Famous Long Romance Poems

Famous Long Romance Poems. Long Romance Poetry by Famous Poets. A collection of the all-time best Romance long poems

See also: Long Member Poems

 RUM tiddy um,
 tiddy um,
 tiddy um tum tum.
My knees are loose-like, my feet want to sling their selves.
I feel like tickling you under the chin—honey—and a-asking: Why Does a Chicken Cross the Road?
When the hens are a-laying eggs, and the roosters pluck-pluck-put-akut and you—honey—put new potatoes and gravy on the table, and there ain’t too much rain or too little:
 Say, why do I feel so gabby?
 Why do I want to holler all over the place?. . .
Do you remember I held empty hands to you
 and I said all is yours
 the handfuls of nothing?. . .
I ask you for white blossoms.
I bring a concertina after sunset under the apple trees.
I bring out “The Spanish Cavalier” and “In the Gloaming, O My Darling.”

The orchard here is near and home-like.
The oats in the valley run a mile.
Between are the green and marching potato vines.
The lightning bugs go criss-cross carrying a zigzag of fire: the potato bugs are asleep under their stiff and yellow-striped wings: here romance stutters to the western stars, “Excuse … me…”. . .
Old foundations of rotten wood.
An old barn done-for and out of the wormholes ten-legged roaches shook up and scared by sunlight.
So a...
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 At dusk, when lowlands where dark waters glide 
Robe in gray mist, and through the greening hills 
The hoot-owl calls his mate, and whippoorwills 
Clamor from every copse and orchard-side, 
I watched the red star rising in the East, 
And while his fellows of the flaming sign 
From prisoning daylight more and more released, 
Lift their pale lamps, and, climbing higher, higher, 
Out of their locks the waters of the Line 
Shaking in clouds of phosphorescent fire, 
Rose in the splendor of their curving flight, 
Their dolphin leap across the austral night, 
From windows southward opening on the sea 
What eyes, I wondered, might be watching, too, 
Orbed in some blossom-laden balcony. 
Where, from the garden to the rail above, 
As though a lover's greeting to his love 
Should borrow body and form and hue 
And tower in torrents of floral flame, 
The crimson bougainvillea grew, 
What starlit brow uplifted to the same 
Majestic regress of the summering sky, 
What ultimate thing -- hushed, holy, throned as high 
Above the currents that tarnish and profane 
As silver summits are whose pure repose 
No curious eyes disclose 
Nor any footfalls stain, 
But round their beauty on azure evenings 
Only the...
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 Within a pub that's off the Strand and handy to the bar,
With pipe in mouth and mug in hand sat Jobson of the Star.
"Come, sit ye down, ye wond'ring wight, and have a yarn," says he.
"I can't," says I, "because to-night I'm off to Tripoli;
To Tripoli and Trebizond and Timbuctoo mayhap,
Or any magic name beyond I find upon the map.
I go errant trail to try, to clutch the skirts of Chance,
To make once more before I die the gesture of Romance."
The Jobson yawned above his jug, and rumbled: "Is that so?
Well, anyway, sit down, you mug, and have a drink before you go."

Now Jobson is a chum of mine, and in a dusty den,
Within the street that's known as Fleet, he wields a wicked pen.
And every night it's his delight, above the fleeting show,
To castigate the living Great, and keep the lowly low.
And all there is to know he knows, for unto him is spurred
The knowledge of the knowledge of the Thing That Has Occurred.
And all that is to hear he hears, for to his ear is whirled
The echo of the echo of the Sound That Shocks The World.
Let Revolutions rage and rend, and Kingdoms rise and fall,
There Jobson...
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 Green, how I want you green.
Green wind. Green branches.
The ship out on the sea
and the horse on the mountain. 
With the shade around her waist 
she dreams on her balcony, 
green flesh, her hair green, 
with eyes of cold silver. 
Green, how I want you green. 
Under the gypsy moon, 
all things are watching her 
and she cannot see them.

Green, how I want you green. 
Big hoarfrost stars 
come with the fish of shadow 
that opens the road of dawn. 
The fig tree rubs its wind 
with the sandpaper of its branches, 
and the forest, cunning cat, 
bristles its brittle fibers. 
But who will come? And from where? 
She is still on her balcony 
green flesh, her hair green, 
dreaming in the bitter sea.

--My friend, I want to trade 
my horse for her house, 
my saddle for her mirror, 
my knife for her blanket. 
My friend, I come bleeding 
from the gates of Cabra.
--If it were possible, my boy, 
I'd help you fix that trade. 
But now I am not I, 
nor is my house now my house.
--My friend, I want to die
decently in my bed. 
Of iron, if that's possible, 
with blankets of fine chambray. 
Don't you see...
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 Me and Ed and a stretcher
 Out on the nootral ground.
(If there's one dead corpse, I'll betcher
 There's a 'undred smellin' around.)
Me and Eddie O'Brian,
 Both of the R. A. M. C.
"It'as a 'ell of a night
For a soul to take flight,"
 As Eddie remarks to me.
Me and Ed crawlin' 'omeward,
 Thinkin' our job is done,
When sudden and clear,
Wot do we 'ear:
 'Owl of a wounded 'Un.

"Got to take 'im," snaps Eddy;
 "Got to take all we can.
'E may be a Germ
Wiv the 'eart of a worm,
 But, blarst 'im! ain't 'e a man?"
So 'e sloshes out fixin' a dressin'
 ('E'd always a medical knack),
When that wounded 'Un
'E rolls to 'is gun,
 And 'e plugs me pal in the back.

Now what would you do? I arst you.
 There was me slaughtered mate.
There was that 'Un
(I'd collered 'is gun),
 A-snarlin' 'is 'ymn of 'ate.
Wot did I do? 'Ere, whisper . . .
 'E'd a shiny bald top to 'is 'ead,
But when I got through,
Between me and you,
 It was 'orrid and jaggy and red.

"'Ang on like a limpet, Eddy.
 Thank Gord! you ain't dead after all."
It's slow and it's sure and it's steady
 (Which is 'ard, for 'e's big and...
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 Is it not strange? A year ago to-day,
 With scarce a thought beyond the hum-drum round,
I did my decent job and earned my pay;
 Was averagely happy, I'll be bound.
Ay, in my little groove I was content,
 Seeing my life run smoothly to the end,
With prosy days in stolid labour spent,
 And jolly nights, a pipe, a glass, a friend.
In God's good time a hearth fire's cosy gleam,
 A wife and kids, and all a fellow needs;
When presto! like a bubble goes my dream:
 I leap upon the Stage of Splendid Deeds.
I yell with rage; I wallow deep in gore:
 I, that was clerk in a drysalter's store.

Stranger than any book I've ever read.
 Here on the reeking battlefield I lie,
Under the stars, propped up with smeary dead,
 Like too, if no one takes me in, to die.
Hit on the arms, legs, liver, lungs and gall;
 Damn glad there's nothing more of me to hit;
But calm, and feeling never pain at all,
 And full of wonder at the turn of it.
For of the dead around me three are mine,
 Three foemen vanquished in the whirl of fight;
So if I die I have no right to whine,
 I feel I've...
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 Oh ye whose hearts are resonant, and ring to War's romance,
Hear ye the story of a boy, a peasant boy of France;
A lad uncouth and warped with toil, yet who, when trial came,
Could feel within his soul upleap and soar the sacred flame;
Could stand upright, and scorn and smite, as only heroes may:
Oh, harken! Let me try to tell the tale of Jean Desprez.

With fire and sword the Teuton horde was ravaging the land,
And there was darkness and despair, grim death on every hand;
Red fields of slaughter sloping down to ruin's black abyss;
The wolves of war ran evil-fanged, and little did they miss.
And on they came with fear and flame, to burn and loot and slay,
Until they reached the red-roofed croft, the home of Jean Desprez.

"Rout out the village, one and all!" the Uhlan Captain said.
"Behold! Some hand has fired a shot. My trumpeter is dead.
Now shall they Prussian vengeance know; now shall they rue the day,
For by this sacred German slain, ten of these dogs shall pay."
They drove the cowering peasants forth, women and babes and men,
And from the last, with many a jeer, the Captain chose he ten;
Ten simple peasants, bowed with toil; they stood, they knew...
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 This was the way of it, don't you know -- 
Ryan was "wanted" for stealing sheep, 
And never a trooper, high or low, 
Could find him -- catch a weasel asleep! 
Till Trooper Scott, from the Stockman's Ford -- 
A bushman, too, as I've heard them tell -- 
Chanced to find him drunk as a lord 
Round at the Shadow of Death Hotel. 
D'you know the place? It's a wayside inn, 
A low grog-shanty -- a bushman trap, 
Hiding away in its shame and sin 
Under the shelter of Conroy's Gap -- 
Under the shade of that frowning range 
The roughest crowd that ever drew breath -- 
Thieves and rowdies, uncouth and strange, 
Were mustered round at the "Shadow of Death". 

The trooper knew that his man would slide 
Like a dingo pup, if he saw the chance; 
And with half a start on the mountain side 
Ryan would lead him a merry dance. 
Drunk as he was when the trooper came, 
to him that did not matter a rap -- 
Drunk or sober, he was the same, 
The boldest rider in Conroy's Gap. 

"I want you, Ryan," the trooper said, 
"And listen to me, if you dare resist,...
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 The Muse is stern unto her favoured sons,
Giving to some the keys of all the joy
Of the green earth, but holding even that joy
Back from their life;
Bidding them feed on hope,
A plant of bitter growth,
Deep-rooted in the past;
Truth, 'tis a doubtful art
To make Hope sweeten
Time as it flows;
For no man knows
Until the very last,
Whether it be a sovereign herb that he has eaten,
Or his own heart.

O stern, implacable Muse,
Giving to Keats so richly dowered,
Only the thought that he should be
Among the English poets after death;
Letting him fade with that expectancy,
All powerless to unfold the future!
What boots it that our age has snatched him free
From thy too harsh embrace,
Has given his fame the certainty
Of comradeship with Shakespeare's?
He lies alone
Beneath the frown of the old Roman stone
And the cold Roman violets;
And not our wildest incantation
Of his most sacred lines,
Nor all the praise that sets
Towards his pale grave,
Like oceans towards the moon,
Will move the Shadow with the pensive brow
To break his dream,
And give unto him now
One word! --

When the young master reasoned
That our puissant England
Reared her great poets by neglect,
Trampling them down in the by-paths of Life
And fostering them with glory after death,
Did any flame of triumph from his own fame
Fall swift...
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 'Twas in the prime of summer-time 
An evening calm and cool, 
And four-and-twenty happy boys 
Came bounding out of school: 
There were some that ran and some that leapt, 
Like troutlets in a pool.

Away they sped with gamesome minds, 
And souls untouched by sin; 
To a level mead they came, and there 
They drave the wickets in: 
Pleasantly shone the setting sun 
Over the town of Lynn.

Like sportive deer they coursed about, 
And shouted as they ran,-- 
Turning to mirth all things of earth, 
As only boyhood can; 
But the Usher sat remote from all, 
A melancholy man!

His hat was off, his vest apart, 
To catch heaven's blessed breeze; 
For a burning thought was in his brow, 
And his bosom ill at ease: 
So he leaned his head on his hands, and read 
The book upon his knees!

Leaf after leaf he turned it o'er 
Nor ever glanced aside, 
For the peace of his soul he read that book 
In the golden eventide: 
Much study had made him very lean, 
And pale, and leaden-eyed.

At last he shut the pond'rous tome, 
With a fast and fervent grasp 
He strained the dusky covers close, 
And fixed the brazen hasp; 
"Oh, God! could...
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 A goddess, with a siren's grace,--
A sun-haired girl on a craggy place
Above a bay where fish-boats lay
Drifting about like birds of prey.

Wrought was she of a painter's dream,--
Wise only as are artists wise,
My artist-friend, Rolf Herschkelhiem,
With deep sad eyes of oversize,
And face of melancholy guise.

I pressed him that he tell to me
This masterpiece's history.
He turned--REturned--and thus beguiled
Me with the tale of Orlie Wilde:--

"We artists live ideally:
We breed our firmest facts of air;
We make our own reality--
We dream a thing and it is so.
The fairest scenes we ever see
Are mirages of memory;
The sweetest thoughts we ever know
We plagiarize from Long Ago:
And as the girl on canvas there
Is marvelously rare and fair,
'Tis only inasmuch as she
Is dumb and may not speak to me!"
He tapped me with his mahlstick--then
The picture,--and went on again:

"Orlie Wilde, the fisher's child--
I see her yet, as fair and mild
As ever nursling summer day
Dreamed on the bosom of the bay:
For I was twenty then, and went
Alone and long-haired--all content
With promises of sounding name
And fantasies of future fame,
And thoughts that now my mind discards
As editor a fledgling bard's.

"At evening once I chanced to go,
With pencil and portfolio,
Adown the street of silver sand
That winds beneath this craggy land,
To make a...
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Can that be you, la mouche? Wait till I lift
This palsied eye-lid and make sure... Ah, true.
Come in, dear fly, and pardon my delay
In thus existing; I can promise you
Next time you come you'll find no dying poet—
Without sufficient spleen to see me through,
The joke becomes too tedious a jest.
I am afraid my mind is dull to-day;
I have that—something—heavier on my chest
And then, you see, I've been exchanging thoughts
With Doctor Franz. He talked of Kant and Hegel
As though he'd nursed them both through whooping cough
And, as he left, he let his finger shake
Too playfully, as though to say, "Now off
With that long face—you've years and years to live."
I think he thinks so. But, for Heaven's sake,
Don't credit it—and never tell Mathilde.
Poor dear, she has enough to bear already....
This was a month! During my lonely weeks
One person actually climbed the stairs
To seek a cripple. It was Berlioz—
But Berlioz always was original.

Meissner was also here; he caught me unawares,
Scribbling to my old mother. "What!" he cried,
"Is the old lady of the Dammthor still alive?
And do you write her still?" "Each month or so."
"And is she not unhappy then, to find
How wretched you must be?" "How can she know?
You see," I laughed, "she...
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 Close by those meads, for ever crown'd with flow'rs, 
Where Thames with pride surveys his rising tow'rs,
There stands a structure of majestic frame,
Which from the neighb'ring Hampton takes its name.
Here Britain's statesmen oft the fall foredoom
Of foreign tyrants and of nymphs at home;
Here thou, great Anna! whom three realms obey,
Dost sometimes counsel take--and sometimes tea.
Hither the heroes and the nymphs resort,
To taste awhile the pleasures of a court;
In various talk th' instructive hours they pass'd,
Who gave the ball, or paid the visit last;
One speaks the glory of the British queen,
And one describes a charming Indian screen;
A third interprets motions, looks, and eyes;
At ev'ry word a reputation dies.
Snuff, or the fan, supply each pause of chat,
With singing, laughing, ogling, and all that.

Meanwhile, declining from the noon of day,
The sun obliquely shoots his burning ray;
The hungry judges soon the sentence sign,
And wretches hang that jury-men may dine;
The merchant from th' Exchange returns in peace,
And the long labours of the toilet cease.
Belinda now, whom thirst of fame invites,
Burns to encounter two adventrous knights,
At ombre singly to decide their doom;
And swells her breast with conquests yet to come.
Straight the three bands prepare in arms to join,
Each band the number of the sacred nine.
Soon...
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 First, London, for its myriads; for its height, 
Manhattan heaped in towering stalagmite; 
But Paris for the smoothness of the paths 
That lead the heart unto the heart's delight. . . . 


Fair loiterer on the threshold of those days 
When there's no lovelier prize the world displays 
Than, having beauty and your twenty years, 
You have the means to conquer and the ways, 


And coming where the crossroads separate 
And down each vista glories and wonders wait, 
Crowning each path with pinnacles so fair 
You know not which to choose, and hesitate -- 


Oh, go to Paris. . . . In the midday gloom 
Of some old quarter take a little room 
That looks off over Paris and its towers 
From Saint Gervais round to the Emperor's Tomb, -- 


So high that you can hear a mating dove 
Croon down the chimney from the roof above, 
See Notre Dame and know how sweet it is 
To wake between Our Lady and our love. 


And have a little balcony to bring 
Fair plants to fill with verdure and blossoming, 
That sparrows seek, to feed from pretty hands, 
And swallows circle over in the Spring. 


There of an evening you...
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 Oft seems the Time a market-town
Where many merchant-spirits meet
Who up and down and up and down
Cry out along the street

Their needs, as wares; one THUS, one SO:
Till all the ways are full of sound:
-- But still come rain, and sun, and snow,
And still the world goes round.



I. Remonstrance.


"Opinion, let me alone: I am not thine.
Prim Creed, with categoric point, forbear
To feature me my Lord by rule and line.
Thou canst not measure Mistress Nature's hair,
Not one sweet inch: nay, if thy sight is sharp,
Would'st count the strings upon an angel's harp?
Forbear, forbear.

"Oh let me love my Lord more fathom deep
Than there is line to sound with: let me love
My fellow not as men that mandates keep:
Yea, all that's lovable, below, above,
That let me love by heart, by heart, because
(Free from the penal pressure of the laws)
I find it fair.

"The tears I weep by day and bitter night,
Opinion! for thy sole salt vintage fall.
-- As morn by morn I rise with fresh delight,
Time through my casement cheerily doth call
`Nature is new, 'tis birthday every day,
Come feast with me, let no man say me nay,
Whate'er befall.'

"So fare I forth to feast: I sit beside
Some brother bright: but, ere good-morrow's passed,
Burly Opinion wedging...
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