From Generation To Generation

O Son of mine, when dusk shall find thee bending
    Between a gravestone and a cradle's head---
Between the love whose name is loss unending
    And the young love whose thoughts are liker dread,---
Thou too shalt groan at heart that all thy spending
    Cannot repay the dead, the hungry dead.

Henry John Newbolt

Sir Henry John Newbolt was an English poet and author, famous for his ballads such as 'Vitaï Lampada'. He graduated from Oxford and was called to the bar, but he is better remembered for his literary contributions than his legal career. Newbolt served as a government advisor on military and naval literature during World War I. He was knighted in 1915 for his services to literature. Newbolt's work often reflected themes of patriotism and duty.

Henry John Newbolt

The Mossrose

Henry John Newbolt, Simple Poetry

The School At War

Henry John Newbolt, Simple Poetry

Sir Hugh the Palmer

Henry John Newbolt, Simple Poetry

Egeria's Silence

Henry John Newbolt, Simple Poetry

English

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Thanatopsis.

To him who in the love of Nature holds
Communion with her visible forms, she speaks
A various language; for his gayer hours
She has a voice of gladness, and a smile
And eloquence of beauty, and she glides
Into his darker musings, with a mild
And healing sympathy, that steals away
Their sharpness, e're he is aware. When thoughts
Of the last bitter hour come like a blight
Over thy spirit, and sad images
Of the stern agony, and shroud, and pall,
And breathless darkness, and the narrow house,
Make thee to shudder, and grow sick at heart;
Go forth, under the open sky, and list
To Nature's teachings, while from all around,
Earth and her waters, and the depths of air,
Comes a still voice, Yet a few days, and thee
The all-beholding sun shall see no more
In a...

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When I Remember

When I remember that the day will come
    For this our love to quit his land of birth,
    And bid farewell to all the ways of earth
With lips that must for evermore be dumb,

Then creep I silent from the stirring hum,
    And shut away the music and the mirth,
    And reckon up what may be left of worth
When hearts are cold and love's own body numb.

Something there must be that I know not here,
Or know too dimly through the symbol dear;
    Some touch, some beauty, only guessed by this---
If He that made us loves, it shall replace,
Beloved, even the vision of thy face
    And deep communion of thine inmost kiss.

Henry John Newbolt

Ad Matrem Dolorosam

    Think not thy little fountain's rain
        That in the sunlight rose and flashed,
    From the bright sky has fallen again,
        To cold and shadowy silence dashed.
    The Joy that in her radiance leapt
    From everlasting hath not slept.

    The hand that to thy hand was dear,
        The untroubled eyes that mirrored thine,
    The voice that gave thy soul to hear
        A whisper of the Love Divine--
    What though the gold was mixed with dust?
    The gold is thine and cannot rust.

    Nor fear, because thy darling's heart
        No longer beats with mortal life,
    That she has missed the ennobling part
        Of human growth and human strife.
    Only she has the eternal peace
    Wherein to reap the soul's increase.

Henry John Newbolt

In Death Divided

I

    I shall rot here, with those whom in their day
    You never knew,
    And alien ones who, ere they chilled to clay,
    Met not my view,
Will in your distant grave-place ever neighbour you.

II

    No shade of pinnacle or tree or tower,
    While earth endures,
    Will fall on my mound and within the hour
    Steal on to yours;
One robin never haunt our two green covertures.

III

    Some organ may resound on Sunday noons
    By where you lie,
    Some other thrill the panes with other tunes
    Where moulder I;
No selfsame chords compose our common lullaby.

IV

    The simply-cut memorial at my head
    Perhaps may take
    A Gothic form, and that above your bed
    Be Greek in make;...

Thomas Hardy

Love and Grief.

    One day, when Love and Summer both were young,
        Love in a garden found my lady weeping;
    Whereat, when he to kiss her would have sprung,
        I stayed his childish leaping.

    "Forbear," said I, "she is not thine to-day;
        Subdue thyself in silence to await her;
    If thou dare call her from Death's side away
        Thou art no Love, but traitor.

    Yet did he run, and she his kiss received,
        "She is twice mine," he cried, "since she is troubled;
    I knew but half, and now I see her grieved
        My part in her is doubled."

Henry John Newbolt

Commemoration

I sat by the granite pillar, and sunlight fell
    Where the sunlight fell of old,
And the hour was the hour my heart remembered well,
    And the sermon rolled and rolled
As it used to roll when the place was still unhaunted,
And the strangest tale in the world was still untold.

And I knew that of all this rushing of urgent sound
    That I so clearly heard,
The green young forest of saplings clustered round
    Was heeding not one word:
Their heads were bowed in a still serried patience
Such as an angel's breath could never have stirred.

For some were already away to the hazardous pitch,
    Or lining the parapet wall,
And some were in glorious battle, or great and rich,
    Or throned in a college hall:
And among the rest was one like my own you...

Henry John Newbolt