The Poet Shepherd.

Down in the vale the lazy sheep
    Are roaming at their will,
But I would be away to weep
    Upon the windy hill,

For Summer's song is in my heart,
    Her kiss is on my brow,
As here I kneel alone, apart,
    To consecrate our vow.

Ah, doubly poor the gift shall be
    That links my soul with hers,
For she has given her all to me
    While I can give but tears!

Charles Hamilton Musgrove

No biography available

Charles Hamilton Musgrove

De Profundis.

Charles Hamilton Musgrove, Simple Poetry

The Snow Man.

Charles Hamilton Musgrove, Simple Poetry

The Derelict.

Charles Hamilton Musgrove, Simple Poetry

Romany.

Charles Hamilton Musgrove, 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.

The Shepherd's Lament.

On yonder lofty mountain

A thousand times I stand,
And on my staff reclining,

Look down on the smiling land.

My grazing flocks then I follow,

My dog protecting them well;
I find myself in the valley,

But how, I scarcely can tell.

The whole of the meadow is cover'd

With flowers of beauty rare;
I pluck them, but pluck them unknowing

To whom the offering to bear.

In rain and storm and tempest,

I tarry beneath the tree,
But closed remaineth yon portal;

'Tis all but a vision to me.

High over yonder dwelling,

There rises a rainbow gay;
But she from home hath departed

And wander'd far, far away.

Yes, far away bath she wander'd,

Perchance e'en over ...

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Night In May.

The snowy clouds, soft sleeping lambkins, lie
Along the dark blue meadows of the sky,
    And the bright stars, like golden daffodils,
Are blooming thickly by.

And Luna, gentle shepherdess, the while
Keeps near her flock and guards it with her smile;
    I almost fancy I can hear her song
Down to this shadowed stile.

Lo! Zephyrus, fond lover, comes to woo;
With airy step he hastes the pastures through,
    And steals a kiss from Luna as she nods
Drowsy with fragrant dew.

She starts; the little lambs aroused from sleep,
Fly hence; but Luna near her swain doth keep.
    Oh, it was ever thus since lover came
'Twixt shepherdess and sheep!

Charles Hamilton Musgrove

The Shepherd Lady.

I.

Who pipes upon the long green hill,
    Where meadow grass is deep?
The white lamb bleats but followeth on -
    Follow the clean white sheep.
The dear white lady in yon high tower,
    She hearkeneth in her sleep.

All in long grass the piper stands,
    Goodly and grave is he;
Outside the tower, at dawn of day,
    The notes of his pipe ring free.
A thought from his heart doth reach to hers:
    "Come down, O lady! to me."

She lifts her head, she dons her gown:
    Ah! the lady is fair;
She ties the girdle on her waist,
    And binds her flaxen hair,
And down she stealeth, down and down,
    Down the turret stair.

Behold him! With the flock he wons
    Along yon grassy lea.
"My shepherd lord, my shepherd lov...

Jean Ingelow

Quatrains.

The Sky Line.

Like black fangs in a cruel ogre's jaw
    The grim piles lift against the sunset sky;
Down drops the night, and shuts the horrid maw--
    I listen, breathless, but there comes no cry.


Defeat.

He sits and looks into the west
    Where twilight gathers, wan and gray,
A knight who quit the Golden Quest,
    And flung Excalibur away.


To an Amazon.

O! twain in spirit, we shall know
    Thy like no more, so fierce, so mild,
One breast shorn clean to rest the bow,
    One milk-full for thy warrior child.


The Old Mother.

Life is like an old mother whom trouble and toil
Have sufficed the best part of her nature to spoil,
Whom her children, the Passions, so ...

Charles Hamilton Musgrove

Summer - The Second Pastoral; or Alexis

A Shepherd's Boy (he seeks no better name)
Led forth his flocks along the silver Thame,
Where dancing sun-beams n the waters play'd,
And verdant alders form'd a quiv'ring shade.
Soft as he mourn'd, the streams forgot to flow,
The flocks around a dumb compassion show,
The Naiads wept in ev'ry wat'ry bow'r,
And Jove consented in a silent show'r.
Accept, O Garth, the Muse's early lays,
That adds this wreath of Ivy to thy Bays;
Hear what from Love unpractis'd hearts endure,
From Love, the sole disease thou canst not cure.
Ye shady beeches, and ye cooling streams,
Defence from Phoebus, not from Cupid's beams,
To you I mourn, nor to the deaf I sing,
The woods shall answer, and their echo ring.
The gills and rocks attend my doleful lay,
Why art thou prouder and ...

Alexander Pope

Silence.

I am the word that lovers leave unsaid,
    The eloquence of ardent lips grown mute,
The mourning mother's heart-cry for her dead,
    The flower of faith that grows to unseen fruit.

I am the speech of prophets when their eyes
    Behold some splendid vision of the soul;
The song of morning stars, the hills' replies,
    The far call of the immaterial pole.

And, since I must be mateless, I shall win
    One boon beyond the meed of common clay:
My life shall end where other lives begin,
    And live when other lives have passed away.

Charles Hamilton Musgrove