10 Best Famous Quake Poems

Here is a collection of the top 10 all-time best famous Quake poems. This is a select list of the best famous Quake poetry. Reading, writing, and enjoying famous Quake poetry (as well as classical and contemporary poems) is a great past time. These top poems are the best examples of quake poems.

• All Famous Quake Poems

 I

In my beginning is my end. In succession
Houses rise and fall, crumble, are extended,
Are removed, destroyed, restored, or in their place
Is an open field, or a factory, or a by-pass.
Old stone to new building, old timber to new fires,
Old fires to ashes, and ashes to the earth
Which is already flesh, fur and faeces,
Bone of man and beast, cornstalk and leaf.
Houses live and die: there is a time for building
And a time for living and for generation
And a time for the wind to break the loosened pane
And to shake the wainscot where the field-mouse trots
And to shake the tattered arras woven with a silent motto.

 In my beginning is my end. Now the light falls
Across the open field, leaving the deep lane
Shuttered with branches, dark in the afternoon,
Where you lean against a bank while a van passes,
And the deep lane insists on the direction
Into the village, in the electric heat
Hypnotised. In a warm haze the sultry light
Is absorbed, not refracted, by grey stone.
The dahlias sleep in the empty silence.
Wait for the early owl.

 In that open field
If you do not come too close, if you do not come too close,
On a summer midnight, you can hear the music
Of the weak pipe and the little drum
And see them dancing around the bonfire
The association of man and woman
In daunsinge, signifying matrimonie—
A dignified and commodiois sacrament.
Two and two, necessarye coniunction,
Holding eche other by the hand or the arm
Whiche betokeneth concorde. Round and round the fire
Leaping through the flames, or joined in circles,
Rustically solemn or in rustic laughter
Lifting heavy feet in clumsy shoes,
Earth feet, loam feet, lifted in country mirth
Mirth of those long since under earth
Nourishing the corn. Keeping time,
Keeping the rhythm in their dancing
As in their living in the living seasons
The time of the seasons and the constellations
The time of milking and the time of harvest
The time of the coupling of man and woman
And that of beasts. Feet rising and falling.
Eating and drinking. Dung and death.

 Dawn points, and another day
Prepares for heat and silence. Out at sea the dawn wind
Wrinkles and slides. I am here
Or there, or elsewhere. In my beginning.


II

What is the late November doing
With the disturbance of the spring
And creatures of the summer heat,
And snowdrops writhing under feet
And hollyhocks that aim too high
Red into grey and tumble down
Late roses filled with early snow?
Thunder rolled by the rolling stars
Simulates triumphal cars
Deployed in constellated wars
Scorpion fights against the Sun
Until the Sun and Moon go down
Comets weep and Leonids fly
Hunt the heavens and the plains
Whirled in a vortex that shall bring
The world to that destructive fire
Which burns before the ice-cap reigns.

 That was a way of putting it—not very satisfactory:
A periphrastic study in a worn-out poetical fashion,
Leaving one still with the intolerable wrestle
With words and meanings. The poetry does not matter.
It was not (to start again) what one had expected.
What was to be the value of the long looked forward to,
Long hoped for calm, the autumnal serenity
And the wisdom of age? Had they deceived us
Or deceived themselves, the quiet-voiced elders,
Bequeathing us merely a receipt for deceit?
The serenity only a deliberate hebetude,
The wisdom only the knowledge of dead secrets
Useless in the darkness into which they peered
Or from which they turned their eyes. There is, it seems to us,
At best, only a limited value
In the knowledge derived from experience.
The knowledge imposes a pattern, and falsifies,
For the pattern is new in every moment
And every moment is a new and shocking
Valuation of all we have been. We are only undeceived
Of that which, deceiving, could no longer harm.
In the middle, not only in the middle of the way
But all the way, in a dark wood, in a bramble,
On the edge of a grimpen, where is no secure foothold,
And menaced by monsters, fancy lights,
Risking enchantment. Do not let me hear
Of the wisdom of old men, but rather of their folly,
Their fear of fear and frenzy, their fear of possession,
Of belonging to another, or to others, or to God.
The only wisdom we can hope to acquire
Is the wisdom of humility: humility is endless.

 The houses are all gone under the sea.

 The dancers are all gone under the hill.


III

O dark dark dark. They all go into the dark,
The vacant interstellar spaces, the vacant into the vacant,
The captains, merchant bankers, eminent men of letters,
The generous patrons of art, the statesmen and the rulers,
Distinguished civil servants, chairmen of many committees,
Industrial lords and petty contractors, all go into the dark,
And dark the Sun and Moon, and the Almanach de Gotha
And the Stock Exchange Gazette, the Directory of Directors,
And cold the sense and lost the motive of action.
And we all go with them, into the silent funeral,
Nobody's funeral, for there is no one to bury.
I said to my soul, be still, and let the dark come upon you
Which shall be the darkness of God. As, in a theatre,
The lights are extinguished, for the scene to be changed
With a hollow rumble of wings, with a movement of darkness on darkness,
And we know that the hills and the trees, the distant panorama
And the bold imposing façade are all being rolled away—
Or as, when an underground train, in the tube, stops too long between stations
And the conversation rises and slowly fades into silence
And you see behind every face the mental emptiness deepen
Leaving only the growing terror of nothing to think about;
Or when, under ether, the mind is conscious but conscious of nothing—
I said to my soul, be still, and wait without hope
For hope would be hope for the wrong thing; wait without love,
For love would be love of the wrong thing; there is yet faith
But the faith and the love and the hope are all in the waiting.
Wait without thought, for you are not ready for thought:
So the darkness shall be the light, and the stillness the dancing.
Whisper of running streams, and winter lightning.
The wild thyme unseen and the wild strawberry,
The laughter in the garden, echoed ecstasy
Not lost, but requiring, pointing to the agony
Of death and birth.

 You say I am repeating
Something I have said before. I shall say it again.
Shall I say it again? In order to arrive there,
To arrive where you are, to get from where you are not,
 You must go by a way wherein there is no ecstasy.
In order to arrive at what you do not know
 You must go by a way which is the way of ignorance.
In order to possess what you do not possess
 You must go by the way of dispossession.
In order to arrive at what you are not
 You must go through the way in which you are not.
And what you do not know is the only thing you know
And what you own is what you do not own
And where you are is where you are not.


IV

The wounded surgeon plies the steel
That questions the distempered part;
Beneath the bleeding hands we feel
The sharp compassion of the healer's art
Resolving the enigma of the fever chart.

 Our only health is the disease
If we obey the dying nurse
Whose constant care is not to please
But to remind of our, and Adam's curse,
And that, to be restored, our sickness must grow worse.

 The whole earth is our hospital
Endowed by the ruined millionaire,
Wherein, if we do well, we shall
Die of the absolute paternal care
That will not leave us, but prevents us everywhere.

 The chill ascends from feet to knees,
The fever sings in mental wires.
If to be warmed, then I must freeze
And quake in frigid purgatorial fires
Of which the flame is roses, and the smoke is briars.

 The dripping blood our only drink,
The bloody flesh our only food:
In spite of which we like to think
That we are sound, substantial flesh and blood—
Again, in spite of that, we call this Friday good.


V

So here I am, in the middle way, having had twenty years—
Twenty years largely wasted, the years of l'entre deux guerres
Trying to use words, and every attempt
Is a wholly new start, and a different kind of failure
Because one has only learnt to get the better of words
For the thing one no longer has to say, or the way in which
One is no longer disposed to say it. And so each venture
Is a new beginning, a raid on the inarticulate
With shabby equipment always deteriorating
In the general mess of imprecision of feeling,
Undisciplined squads of emotion. And what there is to conquer
By strength and submission, has already been discovered
Once or twice, or several times, by men whom one cannot hope
To emulate—but there is no competition—
There is only the fight to recover what has been lost
And found and lost again and again: and now, under conditions
That seem unpropitious. But perhaps neither gain nor loss.
For us, there is only the trying. The rest is not our business.

 Home is where one starts from. As we grow older
The world becomes stranger, the pattern more complicated
Of dead and living. Not the intense moment
Isolated, with no before and after,
But a lifetime burning in every moment
And not the lifetime of one man only
But of old stones that cannot be deciphered.
There is a time for the evening under starlight,
A time for the evening under lamplight
(The evening with the photograph album).
Love is most nearly itself
When here and now cease to matter.
Old men ought to be explorers
Here or there does not matter
We must be still and still moving
Into another intensity
For a further union, a deeper communion
Through the dark cold and the empty desolation,
The wave cry, the wind cry, the vast waters
Of the petrel and the porpoise. In my end is my beginning.

When Grandma goes for gold in
The Olympic games this year,
She’ll laugh at her competitors
And make them quake with fear.
She’s ninety-nine years old
But, in athletics, she’s been blessed.
The trouble is she can’t decide
Which sport she plays the best.
She’s such an ace at archery.
She’s queen of the canoe.
She’s tough to top at taekwondo
And table tennis too.
She dominates the diving board.
She tromps the trampoline.
At lifting weights and wrestling
She’s the best you’ve ever seen.
She speeds across the swimming pool
To slake the summer heat.
On BMX and mountain bike
She simply can’t be beat.
She’s highest in the high jump,
And a champ at hammer throwing,
Magnificent in marathons,
Remarkable at rowing.
She beats the best at boxing.
At the pole vault she is peerless.
Her fencing is the finest;
She is positively fearless.
She’s masterful at basketball,
She truly rules the court,
And equally incredible
At every other sport.
But what we find astonishing
And something of a shocker
Is how she wins all contests
With her wheelchair and her walker.

 --Kenn Nesbitt

Copyright © Kenn Nesbitt 2016. All Rights Reserved.

Of course you have faced the dilemma: it is announced, they all smirk and rise. If they are ultra, they remove their hats and look ecstatic; then they look at you. What shall you do? Noblesse oblige; you cannot be boorish, or ungracious; and too, after all it is your country and you do love its ideals if not all of its realities. Now, then, I have thought of a way out: Arise, gracefully remove your hat, and tilt your head. Then sing as follows, powerfully and with deep unction. They’ll hardly note the little changes and their feelings and your conscience will thus be saved: 

My country tis of thee, 
Late land of slavery, 
         Of thee I sing. 
Land where my father’s pride 
Slept where my mother died, 
From every mountain side 
         Let freedom ring! 

My native country thee 
Land of the slave set free, 
         Thy fame I love. 
I love thy rocks and rills 
And o’er thy hate which chills, 
My heart with purpose thrills, 
         To rise above. 

Let laments swell the breeze 
And wring from all the trees 
          Sweet freedom’s song. 
Let laggard tongues awake, 
Let all who hear partake, 
Let Southern silence quake, 
         The sound prolong. 

Our fathers’ God to thee 
Author of Liberty, 
         To thee we sing 
Soon may our land be bright, 
With Freedom’s happy light 
Protect us by Thy might, 
         Great God our King.

 From Job

A spirit passed before me: I beheld
The face of immortality unveiled— 
Deep sleep came down on every eye save mine— 
And there it stood,—all formless—but divine:
Along my bones the creeping flesh did quake;
And as my damp hair stiffened, thus it spake:

"Is man more just than God? Is man more pure
Than He who deems even Seraphs insecure?
Creatures of clay—vain dwellers in the dust!
The moth survives you, and are ye more just?
Things of a day! you wither ere the night,
Heedless and blind to Wisdom's wasted light!"

 Good people of high and low degree,
I pray ye all be advised by me,
And don't believe what the clergy doth say,
That by going to the theatre you will be led astray. 

No, in the theatre we see vice punished and virtue rewarded,
The villain either hanged or shot, and his career retarded;
Therefore the theatre is useful in every way,
And has no inducement to lead the people astray. 

Because therein we see the end of the bad men,
Which must appall the audience - deny it who can
Which will help to retard them from going astray,
While witnessing in a theatre a moral play. 

The theatre ought to be encouraged in every respect,
Because example is better than precept,
And is bound to have a greater effect
On the minds of theatre-goers in every respect. 

Sometimes in theatres, guilty creatures there have been
Struck to the soul by the cunning of the scene;
By witnessing a play wherein murder is enacted,
They were proven to be murderers, they felt so distracted, 

And left the theatre, they felt so much fear,
Such has been the case, so says Shakespeare.
And such is my opinion, I will venture to say,
That murderers will quake with fear on seeing murder in a play. 

Hamlet discovered his father's murderer by a play
That he composed for the purpose, without dismay,
And the king, his uncle, couldn't endure to see that play,
And he withdrew from the scene without delay. 

And by that play the murder was found out,
And clearly proven, without any doubt;
Therefore, stage representation has a greater effect
On the minds of the people than religious precept. 

We see in Shakespeare's tragedy of Othello, which is sublime,
Cassio losing his lieutenancy through drinking wine;
And, in delirium and grief, he exclaims -
"Oh, that men should put an enemy in their mouths to steal away their brains!" 

A young man in London went to the theatre one night
To see the play of George Barnwell, and he got a great fright;
He saw George Barnwell murder his uncle in the play,
And he had resolved to murder his uncle, but was stricken with dismay. 

But when he saw George Barnwell was to be hung
The dread of murdering his uncle tenaciously to him clung,
That he couldn't murder and rob his uncle dear,
Because the play he saw enacted filled his heart with fear. 

And, in conclusion, I will say without dismay,
Visit the theatre without delay,
Because the theatre is a school of morality,
And hasn't the least tendency to lead to prodigality.

 As the sweet sweat of roses in a still,
As that which from chafed musk-cats' pores doth trill,
As the almighty balm of th' early East,
Such are the sweat drops of my mistress' breast,
And on her brow her skin such lustre sets,
They seem no sweat drops, but pearl coronets.
Rank sweaty froth thy Mistress's brow defiles,
Like spermatic issue of ripe menstruous boils,
Or like the scum, which, by need's lawless law
Enforced, Sanserra's starved men did draw
From parboiled shoes and boots, and all the rest
Which were with any sovereigne fatness blest,
And like vile lying stones in saffroned tin,
Or warts, or weals, they hang upon her skin.
Round as the world's her head, on every side,
Like to the fatal ball which fell on Ide,

Or that whereof God had such jealousy,
As, for the ravishing thereof we die.
Thy head is like a rough-hewn statue of jet,
Where marks for eyes, nose, mouth, are yet scarce set;
Like the first Chaos, or flat-seeming face
Of Cynthia, when th' earth's shadows her embrace.
Like Proserpine's white beauty-keeping chest,
Or Jove's best fortunes urn, is her fair breast.
Thine's like worm-eaten trunks, clothed in seals' skin,
Or grave, that's dust without, and stink within.
And like that slender stalk, at whose end stands
The woodbine quivering, are her arms and hands.
Like rough barked elm-boughs, or the russet skin
Of men late scourged for madness, or for sin,
Like sun-parched quarters on the city gate,
Such is thy tanned skin's lamentable state.
And like a bunch of ragged carrots stand
The short swol'n fingers of thy gouty hand.
Then like the Chimic's masculine equal fire,
Which in the Lymbecks warm womb doth inspire
Into th' earth's worthless dirt a soul of gold,
Such cherishing heat her best loved part doth hold.
Thine's like the dread mouth of a fired gun,
Or like hot liquid metals newly run
Into clay moulds, or like to that Etna
Where round about the grass is burnt away.
Are not your kisses then as filthy, and more,
As a worm sucking an envenomed sore?
Doth not thy feareful hand in feeling quake,
As one which gath'ring flowers still fears a snake?
Is not your last act harsh, and violent,
As when a plough a stony ground doth rent?
So kiss good turtles, so devoutly nice
Are priests in handling reverent sacrifice,
And such in searching wounds the surgeon is
As we, when we embrace, or touch, or kiss.
Leave her, and I will leave comparing thus,
She, and comparisons are odious.

 A bullet through his heart at dawn. On 
the table a letter signed
with a woman's name. A wind that goes howling round the 
house,
and weeping as in shame. Cold November dawn peeping through 
the windows,
cold dawn creeping over the floor, creeping up his cold legs,
creeping over his cold body, creeping across his cold face.
A glaze of thin yellow sunlight on the staring eyes. Wind 
howling
through bent branches. A wind which never dies down. Howling, 
wailing.
The gazing eyes glitter in the sunlight. The lids are 
frozen open
and the eyes glitter.

The thudding of a pick on hard earth. A spade grinding 
and crunching.
Overhead, branches writhing, winding, interlacing, unwinding, scattering;
tortured twinings, tossings, creakings. Wind flinging 
branches apart,
drawing them together, whispering and whining among them. A 
waning,
lobsided moon cutting through black clouds. A stream 
of pebbles and earth
and the empty spade gleams clear in the moonlight, then is rammed 
again
into the black earth. Tramping of feet. Men 
and horses.
Squeaking of wheels.
"Whoa! Ready, Jim?"
"All ready."
Something falls, settles, is still. Suicides 
have no coffin.
"Give us the stake, Jim. Now."
Pound! Pound!
"He'll never walk. Nailed to the ground."
An ash stick pierces his heart, if it buds the 
roots will hold him.
He is a part of the earth now, clay to clay. Overhead 
the branches sway,
and writhe, and twist in the wind. He'll never walk with 
a bullet
in his heart, and an ash stick nailing him to the cold, black ground.

Six months he lay still. Six months. And the 
water welled up in his body,
and soft blue spots chequered it. He lay still, for the 
ash stick
held him in place. Six months! Then her face 
came out of a mist of green.
Pink and white and frail like Dresden china, lilies-of-the-valley
at her breast, puce-coloured silk sheening about her. Under 
the young
green leaves, the horse at a foot-pace, the high yellow wheels of 
the chaise
scarcely turning, her face, rippling like grain a-blowing,
under her puce-coloured bonnet; and burning beside her, flaming 
within
his correct blue coat and brass buttons, is someone. What 
has dimmed the sun?
The horse steps on a rolling stone; a wind in the branches makes 
a moan.
The little leaves tremble and shake, turn and quake, over and over,
tearing their stems. There is a shower of young leaves,
and a sudden-sprung gale wails in the trees.
The yellow-wheeled chaise is rocking -- rocking, 
and all the branches
are knocking -- knocking. The sun in the sky is a flat, 
red plate,
the branches creak and grate. She screams and cowers, 
for the green foliage
is a lowering wave surging to smother her. But she sees 
nothing.
The stake holds firm. The body writhes, the body squirms.
The blue spots widen, the flesh tears, but the stake wears well
in the deep, black ground. It holds the body in the still, 
black ground.

Two years! The body has been in the ground two years. It 
is worn away;
it is clay to clay. Where the heart moulders, a greenish 
dust, the stake
is thrust. Late August it is, and night; a night flauntingly 
jewelled
with stars, a night of shooting stars and loud insect noises.
Down the road to Tilbury, silence -- and the slow flapping of large 
leaves.
Down the road to Sutton, silence -- and the darkness of heavy-foliaged 
trees.
Down the road to Wayfleet, silence -- and the whirring scrape of 
insects
in the branches. Down the road to Edgarstown, silence 
-- and stars like
stepping-stones in a pathway overhead. It is very quiet 
at the cross-roads,
and the sign-board points the way down the four roads, endlessly 
points
the way where nobody wishes to go.
A horse is galloping, galloping up from Sutton. Shaking 
the wide,
still leaves as he goes under them. Striking sparks with 
his iron shoes;
silencing the katydids. Dr. Morgan riding to a child-birth 
over Tilbury way;
riding to deliver a woman of her first-born son. One 
o'clock from
Wayfleet bell tower, what a shower of shooting stars! And 
a breeze
all of a sudden, jarring the big leaves and making them jerk up 
and down.
Dr. Morgan's hat is blown from his head, the horse swerves, and 
curves away
from the sign-post. An oath -- spurs -- a blurring of 
grey mist.
A quick left twist, and the gelding is snorting and racing
down the Tilbury road with the wind dropping away behind him.
The stake has wrenched, the stake has started, 
the body, flesh from flesh,
has parted. But the bones hold tight, socket and ball, 
and clamping them down
in the hard, black ground is the stake, wedged through ribs and 
spine.
The bones may twist, and heave, and twine, but the stake holds them 
still
in line. The breeze goes down, and the round stars shine, 
for the stake
holds the fleshless bones in line.

Twenty years now! Twenty long years! The body 
has powdered itself away;
it is clay to clay. It is brown earth mingled with brown 
earth. Only flaky
bones remain, lain together so long they fit, although not one bone 
is knit
to another. The stake is there too, rotted through, but 
upright still,
and still piercing down between ribs and spine in a straight line.
Yellow stillness is on the cross-roads, yellow 
stillness is on the trees.
The leaves hang drooping, wan. The four roads point four 
yellow ways,
saffron and gamboge ribbons to the gaze. A little swirl 
of dust
blows up Tilbury road, the wind which fans it has not strength to 
do more;
it ceases, and the dust settles down. A little whirl 
of wind
comes up Tilbury road. It brings a sound of wheels and 
feet.
The wind reels a moment and faints to nothing under the sign-post.
Wind again, wheels and feet louder. Wind again -- again 
-- again.
A drop of rain, flat into the dust. Drop! -- Drop! Thick 
heavy raindrops,
and a shrieking wind bending the great trees and wrenching off their 
leaves.
Under the black sky, bowed and dripping with rain, 
up Tilbury road,
comes the procession. A funeral procession, bound for 
the graveyard
at Wayfleet. Feet and wheels -- feet and wheels. And 
among them
one who is carried.
The bones in the deep, still earth shiver and pull. There 
is a quiver
through the rotted stake. Then stake and bones fall together
in a little puffing of dust.
Like meshes of linked steel the rain shuts down 
behind the procession,
now well along the Wayfleet road.
He wavers like smoke in the buffeting wind. His 
fingers blow out like smoke,
his head ripples in the gale. Under the sign-post, in 
the pouring rain,
he stands, and watches another quavering figure drifting down
the Wayfleet road. Then swiftly he streams after it. It 
flickers
among the trees. He licks out and winds about them. Over, 
under,
blown, contorted. Spindrift after spindrift; smoke following 
smoke.
There is a wailing through the trees, a wailing of fear,
and after it laughter -- laughter -- laughter, skirling up to the 
black sky.
Lightning jags over the funeral procession. A heavy clap 
of thunder.
Then darkness and rain, and the sound of feet and wheels.

 After the first astounding rush,
after the weeks at the lake,
the crystal, the clouds, the water lapping the rocks,
the snow breaking under our boots like skin,
& the long mornings in bed. . .

After the tangos in the kitchen,
& our eyes fixed on each other at dinner,
as if we would eat with our lids,
as if we would swallow each other. . .

I find you still
here beside me in bed,
(while my pen scratches the pad
& your skin glows as you read)
& my whole life so mellowed & changed

that at times I cannot remember
the crimp in my heart that brought me to you,
the pain of a marriage like an old ache,
a husband like an arthritic knuckle.

Here, living with you,
love is still the only subject that matters.
I open to you like a flowering wound,
or a trough in the sea filled with dreaming fish,
or a steaming chasm of earth
split by a major quake.

You changed the topography.
Where valleys were,
there are now mountains.
Where deserts were,
there now are seas.

We rub each other,
but we do not wear away.

The sand gets finer
& our skins turn silk.

 Hark! 'tis the twanging horn! O'er yonder bridge,
That with its wearisome but needful length
Bestrides the wintry flood, in which the moon
Sees her unwrinkled face reflected bright,
He comes, the herald of a noisy world,
With spatter'd boots, strapp'd waist, and frozen locks;
News from all nations lumb'ring at his back.
True to his charge, the close-pack'd load behind,
Yet careless what he brings, his one concern
Is to conduct it to the destin'd inn:
And, having dropp'd th' expected bag, pass on.
He whistles as he goes, light-hearted wretch,
Cold and yet cheerful: messenger of grief
Perhaps to thousands, and of joy to some;
To him indiff'rent whether grief or joy.
Houses in ashes, and the fall of stocks,
Births, deaths, and marriages, epistles wet
With tears that trickled down the writer's cheeks
Fast as the periods from his fluent quill,
Or charg'd with am'rous sighs of absent swains,
Or nymphs responsive, equally affect
His horse and him, unconscious of them all.
But oh th' important budget! usher'd in
With such heart-shaking music, who can say
What are its tidings? have our troops awak'd?
Or do they still, as if with opium drugg'd,
Snore to the murmurs of th' Atlantic wave?
Is India free? and does she wear her plum'd
And jewell'd turban with a smile of peace,
Or do we grind her still? The grand debate,
The popular harangue, the tart reply,
The logic, and the wisdom, and the wit,
And the loud laugh--I long to know them all;
I burn to set th' imprison'd wranglers free,
And give them voice and utt'rance once again.
Now stir the fire, and close the shutters fast,
Let fall the curtains, wheel the sofa round,
And, while the bubbling and loud-hissing urn
Throws up a steamy column, and the cups,
That cheer but not inebriate, wait on each,
So let us welcome peaceful ev'ning in.
Not such his ev'ning, who with shining face
Sweats in the crowded theatre, and, squeez'd
And bor'd with elbow-points through both his sides,
Out-scolds the ranting actor on the stage:
Nor his, who patient stands till his feet throb,
And his head thumps, to feed upon the breath
Of patriots, bursting with heroic rage,
Or placemen, all tranquility and smiles.
This folio of four pages, happy work!
Which not ev'n critics criticise; that holds
Inquisitive attention, while I read,
Fast bound in chains of silence, which the fair,
Though eloquent themselves, yet fear to break;
What is it, but a map of busy life,
Its fluctuations, and its vast concerns?...


Oh winter, ruler of th' inverted year,
Thy scatter'd hair with sleet like ashes fill'd,
Thy breath congeal'd upon thy lips, thy cheeks
Fring'd with a beard made white with other snows
Than those of age, thy forehead wrapp'd in clouds,
A leafless branch thy sceptre, and thy throne
A sliding car, indebted to no wheels,
But urg'd by storms along its slipp'ry way,
I love thee, all unlovely as thou seem'st,
And dreaded as thou art! Thou hold'st the sun
A pris'ner in the yet undawning east,
Short'ning his journey between morn and noon,
And hurrying him, impatient of his stay,
Down to the rosy west; but kindly still
Compensating his loss with added hours
Of social converse and instructive ease,
And gath'ring, at short notice, in one group
The family dispers'd, and fixing thought,
Not less dispers'd by day-light and its cares.
I crown thee king of intimate delights,
Fire-side enjoyments, home-born happiness,
And all the comforts that the lowly roof
Of undisturb'd retirement, and the hours
Of long uninterrupted ev'ning, know.
No rattling wheels stop short before these gates;
No powder'd pert proficient in the art
Of sounding an alarm, assaults these doors
Till the street rings; no stationary steeds
Cough their own knell, while, heedless of the sound,
The silent circle fan themselves, and quake:
But here the needle plies its busy task,
The pattern grows, the well-depicted flow'r,
Wrought patiently into the snowy lawn,
Unfolds its bosom; buds, and leaves, and sprigs,
And curling tendrils, gracefully dispos'd,
Follow the nimble finger of the fair;
A wreath that cannot fade, or flow'rs that blow
With most success when all besides decay.
The poet's or historian's page, by one
Made vocal for th' amusement of the rest;
The sprightly lyre, whose treasure of sweet sounds
The touch from many a trembling chord shakes out;
And the clear voice symphonious, yet distinct,
And in the charming strife triumphant still;
Beguile the night, and set a keener edge
On female industry: the threaded steel
Flies swiftly, and, unfelt, the task proceeds.
The volume clos'd, the customary rites
Of the last meal commence. A Roman meal;
Such as the mistress of the world once found
Delicious, when her patriots of high note,
Perhaps by moonlight, at their humble doors,
And under an old oak's domestic shade,
Enjoy'd--spare feast!--a radish and an egg!
Discourse ensues, not trivial, yet not dull,
Nor such as with a frown forbids the play
Of fancy, or proscribes the sound of mirth:
Nor do we madly, like an impious world,
Who deem religion frenzy, and the God
That made them an intruder on their joys,
Start at his awful name, or deem his praise
A jarring note. Themes of a graver tone,
Exciting oft our gratitude and love,
While we retrace with mem'ry's pointing wand,
That calls the past to our exact review,
The dangers we have 'scaped, the broken snare,
The disappointed foe, deliv'rance found
Unlook'd for, life preserv'd and peace restor'd--
Fruits of omnipotent eternal love.
Oh ev'nings worthy of the gods! exclaim'd
The Sabine bard. Oh ev'nings, I reply,
More to be priz'd and coveted than yours,
As more illumin'd, and with nobler truths.
That I, and mine, and those we love, enjoy....

 THOUGHTS ON JESUS CHRIST'S DESCENT INTO HELL.

[THE remarkable Poem of which this is a literal 
but faint representation, was written when Goethe was only sixteen 
years old. It derives additional interest from the fact of its being 
the very earliest piece of his that is preserved. The few other 
pieces included by Goethe under the title of Religion and Church 
are polemical, and devoid of interest to the English reader.]

WHAT wondrous noise is heard around!
Through heaven exulting voices sound,

A mighty army marches on
By thousand millions follow'd, lo,
To yon dark place makes haste to go

God's Son, descending from His throne!
He goes--the tempests round Him break,

As Judge and Hero cometh He;
He goes--the constellations quake,

The sun, the world quake fearfully.

I see Him in His victor-car,
On fiery axles borne afar,

Who on the cross for us expired.
The triumph to yon realms He shows,--
Remote from earth, where star ne'er glows,

The triumph He for us acquired.
He cometh, Hell to extirpate,

Whom He, by dying, wellnigh kill'd;
He shall pronounce her fearful fate

Hark! now the curse is straight fulfill'd.

Hell sees the victor come at last,
She feels that now her reign is past,

She quakes and fears to meet His sight;
She knows His thunders' terrors dread,
In vain she seeks to hide her head,

Attempts to fly, but vain is flight;
Vainly she hastes to 'scape pursuit

And to avoid her Judge's eye;
The Lord's fierce wrath restrains her foot

Like brazen chains,--she cannot fly.

Here lies the Dragon, trampled down,
He lies, and feels God's angry frown,

He feels, and grinneth hideously;
He feels Hell's speechless agonies,
A thousand times he howls and sighs:

"Oh, burning flames! quick, swallow me!"
There lies he in the fiery waves,

By torments rack'd and pangs infernal,
Instant annihilation craves,

And hears, those pangs will be eternal.

Those mighty squadrons, too, are here,
The partners of his cursed career,

Yet far less bad than he were they.
Here lies the countless throng combined,
In black and fearful crowds entwined,

While round him fiery tempests play;
He sees how they the Judge avoid,

He sees the storm upon them feed,
Yet is not at the sight o'erjoy'd,

Because his pangs e'en theirs exceed.

The Son of Man in triumph passes
Down to Hell's wild and black morasses,

And there unfolds His majesty.
Hell cannot bear the bright array,
For, since her first created day.

Darkness alone e'er govern'd she.
She lay remote from ev'ry light

With torments fill'd in Chaos here;
God turn'd for ever from her sight

His radiant features' glory clear.

Within the realms she calls her own,
She sees the splendour of the Son,

His dreaded glories shining forth;
She sees Him clad in rolling thunder,
She sees the rocks all quake with wonder,

When God before her stands in wrath.
She sees He comes her Judge to be,

She feels the awful pangs inside her,
Herself to slay endeavours she,

But e'en this comfort is denied her.

Now looks she back, with pains untold,
Upon those happy times of old,

When those glories gave her joy;
When yet her heart revered the truth,
When her glad soul, in endless youth

And rapture dwelt, without alloy.
She calls to mind with madden'd thought

How over man her wiles prevail'd;
To take revenge on God she sought,

And feels the vengeance it entail'd.

God was made man, and came to earth.
Then Satan cried with fearful mirth:

"E'en He my victim now shall be!"
He sought to slay the Lord Most High,
The world's Creator now must die;

But, Satan, endless woe to thee!
Thou thought'st to overcome Him then,

Rejoicing in His suffering;
But he in triumph comes again

To bind thee: Death! where is thy sting?

Speak, Hell! where is thy victory?
Thy power destroy'd and scatter'd see!

Know'st thou not now the Highest's might?
See, Satan, see thy rule o'erthrown!

By thousand-varying pangs weigh'd down,
Thou dwell'st in dark and endless night.

As though by lightning struck thou liest,
No gleam of rapture far or wide;

In vain! no hope thou there decriest,--
For me alone Messiah died!

A howling rises through the air,
A trembling fills each dark vault there,

When Christ to Hell is seen to come.
She snarls with rage, but needs must cower
Before our mighty hero's power;

He signs--and Hell is straightway dumb.
Before his voice the thunders break,

On high His victor-banner blows;
E'en angels at His fury quake,

When Christ to the dread judgment goes.

Now speaks He, and His voice is thunder,
He speaks, the rocks are rent in sunder,

His breath is like devouring flames.
Thus speaks He: "Tremble, ye accurs'd!
He who from Eden hurl'd you erst,

Your kingdom's overthrow proclaims.
Look up! My children once were ye,

Your arms against Me then ye turn'd,
Ye fell, that ye might sinners be,

Ye've now the wages that ye earn'd.

"My greatest foeman from that day,
Ye led my dearest friends astray,--

As ye had fallen, man must fall.
To kill him evermore ye sought,
'They all shall die the death,' ye thought;

But howl! for Me I won them all.
For them alone did I descend,

For them pray'd, suffer'd, perish'd I.
Ye ne'er shall gain your wicked end;

Who trusts in Me shall never die.

"In endless chains here lie ye now,
Nothing can save you from the slough.

Not boldness, not regret for crime.
Lie, then, and writhe in brimstone fire!
'Twas ye yourselves drew down Mine ire,

Lie and lament throughout all time!
And also ye, whom I selected,

E'en ye forever I disown,
For ye My saving grace rejected

Ye murmur? blame yourselves alone!

"Ye might have lived with Me in bliss,
For I of yore had promis'd this;

Ye sinn'd, and all My precepts slighted
Wrapp'd in the sleep of sin ye dwelt,
Now is My fearful judgment felt,

By a just doom your guilt requited."--
Thus spake He, and a fearful storm

From Him proceeds, the lightnings glow,
The thunders seize each wicked form,

And hurl them in the gulf below.

The God-man closeth Hell's sad doors,
In all His majesty He soars

From those dark regions back to light.
He sitteth at the Father's side;
Oh, friends, what joy doth this betide!

For us, for us He still will fight!
The angels sacred quire around

Rejoice before the mighty Lord,
So that all creatures hear the sound:

"Zebaoth's God be aye ador'd!"

 1765.
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