Verse

Past ruin'd Ilion Helen lives,
Alcestis rises from the shades;
Verse calls them forth; 'tis verse that gives
Immortal youth to mortal maids.

Soon shall Oblivion's deepening veil
Hide all the peopled hills you see,
The gay, the proud, while lovers hail
These many summers you and me.

Walter Savage Landor

Walter Savage Landor was an English writer, poet, and dramatist. He is best known for his prose work, the 'Imaginary Conversations,' but also wrote numerous poems and plays. Landor had a tempestuous character and often found himself in conflict with authorities and contemporaries. Despite his combative nature, he was highly regarded by other literary figures such as Charles Dickens and Robert Browning. His works reflect his classical education and strong individualism.

Walter Savage Landor

Fiesole Idyl

Walter Savage Landor, Simple Poetry

Of Clementina

Walter Savage Landor, Simple Poetry

Tell me not things past all belief;

Walter Savage Landor, Simple Poetry

An Invocation

Walter Savage Landor, Simple Poetry

English

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Past ruin'd Ilion Helen lives,

Past ruin'd Ilion Helen lives,
Alcestis rises from the shades;
Verse calls them forth; 'tis verse that gives
Immortal youth to mortal maids.

Soon shall Oblivion's deepening veil
Hide all the peopled hills you see,
The gay, the proud, while lovers hail
These many summers you and me.

Walter Savage Landor

Lately Our Poets

Lately our poets loiter'd in green lanes,
Content to catch the ballads of the plains;
I fancied I had strength enough to climb
A loftier station at no distant time,
And might securely from intrusion doze
Upon the flowers thro' which Ilissus flows.
In those pale olive grounds all voices cease,
And from afar dust fills the paths of Greece.
My sluber broken and my doublet torn,
I find the laurel also bears a thorn.

Walter Savage Landor

Yes; I write verses now and then,

Yes; I write verses now and then,
But blunt and flaccid is my pen,
No longer talkt of by young men
As rather clever:

In the last quarter are my eyes,
You see it by their form and size;
Is it not time then to be wise?
Or now or never.

Fairest that ever sprang from Eve!
While Time allows the short reprieve,
Just look at me! would you believe
'Twas once a lover?

I cannot clear the five-bar gate,
But, trying first its timber's state,
Climb stiffly up, take breath, and wait
To trundle over.

Thro' gallopade I cannot swing
The entangling blooms of Beauty's spring:
I cannot say the tender thing,
Be 't true or false,

And am beginning to opine
Those girls are only half-divine
Whose waists yon wicked boys entwin...

Walter Savage Landor

To Wordsworth

Those who have laid the harp aside
And turn'd to idler things,
From very restlessness have tried
The loose and dusty strings.
And, catching back some favourite strain,
Run with it o'er the chords again.

But Memory is not a Muse,
O Wordsworth! though 'tis said
They all descend from her, and use
To haunt her fountain-head:
That other men should work for me
In the rich mines of Poesie,
Pleases me better than the toil
Of smoothing under hardened hand,
With Attic emery and oil,
The shining point for Wisdom's wand,
Like those thou temperest 'mid the rills
Descending from thy native hills.

Without his governance, in vain
Manhood is strong, and Youth is bold
If oftentimes the o'er-piled strain
Clogs in the furnace, and grows cold

Walter Savage Landor

In After Time

No, my own love of other years!
No, it must never be.
Much rests with you that yet endears,
Alas! but what with me?
Could those bright years oer me revolve
So gay, oer you so fair,
The pearl of life we would dissolve
And each the cup might share.
You show that truth can neer decay,
Whatever fate befalls;
I, that the myrtle and the bay
Shoot fresh on ruind walls.

Walter Savage Landor

Elegy I To Charles Diodati.1

At length, my friend, the far-sent letters come,
Charged with thy kindness, to their destin'd home,
They come, at length, from Deva's² Western side,
Where prone she seeks the salt Vergivian tide.³
Trust me, my joy is great that thou shouldst be,
Though born of foreign race, yet born for me,
And that my sprightly friend, now free to roam,
Must seek again so soon his wonted home.
I well content, where Thames with refluent tide
My native city laves, meantime reside,
Nor zeal nor duty, now, my steps impell
To reedy Cam,⁴ and my forbidden cell.⁵
Nor aught of pleasure in those fields have I,
That, to the musing bard, all shade deny.
Tis time, that I, a pedant's threats⁶ disdain,
And fly from wrongs, my soul will ne'e...

John Milton