The Three Wise Men Of Gotham



The Three Wise Men Of Gotham.

                Three wise men of Gotham
                    Went to sea in a bowl:



                If the bowl had been stronger,
                    My song would have been longer.

Leonard Brooke

Leonard Leslie Brooke was a British artist and writer, born on September 24, 1862. He is best known for his illustrations for children's books, including classic nursery rhymes and fairy tales such as 'Johnny Crow's Garden' and 'The Golden Goose Book.' His work brought a distinctive elegance and charm to the illustration of children's literature. In addition to his writing, his illustrations have been featured in works by other authors as well. He passed away on May 2, 1940.

Leonard Brooke

Goosey, Goosey Gander

Leonard Brooke, Simple Poetry

Oranges And Lemons

Leonard Brooke, Simple Poetry

Good King Arthur

Leonard Brooke, Simple Poetry

Baa, Baa, Black Sheep

Leonard Brooke, 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.

Magi Gothamenses.

Three wise men of Gotham
Went to sea in a bowl.
If the bowl had been stronger,
My song had been longer.

Tres magi Gothamenses
In scypho mare tranant
Si cymba secura,
Canenda sint plura.

Cives tres docti Gothamenses æquora verrunt,
Crater et fragilis corpora obesa vehit.
Mox en tempestas, surguntque ad sidera fluctus.
Musa dolens casum nunc memorare nequit.

Jacob Bigelow

Nursery Rhyme. LXV. Tales.

        [The "foles of Gotham" are mentioned as early as the fifteenth century in the 'Townley Mysteries;' and, at the commencement of the sixteenth century, Dr. Andrew Borde made a collection of stories about them, not however, including the following, which rests on the authority of nursery tradition.]

    Three wise men of Gotham
    Went to sea in a bowl:
    And if the bowl had been stronger,
    My song would have been longer.

Unknown

The Bat, The Bush, And The Duck.

^[1]

A bush, duck, and bat, having found that in trade,
Confined to their country, small profits were made,
Into partnership enter'd to traffic abroad,
Their purse, held in common, well guarded from fraud.
Their factors and agents, these trading allies
Employ'd where they needed, as cautious as wise:
Their journals and ledgers, exact and discreet,
Recorded by items expense and receipt.
All throve, till an argosy, on its way home,
With a cargo worth more than their capital sum,
In attempting to pass through a dangerous strait,
Went down with its passengers, sailors, and freight,
To enrich those enormous and miserly stores,
From Tartarus distant but very few doors.
Regret was a thing which the firm could but feel;
Regret was the thing they were s...

Jean de La Fontaine

Goosey, Goosey Gander




Goosey, Goosey Gander.


                Goosey, Goosey Gander,
                Where shall I wander?



                Upstairs, downstairs,
                And in my lady's chamber.



                There I met an old man
                    That would not say his prayers:
                I took him by the left leg,
                    And threw him downstairs.

Leonard Brooke

The Three Kings

Three Kings came riding from far away,
    Melchior and Gaspar and Baltasar;
Three Wise Men out of the East were they,
And they travelled by night and they slept by day,
    For their guide was a beautiful, wonderful star.

The star was so beautiful, large, and clear,
    That all the other stars of the sky
Became a white mist in the atmosphere,
And by this they knew that the coming was near
    Of the Prince foretold in the prophecy.

Three caskets they bore on their saddle-bows,
    Three caskets of gold with golden keys;
Their robes were of crimson silk with rows
Of bells and pomegranates and furbelows,
    Their turbans like blossoming almond-trees.

And so the Three Kings rode into the West,
    Through the dusk of night, over hill and dell...

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

The Three Kings

Trio East is dead and the West is done, and again our course lies thus
South-east by Fate and the Rising Sun where the Three Kings* wait for us.
When our hearts are young and the world is wide, and the heights seem grand to climb,
We are off and away to the Sydney-side; but the Three Kings bide their time.

Ive been to the West, the digger said: he was bearded, bronzed and old;
Ah, the smothering curse of the East is wool, and the curse of the West is gold.
I went to the West in the golden boom, with Hope and a life-long mate,
They sleep in the sand by the Boulder Soak, and long may the Three Kings wait.

Ive had my fling on the Sydney-side, said a blacksheep to the sea,
Let the young fool learn when he cant be taught: Ive learnt whats good for me.
And he gazed ahead ...

Henry Lawson