Gavotte

(Old French)

Memories long in music sleeping,
    No more sleeping,
        No more dumb;
Delicate phantoms softly creeping
    Softly back from the old-world come.

Faintest odours around them straying,
    Suddenly straying
        In chambers dim;
Whispering silks in order swaying,
    Glimmering gems on shoulders slim:

Courage advancing strong and tender,
    Grace untender
        Fanning desire;
Suppliant conquest, proud surrender,
    Courtesy cold of hearts on fire---

Willowy billowy now they're bending,
    Low they're bending
        Down-dropt eyes;
Stately measure and stately ending,
    Music sobbing, and a dream that dies.

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

From Generation To Generation

Henry John Newbolt, Simple Poetry

The Building Of The Temple

Henry John Newbolt, Simple Poetry

Ad Matrem Dolorosam

Henry John Newbolt, Simple Poetry

The Final Mystery

Henry John Newbolt, 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.

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

Among The Tombs

She is a lady fair and wise,
    Her heart her counsel keeps,
And well she knows of time that flies
    And tide that onward sweeps;
But still she sits with restless eyes
    Where Memory sleeps---
    Where Memory sleeps.

Ye that have heard the whispering dead
    In every wind that creeps,
Or felt the stir that strains the lead
    Beneath the mounded heaps,
Tread softly, ah! more softly tread
    Where Memory sleeps---
    Where Memory sleeps.

Henry John Newbolt

Imogen

(A Lady of Tender Age)

Ladies, where were your bright eyes glancing,
    Where were they glancing yester-night?
Saw ye Imogen dancing, dancing,
    Imogen dancing all in white?
    Laughed she not with a pure delight,
    Laughed she not with a joy serene,
Stepped she not with a grace entrancing,
    Slenderly girt in silken sheen?

All through the night from dusk to daytime
    Under her feet the hours were swift,
Under her feet the hours of play-time
    Rose and fell with a rhythmic lift:
    Music set her adrift, adrift,
    Music eddying towards the day
Swept her along as brooks in May-time
    Carry the freshly falling May.

Ladies, life is a changing measure,
    Youth is a lilt that endeth soon;
Pluck ye never so fast at ...

Henry John Newbolt

Memory's River

In Nature's bright blossoms not always reposes
    That strange subtle essence more rare than their bloom,
Which lies in the hearts of carnations and roses,
    That unexplained something by men called perfume.
Though modest the flower, yet great is its power
    And pregnant with meaning each pistil and leaf,
If only it hides there, if only abides there,
    The fragrance suggestive of love, joy, and grief.

Not always the air that a master composes
    Can stir human heart-strings with pleasure or pain.
But strange, subtle chords, like the scent of the roses,
    Breathe out of some measures, though simple the strain.
And lo! when you hear them, you love them and fear them,
    You tremble with anguish, you thrill with delight,
For back of them slumber old dreams...

Ella Wheeler Wilcox

A Duettist To Her Pianoforte Song Of Silence

(E. L. H. H. C. H.)


Since every sound moves memories,
How can I play you
Just as I might if you raised no scene,
By your ivory rows, of a form between
My vision and your time-worn sheen,
As when each day you
Answered our fingers with ecstasy?
So it's hushed, hushed, hushed, you are for me!

And as I am doomed to counterchord
Her notes no more
In those old things I used to know,
In a fashion, when we practised so,
"Good-night! Good-bye!" to your pleated show
Of silk, now hoar,
Each nodding hammer, and pedal and key,
For dead, dead, dead, you are to me!

I fain would second her, strike to her stroke,
As when she was by,
Aye, even from the ancient clamorous "Fall
Of Paris," or "Battle of Prague" withal,
To the "Rovin...

Thomas Hardy

The Beautiful Blue Danube.

        They drift down the hall together;
    He smiles in her lifted eyes;
        Like waves of that mighty river,
    The strains of the "Danube" rise.
        They float on its rhythmic measure
    Like leaves on a summer-stream;
        And here, in this scene of pleasure,
    I bury my sweet, dead dream.

        Through the cloud of her dusky tresses,
    Like a star, shines out her face,
        And the form his strong arm presses
    Is sylph like in its grace.
        As a leaf on the bounding river
    Is lost in the seething sea,
        I know that forever and ever
    My dream is lost to me.

        And still the viols are playing
    That grand old wordless rhyme;
        And still those two ate swaying
    In perfect ...

Ella Wheeler Wilcox