Written by
Siegfried Sassoon |
The glorying forest shakes and swings with glancing
Of boughs that dip and strain; young, slanting sprays
Beckon and shift like lissom creatures dancing,
While the blown beechwood streams with drifting rays.
Rooted in steadfast calm, grey stems are seen
Like weather-beaten masts; the wood, unfurled,
Seems as a ship with crowding sails of green
That sweeps across the lonely billowing world.
O luminous and lovely! Let your flowers,
Your ageless-squadroned wings, your surge and gleam,
Drown me in quivering brightness: let me fade
In the warm, rustling music of the hours
That guard your ancient wisdom, till my dream
Moves with the chant and whisper of the glade.
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Written by
Laurence Binyon |
Away, sad thoughts, and teasing
Perplexities, away!
Let other blood go freezing,
We will be wise and gay.
For here is all heart-easing,
An ecstasy at play.
The children dancing, dancing,
Light upon happy feet,
Both eye and heart entrancing
Mingle, escape, and meet;
Come joyous-eyed and advancing
Or floatingly retreat.
Now slow, now swifter treading
Their paces timed and true,
An instant poised, then threading
A maze of printless clue,
Their motions smoothly wedding
To melody anew,
They sway in chime, and scatter
In looping circles; they
Are Music's airy matter,
And their feet move, the way
The raindrops shine and patter
On tossing flowers in May.
As if those flowers were singing
For joy of the clean air,
As if you saw them springing
To dance the breeze, so fair
The lissom bodies swinging,
So light the flung-back hair.
And through the mind enchanted
A happy river goes
By its own young carol haunted
And bringing where it flows
What all in the world has wanted
And who in this world knows?
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Written by
Robert William Service |
I burned my fingers on the stove
And wept with bitterness;
But poor old Auntie Maggie strove
To comfort my distress.
Said she: 'Think, lassie, how you'll burn
Like any wicked besom
In fires of hell if you don't learn
Your Shorter Catechism.'
A man's chief end is it began,
(No mention of a woman's),
To glorify--I think it ran,
The God who made poor humans.
And as I learned, I thought: if this--
(My distaste growing stronger),
The Shorter Catechism is,
Lord save us from the longer.
The years have passed and I begin
(Although I'm far from clever),
To doubt if when we die in sin
Our bodies grill forever.
Now I've more surface space to burn,
Since I am tall and lissom,
I think it's hell enough to learn
The Shorter Catechism.
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