Walter De La Mare
Melmillo
Three and thirty birds there stood In an elder in a wood; Called Melmillo flew off three, Leaving thirty in the tree; Called Melmillo nine now gone, And the boughs held twenty-one; Called Melmillo
Nicholas Nye
Thistle and darnell and dock grew there, And a bush, in the corner, of may, On the orchard wall I used to sprawl In the blazing heat of the day; Half asleep and half
Silver
Slowly, silently, now the moon Walks the night in her silver shoon; This way, and that, she peers, and sees Silver fruit upon silver trees; One by one the casements catch Her beams beneath
Good-bye
The last of last words spoken is, Good-bye – The last dismantled flower in the weed-grown hedge, The last thin rumour of a feeble bell far ringing, The last blind rat to spurn the
The Song Of Shadows
“Sweep thy faint strings, Musician, With thy long lean hand; Downward the starry tapers burn, Sinks soft the waning sand; The old hound whimpers couched in sleep, The embers smoulder low; Across the walls
Wanderers
Wide are the meadows of night, And daisies are shinng there, Tossing their lovely dews, Lustrous and fair; And through these sweet fields go, Wanderers amid the stars Venus, Mercury, Uranus, Neptune, Saturn, Jupiter,
The Widow
Grief hath pacified her face; Even hope might share so still a place; Yet, on the silence of her heart, Haply, if a strange footfall start, Or a chance word of ecstasy Cry through
Full Moon
One night as Dick lay half asleep, Into his drowsy eyes A great still light began to creep From out the silent skies. It was the lovely moon’s, for when He raised his dreamy
The Spirit of Air
Coral and clear emerald, And amber from the sea, Lilac-coloured amethyst, Chalcedony; The lovely Spirit of Air Floats on a cloud and doth ride, Clad in the beauties of earth Like a bride. So
Why?
Ever, ever Stir and shiver The reeds and rushes By the river: Ever, ever, As if in dream, The lone moon’s silver Sleeks the stream. What old sorrow, What lost love, Moon, reeds, rushes,
An Epitaph
Here lies a most beautiful lady, Light of step and heart was she; I think she was the most beautiful lady That ever was in the West Country. But beauty vanishes, beauty passes; However
Alexander
It was the Great Alexander, Capped with a golden helm, Sate in the ages, in his floating ship, In a dead calm. Voices of sea-maids singing Wandered across the deep: The sailors labouring on
Alone
The abode of the nightingale is bare, Flowered frost congeals in the gelid air, The fox howls from his frozen lair: Alas, my loved one is gone, I am alone: It is winter. Once
Tom's Little Dog
Tom told his dog called Tim to beg, And up at once he sat, His two clear amber eyes fixed fast, His haunches on his mat. Tom poised a lump of sugar on His
At Ease
Most wounds can Time repair; But some are mortal these: For a broken heart there is no balm, No cure for a heart at ease At ease, but cold as stone, Though the intellect