The Auction

"Who'll bid?Who'll bid?" the question rang
Where throned Death was calling.
I seemed to sense his charnel tang,
Mephitic air appalling;
And every tick I heard the clang
Of his steel hammer falling.

Come great men who upon our earth
Had held a lofty mission,
The spacious ones of lordly birth,
The cunning politician,
And gentlemen of holy worth
Or wondrous erudition.

One buyer in a corner trolls
Beyond the ghastly revel.
He buys by lots or single souls,
His voice is low and level.
And paltry is the price he doles.
The buyer is the Devil!

Edward

Edward Dyson was a versatile Australian writer and poet known for his prose and poetry that vividly depicted the lives and experiences of miners and working-class people in Australia. Born on March 4, 1865, in Ballarat, Victoria, Dyson worked in various manual labor roles in the mining industry before turning to writing. His works often drew from his firsthand experiences and offered a unique perspective on the struggles and triumphs of everyday Australians. Dyson passed away on August 22, 1931.

Edward

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English

Suggested Poems

Explore a curated selection of verses that share themes, styles, and emotional resonance with the poem you've just read.

Death's Ramble.[1]

One day the dreary old King of Death
Inclined for some sport with the carnal,
So he tied a pack of darts on his back,
And quietly stole from his charnel.

His head was bald of flesh and of hair,
His body was lean and lank,
His joints at each stir made a crack, and the cur
Took a gnaw, by the way, at his shank.

And what did he do with his deadly darts,
This goblin of grisly bone?
He dabbled and spill'd man's blood, and he kill'd
Like a butcher that kills his own.

The first he slaughter'd, it made him laugh,
(For the man was a coffin-maker,)
To think how the mutes, and men in black suits,
Would mourn for an undertaker.

Death saw two Quakers sitting at church,
Quoth he, "We shall not differ."
And he let them alone, like figures of...

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The Doom Of The Esquire Bedell.

Adown the torturing mile of street
    I mark him come and go,
Thread in and out with tireless feet
    The crossings to and fro;
A soul that treads without retreat
    A labyrinth of woe.

Palsied with awe of such despair,
    All living things give room,
They flit before his sightless glare
    As horrid shapes, that loom
And shriek the curse that bids him bear
    The symbol of his doom.

The very stones are coals that bake
    And scorch his fevered skin;
A fire no hissing hail may slake
    Consumes his heart within.
Still must he hasten on to rake
    The furnace of his sin.

Still forward! forward!    For he feels
    Fierce claws that pluck his breast,
And blindly beckon as he reels
    Upon his awful quest:

Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch

Braggadocio

Chess playing Death
-    no, the reverse
Death sitting decked out and self-satisfied
in black no mandatory top hat but a shroud
shouldering a cowl.

There stereotypes end    -
appearances have to be kept up
tho' hardly any cinematic gnarled fingers
of Baron Samedi fame
rather pudgy digitals reflecting
gentile prosperity
(after all, Winners do take all
his fellow satanists bank on it).

Of course, such things are fictitious.
Death plays no favourites (and waits
for no man when rivalling Time).
Still, parlour games are one indulgence.
Hardly comforting to know human beings
function at one purpose
when this Hallow of Hallows puts on the smirk.

Dalliance with the victim is the upshot    -
the chess motif again.
Sift th...

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Poem On Death

    Why should man's high aspiring mind
    Burn in him with so proud a breath,
    When all his haughty views can find
    In this world yields to Death?
    The fair, the brave, the vain, the wise,
    The rich, the poor, and great, and small,
    Are each but worm's anatomies
    To strew his quiet hall.

    Power may make many earthly gods,
    Where gold and bribery's guilt prevails,
    But Death's unwelcome, honest odds
    Kick o'er the unequal scales.
    The flatter'd great may clamours raise
    Of power, and their own weakness hide,
    But Death shall find unlooked-for ways
    To end the farce of pride.

    An arrow hurtel'd e'er so high,
    With e'en a giant's sinewy strength,
    In Time's untraced eternity
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Death

Why should man's high aspiring mind
Burn in him with so proud a breath,
When all his haughty views can find
In this world yields to death?
The fair, the brave, the vain, the wise,
The rich, the poor, the great, and small,
Are each but worm's anatomies
To strew his quiet hall.

Power may make many earthly gods,
Where gold and bribery's guilt prevails,
But death's unwelcome, honest odds
Kick o'er the unequal scales.
The flattered great may clamours raise
Of power, and their own weakness hide,
But death shall find unlooked-for ways
To end the farce of pride,

An arrow hurtled eer so high,
From een a giant's sinewy strength,
In Time's untraced eternity
Goes but a pigmy length;
Nay, whirring from the tortured string,
With all its ...

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The Court Of Death.

        Once on a time, in solemn state,
        Death, in his pomp of terror, sate.
        Attendant on his gloomy reign,
        Sadness and Madness, Woe and Pain,
        His vassal train. With hollow tone
        The tyrant muttered from his throne:

        "We choose a minister to-night;
        Let him who wills prefer his right,
        And unto the most worthy hand
        We will commit the ebon wand."

        Fever stood forth: "And I appeal
        To weekly bills to show my zeal.
        Repelled, repulsed, I persevere;
        Often quotidian through a year."

        Gout next appeared to urge his claim
        For the racked joints of tortured frame:
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John Gay