So Soon Tired!

Am I so soon grown tired? - yet this old sky
Can open still each morn so blue an eye,
This great old river still through nights and days
Run like a happy boy to holidays,
This sun be still a bridegroom, though long wed,
And still those stars go singing up the night,
Glad as yon lark there splashing in the light:
Are these old things indeed unwearied,
Yet I, so soon grown tired, would creep away to bed!

Richard Le Gallienne

Richard Le Gallienne was an English author and poet born on January 20, 1866. Known for his lyrical poetry, he was a key figure in the literary circles of the fin de siècle. He contributed to the literary magazine 'The Yellow Book' and was involved with the Rhymers' Club, an influential group of London-based poets. His works often explored themes of beauty, love, and nature. His influence extended to both sides of the Atlantic, and he spent the latter part of his life in the United States, where he continued to write until his death on September 15, 1947.

Richard Le Gallienne

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Richard Le Gallienne, Simple Poetry

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Richard Le Gallienne, Simple Poetry

Omar Khayyám

Richard Le Gallienne, Simple Poetry

Jenny Dead

Richard Le Gallienne, Simple Poetry

English

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A Child's Evensong

The sun is weary, for he ran
So far and fast to-day;
The birds are weary, for who sang
So many songs as they?
The bees and butterflies at last
Are tired out, for just think too
How many gardens through the day
Their little wings have fluttered through.
And so, as all tired people do,
They've gone to lay their sleepy heads
Deep deep in warm and happy beds.
The sun has shut his golden eye
And gone to sleep beneath the sky,
The birds and butterflies and bees
Have all crept into flowers and trees,
And all lie quiet, still as mice,
Till morning comes - like father's voice.

So Geoffrey, Owen, Phyllis, you
Must sleep away till morning too.
Close little eyes, down little heads,
And sleep - sleep - sleep in happy beds.

Richard Le Gallienne

An Out-Worn Sappho

How tired I am! I sink down all alone
Here by the wayside of the Present. Lo,
Even as a child I hide my face and moan -
A little girl that may no farther go;
The path above me only seems to grow
    More rugged, climbing still, and ever briered
With keener thorns of pain than these below;
And O the bleeding feet that falter so
    And are so very tired!

Why, I have journeyed from the far-off Lands
Of Babyhood - where baby-lilies blew
Their trumpets in mine ears, and filled my hands
With treasures of perfume and honey-dew,
And where the orchard shadows ever drew
    Their cool arms round me when my cheeks were fired
With too much joy, and lulled mine eyelids to,
And only let the starshine trickle through
    In sprays, when I was tired!

Ye...

James Whitcomb Riley

Tired Out

"tired out!"    Yet face and brow
Do not look aweary now,
And the eyelids lie like two
Pure, white rose-leaves washed with dew.
Was her life so hard a task? -
Strange that we forget to ask
What the lips now dumb for aye
Could have told us yesterday!

"Tired out!"    A faded scrawl
Pinned upon the ragged shawl -
Nothing else to leave a clue
Even of a friend or two,
Who might come to fold the hands,
Or smooth back the dripping strands
Of her tresses, or to wet
Them anew with fond regret.

"Tired out!"    We can but guess
Of her little happiness -
Long ago, in some fair land,
When a lover held her hand
In the dream that frees us all,
Soon or later, from its thrall -
Be it either false or true,
We, at last, must tire, t...

James Whitcomb Riley

Weariness

O little feet! that such long years
Must wander on through hopes and fears,
    Must ache and bleed beneath your load;
I, nearer to the wayside inn
Where toil shall cease and rest begin,
    Am weary, thinking of your road!

O little hands! that, weak or strong,
Have still to serve or rule so long,
    Have still so long to give or ask;
I, who so much with book and pen
Have toiled among my fellow-men,
    Am weary, thinking of your task.

O little hearts! that throb and beat
With such impatient, feverish heat,
    Such limitless and strong desires;
Mine that so long has glowed and burned,
With passions into ashes turned
    Now covers and conceals its fires.

O little souls! as pure and white
And crystalline as rays of light
...

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

The Sewing-Girl

"And now, blow out your candle, lad, and get to bed. See, the dawn is in the sky. Open your window and let its freshness rouge your cheek.
You've earned your rest. Sleep."

Aye, but before I do so, let me read again the last of my Ballads.




The Sewing-Girl



The humble garret where I dwell
Is in that Quarter called the Latin;
It isn't spacious - truth to tell,
There's hardly room to swing a cat in.
But what of that! It's there I fight
For food and fame, my Muse inviting,
And all the day and half the night
You'll find me writing, writing, writing.

Now, it was in the month of May
As, wrestling with a rhyme rheumatic,
I chanced to look across the way,
And lo! within a neighbor attic,
A hand drew back the wi...

Robert William Service

Between The Rapids.

The point is turned; the twilight shadow fills
The wheeling stream, the soft receding shore,
And on our ears from deep among the hills
Breaks now the rapid's sudden quickening roar.
Ah yet the same, or have they changed their face,
The fair green fields, and can it still be seen,
The white log cottage near the mountain's base,
So bright and quiet, so home-like and serene?
Ah, well I question, for as five years go,
How many blessings fall, and how much woe.

Aye there they are, nor have they changed their cheer,
The fields, the hut, the leafy mountain brows;
Across the lonely dusk again I hear
The loitering bells, the lowing of the cows,
The bleat of many sheep, the stilly rush
Of the low whispering river, and through all,
Soft human tongues that break the...

Archibald Lampman