Never-To-Be

Down by the waters of the sea,
Reigns the King of Never-to-be.
His palace walls are black with night;
His torches star and moonès light,
And for his timepiece deep and grave
Beats on the green unhastening wave.

Windswept are his high corridors;
His pleasance the sea-mantled shores;
For sentinel a shadow stands
With hair in heaven, and cloudy hands;
And round his bed, king's guards to be,
Watch pines in iron solemnity.

His hound is mute; his steed at will
Roams pastures deep with asphodel;
His queen is to her slumber gone;
His courtiers mute lie, hewn in stone;
He hath forgot where he did hide
His sceptre in the mountain-side.

Grey-capped and muttering, mad is he -
The childless King of Never-to-be;
For all his people in the deep
Keep everlasting fast asleep;
And all his realm is foam and rain,
Whispering of what comes not again.

Walter De La Mare

Walter De La Mare was an English poet, short story writer, and novelist, best remembered for his works for children and his poem "The Listeners". Born in 1873 in Charlton, Kent, De La Mare's unique blend of haunting, dreamlike imagery and masterful command of language earned him a lasting place in English literature. He was awarded the Order of Merit in 1953, and his works continue to be celebrated for their ethereal and evocative quality.

Walter De La Mare

Envoy

Walter De La Mare, Simple Poetry

The Ogre

Walter De La Mare, Simple Poetry

Betrayal

Walter De La Mare, Simple Poetry

Dame Hickory

Walter De La Mare, 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.

Never More, Sailor

Never more, Sailor,
Shalt thou be
Tossed on the wind-ridden,
Restless sea.
Its tides may labour;
All the world
Shake 'neath that weight
Of waters hurled:
But its whole shock
Can only stir
Thy dust to a quiet
Even quieter.
Thou mock'd'st at land
Who now art come
To such a small
And shallow home;
Yet bore the sea
Full many a care
For bones that once
A sailor's were.
And though the grave's
Deep soundlessness
Thy once sea-deafened
Ear distress,
No robin ever
On the deep
Hopped with his song
To haunt thy sleep.

Walter De La Mare

Hamlet

Umbrageous cedars murmuring symphonies
Stooped in late twilight o'er dark Denmark's Prince:
He sat, his eyes companioned with dream -
Lustrous large eyes that held the world in view
As some entrancèd child's a puppet show.
Darkness gave birth to the all-trembling stars,
And a far roar of long-drawn cataracts,
Flooding immeasurable night with sound.
He sat so still, his very thoughts took wing,
And, lightest Ariels, the stillness haunted
With midge-like measures; but, at last, even they
Sank 'neath the influences of his night.
The sweet dust shed faint perfume in the gloom;
Through all wild space the stars' bright arrows fell
On the lone Prince - the troubled son of man -
On Time's dark waters in unearthly trouble:
Then, as the roar increased, and one fair towe...

Walter De La Mare

The Tryst

Flee into some forgotten night and be
Of all dark long my moon-bright company:
Beyond the rumour even of Paradise come,
There, out of all remembrance, make our home:
Seek we some close hid shadow for our lair,
Hollowed by Noah's mouse beneath the chair
Wherein the Omnipotent, in slumber bound,
Nods till the piteous Trump of Judgment sound.
Perchance Leviathan of the deep sea
Would lease a lost mermaiden's grot to me,
There of your beauty we would joyance make -
A music wistful for the sea-nymph's sake:
Haply Elijah, o'er his spokes of fire,
Cresting steep Leo, or the heavenly Lyre,
Spied, tranced in azure of inanest space,
Some eyrie hostel, meet for human grace,
Where two might happy be - just you and I -
Lost in the uttermost of Eternity.
Think! In...

Walter De La Mare

Foreboding

Thou canst not see him standing by -
Time - with a poppied hand
Stealing thy youth's simplicity,
Even as falls unceasingly
His waning sand.

He will pluck thy childish roses, as
Summer from her bush
Strips all the loveliness that was;
Even to the silence evening has
Thy laughter hush.

Thy locks too faint for earthly gold,
The meekness of thine eyes,
He will darken and dim, and to his fold
Drive, 'gainst the night, thy stainless, old
Innocencies;

Thy simple words confuse and mar,
Thy tenderest thoughts delude,
Draw a long cloud athwart thy star,
Still with loud timbrels heaven's far
Faint interlude.

Thou canst not see; I see, dearest;
O, then, yet patient be,
Though love refuse thy heart all rest,
Though...

Walter De La Mare

Thule

If thou art sweet as they are sad
Who on the shores of Time's salt sea
Watch on the dim horizon fade
Ships bearing love to night and thee;

If past all beacons Hope hath lit
In the dark wanderings of the deep
They who unwilling traverse it
Dream not till dawn unseal their sleep;

Ah, cease not in thy winds to mock
Us, who yet wake, but cannot see
Thy distant shores; who at each shock
Of the waves' onset faint for thee!

Walter De La Mare

The Dark Chateau

In dreams a dark château
Stands ever open to me,
In far ravines dream-waters flow,
Descending soundlessly;
Above its peaks the eagle floats,
Lone in a sunless sky;
Mute are the golden woodland throats
Of the birds flitting by.

No voice is audible. The wind
Sleeps in its peace.
No flower of the light can find
Refuge 'neath its trees;
Only the darkening ivy climbs
Mingled with wilding rose,
And cypress, morn and evening, time's
Black shadow throws.

All vacant, and unknown;
Only the dreamer steps
From stone to hollow stone,
Where the green moss sleeps,
Peers at the river in its deeps,
The eagle lone in the sky,
While the dew of evening drips,
Coldly and silently.

Would that I could press in! -
Into ea...

Walter De La Mare