The Well-Dressed Children.

Here's flowery taffeta for Mary's new gown:
    Here's black velvet, all the rage, for Dick's birthday coat.
Pearly buttons for you, Mary, all the way down,
    Lace ruffles, Dick, for you; you'll be a man of note.

Mary, here I've bought you a green gingham shade
    And a silk purse brocaded with roses gold and blue,
You'll learn to hold them proudly like colours on parade.
    No banker's wife in all the town half so grand as you.

I've bought for young Diccon a long walking-stick,
    Yellow gloves, well tanned, at Woodstock village made.
I'll teach you to flourish 'em and show your name is DICK,
    Strutting by your sister's side with the same parade.

On Sunday to church you go, each with a book of prayer:
    Then up the street and down the aisles, everywhere you'll see
Of all the honours paid around, how small is Virtue's share.
    How large the share of Vulgar Pride in peacock finery.

Robert von Ranke Graves

Robert von Ranke Graves was a British poet, historical novelist, critic, and classicist. His father was Alfred Perceval Graves, a distinguished Irish poet and figure in the Gaelic revival. Known for his war poetry, love poems, and scholarly works, he created a lasting literary legacy, including his interpretations of the Greek myths. Graves was also a soldier in World War I, an experience that profoundly influenced his writing.

Robert von Ranke Graves

The Cupboard.

Robert von Ranke Graves, Simple Poetry

The "Alice Jean".

Robert von Ranke Graves, Simple Poetry

Give Us Rain.

Robert von Ranke Graves, Simple Poetry

Marigolds

Robert von Ranke Graves, 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.

A New Suit.

The artist and the loom unseen,
In textures soft as crepe de chine
Spring weaves her royal robe of green,
    With grasses fringed and daisies dotted,
With furzy tufts like mosses fine
And showy clumps of eglantine,
With dainty shrub and creeping vine
    Upon the verdant fabric knotted.

Oh, winter takes our love away
For ashen hues of sober gray!
So when the blooming, blushing May
    Comes out in bodice, cap, and kirtle,
With arbutus her corsage laced,
And roses clinging to her waist,
We crown her charming queen of taste,
    Her chaplet-wreath of modest myrtle.

For eighteen centuries and more
Her fairy hands have modeled o'er
The same habiliments she wore
    At her primeval coronation;
And still the pattern exquisite,...

Hattie Howard

The Periwinkle Girl

I've often thought that headstrong youths,
Of decent education,
Determine all-important truths
With strange precipitation.

The over-ready victims they,
Of logical illusions,
And in a self-assertive way
They jump at strange conclusions.

Now take my case: Ere sorrow could
My ample forehead wrinkle,
I had determined that I would
Not like to be a winkle.

"A winkle," I would oft advance
With readiness provoking,
"Can seldom flirt, and never dance
Or soothe his mind by smoking."

In short, I spurned the shelly joy,
And spoke with strange decision
Men pointed to me as a boy
Who held them in derision.

But I was young too young, by far
Or I had been more wary,
I knew not then that winkles are
The stock-in-...

William Schwenck Gilbert

Twopenny Post-Bag, Intercepted Letters, Etc. Letter VIII.

FROM COLONEL THOMAS TO ---- SKEFFINGTON, ESQ.


Come to our Fête and bring with thee
Thy newest, best embroidery.
Come to our Fête and show again
That pea-green coat, thou pink of men,
Which charmed all eyes that last surveyed it;
When Brummel's self inquired "who made it?"--
When Cits came wondering from the East
And thought thee Poet Pye at least!

    Oh! come, (if haply 'tis thy week
For looking pale,) with paly cheek;
Tho' more we love thy roseate days,
When the rich rouge-pot pours its blaze
Full o'er thy face and amply spread,
Tips even thy whisker-tops with red--
Like the last tints of dying Day
That o'er some darkling grove delay.

    Bring thy best lace, thou gay Philander,
(That lace, like Harry Alexander,
...

Thomas Moore

Beauty's Wardrobe

My love said she had nought to wear;
Her garments all were old,
And soon her body must go bare
Against the winter's cold.

I took her out into the dawn,
And from the mountain's crest
Unwound long wreaths of misty lawn,
And wound them round her breast.

Then passed we to the maple grove,
Like a great hall of gold,
The yellow and the red we wove
In rustling flounce and fold.

"Now, love," said I, "go, do it on!
And I would have you note
No lovely lady dead and gone
Had such a petticoat."

Then span I out of milkweeds fine
Fair stockings soft and long,
And other things of quaint design
That unto maids belong.

And beads of amber and of pearl
About her neck I strung,
And in the bronze of her thick hair
Th...

Richard Le Gallienne

Ode To Ferdinand.

Quit the sword, thou King of men,
Grasp the needle once again;
Making petticoats is far
Safer sport than making war;
Trimming is a better thing,
Than the being trimmed, oh King!
Grasp the needle bright with which
Thou didst for the Virgin stitch
Garment, such as ne'er before
Monarch stitched or Virgin wore,
Not for her, oh semster nimble!
Do I now invoke thy thimble;
Not for her thy wanted aid is,
But for certain grave old ladies,
Who now sit in England's cabinet,
Waiting to be clothed in tabinet,
Or whatever choice étoffe is
Fit for Dowagers in office.
First, thy care, oh King, devote
To Dame Eldon's petticoat.
Make it of that silk whose dye
Shifts for ever to the eye,
Just as if it hardly knew
Whether to be pi...

Thomas Moore

The Fancy Fair.

Come, maids and youths, for here we sell
    All wondrous things of earth and air;
Whatever wild romancers tell,
    Or poets sing, or lovers swear,
    You'll find at this our Fancy Fair.

Here eyes are made like stars to shine,
    And kept for years in such repair,
That even when turned of thirty-nine,
    They'll hardly look the worse for wear,
    If bought at this our Fancy Fair.

We've lots of tears for bards to shower,
    And hearts that such ill usage bear,
That, tho' they're broken every hour,
    They'll still in rhyme fresh breaking bear,
    If purchased at our Fancy Fair.

As fashions change in every thing,
    We've goods to suit each season's air,
Eternal friendships for the spring,
    And endless loves for summer wea...

Thomas Moore