereft you,
Health is failing, wish you'd die -
Why, you've still the sunshine left you,
And the big, blue sky.

Sky so blue it makes you wonder
If it's heaven shining through;
Earth so smiling 'way out yonder,
Sun so bright it dazzles you;
Birds a-singing, flowers a-flinging
All their fragrance on the breeze;
Dancing shadows, green, still meadows -
Don't you mope, you've still got these.

These, and none can take them from you;
These, and none can weigh their worth.
What! you're tired and broke and beaten? -
Why, you're rich - you've got the earth!
Yes, if you're a tramp in tatters,
While the blue sky bends above,
You've got nearly all that matters,
You've got God, and God is love.

Robert William Service

Robert William Service was a British-Canadian poet and writer, often referred to as 'the Bard of the Yukon.' He is best known for his poems about the Canadian North, particularly the Yukon Territory. Service's works include 'The Shooting of Dan McGrew' and 'The Cremation of Sam McGee,' which have contributed significantly to Canadian literature. His vivid and robust storytelling style, often dramatic and humorous, captivated audiences and made him a prominent literary figure of his time.

Robert William Service

Bill the Bomber

Robert William Service, Simple Poetry

The Song of the Camp-Fire

Robert William Service, Simple Poetry

The Harpy

Robert William Service, Simple Poetry

The Baldness of Chewed-Ear

Robert William Service, 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.

Cheer

    It's a mighty good world, so it is, dear lass,
    When even the worst is said.
    There's a smile and a tear, a sigh and a cheer,
    But better be living than dead;
    A joy and a pain, a loss and a gain;
    There's honey and may be some gall:
    Yet still I declare, foul weather or fair,
    It's a mighty good world after all.

    For look, lass! at night when I break from the fight,
    My Kingdom's awaiting for me;
    There's comfort and rest, and the warmth of your breast,
    And little ones climbing my knee.
    There's fire-light and song - Oh, the world may be wrong!
    Its empires may topple and fall:
    My home is my care - if gladness be there,
    It's a mighty good world after all.

    O heart of pure gold! I have made you...

Robert William Service

The World's All Right

        Be honest, kindly, simple, true;
        Seek good in all, scorn but pretence;
        Whatever sorrow come to you,
        Believe in Life's Beneficence!

    The World's all right; serene I sit,
    And cease to puzzle over it.
    There's much that's mighty strange, no doubt;
    But Nature knows what she's about;
    And in a million years or so
    We'll know more than to-day we know.
    Old Evolution's under way -
    What ho! the World's all right, I say.

    Could things be other than they are?
    All's in its place, from mote to star.
    The thistledown that flits and flies
    Could drift no hair-breadth otherwise.
    What is, must be; with rhythmic laws
    All Nature chimes, Effect and Cause.
    The sand-gra...

Robert William Service

A Rolling Stone

    There's sunshine in the heart of me,
    My blood sings in the breeze;
    The mountains are a part of me,
    I'm fellow to the trees.
    My golden youth I'm squandering,
    Sun-libertine am I;
    A-wandering, a-wandering,
    Until the day I die.

    I was once, I declare, a Stone-Age man,
    And I roomed in the cool of a cave;
    I have known, I will swear, in a new life-span,
    The fret and the sweat of a slave:
    For far over all that folks hold worth,
    There lives and there leaps in me
    A love of the lowly things of earth,
    And a passion to be free.

    To pitch my tent with no prosy plan,
    To range and to change at will;
    To mock at the mastership of man,
    To seek Adventure's thrill.
...

Robert William Service

The Telegraph Operator

I will not wash my face;
I will not brush my hair;
I "pig" around the place -
There's nobody to care.
Nothing but rock and tree;
Nothing but wood and stone,
Oh, God, it's hell to be
Alone, alone, alone!

Snow-peaks and deep-gashed draws
Corral me in a ring.
I feel as if I was
The only living thing
On all this blighted earth;
And so I frowst and shrink,
And crouching by my hearth
I hear the thoughts I think.

I think of all I miss -
The boys I used to know;
The girls I used to kiss;
The coin I used to blow:
The bars I used to haunt;
The racket and the row;
The beers I didn't want
(I wish I had 'em now).

Day after day the same,
Only a little worse;
No one to grouch or blame -
Oh, for a loving...

Robert William Service

The Joy of Little Things

It's good the great green earth to roam,
Where sights of awe the soul inspire;
But oh, it's best, the coming home,
The crackle of one's own hearth-fire!
You've hob-nobbed with the solemn Past;
You've seen the pageantry of kings;
Yet oh, how sweet to gain at last
The peace and rest of Little Things!

Perhaps you're counted with the Great;
You strain and strive with mighty men;
Your hand is on the helm of State;
Colossus-like you stride . . . and then
There comes a pause, a shining hour,
A dog that leaps, a hand that clings:
O Titan, turn from pomp and power;
Give all your heart to Little Things.

Go couch you childwise in the grass,
Believing it's some jungle strange,
Where mighty monsters peer and pass,
Where beetles roam and spiders r...

Robert William Service

Son

He hurried away, young heart of joy, under our Devon sky!
And I watched him go, my beautiful boy, and a weary woman was I.
For my hair is grey, and his was gold; he'd the best of his life to live;
And I'd loved him so, and I'm old, I'm old; and he's all I had to give.

Ah yes, he was proud and swift and gay, but oh how my eyes were dim!
With the sun in his heart he went away, but he took the sun with him.
For look! How the leaves are falling now, and the winter won't be long. . . .
Oh boy, my boy with the sunny brow, and the lips of love and of song!

How we used to sit at the day's sweet end, we two by the firelight's gleam,
And we'd drift to the Valley of Let's Pretend, on the beautiful river of Dream.
Oh dear little heart! All wealth untold would I gladly, gladly pay
Coul...

Robert William Service