Home ⇒ 📌Robert Southey ⇒ Porlock
Porlock
Porlock! thy verdant vale so fair to sight,
Thy lofty hills which fern and furze imbrown,
The waters that roll musically down
Thy woody glens, the traveller with delight
Recalls to memory, and the channel grey
Circling its surges in thy level bay.
Porlock! I shall forget thee not,
Here by the unwelcome summer rain confined;
But often shall hereafter call to mind
How here, a patient prisoner, ’twas my lot
To wear the lonely, lingering close of day,
Making my sonnet by the alehouse fire,
Whilst Idleness and Solitude inspire
Dull rhymes to pass the duller hours away.
(2 votes, average: 4.00 out of 5)
Related poetry:
- Verses Observe this Piece, which to our Sight does bring The fittest Posture for the Swedish King; (Encompass’d, as we think, with Armies round, Tho’ not express’d within this narrow Bound) Who, whilst his warlike and extended Hand Directs the foremost Ranks to Charge or Stand, Reverts his Face, lest That, so Fair and Young, Should […]...
- Prisoner ‘Prisoner, tell me, who was it that bound you?’ ‘It was my master,’ said the prisoner. ‘I thought I could outdo everybody in the world in wealth and power, And I amassed in my own treasure-house the money due to my king. When sleep overcame me I lay upon the bed that was for my […]...
- Unlyric Love Song It is time to give that-of-myself which I could not at first: To offer you now at last my least and my worst: Minor, absurd preserves, The shell’s end-curves, A document kept at the back of a drawer, A tin hidden under the floor, Recalcitrant prides and hesitations: To pile them carefully in a desparate […]...
- In Age And art thou he, now “fallen on evil days,” And changed indeed! Yet what do this sunk cheek, These thinner locks, and that calm forehead speak! A spirit reckless of man’s blame or praise, A spirit, when thine eyes to the noon’s blaze Their dark orbs roll in vain, in suffering meek, As in the […]...
- There is a solitude of space There is a solitude of space A solitude of sea A solitude of death, but these Society shall be Compared with that profounder site That polar privacy A soul admitted to itself Finite infinity....
- Love's Young Dream Oh! the days are gone, when Beauty bright My heart’s chain wove; When my dream of life, from morn till night, Was love, still love. New hope may bloom, And days may come, Of milder calmer beam, But there’s nothing half so sweet in life As love’s young dream: No, there’s nothing half so sweet […]...
- To a Child of Quality, Five Years Old, 1704. The Author then Forty LORDS, knights, and squires, the numerous band That wear the fair Miss Mary’s fetters, Were summoned by her high command To show their passions by their letters. My pen amongst the rest I took, Lest those bright eyes, that cannot read, Should dart their kindling fire, and look The power they have to be obey’d. […]...
- XVII (Thinking, Tangling Shadows…) Thinking, tangling shadows in the deep solitude. You are far away too, oh farther than anyone. Thinking, freeing birds, dissolving images, Burying lamps. Belfry of fogs, how far away, up there! Stifling laments, milling shadowy hopes, Taciturn miller, Night falls on you face downward, far from the city. Your presence is foreign, as strange to […]...
- Hymn 151 Prophecy and inspiration. ‘Twas by an order from the Lord The ancient prophets spoke his word; His Spirit did their tongues inspire, And warmed their hearts with heav’nly fire. The works and wonders which they wrought Confirmed the messages they brought; The prophet’s pen succeeds his breath, To save the holy words from death. Great […]...
- To my small Hearth His fire came To my small Hearth His fire came And all my House aglow Did fan and rock, with sudden light ‘Twas Sunrise ’twas the Sky Impanelled from no Summer brief With limit of Decay ‘Twas Noon without the News of Night Nay, Nature, it was Day...
- The Song Of The Old Mother I rise in the dawn, and I kneel and blow Till the seed of the fire flicker and glow; And then I must scrub and bake and sweep Till stars are beginning to blink and peep; And the young lie long and dream in their bed Of the matching of ribbons for bosom and head, […]...
- To A Cat Mirrors are not more silent Nor the creeping dawn more secretive; In the moonlight, you are that panther We catch sight of from afar. By the inexplicable workings of a divine law, We look for you in vain; More remote, even, than the Ganges or the setting sun, Yours is the solitude, yours the secret. […]...
- Best Society When I was a child, I thought, Casually, that solitude Never needed to be sought. Something everybody had, Like nakedness, it lay at hand, Not specially right or specially wrong, A plentiful and obvious thing Not at all hard to understand. Then, after twenty, it became At once more difficult to get And more desired […]...
- 124. Motto prefixed to the Author's first Publication THE SIMPLE Bard, unbroke by rules of art, He pours the wild effusions of the heart; And if inspir’d ’tis Nature’s pow’rs inspire; Her’s all the melting thrill, and her’s the kindling fire....
- What Fields Are As Fragrant As Your Hands? What fields are as fragrant as your hands? You feel how external fragrance stands Upon your stronger resistance. Stars stand in images above. Give me your mouth to soften, love; Ah, your hair is all in idleness. See, I want to surround you with yourself And the faded expectation lift From the edges of your […]...
- Stripes POLICEMAN in front of a bank 3 A. M. … lonely. Policeman State and Madison… high noon… mobs… cars… parcels… lonely. Woman in suburbs… keeping night watch on a sleeping typhoid patient… only a clock to talk to… lonesome. Woman selling gloves… bargain day department store… furious crazy-work of many hands slipping in and out […]...
- Farewell To Verse In youth when oft my muse was dumb, My fancy nighly dead, To make my inspiration come I stood upon my head; And thus I let the blood down flow Into my cerebellum, And published every Spring or so Slim tomes in vellum. Alas! I am rheumatic now, Grey is my crown; I can no […]...
- Shall Earth No More Inspire Thee Shall Earth no more inspire thee, Thou lonely dreamer now? Since passion may not fire thee Shall nature cease to bow? Thy mind is ever moving In regions dark to thee; Recall its useless roving – Come back and dwell with me – I know my mountain breezes Enchant annd soothe thee still – I […]...
- A Stone Is Nobody's A man ambushed a stone. Caught it. Made it a prisoner. Put it in a dark room and stood guard over it for the Rest of his life. His mother asked why. He said, because it’s held captive, because it is Captured. Look, the stone is asleep, she said, it does not know Whether it’s […]...
- Sonnet LII SO oft as homeward I from her depart, I goe lyke one that hauing lost the field: Is prisoner led away with heauy hart, Despoyld of warlike armes and knowen shield. So doe I now my selfe a prisoner yeeld, To sorrow and to solitary paine: From presence of my dearest deare exylde, Longwhile alone […]...
- Briefly It Enters, and Briefly Speaks I am the blossom pressed in a book, Found again after two hundred years. . . . I am the maker, the lover, and the keeper. . . . When the young girl who starves Sits down to a table She will sit beside me. . . . I am food on the prisoner’s plate. […]...
- The Cat in the Kitchen (For Donald Hall) Have you heard about the boy who walked by The black water? I won’t say much more. Let’s wait a few years. It wanted to be entered. Sometimes a man walks by a pond, and a hand Reaches out and pulls him in. There was no Intention, exactly. The pond was lonely, […]...
- If you refuse me once, and think again If you refuse me once, and think again, I will complain. You are deceiv’d, love is no work of art, It must be got and born, Not made and worn, By every one that hath a heart. Or do you think they more than once can die, Whom you deny? Who tell you of a […]...
- Most she touched me by her muteness Most she touched me by her muteness Most she won me by the way She presented her small figure Plea itself for Charity Were a Crumb my whole possession Were there famine in the land Were it my resource from starving Could I such a plea withstand Not upon her knee to thank me Sank […]...
- An Hymn To Humanity (To S. P. G. Esp) O! for this dark terrestrial ball Forsakes his azure-paved hall A prince of heav’nly birth! Divine Humanity behold, What wonders rise, what charms unfold At his descent to earth! II. The bosoms of the great and good With wonder and delight he view’d, And fix’d his empire there: Him, close compressing to his breast, The […]...
- Sonnet 111: O, for my sake do you with Fortune chide O, for my sake do you with Fortune chide, The guilty goddess of my harmful deeds, That did not better for my life provide Than public means which public manners breeds. Thence comes it that my name receives a brand, And almost thence my nature is subdued To what it works in, like the dyer’s […]...
- Sonnet CXI O, for my sake do you with Fortune chide, The guilty goddess of my harmful deeds, That did not better for my life provide Than public means which public manners breeds. Thence comes it that my name receives a brand, And almost thence my nature is subdued To what it works in, like the dyer’s […]...
- The Owl Describing her Young Ones Why was that baleful Creature made, Which seeks our Quiet to invade, And screams ill Omens through the Shade? ‘Twas, sure, for every Mortals good, When, by wrong painting of her Brood, She doom’d them for the Eagle’s Food: Who proffer’d Safety to her Tribe, Wou’d she but shew them or describe, And serving him, […]...
- Sonnet CXI: O, for my sake do you with Fortune chide O, for my sake do you with Fortune chide, The guilty goddess of my harmful deeds, That did not better for my life provide Than public means which public manners breeds. Thence comes it that my name receives a brand, And almost thence my nature is subdu’d To what it works in, like the dyer’s […]...
- Sonnet XIII: Letters and Lines To the Shadow Letters and lines we see are soon defac’d, Metals do waste and fret with canker’s rust, The diamond shall once consume to dust, And freshest colors with foul stains disgrac’d; Paper and ink can paint but naked words, To write with blood of force offends the sight; And if with tears I […]...
- He Remembers Forgotten Beauty When my arms wrap you round I press My heart upon the loveliness That has long faded from the world; The jewelled crowns that kings have hurled In shadowy pools, when armies fled; The love-tales wrought with silken thread By dreaming ladies upon cloth That has made fat the murderous moth; The roses that of […]...
- Layover Making love in the sun, in the morning sun In a hotel room Above the alley Where poor men poke for bottles; Making love in the sun Making love by a carpet redder than our blood, Making love while the boys sell headlines And Cadillacs, Making love by a photograph of Paris And an open […]...
- Have A Nice Day ‘Help, help, ‘ said a man. ‘I’m drowning.’ ‘Hang on, ‘ said a man from the shore. ‘Help, help, ‘ said the man. ‘I’m not clowning.’ ‘Yes, I know, I heard you before. Be patient dear man who is drowning, You, see I’ve got a disease. I’m waiting for a Doctor J. Browning. So do […]...
- On my volcano grows the Grass On my volcano grows the Grass A meditative spot An acre for a Bird to choose Would be the General thought How red the Fire rocks below How insecure the sod Did I disclose Would populate with awe my solitude....
- Hatred of Sin Holy Lord God! I love Thy truth, Nor dare Thy least commandment slight; Yet pierced by sin the serpent’s tooth, I mourn the anguish of the bite. But though the poison lurks within, Hope bids me still with patience wait; Till death shall set me free from sin, Free from the only thing I hate. […]...
- Anna Imroth CROSS the hands over the breast here so. Straighten the legs a little more so. And call for the wagon to come and take her home. Her mother will cry some and so will her sisters and Brothers. But all of the others got down and they are safe and This is the only one […]...
- Patience Be patient with you? When the stooping sky Leans down upon the hills And tenderly, as one who soothing stills An anguish, gathers earth to lie Embraced and girdled. Do the sun-filled men Feel patience then? Be patient with you? When the snow-girt earth Cracks to let through a spurt Of sudden green, and from […]...
- The Human Seasons Four Seasons fill the measure of the year; There are four seasons in the mind of man: He has his lusty Spring, when fancy clear Takes in all beauty with an easy span: He has his Summer, when luxuriously Spring’s honied cud of youthful thought he loves To ruminate, and by such dreaming high Is […]...
- 444. Song-A Fiddler in the North AMANG the trees, where humming bees, At buds and flowers were hinging, O, Auld Caledon drew out her drone, And to her pipe was singing, O: ‘Twas Pibroch, Sang, Strathspeys, and Reels, She dirl’d them aff fu’ clearly, O: When there cam’ a yell o’ foreign squeels, That dang her tapsalteerie, O. Their capon craws […]...
- Masses AMONG the mountains I wandered and saw blue haze and Red crag and was amazed; On the beach where the long push under the endless tide Maneuvers, I stood silent; Under the stars on the prairie watching the Dipper slant Over the horizon’s grass, I was full of thoughts. Great men, pageants of war and […]...
Beauty »