The Convert
After one moment when I bowed my head And the whole world turned over and came upright, And I came out where the old road shone white, I walked the ways and heard what
The Song of Quoodle
They haven’t got no noses, The fallen sons of Eve; Even the smell of roses Is not what they supposes; But more than mind discloses And more than men believe. They haven’t got no
The Myth of Arthur
O learned man who never learned to learn, Save to deduce, by timid steps and small, From towering smoke that fire can never burn And from tall tales that men were never tall. Say,
The Aristocrat
The Devil is a gentleman and askes you down to stay At his little place at What’sitsname (it isn’t far away). They say the sport is splendid; there is always something new, And fairy
A Ballad Of Suicide
The gallows in my garden, people say, Is new and neat and adequately tall; I tie the noose on in a knowing way As one that knots his necktie for a ball; But just
The Deluge
Though giant rains put out the sun, Here stand I for a sign. Though earth be filled with waters dark, My cup is filled with wine. Tell to the trembling priests that here Under
The Song of the Oak
The Druids waved their golden knives And danced around the Oak When they had sacrificed a man; But though the learned search and scan No single modern person can Entirely see the joke. But
The Road to Roundabout
Some say that Guy of Warwick The man that killed the Cow, And brake the mighty Boar alive Beyond the bridge at Slough; Went up against a Loathly Worm That wasted all the Downs,
To the Unknown Warrior
You whom the kings saluted; who refused not The one great pleasure of ignoble days, Fame without name and glory without gossip, Whom no biographer befouls with praise. Who said of you “Defeated”? In
A Hymn
O God of earth and altar, Bow down and hear our cry, Our earthly rulers falter, Our people drift and die; The walls of gold entomb us, The swords of scorn divide, Take not
The New Freethinker
John Grubby who was short and stout And troubled with religious doubt, Refused about the age of three To sit upon the curate’s knee; (For so the eternal strife must rage Between the spirit
Ecclesiastes
There is one sin: to call a green leaf gray, Whereat the sun in heaven shuddereth. There is one blasphemy: for death to pray, For God alone knoweth the praise of death. There is
The Unpardonable Sin
I do not cry, beloved, neither curse. Silence and strength, these two at least are good. He gave me sun and start and aught He could, But not a woman’s love; for that is
The Rolling English Road
Before the Roman came to Rye or out to Severn strode, The rolling English drunkard made the rolling English road. A reeling road, a rolling road, that rambles round the shire, And after him