If By Dull Rhymes Our English Must Be Chain'd

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1. O Dull Cold Northern Sky O DULL cold northern sky, O brawling sabbath bells, O feebly twittering Autumn bird that tells The year is like to die! O still, spoiled trees, O city ways, O sun desired in vain, O dread presentiment of coming rain That cloys the sullen days! Thee, heart of mine, I greet. In what hard mountain […]...
2. TO MISTRESS KATHARINE BRADSHAW, THE LOVELY, THAT CROWNED HIM WITH LAUREL My Muse in meads has spent her many hours Sitting, and sorting several sorts of flowers, To make for others garlands; and to set On many a head here, many a coronet. But amongst all encircled here, not one Gave her a day of coronation; Till you, sweet mistress, came and interwove A laurel for […]...
3. A Song of Autumn ‘WHERE shall we go for our garlands glad At the falling of the year, When the burnt-up banks are yellow and sad, When the boughs are yellow and sere? Where are the old ones that once we had, And when are the new ones near? What shall we do for our garlands glad At the […]...
4. A slant of sun on dull brown walls A slant of sun on dull brown walls, A forgotten sky of bashful blue. Toward God a mighty hymn, A song of collisions and cries, Rumbling wheels, hoof-beats, bells, Welcomes, farewells, love-calls, final moans, Voices of joy, idiocy, warning, despair, The unknown appeals of brutes, The chanting of flowers, The screams of cut trees, The […]...
5. Sonnet 44: If the dull substance of my flesh were thought If the dull substance of my flesh were thought, Injurious distance should not stop my way; For then despite of space I would be brought, From limits far remote, where thou dost stay. No matter then although my foot did stand Upon the farthest earth removed from thee; For nimble thought can jump both sea […]...
6. At A Vacation Exercise In The Colledge, Part Latin, Part English. The Latin Speeches Ended, The English Thus Began Hail native Language, that by sinews weak Didst move my first endeavouring tongue to speak, And mad’st imperfect words with childish tripps, Half unpronounc’t, slide through my infant-lipps, Driving dum silence from the portal dore, Where he had mutely sate two years before: Here I salute thee and thy pardon ask, That now I use […]...
7. TO THE WILLOW-TREE Thou art to all lost love the best, The only true plant found, Wherewith young men and maids distrest And left of love, are crown’d. When once the lover’s rose is dead Or laid aside forlorn, Then willow-garlands, ’bout the head, Bedew’d with tears, are worn. When with neglect, the lover’s bane, Poor maids rewarded […]...
8. The Light of Other Days OFT, in the stilly night, Ere slumber’s chain has bound me, Fond Memory brings the light Of other days around me: The smiles, the tears Of boyhood’s years, The words of love then spoken; The eyes that shone, Now dimm’d and gone, The cheerful hearts now broken! Thus, in the stilly night, Ere slumber’s chain […]...
9. Oft, in the Stilly Night Oft, in the stilly night, Ere slumber’s chain has bound me, Fond memory brings the light Of other days around me; The smiles, the tears, Of boyhood’s years, The words of love then spoken; The eyes that shone, Now dimm’d and gone, The cheerful hearts now broken! Thus, in the stilly night, Ere slumber’s chain […]...
10. The English Flag Above the portico a flag-staff, bearing the Union Jack, Remained fluttering in the flames for some time, but ultimately When it fell the crowds rent the air with shouts, And seemed to see significance in the incident. DAILY PAPERS. Winds of the World, give answer! They are whimpering to and fro And what should they […]...
11. English In 1819 An old, mad, blind, despised, and dying king, Princes, the dregs of their dull race, who Through public scorn, mud from a muddy spring, Rulers who neither see, nor feel, nor know, But leech-like to their fainting country cling, Till they drop, blind in blood, without a blow, A people starved and stabbed in the […]...
12. Wreath the Bowl Wreath the bowl With flowers of soul, The brightest Wit can find us, We’ll take a flight Towards heaven to-night, And leave dull earth behind us. Should Love amid The wreaths be hid That Joy, the enchanter, brings us, No danger fear, While wine is near We’ll drown him if he stings us. Then, wreath […]...
13. Lines on Hearing it Declared that No Women Were So Handsome as the English BEAUTY, the attribute of Heaven! In various forms to mortals given, With magic skill enslaves mankind, As sportive fancy sways the mind. Search the wide world, go where you will, VARIETY pursues you still; Capricious Nature knows no bound, Her unexhausted gifts are found In ev’ry clime, in ev’ry face, Each has its own peculiar […]...
14. He Gives His Beloved Certain Rhymes Fasten your hair with a golden pin, And bind up every wandering tress; I bade my heart build these poor rhymes: It worked at them, day out, day in, Building a sorrowful loveliness Out of the battles of old times. You need but lift a pearl-pale hand, And bind up your long hair and sigh; […]...
15. After Long Drought After long drought, commotion in the sky; After dead silence, thunder. Then it comes, The rain. It slashes leaves, and doubly drums On tin and shingle; beats and bends awry The flower heads; puddles dust, and with a sigh Like love sinks into grasses, where it hums As bees did once, among chrysanthemums And asters […]...
16. Rhymes for Gloriana I. THE DOLL UPON THE TOPMOST BOUGH This doll upon the topmost bough, This playmate-gift, in Christmas dress, Was taken down and brought to me One sleety night most comfortless. Her hair was gold, her dolly-sash Was gray brocade, most good to see. The dear toy laughed, and I forgot The ill the new year […]...
17. A dull sound, varying now and again And then we began eating corn starch, Chalk chewed wet into sirup. We pilfered Argo boxes stored away to stiffen My white dress shirt, and my cousin And I played or watched TV, no longer annoyed By the din of never cooling afternoons. On the way home from church one fifth Sunday, Shirt outside my […]...
18. Prologue to "Rhymes to be Traded for Bread&quot EVEN the shrewd and bitter, Gnarled by the old world’s greed, Cherished the stranger softly Seeing his utter need. Shelter and patient hearing, These were their gifts to him, To the minstrel chanting, begging, As the sunset-fire grew dim. The rich said “you are welcome.” Yea, even the rich were good. How strange that in […]...
19. A Rondeau of College Rhymes Our college rhymes, how light they seem, Like little ghosts of love’s young dream That led our boyish hearts away From lectures and from books, to stray By flowery mead and flowing stream! There’s nothing here, in form or theme, Of thought sublime or art supreme: We would not have the critic weigh Our college […]...
20. Theme For English B The instructor said, Go home and write a page tonight. And let that page come out of you Then, it will be true. I wonder if it’s that simple? I am twenty-two, colored, born in Winston-Salem. I went to school there, then Durham, then here To this college on the hill above Harlem. I am […]...
21. The Conflict No! I this conflict longer will not wage, The conflict duty claims the giant task; Thy spells, O virtue, never can assuage The heart’s wild fire this offering do not ask True, I have sworn a solemn vow have sworn, That I myself will curb the self within; Yet take thy wreath, no more it […]...
22. The Collision in the English Channel ‘Twas on a Sunday morning, and in the year of 1888, The steamer “Saxmundham,” laden with coal and coke for freight, Was run into amidships by the Norwegian barque “Nor,” And sunk in the English Channel, while the storm fiend did roar. She left Newcastle on Friday, in November, about two o’clock, And proceeded well […]...
23. It Was an English Ladye Bright It was an English ladye bright, (The sun shines fair on Carlisle wall,) And she would marry a Scottish knight, For Love will still be lord of all. Blithely they saw the rising sun When he shone fair on Carlisle wall; But they were sad ere day was done, Though Love was still the lord […]...
24. The Ungrateful Garden Midas watched the golden crust That formed over his steaming sores, Hugged his agues, loved his lust, But damned to hell the out-of-doors Where blazing motes of sun impaled The serrid roses, metal-bright. “Those famous flowers,” Midas wailed, “Have scorched my retina with light.” This gift, he’d thought, would gild his joys, Silt up the […]...
25. An Evangelist's Wife “Why am I not myself these many days, You ask? And have you nothing more to ask? I do you wrong? I do not hear your praise To God for giving you me to share your task? “Jealous-of Her? Because her cheeks are pink, And she has eyes? No, not if she had seven. If […]...
26. Inferno (English) CANTO I ONE night, when half my life behind me lay, I wandered from the straight lost path afar. Through the great dark was no releasing way; Above that dark was no relieving star. If yet that terrored night I think or say, As death’s cold hands its fears resuming are. Gladly the dreads I […]...
27. By The Lake ACROSS the flat and the pastel snow Two people go. . . . ‘And do you remember When last we wandered this shore?’ . . . ‘Ah no! For it is cold-hearted December.’ ‘Dead, the leaves that like asses’s ears hung on the trees When last we wandered and squandered joy here; Now Midas your […]...
28. Sonnet I THE partial Muse, has from my earliest hours, Smil’d on the rugged path I’m doom’d to tread, And still with sportive hand has snatch’d wild flowers, To weave fantastic garlands for my head: But far, far happier is the lot of those Who never learn’d her dear delusive art; Which, while it decks the head […]...
29. Two Fusiliers And have we done with War at last? Well, we’ve been lucky devils both, And there’s no need of pledge or oath To bind our lovely friendship fast, By firmer stuff Close bound enough. By wire and wood and stake we’re bound, By Fricourt and by Festubert, By whipping rain, by the sun’s glare, By […]...
30. Fleckno, an English Priest at Rome Oblig’d by frequent visits of this man, Whom as Priest, Poet, and Musician, I for some branch of Melchizedeck took, (Though he derives himself from my Lord Brooke) I sought his Lodging; which is at the Sign Of the sad Pelican; Subject divine For Poetry: There three Stair Cases high, Which signifies his triple property, […]...
31. THE MAYPOLE The May-pole is up, Now give me the cup; I’ll drink to the garlands around it; But first unto those Whose hands did compose The glory of flowers that crown’d it. A health to my girls, Whose husbands may earls Or lords be, granting my wishes, And when that ye wed To the bridal bed, […]...
32. Independence Ode Columbia, fair queen in your glory! Columbia, the pride of the earth! We crown you with song – wreath and story; We honour the day of your birth! The wrath of a king and his minions You braved, to be free, on that day; And the eagle sailed up on strong pinions, And frightened the […]...
33. Credo I cannot find my way: there is no star In all the shrouded heavens anywhere; And there is not a whisper in the air Of any living voice but one so far That I can hear it only as a bar Of lost, imperial music, played when fair And angel fingers wove, and unaware, Dead […]...
34. Farewell and Thanksgiving Whatever I have left unsaid When I am dead O’muse forgive me. You were always there, Like light, like air. Those great good things Of which the least bird sings, So why not I? Yet thank you even then, Sweet muse, Amen....
35. A Song of the English Fair is our lot O goodly is our heritage! (Humble ye, my people, and be fearful in your mirth!) For the Lord our God Most High He hath made the deep as dry, He hath smote for us a pathway to the ends of all the Earth! Yea, though we sinned and our rulers went […]...
36. Sonnet XXXIV: Venus! To Thee Venus! to thee, the Lesbian Muse shall sing, The song, which Myttellenian youths admir’d, When Echo, am’rous of the strain inspir’d, Bade the wild rocks with madd’ning plaudits ring! Attend my pray’r! O! Queen of rapture! bring To these fond arms, he, whom my soul has fir’d; From these fond arms remov’d; yet, still desir’d, […]...
37. An English Wood This valley wood is pledged To the set shape of things, And reasonably hedged: Here are no harpies fledged, No rocs may clap their wings, Nor gryphons wave their stings. Here, poised in quietude, Calm elementals brood On the set shape of things: They fend away alarms From this green wood. Here nothing is that […]...
38. An English Breeze UP with the sun, the breeze arose, Across the talking corn she goes, And smooth she rustles far and wide Through all the voiceful countryside. Through all the land her tale she tells; She spins, she tosses, she compels The kites, the clouds, the windmill sails And all the trees in all the dales. God […]...
39. English Flavors I love to lick English the way I licked the hard Round licorice sticks the Belgian nuns gave me for six Good conduct points on Sundays after mass. Love it when ‘plethora’, ‘indolence’, ‘damask’, Or my new word: ‘lasciviousness,’ stain my tongue, Thicken my saliva, sweet as those sticks – black and slick with every […]...
40. English Thornton Here! You sons of the men Who fought with Washington at Valley Forge, And whipped Black Hawk at Starved Rock, Arise! Do battle with the descendants of those Who bought land in the loop when it was waste sand, And sold blankets and guns to the army of Grant, And sat in legislatures in the […]...