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Best Famous Files Poems

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Written by A E Housman | Create an image from this poem

On the Idle Hill of Summer

On the idle hill of summer,
Sleepy with the flow of streams, 
Far I hear the steady drummer
Drumming like a noise in dreams. 

Far and near and low and louder
On the roads of earth go by, 
Dear to friends and food for powder, 
Soldiers marching, all to die. 

East and west on fields forgotten
Bleach the bones of comrades slain, 
Lovely lads and dead and rotten; 
None that go return again. 

Far the calling bugles hollo, 
High the screaming fife replies, 
Gay the files of scarlet follow: 
Woman bore me, I will rise.


Written by John Keats | Create an image from this poem

Song of the Indian Maid

Song of the Indian Maid 

O SORROW! 
Why dost borrow 
The natural hue of health, from vermeil lips?¡ª 
To give maiden blushes 
To the white rose bushes? 5 
Or is it thy dewy hand the daisy tips? 

O Sorrow! 
Why dost borrow 
The lustrous passion from a falcon-eye?¡ª 
To give the glow-worm light? 10 
Or, on a moonless night, 
To tinge, on siren shores, the salt sea-spry? 

O Sorrow! 
Why dost borrow 
The mellow ditties from a mourning tongue?¡ª 15 
To give at evening pale 
Unto the nightingale, 
That thou mayst listen the cold dews among? 

O Sorrow! 
Why dost borrow 20 
Heart's lightness from the merriment of May?¡ª 
A lover would not tread 
A cowslip on the head, 
Though he should dance from eve till peep of day¡ª 
Nor any drooping flower 25 
Held sacred for thy bower, 
Wherever he may sport himself and play. 

To Sorrow 
I bade good morrow, 
And thought to leave her far away behind; 30 
But cheerly, cheerly, 
She loves me dearly; 
She is so constant to me, and so kind: 
I would deceive her 
And so leave her, 35 
But ah! she is so constant and so kind. 

Beneath my palm-trees, by the river side, 
I sat a-weeping: in the whole world wide 
There was no one to ask me why I wept,¡ª 
And so I kept 40 
Brimming the water-lily cups with tears 
Cold as my fears. 

Beneath my palm-trees, by the river side, 
I sat a-weeping: what enamour'd bride, 
Cheated by shadowy wooer from the clouds, 45 
But hides and shrouds 
Beneath dark palm-trees by a river side? 

And as I sat, over the light blue hills 
There came a noise of revellers: the rills 
Into the wide stream came of purple hue¡ª 50 
'Twas Bacchus and his crew! 
The earnest trumpet spake, and silver thrills 
From kissing cymbals made a merry din¡ª 
'Twas Bacchus and his kin! 
Like to a moving vintage down they came, 55 
Crown'd with green leaves, and faces all on flame; 
All madly dancing through the pleasant valley, 
To scare thee, Melancholy! 
O then, O then, thou wast a simple name! 
And I forgot thee, as the berried holly 60 
By shepherds is forgotten, when in June 
Tall chestnuts keep away the sun and moon:¡ª 
I rush'd into the folly! 

Within his car, aloft, young Bacchus stood, 
Trifling his ivy-dart, in dancing mood, 65 
With sidelong laughing; 
And little rills of crimson wine imbrued 
His plump white arms and shoulders, enough white 
For Venus' pearly bite; 
And near him rode Silenus on his ass, 70 
Pelted with flowers as he on did pass 
Tipsily quaffing. 

'Whence came ye, merry Damsels! whence came ye, 
So many, and so many, and such glee? 
Why have ye left your bowers desolate, 75 
Your lutes, and gentler fate?'¡ª 
'We follow Bacchus! Bacchus on the wing, 
A-conquering! 
Bacchus, young Bacchus! good or ill betide, 
We dance before him thorough kingdoms wide:¡ª 80 
Come hither, lady fair, and join¨¨d be 
To our wild minstrelsy!' 

'Whence came ye, jolly Satyrs! whence came ye, 
So many, and so many, and such glee? 
Why have ye left your forest haunts, why left 85 
Your nuts in oak-tree cleft?'¡ª 
'For wine, for wine we left our kernel tree; 
For wine we left our heath, and yellow brooms, 
And cold mushrooms; 
For wine we follow Bacchus through the earth; 90 
Great god of breathless cups and chirping mirth! 
Come hither, lady fair, and join¨¨d be 
To our mad minstrelsy!' 

Over wide streams and mountains great we went, 
And, save when Bacchus kept his ivy tent, 95 
Onward the tiger and the leopard pants, 
With Asian elephants: 
Onward these myriads¡ªwith song and dance, 
With zebras striped, and sleek Arabians' prance, 
Web-footed alligators, crocodiles, 100 
Bearing upon their scaly backs, in files, 
Plump infant laughers mimicking the coil 
Of seamen, and stout galley-rowers' toil: 
With toying oars and silken sails they glide, 
Nor care for wind and tide. 105 

Mounted on panthers' furs and lions' manes, 
From rear to van they scour about the plains; 
A three days' journey in a moment done; 
And always, at the rising of the sun, 
About the wilds they hunt with spear and horn, 110 
On spleenful unicorn. 

I saw Osirian Egypt kneel adown 
Before the vine-wreath crown! 
I saw parch'd Abyssinia rouse and sing 
To the silver cymbals' ring! 115 
I saw the whelming vintage hotly pierce 
Old Tartary the fierce! 
The kings of Ind their jewel-sceptres vail, 
And from their treasures scatter pearl¨¨d hail; 
Great Brahma from his mystic heaven groans, 120 
And all his priesthood moans, 
Before young Bacchus' eye-wink turning pale. 
Into these regions came I, following him, 
Sick-hearted, weary¡ªso I took a whim 
To stray away into these forests drear, 125 
Alone, without a peer: 
And I have told thee all thou mayest hear. 

Young Stranger! 
I've been a ranger 
In search of pleasure throughout every clime; 130 
Alas! 'tis not for me! 
Bewitch'd I sure must be, 
To lose in grieving all my maiden prime. 

Come then, Sorrow, 
Sweetest Sorrow! 135 
Like an own babe I nurse thee on my breast: 
I thought to leave thee, 
And deceive thee, 
But now of all the world I love thee best. 

There is not one, 140 
No, no, not one 
But thee to comfort a poor lonely maid; 
Thou art her mother, 
And her brother, 
Her playmate, and her wooer in the shade. 145 
Written by Matthew Arnold | Create an image from this poem

Rugby Chapel

 Coldly, sadly descends
The autumn-evening. The field
Strewn with its dank yellow drifts
Of wither'd leaves, and the elms,
Fade into dimness apace,
Silent;--hardly a shout
From a few boys late at their play!
The lights come out in the street,
In the school-room windows;--but cold,
Solemn, unlighted, austere,
Through the gathering darkness, arise
The chapel-walls, in whose bound
Thou, my father! art laid.

There thou dost lie, in the gloom
Of the autumn evening. But ah!
That word, gloom, to my mind
Brings thee back, in the light
Of thy radiant vigour, again;
In the gloom of November we pass'd
Days not dark at thy side;
Seasons impair'd not the ray
Of thy buoyant cheerfulness clear.
Such thou wast! and I stand
In the autumn evening, and think
Of bygone autumns with thee.

Fifteen years have gone round
Since thou arosest to tread,
In the summer-morning, the road
Of death, at a call unforeseen,
Sudden. For fifteen years,
We who till then in thy shade
Rested as under the boughs
Of a mighty oak, have endured
Sunshine and rain as we might,
Bare, unshaded, alone,
Lacking the shelter of thee.

O strong soul, by what shore
Tarriest thou now? For that force,
Surely, has not been left vain!
Somewhere, surely afar,
In the sounding labour-house vast
Of being, is practised that strength,
Zealous, beneficent, firm!

Yes, in some far-shining sphere,
Conscious or not of the past,
Still thou performest the word
Of the Spirit in whom thou dost live--
Prompt, unwearied, as here!
Still thou upraisest with zeal
The humble good from the ground,
Sternly repressest the bad!
Still, like a trumpet, dost rouse
Those who with half-open eyes
Tread the border-land dim
'Twixt vice and virtue; reviv'st,
Succourest!--this was thy work,
This was thy life upon earth.

What is the course of the life
Of mortal men on the earth?--
Most men eddy about
Here and there--eat and drink,
Chatter and love and hate,
Gather and squander, are raised
Aloft, are hurl'd in the dust,
Striving blindly, achieving
Nothing; and then they die--
Perish;--and no one asks
Who or what they have been,
More than he asks what waves,
In the moonlit solitudes mild
Of the midmost Ocean, have swell'd,
Foam'd for a moment, and gone.

And there are some, whom a thirst
Ardent, unquenchable, fires,
Not with the crowd to be spent,
Not without aim to go round
In an eddy of purposeless dust,
Effort unmeaning and vain.
Ah yes! some of us strive
Not without action to die
Fruitless, but something to snatch
From dull oblivion, nor all
Glut the devouring grave!
We, we have chosen our path--
Path to a clear-purposed goal,
Path of advance!--but it leads
A long, steep journey, through sunk
Gorges, o'er mountains in snow.
Cheerful, with friends, we set forth--
Then on the height, comes the storm.
Thunder crashes from rock
To rock, the cataracts reply,
Lightnings dazzle our eyes.
Roaring torrents have breach'd
The track, the stream-bed descends
In the place where the wayfarer once
Planted his footstep--the spray
Boils o'er its borders! aloft
The unseen snow-beds dislodge
Their hanging ruin; alas,
Havoc is made in our train!
Friends, who set forth at our side,
Falter, are lost in the storm.
We, we only are left!
With frowning foreheads, with lips
Sternly compress'd, we strain on,
On--and at nightfall at last
Come to the end of our way,
To the lonely inn 'mid the rocks;
Where the gaunt and taciturn host
Stands on the threshold, the wind
Shaking his thin white hairs--
Holds his lantern to scan
Our storm-beat figures, and asks:
Whom in our party we bring?
Whom we have left in the snow?
Sadly we answer: We bring
Only ourselves! we lost
Sight of the rest in the storm.
Hardly ourselves we fought through,
Stripp'd, without friends, as we are.
Friends, companions, and train,
The avalanche swept from our side.

But thou woulds't not alone
Be saved, my father! alone
Conquer and come to thy goal,
Leaving the rest in the wild.
We were weary, and we
Fearful, and we in our march
Fain to drop down and to die.
Still thou turnedst, and still
Beckonedst the trembler, and still
Gavest the weary thy hand.

If, in the paths of the world,
Stones might have wounded thy feet,
Toil or dejection have tried
Thy spirit, of that we saw
Nothing--to us thou wage still
Cheerful, and helpful, and firm!
Therefore to thee it was given
Many to save with thyself;
And, at the end of thy day,
O faithful shepherd! to come,
Bringing thy sheep in thy hand.

And through thee I believe
In the noble and great who are gone;
Pure souls honour'd and blest
By former ages, who else--
Such, so soulless, so poor,
Is the race of men whom I see--
Seem'd but a dream of the heart,
Seem'd but a cry of desire.
Yes! I believe that there lived
Others like thee in the past,
Not like the men of the crowd
Who all round me to-day
Bluster or cringe, and make life
Hideous, and arid, and vile;
But souls temper'd with fire,
Fervent, heroic, and good,
Helpers and friends of mankind.
Servants of God!--or sons
Shall I not call you? Because
Not as servants ye knew
Your Father's innermost mind,
His, who unwillingly sees
One of his little ones lost--
Yours is the praise, if mankind
Hath not as yet in its march
Fainted, and fallen, and died!

See! In the rocks of the world
Marches the host of mankind,
A feeble, wavering line.
Where are they tending?--A God
Marshall'd them, gave them their goal.
Ah, but the way is so long!
Years they have been in the wild!
Sore thirst plagues them, the rocks
Rising all round, overawe;
Factions divide them, their host
Threatens to break, to dissolve.
--Ah, keep, keep them combined!
Else, of the myriads who fill
That army, not one shall arrive;
Sole they shall stray; in the rocks
Stagger for ever in vain,
Die one by one in the waste.

Then, in such hour of need
Of your fainting, dispirited race,
Ye, like angels, appear,
Radiant with ardour divine!
Beacons of hope, ye appear!
Languor is not in your heart,
Weakness is not in your word,
Weariness not on your brow.
Ye alight in our van! at your voice,
Panic, despair, flee away.
Ye move through the ranks, recall
The stragglers, refresh the outworn,
Praise, re-inspire the brave!
Order, courage, return.
Eyes rekindling, and prayers,
Follow your steps as ye go.
Ye fill up the gaps in our files,
Strengthen the wavering line,
Stablish, continue our march,
On, to the bound of the waste,
On, to the City of God.
Written by Homer | Create an image from this poem

The Iliad

http://www.gutenberg.org/files/6130/6130-h/6130-h.html
Written by Claude McKay | Create an image from this poem

Courage

 O lonely heart so timid of approach, 
Like the shy tropic flower that shuts its lips 
To the faint touch of tender finger tips: 
What is your word? What question would you broach? 

Your lustrous-warm eyes are too sadly kind 
To mask the meaning of your dreamy tale, 
Your guarded life too exquisitely frail 
Against the daggers of my warring mind. 

There is no part of the unyielding earth, 
Even bare rocks where the eagles build their nest, 
Will give us undisturbed and friendly rest. 
No dewfall softens this vast belt of dearth. 

But in the socket-chiseled teeth of strife, 
That gleam in serried files in all the lands, 
We may join hungry, understanding hands, 
And drink our share of ardent love and life.


Written by Barry Tebb | Create an image from this poem

Our Son

 Quarter to three: I wake again at the hour of his birth

Thirty years ago and now he paces corridors of dark

In nightmares of self-condemnation where random thoughts

Besiege his fevered imagination – England’s 

Imminent destruction, his own, the world’s…

Sixty to eighty cigarettes a day, unavailing depot injections,

Failed abscondings, failed everything: Eton and Balliol

Hold no sway on ward one, nor even being

‘A six language master,’ on PICU madness is the only qualification.

There was the ‘shaving incident’ at school, which

Made him ready to walk out at fifteen, the alcohol

Defences at Oxford which shut us out then petered out

During the six years in India, studying Bengali at Shantiniketan.

He tottered from the plane, penniless and unshaven,

To hide away in the seediest bedsit Beeston could boast

Where night turned to day and vaguely he applied 

For jobs as clerk and court usher and drank in pubs with yobs.

When the crisis came – "I feel my head coming off my body’ –

I was ready and unready, making the necessary calls

To get a bed, to keep him on the ward, to visit and reassure 

Us both that some way out could be found.

The ‘Care Home’ was the next disaster, trying to cure

Schizophrenia with sticking plaster: "We don’t want 

Carers’ input, we call patients ‘residents’ and insist on chores

Not medication", then the letters of terrible abuse, the finding of a flat,

‘The discharge into the community.’

His ‘keyworker’ was the keyworker from hell: the more

Isaiah’s care fell apart the more she encouraged 

Him to blame us and ‘Make his life his own’, vital signs

Of decline ignored or consigned to files, ‘confidentiality’ reigned supreme.

Insidiously the way back to the ward unveiled

Over painful months, the self-neglect, the inappropriate remarks

In pubs, the neglected perforated eardrum, keeping

Company with his feckless cousins between their bouts in prison.

The pointless team meetings he was patted through,

My abrupt dismissal as carer at the keyworker’s instigation,

The admission we knew nothing of, the abscondings we were told of

And had to sort out, then the phone call from the ASW.

"We are about to section your son for six months, have you

Any comment?" Then the final absconding to London

From a fifteen minute break on PICU, to face his brother’s 

Drunken abuse, the police were kindness itself as they drove him to the secure unit.



Two nurses came by taxi from Leeds the next day to collect him 

The Newsam Centre’s like a hotel – Informality and first class treatment

Behind the locked doors he freezes before and whispers 

"Daddy, I was damned in hell but now I am God’s friend."

Note: PICU- Psychiatric Intensive Care Unit

Beeston- An inner city area of Leeds

ASW- Approved Social Worker
Written by John Keats | Create an image from this poem

Song of the Indian Maid from Endymion

 O SORROW! 
 Why dost borrow 
 The natural hue of health, from vermeil lips?-- 
 To give maiden blushes 
 To the white rose bushes? 
 Or is it thy dewy hand the daisy tips? 

 O Sorrow! 
 Why dost borrow 
 The lustrous passion from a falcon-eye?-- 
 To give the glow-worm light? 
 Or, on a moonless night, 
 To tinge, on siren shores, the salt sea-spry? 

 O Sorrow! 
 Why dost borrow 
 The mellow ditties from a mourning tongue?-- 
 To give at evening pale 
 Unto the nightingale, 
 That thou mayst listen the cold dews among? 

 O Sorrow! 
 Why dost borrow 
 Heart's lightness from the merriment of May?-- 
 A lover would not tread 
 A cowslip on the head, 
 Though he should dance from eve till peep of day-- 
 Nor any drooping flower 
 Held sacred for thy bower, 
 Wherever he may sport himself and play. 

 To Sorrow 
 I bade good morrow, 
 And thought to leave her far away behind; 
 But cheerly, cheerly, 
 She loves me dearly; 
 She is so constant to me, and so kind: 
 I would deceive her 
 And so leave her, 
 But ah! she is so constant and so kind. 

Beneath my palm-trees, by the river side, 
I sat a-weeping: in the whole world wide 
There was no one to ask me why I wept,-- 
 And so I kept 
Brimming the water-lily cups with tears 
 Cold as my fears. 

Beneath my palm-trees, by the river side, 
I sat a-weeping: what enamour'd bride, 
Cheated by shadowy wooer from the clouds, 
 But hides and shrouds 
Beneath dark palm-trees by a river side? 

And as I sat, over the light blue hills 
There came a noise of revellers: the rills 
Into the wide stream came of purple hue-- 
 'Twas Bacchus and his crew! 
The earnest trumpet spake, and silver thrills 
From kissing cymbals made a merry din-- 
 'Twas Bacchus and his kin! 
Like to a moving vintage down they came, 
Crown'd with green leaves, and faces all on flame; 
All madly dancing through the pleasant valley, 
 To scare thee, Melancholy! 
O then, O then, thou wast a simple name! 
And I forgot thee, as the berried holly 
By shepherds is forgotten, when in June 
Tall chestnuts keep away the sun and moon:-- 
 I rush'd into the folly! 

Within his car, aloft, young Bacchus stood, 
Trifling his ivy-dart, in dancing mood, 
 With sidelong laughing; 
And little rills of crimson wine imbrued 
His plump white arms and shoulders, enough white 
 For Venus' pearly bite; 
And near him rode Silenus on his ass, 
Pelted with flowers as he on did pass 
 Tipsily quaffing. 

'Whence came ye, merry Damsels! whence came ye, 
So many, and so many, and such glee? 
Why have ye left your bowers desolate, 
 Your lutes, and gentler fate?'-- 
'We follow Bacchus! Bacchus on the wing, 
 A-conquering! 
Bacchus, young Bacchus! good or ill betide, 
We dance before him thorough kingdoms wide:-- 
Come hither, lady fair, and joined be 
 To our wild minstrelsy!' 

'Whence came ye, jolly Satyrs! whence came ye, 
So many, and so many, and such glee? 
Why have ye left your forest haunts, why left 
 Your nuts in oak-tree cleft?'-- 
'For wine, for wine we left our kernel tree; 
For wine we left our heath, and yellow brooms, 
 And cold mushrooms; 
For wine we follow Bacchus through the earth; 
Great god of breathless cups and chirping mirth! 
Come hither, lady fair, and joined be 
 To our mad minstrelsy!' 

Over wide streams and mountains great we went, 
And, save when Bacchus kept his ivy tent, 
Onward the tiger and the leopard pants, 
 With Asian elephants: 
Onward these myriads--with song and dance, 
With zebras striped, and sleek Arabians' prance, 
Web-footed alligators, crocodiles, 
Bearing upon their scaly backs, in files, 
Plump infant laughers mimicking the coil 
Of seamen, and stout galley-rowers' toil: 
With toying oars and silken sails they glide, 
 Nor care for wind and tide. 

Mounted on panthers' furs and lions' manes, 
From rear to van they scour about the plains; 
A three days' journey in a moment done; 
And always, at the rising of the sun, 
About the wilds they hunt with spear and horn, 
 On spleenful unicorn. 

I saw Osirian Egypt kneel adown 
 Before the vine-wreath crown! 
I saw parch'd Abyssinia rouse and sing 
 To the silver cymbals' ring! 
I saw the whelming vintage hotly pierce 
 Old Tartary the fierce! 
The kings of Ind their jewel-sceptres vail, 
And from their treasures scatter pearled hail; 
Great Brahma from his mystic heaven groans, 
 And all his priesthood moans, 
Before young Bacchus' eye-wink turning pale. 
Into these regions came I, following him, 
Sick-hearted, weary--so I took a whim 
To stray away into these forests drear, 
 Alone, without a peer: 
And I have told thee all thou mayest hear. 

 Young Stranger! 
 I've been a ranger 
In search of pleasure throughout every clime; 
 Alas! 'tis not for me! 
 Bewitch'd I sure must be, 
To lose in grieving all my maiden prime. 

 Come then, Sorrow, 
 Sweetest Sorrow! 
Like an own babe I nurse thee on my breast: 
 I thought to leave thee, 
 And deceive thee, 
But now of all the world I love thee best. 

 There is not one, 
 No, no, not one 
But thee to comfort a poor lonely maid; 
 Thou art her mother, 
 And her brother, 
Her playmate, and her wooer in the shade.
Written by Thomas Hardy | Create an image from this poem

Gods Funeral

 I 
I saw a slowly-stepping train --
Lined on the brows, scoop-eyed and bent and hoar --
Following in files across a twilit plain
A strange and mystic form the foremost bore.

II 
And by contagious throbs of thought
Or latent knowledge that within me lay
And had already stirred me, I was wrought
To consciousness of sorrow even as they.

III 
The fore-borne shape, to my blurred eyes,
At first seemed man-like, and anon to change
To an amorphous cloud of marvellous size,
At times endowed with wings of glorious range.

IV 
And this phantasmal variousness
Ever possessed it as they drew along:
Yet throughout all it symboled none the less
Potency vast and loving-kindness strong.

V 
Almost before I knew I bent
Towards the moving columns without a word;
They, growing in bulk and numbers as they went,
Struck out sick thoughts that could be overheard: --

VI 
'O man-projected Figure, of late
Imaged as we, thy knell who shall survive?
Whence came it we were tempted to create
One whom we can no longer keep alive?

VII 
'Framing him jealous, fierce, at first,
We gave him justice as the ages rolled,
Will to bless those by circumstance accurst,
And longsuffering, and mercies manifold.

VIII 
'And, tricked by our own early dream
And need of solace, we grew self-deceived,
Our making soon our maker did we deem,
And what we had imagined we believed,

IX 
'Till, in Time's stayless stealthy swing,
Uncompromising rude reality
Mangled the Monarch of our fashioning,
Who quavered, sank; and now has ceased to be.

X 
'So, toward our myth's oblivion,
Darkling, and languid-lipped, we creep and grope
Sadlier than those who wept in Babylon,
Whose Zion was a still abiding hope.

XI 
'How sweet it was in years far hied
To start the wheels of day with trustful prayer,
To lie down liegely at the eventide
And feel a blest assurance he was there!

XII 
'And who or what shall fill his place?
Whither will wanderers turn distracted eyes
For some fixed star to stimulate their pace
Towards the goal of their enterprise?'...

XIII 
Some in the background then I saw,
Sweet women, youths, men, all incredulous,
Who chimed as one: 'This is figure is of straw,
This requiem mockery! Still he lives to us!'

XIV 
I could not prop their faith: and yet
Many I had known: with all I sympathized;
And though struck speechless, I did not forget
That what was mourned for, I, too, once had prized.

XV 
Still, how to bear such loss I deemed
The insistent question for each animate mind,
And gazing, to my growing sight there seemed
A pale yet positive gleam low down behind,

XVI 
Whereof, to lift the general night,
A certain few who stood aloof had said,
'See you upon the horizon that small light --
Swelling somewhat?' Each mourner shook his head.

XVII 
And they composed a crowd of whom
Some were right good, and many nigh the best....
Thus dazed and puzzled 'twixt the gleam and gloom
Mechanically I followed with the rest.
Written by George (Lord) Byron | Create an image from this poem

Don Juan

 http://www.gutenberg.org/files/21700/21700-h/21700-h.htm
Written by Ralph Waldo Emerson | Create an image from this poem

Each And All

 Little thinks, in the field, yon red-cloaked clown,
Of thee, from the hill-top looking down;
And the heifer, that lows in the upland farm,
Far-heard, lows not thine ear to charm;
The sexton tolling the bell at noon,
Dreams not that great Napoleon
Stops his horse, and lists with delight,
Whilst his files sweep round yon Alpine height;
Nor knowest thou what argument
Thy life to thy neighbor's creed has lent:
All are needed by each one,
Nothing is fair or good alone.

I thought the sparrow's note from heaven,
Singing at dawn on the alder bough;
I brought him home in his nest at even;—
He sings the song, but it pleases not now;
For I did not bring home the river and sky;
He sang to my ear; they sang to my eye.

The delicate shells lay on the shore;
The bubbles of the latest wave
Fresh pearls to their enamel gave;
And the bellowing of the savage sea
Greeted their safe escape to me;
I wiped away the weeds and foam,
And fetched my sea-born treasures home;
But the poor, unsightly, noisome things
Had left their beauty on the shore
With the sun, and the sand, and the wild uproar.

The lover watched his graceful maid
As 'mid the virgin train she strayed,
Nor knew her beauty's best attire
Was woven still by the snow-white quire;
At last she came to his hermitage,
Like the bird from the woodlands to the cage,—
The gay enchantment was undone,
A gentle wife, but fairy none.

Then I said, "I covet Truth;
Beauty is unripe childhood's cheat,—
I leave it behind with the games of youth."
As I spoke, beneath my feet
The ground-pine curled its pretty wreath,
Running over the club-moss burrs;
I inhaled the violet's breath;
Around me stood the oaks and firs;
Pine cones and acorns lay on the ground;
Above me soared the eternal sky,
Full of light and deity;
Again I saw, again I heard,
The rolling river, the morning bird;—
Beauty through my senses stole,
I yielded myself to the perfect whole.

Book: Reflection on the Important Things