On The Birth Of A Friend's Child

Mark the day white, on which the Fates have smiled:
Eugenio and Egeria have a child.
On whom abundant grace kind Jove imparts
If she but copy either parent's parts.
Then, Muses! long devoted to her race,
Grant her Egeria's virtues and her face;
Nor stop your bounty there, but add to it
Eugenio's learning and Eugenio's wit.

Ernest Christopher Dowson

Ernest Christopher Dowson, a notable English poet of the late 19th century, was associated with the Decadent movement. Renowned for his melancholic and evocative verse, he significantly influenced 20th-century literature. Despite struggling with poverty and alcoholism, Dowson's work, including the famous phrase "days of wine and roses," endures. He faced immense personal tragedies, losing both parents within a year, which plunged him into deeper despair. Dowson's legacy persists through his deeply moving poetry that captures the fragility of life and love.

Ernest Christopher Dowson

To A Lost Love

Ernest Christopher Dowson, Simple Poetry

Extreme Unction

Ernest Christopher Dowson, Simple Poetry

Carthusians

Ernest Christopher Dowson, Simple Poetry

Seraphita

Ernest Christopher Dowson, 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.

To A Friend On His Nuptials

When Jove lay bless'd in his Alcmæna's charms,
Three nights in one he press'd her in his arms;
The sun lay set, and conscious nature strove
To shade her god, and to prolong his love.
From that auspicious night Alcides came;
What less could rise from Jove and such a dame?
May this auspicious night with that compare,
Nor less the joys, nor less the rising heir,
He strong as Jove, she like Alcmæna fair.

Matthew Prior

To . Upon The Birth Of Her First-Born Child, March 1833

"Tum porro puer, ut saevis projectus ab undis
Navita, nudus humi jacet, etc." Lucretius.



Like a shipwrecked Sailor tost
By rough waves on a perilous coast,
Lies the Babe, in helplessness
And in tenderest nakedness,
Flung by labouring nature forth
Upon the mercies of the earth.
Can its eyes beseech? no more
Than the hands are free to implore:
Voice but serves for one brief cry;
Plaint was it? or prophecy
Of sorrow that will surely come?
Omen of man's grievous doom!

But, O Mother! by the close
Duly granted to thy throes;
By the silent thanks, now tending
Incense-like to Heaven, descending
Now to mingle and to move
With the gush of earthly love,
As a debt to that frail Creature,
Instrument of struggling Nature

William Wordsworth

Connubii Flores, Or The Well-Wishes At Weddings.

Chorus Sacerdotum. From the temple to your home
May a thousand blessings come!
And a sweet concurring stream
Of all joys to join with them.

Chorus Juvenum. Happy Day,
Make no long stay
        Here
        In thy sphere;
        But give thy place to Night,
        That she,
        As thee,
        May be
Partaker of this sight.
And since it was thy care
To see the younglings wed,
'Tis fit that Night the pair
Should see safe brought to bed.

Chorus Senum. Go to your banquet then, but use delight,
So as to rise still with an appetite.
Love is a thing most nice, and must be fed
To such a height, but never surfeited.
What is beyond the mean is ever ill:
'Tis best to feed Love, but not overfill;...

Robert Herrick

The Birth Of Love

When Love was born of heavenly line,
What dire intrigues disturbed Cythera's joy!
Till Venus cried, "A mother's heart is mine;
None but myself shall nurse my boy,"

But, infant as he was, the child
In that divine embrace enchanted lay;
And, by the beauty of the vase beguiled,
Forgot the beverage--and pined away.

"And must my offspring languish in my sight?"
(Alive to all a mother's pain,
The Queen of Beauty thus her court addressed)
"No: Let the most discreet of all my train
Receive him to her breast:
Think all, he is the God of young delight."

Then TENDERNESS with CANDOUR joined,
And GAIETY the charming office sought;
Nor even DELICACY stayed behind:
But none of those fair Graces brought

Wherewith to nurse the child--and still...

William Wordsworth

To A Young Mother On The Birth Of Her First-Born Child.

Young mother! proudly throbs thine heart, and well may it rejoice,
Well may'st thou raise to Heaven above in grateful prayer thy voice:
A gift hath been bestowed on thee, a gift of priceless worth,
Far dearer to thy woman's heart than all the wealth of earth.

What store of deep and holy joy is opened to thy thought -
Glad, sunny dreams of future days, with bliss and rapture fraught;
Of hopes as varied, yet as bright, as beams of April sun,
And plans and wishes centred all within thy darling one!

While others seek in changing scenes earth's happiness to gain,
In fashion's halls to win a joy as dazzling as 'tis vain -
A bliss more holy far is thine, far sweeter and more deep,
To watch beside thine infant's couch and bend above his sleep.

What joy for thee to ling'...

Rosanna Eleanor Leprohon

Translation Of Part Of The First Book Of The Aeneidto

THE EDITORS OF THE PHILOLOGICAL MUSEUM

But Cytherea, studious to invent
Arts yet untried, upon new counsels bent,
Resolves that Cupid, changed in form and face
To young Ascanius, should assume his place;
Present the maddening gifts, and kindle heat
Of passion at the bosom's inmost seat.
She dreads the treacherous house, the double tongue;
She burns, she frets by Juno's rancour stung;
The calm of night is powerless to remove
These cares, and thus she speaks to winged Love:

"O son, my strength, my power! who dost despise
(What, save thyself, none dares through earth and skies)
The giant-quelling bolts of Jove, I flee,
O son, a suppliant to thy deity!
What perils meet Aeneas in his course,
How Juno's hate with unrelenting force
Pursues thy brothe...

William Wordsworth