To Time.

In Fancy's eye, what an extended span,
Time, hoary herald, has been stretch'd by thee:
Vain to conceive where thy dark burst began,
Thou birthless, boundless, vast immensity!
Vain all conceptions of weak-minded man
Thee to unravel from thy mystery!--
In mortal wisdom, thou'st already ran
A circled travel of eternity;
Still, but a moment of thy mighty plan
Seems yet unwound, from what thy age shall see,
Consuming Tyrant of all mortal kind!--
And what thou art, and what thou art to be,
Is known to none, but that Immortal Mind
Who reigns alone superior to thee.

John Clare

John Clare was an English poet known for his celebrations of the English countryside and lamentation of its disruption. Born in Helpston, Northamptonshire, Clare was initially a farm laborer. His poetry is characterized by its natural imagery and rustic language. Despite periods of fame during his period, Clare spent the later part of his life in an asylum due to mental health issues. His works gained greater recognition posthumously. Clare's major poem collections include "Poems Descriptive of Rural Life and Scenery" and "The Shepherd's Calendar."

John Clare

The Tramp

John Clare, Simple Poetry

Scandal

John Clare, Simple Poetry

The Triumphs Of Time

John Clare, Simple Poetry

To An Hour-Glass.

John Clare, Simple Poetry

English

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The Triumphs Of Time

[From "The Champion"]

    Emblazoned Vapour! Half-eternal Shade!
    That gathers strength from ruin and decay;--
    Emperor of empires! (for the world hath made
    No substance that dare take thy shade away;)
    Thy banners nought but victories display:
    In undisturbed success thou'rt grown sublime:
    Kings are thy subjects, and their sceptres lay
    Round thy proud footstool: tyranny and crime
    Thy serving vassals are. Then hail, victorious Time!

    The elements that wreck the marble dome
    Proud with the polish of the artisan--
    Bolts that crash shivering through the humble home,
    Traced with the insignificance of man--
    Are architects of thine, and proudly plan
    Rich monuments to show thy growing prime:
    Earthquake...

John Clare

Earth's Eternity

Man, Earth's poor shadow! talks of Earth's decay:
But hath it nothing of eternal kin?
No majesty that shall not pass away?
No soul of greatness springing up within?
Thought marks without hoar shadows of sublime,
Pictures of power, which if not doomed to win
Eternity, stand laughing at old Time
For ages: in the grand ancestral line
Of things eternal, mounting to divine,
I read Magnificence where ages pay
Worship like conquered foes to the Apennine,
Because they could not conquer. There sits Day
Too high for Night to come at--mountains shine,
Outpeering Time, too lofty for decay.

John Clare

To An Hour-Glass.

Old-fashioned uncouth measurer of the day,
I love to watch thy filtering burthen pass;
Though some there are that live would bid thee stay;
But these view reasons through a different glass
From him, Time's meter, who addresses thee.
The world has joys which they may deem as such;
The world has wealth to season vanity,
And wealth is theirs to make their vainness much:
But small to do with joys and Fortune's fee
Hath he, Time's chronicler, who welcomes thee.
So jog thou on, through hours of doom'd distress;
So haste thou on the glimpse of hopes to come;
As every sand-grain counts a trouble less,
As every drain'd glass leaves me nearer home.

John Clare

On Time

Fly envious Time, till thou run out thy race,
Call on the lazy leaden-stepping hours,
Whose speed is but the heavy Plummets pace;
And glut thy self with what thy womb devours,
Which is no more then what is false and vain,
And meerly mortal dross;
So little is our loss,
So little is thy gain.
For when as each thing bad thou hast entomb'd,
And last of all, thy greedy self consum'd,
Then long Eternity shall greet our bliss
With an individual kiss;
And Joy shall overtake us as a flood,
When every thing that is sincerely good
And perfectly divine,
With Truth, and Peace, and Love shall ever shine
About the supreme Throne
Of him, t'whose happy-making sight alone,
When once our heav'nly-guided soul shall clime,
Then all this Earthy grosnes quit,
At...

John Milton

The Tomb.

Once musing o'er an old effaced stone,
Longing to know whose dust it did conceal,
I anxious ponder'd o'er what might reveal,
And sought the seeming date with weeds o'ergrown;
But that prov'd fruitless--both the date and name
Had been for ages in oblivion thrown.
The dim remains of sculptur'd ornament
Gave proof sufficient 'twas reward for fame:
This did my searching view so much torment,
That Time I question'd to expose the same;
But soon a check--"And what is it to thee
Whose dust lies here?--since thou wilt quickly be
Forgot like him:--then Time shall bid thee go
To heaven's pure bliss, or hell's tormenting woe."

John Clare

That Nature is Not Subject to Decay.

Ah, how the Human Mind wearies herself
With her own wand'rings, and, involved in gloom
Impenetrable, speculates amiss!
Measuring, in her folly, things divine
By human, laws inscrib'd on adamant
By laws of Man's device, and counsels fix'd
For ever, by the hours, that pass, and die.
How? shall the face of Nature then be plow'd
Into deep wrinkles, and shall years at last
On the great Parent fix a sterile curse?
Shall even she confess old age, and halt
And, palsy-smitten, shake her starry brows?
Shall foul Antiquity with rust and drought
And famine vex the radiant worlds above?
Shall Time's unsated maw crave and engulf
The very heav'ns that regulate his flight?
And was the Sire of all able to fence
His works, and to uphold the circling worlds,
But throug...

John Milton