The Presentation

    When in the womb of Time our souls' own son
    Dear Love lay sleeping till his natal hour,
    Long months I knew not that sweet life begun,
    Too dimly treasuring thy touch of power;
        And wandering all those days
        By far-off ways,
    Forgot immortal seed must have immortal flower.

    Only, beloved, since my beloved thou art
    I do remember, now that memory's vain,
    How twice or thrice beneath my beating heart
    Life quickened suddenly with proudest pain.
        Then dreamed I Love's increase,
        Yet held my peace
    Till I might render thee thy own great gift again.

    For as with bodies, so with souls it is,
    The greater gives, the lesser doth conceive:
    That thou hast fathered Love, I tell thee this,
    And by my pangs beseech thee to believe.
        Look on his hope divine--
        Thy hope and mine--
    Pity his outstretched hands, tenderly him receive!

Henry John Newbolt

Sir Henry John Newbolt was an English poet and author, famous for his ballads such as 'Vitaï Lampada'. He graduated from Oxford and was called to the bar, but he is better remembered for his literary contributions than his legal career. Newbolt served as a government advisor on military and naval literature during World War I. He was knighted in 1915 for his services to literature. Newbolt's work often reflected themes of patriotism and duty.

Henry John Newbolt

Epistle

Henry John Newbolt, Simple Poetry

Drake's Drum

Henry John Newbolt, Simple Poetry

Gold

Henry John Newbolt, Simple Poetry

Waggon Hill

Henry John Newbolt, 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.

Ad Matrem Dolorosam

    Think not thy little fountain's rain
        That in the sunlight rose and flashed,
    From the bright sky has fallen again,
        To cold and shadowy silence dashed.
    The Joy that in her radiance leapt
    From everlasting hath not slept.

    The hand that to thy hand was dear,
        The untroubled eyes that mirrored thine,
    The voice that gave thy soul to hear
        A whisper of the Love Divine--
    What though the gold was mixed with dust?
    The gold is thine and cannot rust.

    Nor fear, because thy darling's heart
        No longer beats with mortal life,
    That she has missed the ennobling part
        Of human growth and human strife.
    Only she has the eternal peace
    Wherein to reap the soul's increase.

Henry John Newbolt

When I Remember

When I remember that the day will come
    For this our love to quit his land of birth,
    And bid farewell to all the ways of earth
With lips that must for evermore be dumb,

Then creep I silent from the stirring hum,
    And shut away the music and the mirth,
    And reckon up what may be left of worth
When hearts are cold and love's own body numb.

Something there must be that I know not here,
Or know too dimly through the symbol dear;
    Some touch, some beauty, only guessed by this---
If He that made us loves, it shall replace,
Beloved, even the vision of thy face
    And deep communion of thine inmost kiss.

Henry John Newbolt

The Birth Of Love

When Love was born of heavenly line,
What dire intrigues disturbed Cythera's joy!
Till Venus cried, "A mother's heart is mine;
None but myself shall nurse my boy,"

But, infant as he was, the child
In that divine embrace enchanted lay;
And, by the beauty of the vase beguiled,
Forgot the beverage--and pined away.

"And must my offspring languish in my sight?"
(Alive to all a mother's pain,
The Queen of Beauty thus her court addressed)
"No: Let the most discreet of all my train
Receive him to her breast:
Think all, he is the God of young delight."

Then TENDERNESS with CANDOUR joined,
And GAIETY the charming office sought;
Nor even DELICACY stayed behind:
But none of those fair Graces brought

Wherewith to nurse the child--and still...

William Wordsworth

Mater Amabilis.

Down the goldenest of streams,
    Tide of dreams,
The fair cradled man-child drifts;
Sways with cadenced motion slow,
    To and fro,
As the mother-foot poised lightly, falls and lifts.


He, the firstling, - he, the light
    Of her sight, -
He, the breathing pledge of love,
'Neath the holy passion lies,
    Of her eyes, -
Smiles to feel the warm, life-giving ray above.


She believes that in his vision,
    Skies elysian
O'er an angel-people shine.
Back to gardens of delight,
    Taking flight,
His auroral spirit basks in dreams divine.


But she smiles through anxious tears;
    Unborn years
Pressing forward, she perceives.
Shadowy muffled shapes, they come
    Deaf and dumb,
Bringing what? d...

Emma Lazarus

Love Eternal

The human heart will never change,
The human dream will still go on,
The enchanted earth be ever strange
With moonlight and the morning sun,
And still the seas shall shout for joy,
And swing the stars as in a glass,
The girl be angel for the boy,
The lad be hero for the lass.

The fashions of our mortal brains
New names for dead men's thoughts shall give,
But we find not for all our pains
Why 'tis so wonderful to live;
The beauty of a meadow-flower
Shall make a mock of all our skill,
And God, upon his lonely tower
Shall keep his secret - secret still.

The old magician of the skies,
With coloured and sweet-smelling things,
Shall charm the sense and trance the eyes,
Still onward through a million springs;
And nothing old and nothin...

Richard Le Gallienne

Fragment Of A Mythological Hymn To Love.[1]

        Blest infant of eternity!
    Before the day-star learned to move,
In pomp of fire, along his grand career,
    Glancing the beamy shafts of light

From his rich quiver to the farthest sphere,
        Thou wert alone, oh Love!
    Nestling beneath the wings of ancient Night,
    Whose horrors seemed to smile in shadowing thee.
No form of beauty soothed thine eye,
    As through the dim expanse it wandered wide;
No kindred spirit caught thy sigh,
    As o'er the watery waste it lingering died.

Unfelt the pulse, unknown the power,
    That latent in his heart was sleeping,--
Oh Sympathy! that lonely hour
    Saw Love himself thy absence weeping.

But look, what glory through the darkness beams!
Celestial airs along the water glide:--...

Thomas Moore