In the Depths

Related poetry:

1. The Spirit's Depths Not in the crisis of events Of compass’d hopes, or fears fulfill’d, Or acts of gravest consequence, Are life’s delight and depth reveal’d. The day of days was not the day; That went before, or was postponed; The night Death took our lamp away Was not the night on which we groan’d. I drew my […]...
2. Stanzas To Jessy There is a mystic thread of life So dearly wreath’d with mine alone, That Destiny’s relentless knife At once must sever both, or none. There is a Form on which these eyes Have fondly gazed with such delight – By day, that Form their joy supplies, And Dreams restore it, through the night. There is […]...
3. Walking With God (Genesis, v.24) Oh! for a closer walk with God, A calm and heavenly frame; A light to shine upon the road That leads me to the Lamb! Where is the blessedness I knew When first I saw the Lord? Where is the soul-refershing view Of Jesus and his word? What peaceful hours I once enjoyed! […]...
4. Domestic Scene The meal was o’er, the lamp was lit, The family sat in its glow; The Mother never ceased to knit, The Daughter never slacked to sew; The Father read his evening news, The Son was playing solitaire: If peace a happy home could choose I’m sure you’d swear that it was there. BUT The Mother: […]...
5. Marine Snow At Mid-Depths And Down As you descend, slowly, falling faster past You this snow, Ghostly, some flakes bio- Luminescent (you plunge, And this lit snow doesn’t land At your feet but keeps falling below You): single-cell-plant chains, shreds Of zooplankton’s mucus food traps, Fish fecal pellets, radioactive fallouts, Sand grains, pollen….And inside These jagged falling islands Live more microlives, […]...
6. Ode on Solitude Happy the man, whose wish and care A few paternal acres bound, Content to breathe his native air, In his own ground. Whose heards with milk, whose fields with bread, Whose flocks supply him with attire, Whose trees in summer yield him shade, In winter fire. Blest! who can unconcern’dly find Hours, days, and years […]...
7. Solitude Happy the man, whose wish and care A few paternal acres bound, Content to breathe his native air In his own ground. Whose herds with milk, whose fields with bread, Whose flocks supply him with attire; Whose trees in summer yield shade, In winter, fire. Blest, who can unconcern’dly find Hours, days, and years, slide […]...
8. Solitude: An Ode I. How happy he, who free from care The rage of courts, and noise of towns; Contented breaths his native air, In his own grounds. II. Whose herds with milk, whose fields with bread, Whose flocks supply him with attire, Whose trees in summer yield him shade, In winter fire. III. Blest! who can unconcern’dly […]...
9. In Memoriam A. H. H.: 11. Calm is the morn without a sound Calm is the morn without a sound, Calm as to suit a calmer grief, And only thro’ the faded leaf The chestnut pattering to the ground: Calm and deep peace on this high wold, And on these dews that drench the furze. And all the silvery gossamers That twinkle into green and gold: Calm and […]...
10. The Future A wanderer is man from his birth. He was born in a ship On the breast of the river of Time; Brimming with wonder and joy He spreads out his arms to the light, Rivets his gaze on the banks of the stream. As what he sees is, so have his thoughts been. Whether he […]...
11. Sing Sing Music Was Given Sing sing Music was given To brighten the gay, and kindle the loving; Souls here, like planets in heaven, By harmony’s laws alone are kept moving. Beauty may boast of her eyes and her cheeks, But Love from the lips his true archery wings; And she, who but feathers the dart when she speaks, At […]...
12. For a Naughty Little Girl My sweet little girl should be cheerful and mild She must not be fretful and cry! Oh! why is this passion? remember, my child, GOD sees you, who lives in the sky. That dear little face, that I like so to kiss, How alter’d and sad it appears! Do you think I can love you […]...
13. Long Time I Lay In Little Ease LONG TIME I LAY IN LITTLE EASE LONG time I lay in little ease Where, placed by the Turanian, Marseilles, the many-masted, sees The blue Mediterranean. Now songful in the hour of sport, Now riotous for wages, She camps around her ancient port, As ancient of the ages. Algerian airs through all the place Unconquerably […]...
14. Recompense I saw two sowers in Life’s field at morn, To whom came one in angel guise and said, “Is it for labour that a man is born? Lo: I am Ease. Come ye and eat my bread!” Then gladly one forsook his task undone And with the Tempter went his slothful way, The other toiled […]...
15. Dedication To Christina G. Rossetti Songs light as these may sound, though deep and strong The heart spake through them, scarce should hope to please Ears tuned to strains of loftier thoughts than throng Songs light as these. Yet grace may set their sometime doubt at ease, Nor need their too rash reverence fear to wrong The shrine it serves […]...
16. Earth! my Likeness! EARTH! my likeness! Though you look so impassive, ample and spheric there, I now suspect that is not all; I now suspect there is something fierce in you, eligible to burst forth; For an athlete is enamour’d of me-and I of him; But toward him there is something fierce and terrible in me, eligible to […]...
17. Youth and Calm ‘Tis death! and peace, indeed, is here, And ease from shame, and rest from fear. There’s nothing can dismarble now The smoothness of that limpid brow. But is a calm like this, in truth, The crowning end of life and youth, And when this boon rewards the dead, Are all debts paid, has all been […]...
18. A Voice From The Dungeon I’m buried now; I’ve done with life; I’ve done with hate, revenge and strife; I’ve done with joy, and hope and love And all the bustling world above. Long have I dwelt forgotten here In pining woe and dull despair; This place of solitude and gloom Must be my dungeon and my tomb. No hope, […]...
19. Sonnets CX: Alas, 'tis true I have gone here and there Alas, ’tis true I have gone here and there And made myself a motley to the view, Gor’d mine own thoughts, sold cheap what is most dear, Made old offences of affections new. Most true it is that I have look’d on truth Askance and strangely: but, by all above, These blenches gave my heart […]...
20. Holy Sonnet III: O Might Those Sighs And Tears Return Again O might those sighs and tears return again Into my breast and eyes, which I have spent, That I might in this holy discontent Mourn with some fruit, as I have mourned in vain; In mine Idolatry what showers of rain Mine eyes did waste! what griefs my heart did rent! That sufferance was my […]...
21. Sonnet CX Alas, ’tis true I have gone here and there And made myself a motley to the view, Gored mine own thoughts, sold cheap what is most dear, Made old offences of affections new; Most true it is that I have look’d on truth Askance and strangely: but, by all above, These blenches gave my heart […]...
22. The Wife's Will SIT still­a word­a breath may break (As light airs stir a sleeping lake,) The glassy calm that soothes my woes, The sweet, the deep, the full repose. O leave me not! for ever be Thus, more than life itself to me! Yes, close beside thee, let me kneel­ Give me thy hand that I may […]...
23. Hymn 54 Electing grace; or, Saints beloved in Christ. Eph. 1:3ff. Jesus, we bless thy Father’s name; Thy God and ours are both the same; What heav’nly blessings from his throne Flow down to sinners through his Son! “Christ be my first elect,” he said, Then chose our souls in Christ our head, Before he gave the […]...
24. Hymn 19 The song of Simeon; or, Death made desirable. Luke 2:27ff Lord, at thy temple we appear, As happy Simeon came, And hope to meet our Savior here; O make our joys the same! With what divine and vast delight The good old man was filled, When fondly in his withered arms He clasped the holy […]...
25. Trees (For Mrs. Henry Mills Alden) I think that I shall never see A poem lovely as a tree. A tree whose hungry mouth is prest Against the earth’s sweet flowing breast; A tree that looks at God all day, And lifts her leafy arms to pray; A tree that may in Summer wear A nest […]...
26. 315. Song-Out over the Forth OUT over the Forth, I look to the North; But what is the north and its Highlands to me? The south nor the east gie ease to my breast, The far foreign land, or the wide rolling sea. But I look to the west when I gae to rest, That happy my dreams and my […]...
27. Love Poem My clumsiest dear, whose hands shipwreck vases, At whose quick touch all glasses chip and ring, Whose palms are bulls in china, burs in linen, And have no cunning with any soft thing Except all ill-at-ease fidgeting people: The refugee uncertain at the door You make at home; deftly you steady The drunk clambering on […]...
28. Holy Sonnet VIII: If Faithful Souls Be Alike Glorified If faithful souls be alike glorified As angels, then my fathers soul doth see, And adds this even to full felicity, That valiantly I hells wide mouth o’erstride: But if our minds to these souls be descried By circumstances, and by signs that be Apparent in us, not immediately, How shall my mind’s white truth […]...
29. Sonnet 110: Alas, 'tis true, I have gone here and there Alas, ’tis true, I have gone here and there, And made myself a motley to the view, Gored mine own thoughts, sold cheap what is most dear, Made old offences of affections new. Most true it is that I have looked on truth Askance and strangely. But, by all above, These blenches gave my heart […]...
30. Through a Glass Darkly What we, when face to face we see The Father of our souls, shall be, John tells us, doth not yet appear; Ah! did he tell what we are here! A mind for thoughts to pass into, A heart for loves to travel through, Five senses to detect things near, Is this the whole that […]...
31. His Litany to the Holy Spirit In the hour of my distress, When temptations me oppress, And when I my sins confess, Sweet Spirit comfort me! When I lie within my bed, Sick in heart, and sick in head, And with doubts discomforted, Sweet Spirit comfort me! When the house doth sigh and weep, And the world is drown’d in sleep, […]...
32. The Contented Man “How good God is to me,” he said; “For have I not a mansion tall, With trees and lawns of velvet tread, And happy helpers at my call? With beauty is my life abrim, With tranquil hours and dreams apart; You wonder that I yield to Him That best of prayers, a grateful heart?” “How […]...
33. The Satin Dress Needle, needle, dip and dart, Thrusting up and down, Where’s the man could ease a heart Like a satin gown? See the stitches curve and crawl Round the cunning seams- Patterns thin and sweet and small As a lady’s dreams. Wantons go in bright brocade; Brides in organdie; Gingham’s for the plighted maid; Satin’s for […]...
34. A Translation Horace, BK. V., Ode 3 “Regulus” A Diversity of Creatures There are whose study is of smells, And to attentive schools rehearse How something mixed with something else Makes something worse. Some cultivate in broths impure The clients of our body these, Increasing without Venus, cure, Or cause, disease. Others the heated wheel extol, And […]...
35. SUCH, SUCH IS HE WHO PLEASETH ME FLY, dearest, fly! He is not nigh! He who found thee one fair morn in Spring In the wood where thou thy flight didst wing. Fly, dearest, fly! He is not nigh! Never rests the foot of evil spy. Hark! flutes’ sweet strains and love’s refrains Reach the loved one, borne there by the wind, […]...
36. GENIAL IMPULSE THUS roll I, never taking ease, My tub, like Saint Diogenes, Now serious am, now seek to please; Now love and hate in turn one sees; The motives now are those, now these; Now nothings, now realities. Thus roll I, never taking ease, My tub, like Saint Diogenes. 1810....
37. Land, Ho! I know ’tis but a loom of land, Yet is it land, and so I will rejoice, I know I cannot hear His voice Upon the shore, nor see Him stand; Yet is it land, ho! land. The land! the land! the lovely land! ‘Far off,’ dost say? Far off-ah, blessиd home! Farewell! farewell! thou […]...
38. New Year's Morning Only a night from old to new! Only a night, and so much wrought! The Old Year’s heart all weary grew, But said: The New Year rest has brought.” The Old Year’s hopes its heart laid down, As in a grave; but trusting, said: “The blossoms of the New Year’s crown Bloom from the ashes […]...
39. Serenade So sweet the hour, so calm the time, I feel it more than half a crime, When Nature sleeps and stars are mute, To mar the silence ev’n with lute. At rest on ocean’s brilliant dyes An image of Elysium lies: Seven Pleiades entranced in Heaven, Form in the deep another seven: Endymion nodding from […]...
40. The Clinging Vine “Be calm? And was I frantic? You’ll have me laughing soon. I’m calm as this Atlantic, And quiet as the moon; I may have spoken faster Than once, in other days; For I’ve no more a master, And now-‘Be calm,’ he says. “Fear not, fear no commotion,- I’ll be as rocks and sand; The moon […]...