The night is freezing fast,

The night is freezing fast,
To-morrow comes December;
    And winterfalls of old
Are with me from the past;
And chiefly I remember
    How Dick would hate the cold.

Fall, winter, fall; for he,
Prompt hand and headpiece clever,
    Has woven a winter robe,
And made of earth and sea
His overcoat for ever,
    And wears the turning globe.

Alfred Edward Housman

Alfred Edward Housman was an English classical scholar and poet, best known for his cycle of poems "A Shropshire Lad." Housman's work is noted for its pessimism and preoccupation with death, youth, and the fleeting nature of beauty. His poetry, steeped in the English pastoral tradition, gained popularity during the Second Boer War and World War I. In addition to his poetry, Housman had a distinguished academic career, holding professorships at both University College London and the University of Cambridge.

Alfred Edward Housman

Poems From "A Shropshire Lad" - XIII

Alfred Edward Housman, Simple Poetry

As I gird on for fighting

Alfred Edward Housman, Simple Poetry

Poems From "A Shropshire Lad" - XVIII

Alfred Edward Housman, Simple Poetry

Poems From "A Shropshire Lad" - LIII - The True Lover

Alfred Edward Housman, 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.

In midnights of November,

In midnights of November,
When Dead Mans Fair is nigh,
And danger in the valley,
And anger in the sky,

Around the huddling homesteads
The leafless timber roars,
And the dead call the dying
And finger at the doors.

Oh, yonder faltering fingers
Are hands I used to hold;
Their false companion drowses
And leaves them in the cold.

Oh, to the bed of ocean,
To Africk and to Ind,
I will arise and follow
Along the rainy wind.

The night goes out and under
With all its train forlorn;
Hues in the east assemble
And cocks crow up the morn.

The living are the living
And dead the dead will stay,
And I will sort with comrades
That face the beam of day.

Alfred Edward Housman

When summers end is nighing

When summers end is nighing
And skies at evening cloud,
I muse on change and fortune
And all the feats I vowed
When I was young and proud.

The weathercock at sunset
Would lose the slanted ray,
And I would climb the beacon
That looked to Wales away
And saw the last of day.

From hill and cloud and heaven
The hues of evening died;
Night welled through lane and hollow
And hushed the countryside,
But I had youth and pride.

And I with earth and nightfall
In converse high would stand,
Late, till the west was ashen
And darkness hard at hand,
And the eye lost the land.

The year might age, and cloudy
The lessening day might close,
But air of other summers
Breathed from beyond the snows,
And I had hope of t...

Alfred Edward Housman

Spring Morning

Star and coronal and bell
April underfoot renews,
And the hope of man as well
Flowers among the morning dews.

Now the old come out to look,
Winter past and winters pains.
How the sky in pool and brook
Glitters on the grassy plains.

Easily the gentle air
Wafts the turning season on;
Things to comfort them are there,
Though tis true the best are gone.

Now the scorned unlucky lad
Rousing from his pillow gnawn
Mans his heart and deep and glad
Drinks the valiant air of dawn.

Half the night he longed to die,
Now are sown on hill and plain
Pleasures worth his while to try
Ere he longs to die again.

Blue the sky from east to west
Arches, and the world is wide,
Though the girl he loves the best
Rouses f...

Alfred Edward Housman

The rain,

The rain, it streams on stone and hillock,
The boot clings to the clay.
Since all is done thats due and right
Lets home; and now, my lad, good-night,
For I must turn away.

Good-night, my lad, for noughts eternal;
No league of ours, for sure.
Tomorrow I shall miss you less,
And ache of heart and heaviness
Are things that time should cure.

Over the hill the highway marches
And whats beyond is wide:
Oh soon enough will pine to nought
Remembrance and the faithful thought
That sits the grave beside.

The skies, they are not always raining
Nor grey the twelvemonth through;
And I shall meet good days and mirth,
And range the lovely lands of earth
With friends no worse than you.

But oh, my man, the house is fallen
Th...

Alfred Edward Housman

A Winter Night.

The winter wind is raving fierce and shrill,
    And chides with angry moan the frosty skies;
    The white stars gaze with sleepless Gorgon eyes
That freeze the earth in terror fixed and still.
We reck not of the wild night's gloom and chill,
    Housed from its rage, dear friend; and fancy flies,
    Lured by the hand of beckoning memories,
Back to those summer evenings on the hill
Where we together watched the sun go down
    Beyond the gold-washed uplands, while his fires
    Touched into glittering life the vanes and spires
Piercing the purpling mists that veiled the town.
    The wintry night thy voice and eyes beguile,
    Till wake the sleeping summers in thy smile.

John Hay

Now dreary dawns the eastern light,

Now dreary dawns the eastern light,
And fall of eve is drear,
And cold the poor man lies at night,
And so goes out the year.

Little is the luck Ive had,
And oh, tis comfort small
To think that many another lad
Has had no luck at all.

Alfred Edward Housman