Thou Leanest To The Shell Of Night

Thou leanest to the shell of night,
Dear lady, a divining ear.
In that soft choiring of delight
What sound hath made thy heart to fear?
Seemed it of rivers rushing forth
From the grey deserts of the north?

That mood of thine
Is his, if thou but scan it well,
Who a mad tale bequeaths to us
At ghosting hour conjurable,
And all for some strange name he read
In Purchas or in Holinshed.

James Joyce

James Joyce was an Irish novelist, short story writer, poet, teacher, and literary critic. He is regarded as one of the most influential and important writers of the 20th century. Joyce is best known for his groundbreaking work 'Ulysses' (1922), and for his other significant works including 'A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man' (1916), 'Finnegans Wake' (1939), and the short story collection 'Dubliners' (1914). He was a key figure in the modernist avant-garde movement.

James Joyce

Sleep Now, O Sleep Now

James Joyce, Simple Poetry

Tutto è Sciolto

James Joyce, Simple Poetry

A Memory Of The Players In A Mirror At Midnight

James Joyce, Simple Poetry

Strings In The Earth And Air

James Joyce, 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.

What Counsel Has The Hooded Moon

What counsel has the hooded moon
Put in thy heart, my shyly sweet,
Of Love in ancient plenilune,
Glory and stars beneath his feet,
A sage that is but kith and kin
With the comedian Capuchin?

Believe me rather that am wise
In disregard of the divine,
A glory kindles in those eyes
Trembles to starlight. Mine, O Mine!
No more be tears in moon or mist
For thee, sweet sentimentalist.

James Joyce

Alone

The noon's greygolden meshes make
All night a veil,
The shorelamps in the sleeping lake
Laburnum tendrils trail.

The sly reeds whisper to the night
A name, her name,
And all my soul is a delight,
A swoon of shame.

James Joyce

Who Goes Amid The Green Wood

Who goes amid the green wood
With springtide all adorning her?
Who goes amid the merry green wood
To make it merrier?

Who passes in the sunlight
By ways that know the light footfall?
Who passes in the sweet sunlight
With mien so virginal?

The ways of all the woodland
Gleam with a soft and golden fire,
For whom does all the sunny woodland
Carry so brave attire?

O, it is for my true love
The woods their rich apparel wear,
O, it is for my own true love,
That is so young and fair.

James Joyce

Nightpiece

Gaunt in gloom,
The pale stars their torches,
Enshrouded, wave.
Ghostfires from heaven's far verges faint illume,
Arches on soaring arches,
Night's sindark nave.

Seraphim,
The lost hosts awaken
To service till
In moonless gloom each lapses muted, dim,
Raised when she has and shaken
Her thurible.

And long and loud,
To night's nave upsoaring,
A starknell tolls
As the bleak incense surges, cloud on cloud,
Voidward from the adoring
Waste of souls.

James Joyce

Stanzas From The Banks Of The Shannon.

^[1]


        "Take back the virgin page."
        MOORE'S Irish Melodies.


No longer dear Vesey, feel hurt and uneasy
    At hearing it said by the Treasury brother,
That thou art a sheet of blank paper, my Vesey,
    And he, the dear, innocent placeman, another.^[2]

For lo! what a service we Irish have done thee;--
    Thou now art a sheet of blank paper no more;
By St. Patrick, we've scrawled such a lesson upon thee
    As never was scrawled upon foolscap before.

Come--on with your spectacles, noble Lord Duke,
    (Or O'Connell has green ones he haply would lend you,)
Read Vesey all o'er (as you can't read a book)
    And improve by the lesson we bog-trotters send you;

A lesson, in ...

Thomas Moore

Lean Out Of The Window

Lean out of the window,
Goldenhair,
I hear you singing
A merry air.

My book was closed,
I read no more,
Watching the fire dance
On the floor.

I have left my book,
I have left my room,
For I heard you singing
Through the gloom.

Singing and singing
A merry air,
Lean out of the window,
Goldenhair.

James Joyce