Resolution

    I see the work of others, and my heart
    Sinks as my own achievement I compare.
    I will not be irresolute, nor despair,
    But battle strongly for my struggling art

    Convinced against conviction that my part
    Equally with my masters I can bear;
    Although their monuments are very fair,
    Enriched with statues, and I stand apart

    And gaze upon my little heap of stones
    Which I was given to build with, very few
    As yet laid into place, but I will lay

    Blind to these marble monuments and thrones,
    Building as though I confidently knew
    My ultimate end,, a stone in place each day.

Victoria Mary Sackville-West

Victoria Mary Sackville-West, commonly known as Vita Sackville-West, was an English author and poet, renowned for her prolific writing and her association with the Bloomsbury Group. She achieved great success with her novels and significant acclaim for her poetry, particularly in the early 20th century. In addition to her literary pursuits, Sackville-West was also known for her creation of the gardens at Sissinghurst Castle, which remain celebrated to this day.

Victoria Mary Sackville-West

The Banquet

Victoria Mary Sackville-West, Simple Poetry

Full Moon

Victoria Mary Sackville-West, Simple Poetry

The Garden

Victoria Mary Sackville-West, Simple Poetry

For ***

Victoria Mary Sackville-West, Simple Poetry

English

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To A Poet Whose Verses I Had Read

    I would not venture to dispraise or praise.
    Too well I know the indifference which bounds
    A poet in the narrow working-grounds
    Where he is blind and deaf in all his ways.

    He must work out alone his path to glory;
    A thousand breaths are fanning him along;
    A thousand tears end in one little song,
    A thousand conflicts in one little story;

    A thousand notes swell to a single chord.
    He cannot tell where his direction tends;
    He strives unguided towards indefinite ends;
    He is an ignorant though absolute lord.

Victoria Mary Sackville-West

Victory.

How strange, in some brief interval of rest,
    Backward to look on her far-stretching past.
To see how much is conquered and repressed,
    How much is gained in victory at last!
The shadow is not lifted, - but her faith,
Strong from life's miracles, now turns toward death.


Though much be dark where once rare splendor shone,
    Yet the new light has touched high peaks unguessed
In her gold, mist-bathed dawn, and one by one
    New outlooks loom from many a mountain crest.
She breathes a loftier, purer atmosphere,
And life's entangled paths grow straight and clear.


Nor will Death prove an all-unwelcome guest;
    The struggle has been toilsome to this end,
Sleep will be sweet, and after labor rest,
    And all will be atoned with him to fr...

Emma Lazarus

A Creed

    That I should live and look with open eyes
    I count as half my claim to Paradise.
    I have not crept beneath cathedral arches,
    But bathed in streams beneath the silver larches;

    And have not grovelled to the Sunday priest,
    But found an unconfined and daily feast;
    Was called ungodly, and to those who blamed
    Laughed back defiance and was not ashamed.

    Some hold their duty to be mournful; why?
    I cannot love your weeping poets; I
    Am sad in winter, but in summer gay,
    And vary with each variable day.

    And though the pious cavilled at my mirth,
    At least I rendered thanks for God's fair earth,
    Grateful that I, among the murmuring rest,
    Was not an unappreciative guest.

Victoria Mary Sackville-West

Never Mind

Whatever your work and whatever its worth,
    No matter how strong or clever,
Some one will sneer if you pause to hear,
    And scoff at your best endeavour.
For the target art has a broad expanse,
    And wherever you chance to hit it,
Though close be your aim to the bull's-eye fame,
    There are those who will never admit it.

Though the house applauds while the artist plays,
    And a smiling world adores him,
Somebody is there with an ennuied air
    To say that the acting bores him.
For the tower of art has a lofty spire,
    With many a stair and landing,
And those who climb seem small oft-time
    To one at the bottom standing.

So work along in your chosen niche
    With a steady purpose to nerve you;
Let nothing men say who pass ...

Ella Wheeler Wilcox

A Sculptor.

        As the ambitious sculptor, tireless, lifts
    Chisel and hammer to the block at hand,
    Before my half-formed character I stand
        And ply the shining tools of mental gifts.
    I'll cut away a huge, unsightly side
        Of selfishness, and smooth to curves of grace
        The angles of ill-temper.

    And no trace
    Shall my sure hammer leave of silly pride.
        Chip after chip must fall from vain desires,
    And the sharp corners of my discontent
    Be rounded into symmetry, and lent
        Great harmony by faith that never tires.
    Unfinished still, I must toil on and on,
    Till the pale critic, Death, shall say, "'Tis done."

Ella Wheeler Wilcox

The Worker And The Work

In what I do I note the marring flaw,
The imperfections of the work I see;
Nor am I one who rather DO than BE,
Since its reversal is Creation's law.

Nay, since there lies a better and a worse,
A lesser and a larger, in men's view,
I would be better than the thing I do,
As God is greater than His universe.

He shaped Himself before He shaped one world:
A million eons, toiling day and night,
He built Himself to majesty and might,
Before the planets into space were hurled.

And when Creation's early work was done,
What crude beginnings out of chaos came -
A formless nebula, a wavering flame,
An errant comet, a voracious sun.

And, still unable to perfect His plan,
What awful creatures at His touch found birth -
Those protoplasmic mo...

Ella Wheeler Wilcox