10 Best Famous Writings Poems

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

• All Famous Writings Poems

 I was born in 1902
I never once went back to my birthplace
I don't like to turn back
at three I served as a pasha's grandson in Aleppo
at nineteen as a student at Moscow Communist University
at forty-nine I was back in Moscow as the Tcheka Party's guest
and I've been a poet since I was fourteen
some people know all about plants some about fish
 I know separation
some people know the names of the stars by heart
 I recite absences
I've slept in prisons and in grand hotels
I've known hunger even a hunger strike and there's almost no food
 I haven't tasted
at thirty they wanted to hang me
at forty-eight to give me the Peace Prize
 which they did
at thirty-six I covered four square meters of concrete in half a year
at fifty-nine I flew from Prague to Havana in eighteen hours
I never saw Lenin I stood watch at his coffin in '24
in '61 the tomb I visit is his books
they tried to tear me away from my party
 it didn't work
nor was I crushed under the falling idols
in '51 I sailed with a young friend into the teeth of death
in '52 I spent four months flat on my back with a broken heart
 waiting to die
I was jealous of the women I loved
I didn't envy Charlie Chaplin one bit
I deceived my women
I never talked my friends' backs
I drank but not every day
I earned my bread money honestly what happiness
out of embarrassment for others I lied
I lied so as not to hurt someone else
 but I also lied for no reason at all
I've ridden in trains planes and cars
most people don't get the chance
I went to opera
 most people haven't even heard of the opera
and since '21 I haven't gone to the places most people visit
 mosques churches temples synagogues sorcerers
 but I've had my coffee grounds read
my writings are published in thirty or forty languages
 in my Turkey in my Turkish they're banned
cancer hasn't caught up with me yet
and nothing says it will
I'll never be a prime minister or anything like that
and I wouldn't want such a life
nor did I go to war
or burrow in bomb shelters in the bottom of the night
and I never had to take to the road under diving planes
but I fell in love at almost sixty
in short comrades
even if today in Berlin I'm croaking of grief
 I can say I've lived like a human being
and who knows
 how much longer I'll live
 what else will happen to me


 This autobiography was written 
 in east Berlin on 11 September 1961

 All human things are subject to decay,
And, when Fate summons, monarchs must obey:
This Flecknoe found, who, like Augustus, young
Was call'd to empire, and had govern'd long:
In prose and verse, was own'd, without dispute
Through all the realms of Non-sense, absolute.
This aged prince now flourishing in peace,
And blest with issue of a large increase,
Worn out with business, did at length debate
To settle the succession of the State:
And pond'ring which of all his sons was fit
To reign, and wage immortal war with wit;
Cry'd, 'tis resolv'd; for nature pleads that he
Should only rule, who most resembles me:
Shadwell alone my perfect image bears,
Mature in dullness from his tender years.
Shadwell alone, of all my sons, is he
Who stands confirm'd in full stupidity.
The rest to some faint meaning make pretence,
But Shadwell never deviates into sense.
Some beams of wit on other souls may fall,
Strike through and make a lucid interval;
But Shadwell's genuine night admits no ray,
His rising fogs prevail upon the day:
Besides his goodly fabric fills the eye,
And seems design'd for thoughtless majesty:
Thoughtless as monarch oaks, that shade the plain,
And, spread in solemn state, supinely reign.
Heywood and Shirley were but types of thee,
Thou last great prophet of tautology:
Even I, a dunce of more renown than they,
Was sent before but to prepare thy way;
And coarsely clad in Norwich drugget came
To teach the nations in thy greater name.
My warbling lute, the lute I whilom strung
When to King John of Portugal I sung,
Was but the prelude to that glorious day,
When thou on silver Thames did'st cut thy way,
With well tim'd oars before the royal barge,
Swell'd with the pride of thy celestial charge;
And big with hymn, commander of an host,
The like was ne'er in Epsom blankets toss'd.
Methinks I see the new Arion sail,
The lute still trembling underneath thy nail.
At thy well sharpen'd thumb from shore to shore
The treble squeaks for fear, the basses roar:
Echoes from Pissing-Alley, Shadwell call,
And Shadwell they resound from Aston Hall.
About thy boat the little fishes throng,
As at the morning toast, that floats along.
Sometimes as prince of thy harmonious band
Thou wield'st thy papers in thy threshing hand.
St. Andre's feet ne'er kept more equal time,
Not ev'n the feet of thy own Psyche's rhyme:
Though they in number as in sense excel;
So just, so like tautology they fell,
That, pale with envy, Singleton forswore
The lute and sword which he in triumph bore
And vow'd he ne'er would act Villerius more.
Here stopt the good old sire; and wept for joy
In silent raptures of the hopeful boy.
All arguments, but most his plays, persuade,
That for anointed dullness he was made.

 Close to the walls which fair Augusta bind,
(The fair Augusta much to fears inclin'd)
An ancient fabric, rais'd t'inform the sight,
There stood of yore, and Barbican it hight:
A watch tower once; but now, so fate ordains,
Of all the pile an empty name remains.
From its old ruins brothel-houses rise,
Scenes of lewd loves, and of polluted joys.
Where their vast courts, the mother-strumpets keep,
And, undisturb'd by watch, in silence sleep.
Near these a nursery erects its head,
Where queens are form'd, and future heroes bred;
Where unfledg'd actors learn to laugh and cry,
Where infant punks their tender voices try,
And little Maximins the gods defy.
Great Fletcher never treads in buskins here,
Nor greater Jonson dares in socks appear;
But gentle Simkin just reception finds
Amidst this monument of vanish'd minds:
Pure clinches, the suburbian muse affords;
And Panton waging harmless war with words.
Here Flecknoe, as a place to fame well known,
Ambitiously design'd his Shadwell's throne.
For ancient Decker prophesi'd long since,
That in this pile should reign a mighty prince,
Born for a scourge of wit, and flail of sense:
To whom true dullness should some Psyches owe,
But worlds of Misers from his pen should flow;
Humorists and hypocrites it should produce,
Whole Raymond families, and tribes of Bruce.

 Now Empress Fame had publisht the renown,
Of Shadwell's coronation through the town.
Rous'd by report of fame, the nations meet,
From near Bun-Hill, and distant Watling-street.
No Persian carpets spread th'imperial way,
But scatter'd limbs of mangled poets lay:
From dusty shops neglected authors come,
Martyrs of pies, and reliques of the bum.
Much Heywood, Shirley, Ogleby there lay,
But loads of Shadwell almost chok'd the way.
Bilk'd stationers for yeoman stood prepar'd,
And Herringman was Captain of the Guard.
The hoary prince in majesty appear'd,
High on a throne of his own labours rear'd.
At his right hand our young Ascanius sat
Rome's other hope, and pillar of the state.
His brows thick fogs, instead of glories, grace,
And lambent dullness play'd around his face.
As Hannibal did to the altars come,
Sworn by his sire a mortal foe to Rome;
So Shadwell swore, nor should his vow be vain,
That he till death true dullness would maintain;
And in his father's right, and realm's defence,
Ne'er to have peace with wit, nor truce with sense.
The king himself the sacred unction made,
As king by office, and as priest by trade:
In his sinister hand, instead of ball,
He plac'd a mighty mug of potent ale;
Love's kingdom to his right he did convey,
At once his sceptre and his rule of sway;
Whose righteous lore the prince had practis'd young,
And from whose loins recorded Psyche sprung,
His temples last with poppies were o'er spread,
That nodding seem'd to consecrate his head:
Just at that point of time, if fame not lie,
On his left hand twelve reverend owls did fly.
So Romulus, 'tis sung, by Tiber's brook,
Presage of sway from twice six vultures took.
Th'admiring throng loud acclamations make,
And omens of his future empire take.
The sire then shook the honours of his head,
And from his brows damps of oblivion shed
Full on the filial dullness: long he stood,
Repelling from his breast the raging god;
At length burst out in this prophetic mood:

Heavens bless my son, from Ireland let him reign
To far Barbadoes on the Western main;
Of his dominion may no end be known,
And greater than his father's be his throne.
Beyond love's kingdom let him stretch his pen;
He paus'd, and all the people cry'd Amen.
Then thus, continu'd he, my son advance
Still in new impudence, new ignorance.
Success let other teach, learn thou from me
Pangs without birth, and fruitless industry.
Let Virtuosos in five years be writ;
Yet not one thought accuse thy toil of wit.
Let gentle George in triumph tread the stage,
Make Dorimant betray, and Loveit rage;
Let Cully, Cockwood, Fopling, charm the pit,
And in their folly show the writer's wit.
Yet still thy fools shall stand in thy defence,
And justify their author's want of sense.
Let 'em be all by thy own model made
Of dullness, and desire no foreign aid:
That they to future ages may be known,
Not copies drawn, but issue of thy own.
Nay let thy men of wit too be the same,
All full of thee, and differing but in name;
But let no alien Sedley interpose
To lard with wit thy hungry Epsom prose.
And when false flowers of rhetoric thou would'st cull,
Trust Nature, do not labour to be dull;
But write thy best, and top; and in each line,
Sir Formal's oratory will be thine.
Sir Formal, though unsought, attends thy quill,
And does thy Northern Dedications fill.
Nor let false friends seduce thy mind to fame,
By arrogating Jonson's hostile name.
Let Father Flecknoe fire thy mind with praise,
And Uncle Ogleby thy envy raise.
Thou art my blood, where Jonson has no part;
What share have we in Nature or in Art?
Where did his wit on learning fix a brand,
And rail at arts he did not understand?
Where made he love in Prince Nicander's vein,
Or swept the dust in Psyche's humble strain?
Where sold he bargains, whip-stitch, kiss my ****,
Promis'd a play and dwindled to a farce?
When did his muse from Fletcher scenes purloin,
As thou whole Eth'ridge dost transfuse to thine?
But so transfus'd as oil on waters flow,
His always floats above, thine sinks below.
This is thy province, this thy wondrous way,
New humours to invent for each new play:
This is that boasted bias of thy mind,
By which one way, to dullness, 'tis inclin'd,
Which makes thy writings lean on one side still,
And in all changes that way bends thy will.
Nor let thy mountain belly make pretence
Of likeness; thine's a tympany of sense.
A tun of man in thy large bulk is writ,
But sure thou 'rt but a kilderkin of wit.
Like mine thy gentle numbers feebly creep,
Thy Tragic Muse gives smiles, thy Comic sleep.
With whate'er gall thou sett'st thy self to write,
Thy inoffensive satires never bite.
In thy felonious heart, though venom lies,
It does but touch thy Irish pen, and dies.
Thy genius calls thee not to purchase fame
In keen iambics, but mild anagram:
Leave writing plays, and choose for thy command
Some peaceful province in acrostic land.
There thou may'st wings display and altars raise,
And torture one poor word ten thousand ways.
Or if thou would'st thy diff'rent talents suit,
Set thy own songs, and sing them to thy lute.
He said, but his last words were scarcely heard,
For Bruce and Longvil had a trap prepar'd,
And down they sent the yet declaiming bard.
Sinking he left his drugget robe behind,
Born upwards by a subterranean wind.
The mantle fell to the young prophet's part,
With double portion of his father's art.

 Hic. On the grey sand beside the shallow stream
Under your old wind-beaten tower, where still
A lamp burns on beside the open book
That Michael Robartes left, you walk in the moon,
And, though you have passed the best of life, still trace,
Enthralled by the unconquerable delusion,
Magical shapes.

Ille. By the help of an image
I call to my own opposite, summon all
That I have handled least, least looked upon.

Hic. And I would find myself and not an image.

Ille. That is our modern hope, and by its light
We have lit upon the gentle, sensitive mind
And lost the old nonchalance of the hand;
Whether we have chosen chisel, pen or brush,
We are but critics, or but half create,
Timid, entangled, empty and abashed,
Lacking the countenance of our friends.

Hic. And yet
The chief imagination of Christendom,
Dante Alighieri, so utterly found himself
That he has made that hollow face of his
More plain to the mind's eye than any face
But that of Christ.

Ille. And did he find himself
Or was the hunger that had made it hollow
A hunger for the apple on the bough
Most out of reach? and is that spectral image
The man that Lapo and that Guido knew?
I think he fashioned from his opposite
An image that might have been a stony face
Staring upon a Bedouin's horse-hair roof
From doored and windowed cliff, or half upturned
Among the coarse grass and the camel-dung.
He set his chisel to the hardest stone.
Being mocked by Guido for his lecherous life,
Derided and deriding, driven out
To climb that stair and eat that bitter bread,
He found the unpersuadable justice, he found
The most exalted lady loved by a man.

Hic. Yet surely there are men who have made their art
Out of no tragic war, lovers of life,
Impulsive men that look for happiness
And sing when t"hey have found it.

Ille. No, not sing,
For those that love the world serve it in action,
Grow rich, popular and full of influence,
And should they paint or write, still it is action:
The struggle of the fly in marmalade.
The rhetorician would deceive his neighbours,
The sentimentalist himself; while art
Is but a vision of reality.
What portion in the world can the artist have
Who has awakened from the common dream
But dissipation and despair?

Hic. And yet
No one denies to Keats love of the world;
Remember his deliberate happiness.

Ille. His art is happy, but who knows his mind?
I see a schoolboy when I think of him,
With face and nose pressed to a sweet-shop window,
For certainly he sank into his grave
His senses and his heart unsatisfied,
And made - being poor, ailing and ignorant,
Shut out from all the luxury of the world,
The coarse-bred son of a livery-stable keeper --
Luxuriant song.

Hic. Why should you leave the lamp
Burning alone beside an open book,
And trace these characters upon the sands?
A style is found by sedentary toil
And by the imitation of great masters.

Ille. Because I seek an image, not a book.
Those men that in their writings are most wise,
Own nothing but their blind, stupefied hearts.
I call to the mysterious one who yet
Shall walk the wet sands by the edge of the stream
And look most like me, being indeed my double,
And prove of all imaginable things
The most unlike, being my anti-self,
And, standing by these characters, disclose
All that I seek; and whisper it as though
He were afraid the birds, who cry aloud
Their momentary cries before it is dawn,
Would carry it away to blasphemous men.

 PREFACE

If---and the thing is wildly possible---the charge of writing 
nonsense were ever brought against the author of this brief but 
instructive poem, it would be based, I feel convinced, on the line 

``Then the bowsprit got mixed with the rudder sometimes'' 

In view of this painful possibility, I will not (as I might) appeal 
indignantly to my other writings as a proof that I am incapable of 
such a deed: I will not (as I might) point to the strong moral 
purpose of this poem itself, to the arithmetical principles so 
cautiously inculcated in it, or to its noble teachings in Natural 
History---I will take the more prosaic course of simply explaining 
how it happened. 

The Bellman, who was almost morbidly sensitive about appearances, 
used to have the bowsprit unshipped once or twice a week to be 
revarnished, and it more than once happened, when the time came for 
replacing it, that no one on board could remember which end of the 
ship it belonged to. They knew it was not of the slightest use to 
appeal to the Bellman about it---he would only refer to his Naval 
Code, and read out in pathetic tones Admiralty Instructions which 
none of them had ever been able to understand---so it generally ended 
in its being fastened on, anyhow, across the rudder. The helmsman 
used to stand by with tears in his eyes: he knew it was all wrong, 
but alas! Rule 42 of the Code, ``No one shall speak to the Man at the 
Helm'', had been completed by the Bellman himself with the words 
``and the Man at the Helm shall speak to no one''. So remonstrance 
was impossible, and no steering could be done till the next 
varnishing day. During these bewildering intervals the ship usually 
sailed backwards. 

This office was usually undertaken by the Boots, who found in it 
a refuge from the Baker's constant complaints about the insufficient 
blacking of his three pairs of boots. 

As this poem is to some extent connected with the lay of the 
Jabberwock, let me take this opportunity of answering a question that 
has often been asked me, how to pronounce ``slithy toves''. The 
``i'' in ``slithy'' is long, as in ``writhe''; and ``toves'' is 
pronounced so as to rhyme with ``groves''. Again, the first ``o'' in 
``borogoves'' is pronounced like the ``o'' in ``borrow''. I have 
heard people try to give it the sound of the ``o'' in ``worry''. 
Such is Human Perversity. 

This also seems a fitting occasion to notice the other hard words in 
that poem. Humpty-Dumpty's theory, of two meanings packed into one 
word like a portmanteau, seems to me the right explanation for all. 

For instance, take the two words ``fuming'' and ``furious''. Make up 
your mind that you will say both words, but leave it unsettled which 
you will say first. Now open your mouth and speak. If your thoughts 
incline ever so little towards ``fuming'', you will say 
``fuming-furious''; if they turn, by even a hair's breadth, towards 
``furious'', you will say ``furious-fuming''; but if you have that 
rarest of gifts, a perfectly balanced mind, you will say 
``frumious''. 

Supposing that, when Pistol uttered the well-known words--- 

``Under which king, Bezonian? Speak or die!'' 

Justice Shallow had felt certain that it was either William or 
Richard, but had not been able to settle which, so that he could not 
possibly say either name before the other, can it be doubted that, 
rather than die, he would have gasped out ``Rilchiam!''.

 Bid a strong ghost stand at the head
That my Michael may sleep sound,
Nor cry, nor turn in the bed
Till his morning meal come round;
And may departing twilight keep
All dread afar till morning's back.
That his mother may not lack
Her fill of sleep.

Bid the ghost have sword in fist:
Some there are, for I avow
Such devilish things exist,
Who have planned his murder, for they know
Of some most haughty deed or thought
That waits upon his future days,
And would through hatred of the bays
Bring that to nought.

Though You can fashion everything
From nothing every day, and teach
The morning stars to sing,
You have lacked articulate speech
To tell Your simplest want, and known,
Wailing upon a woman's knee,
All of that worst ignominy
Of flesh and bone;

And when through all the town there ran
The servants of Your enemy,
A woman and a man,
Unless the Holy Writings lie,
Hurried through the smooth and rough
And through the fertile and waste,
protecting, till the danger past,
With human love.

 Kung walked
 by the dynastic temple
and into the cedar grove,
 and then out by the lower river,
And with him Khieu Tchi
 and Tian the low speaking
And "we are unknown," said Kung,
"You will take up charioteering?
 "Then you will become known,
"Or perhaps I should take up charioterring, or archery?
"Or the practice of public speaking?"
And Tseu-lou said, "I would put the defences in order,"
And Khieu said, "If I were lord of a province
"I would put it in better order than this is."
And Tchi said, "I would prefer a small mountain temple,
"With order in the observances,
 with a suitable performance of the ritual,"
And Tian said, with his hand on the strings of his lute
The low sounds continuing
 after his hand left the strings,
And the sound went up like smoke, under the leaves,
And he looked after the sound:
 "The old swimming hole,
"And the boys flopping off the planks,
"Or sitting in the underbrush playing mandolins."
 And Kung smiled upon all of them equally.
And Thseng-sie desired to know:
 "Which had answered correctly?"
And Kung said, "They have all answered correctly,
"That is to say, each in his nature."
And Kung raised his cane against Yuan Jang,
 Yuan Jang being his elder,

or Yuan Jang sat by the roadside pretending to
 be receiving wisdom.
And Kung said
 "You old fool, come out of it,
"Get up and do something useful."
 And Kung said
"Respect a child's faculties
"From the moment it inhales the clear air,
"But a man of fifty who knows nothing
 Is worthy of no respect."
And "When the prince has gathered about him
"All the savants and artists, his riches will be fully employed."
And Kung said, and wrote on the bo leaves:
 If a man have not order within him
He can not spread order about him;
And if a man have not order within him
His family will not act with due order;
 And if the prince have not order within him
He can not put order in his dominions.
And Kung gave the words "order"
and "brotherly deference"
And said nothing of the "life after death."
And he said
 "Anyone can run to excesses,
"It is easy to shoot past the mark,
"It is hard to stand firm in the middle."

And they said: If a man commit murder
 Should his father protect him, and hide him?
And Kung said:
 He should hide him.

And Kung gave his daughter to Kong-Tchang
 Although Kong-Tchang was in prison.
And he gave his niece to Nan-Young
 although Nan-Young was out of office.
And Kung said "Wan ruled with moderation,
 "In his day the State was well kept,
"And even I can remember
"A day when the historians left blanks in their writings,
"I mean, for things they didn't know,
"But that time seems to be passing.
A day when the historians left blanks in their writings,
But that time seems to be passing."
And Kung said, "Without character you will
 "be unable to play on that instrument
"Or to execute the music fit for the Odes.
"The blossoms of the apricot
 "blow from the east to the west,
"And I have tried to keep them from falling."

 O my chief good, 
How shall I measure out thy blood? 
How shall I count what thee befell, 
And each grief tell? 

Shall I thy woes
Number according to thy foes? 
Or, since one star show'd thy first breath, 
Shall all thy death? 

Or shall each leaf, 
Which falls in Autumn, score a grief? 
Or cannot leaves, but fruit be sign
Of the true vine? 

Then let each hour 
Of my whole life one grief devour: 
That thy distress through all may run, 
And be my sun.

Or rather let
My several sins their sorrows get; 
That as each beast his cure doth know, 
Each sin may so.

Since blood is fittest, Lord to write
Thy sorrows in, and bloody fight; 
My heart hath store, write there, where in 
One box doth lie both ink and sin: 

That when sin spies so many foes, 
Thy whips, thy nails, thy wounds, thy woes
All come to lodge there, sin may say, 
'No room for me', and fly away.

Sin being gone, oh fill the place, 
And keep possession with thy grace; 
Lest sin take courage and return, 
And all the writings blot or burn.

 I feel no small reluctance in venturing to give to the public a 
work of the character of that indicated by the title-page to the 
present volume; for, difficult as it must always be to render satisfactorily 
into one's own tongue the writings of the bards of other lands, 
the responsibility assumed by the translator is immeasurably increased 
when he attempts to transfer the thoughts of those great men, who 
have lived for all the world and for all ages, from the language 
in which they were originally clothed, to one to which they may 
as yet have been strangers. Preeminently is this the case with Goethe, 
the most masterly of all the master minds of modern times, whose 
name is already inscribed on the tablets of immortality, and whose 
fame already extends over the earth, although as yet only in its 
infancy. Scarcely have two decades passed away since he ceased to 
dwell among men, yet he now stands before us, not as a mere individual, 
like those whom the world is wont to call great, but as a type, 
as an emblem--the recognised emblem and representative of the human 
mind in its present stage of culture and advancement.

Among the infinitely varied effusions of Goethe's pen, perhaps 
there are none which are of as general interest as his Poems, which 
breathe the very spirit of Nature, and embody the real music of 
the feelings. In Germany, they are universally known, and are considered 
as the most delightful of his works. Yet in this country, this kindred 
country, sprung from the same stem, and so strongly resembling her 
sister in so many points, they are nearly unknown. Almost the only 
poetical work of the greatest Poet that the world has seen for ages, 
that is really and generally read in England, is Faust, the translations 
of which are almost endless; while no single person has as yet appeared 
to attempt to give, in an English dress, in any collective or systematic 
manner, those smaller productions of the genius of Goethe which 
it is the object of the present volume to lay before the reader, 
whose indulgence is requested for its many imperfections. In addition 
to the beauty of the language in which the Poet has given utterance 
to his thoughts, there is a depth of meaning in those thoughts which 
is not easily discoverable at first sight, and the translator incurs 
great risk of overlooking it, and of giving a prosaic effect to 
that which in the original contains the very essence of poetry. 
It is probably this difficulty that has deterred others from undertaking 
the task I have set myself, and in which I do not pretend to do 
more than attempt to give an idea of the minstrelsy of one so unrivalled, 
by as truthful an interpretation of it as lies in my power.

The principles which have guided me on the present occasion are 
the same as those followed in the translation of Schiller's complete 
Poems that was published by me in 1851, namely, as literal a rendering 
of the original as is consistent with good English, and also a very 
strict adherence to the metre of the original. Although translators 
usually allow themselves great license in both these points, it 
appears to me that by so doing they of necessity destroy the very 
soul of the work they profess to translate. In fact, it is not a 
translation, but a paraphrase that they give. It may perhaps be 
thought that the present translations go almost to the other extreme, 
and that a rendering of metre, line for line, and word for word, 
makes it impossible to preserve the poetry of the original both 
in substance and in sound. But experience has convinced me that 
it is not so, and that great fidelity is even the most essential 
element of success, whether in translating poetry or prose. It was 
therefore very satisfactory to me to find that the principle laid 
down by me to myself in translating Schiller met with the very general, 
if not universal, approval of the reader. At the same time, I have 
endeavoured to profit in the case of this, the younger born of the 
two attempts made by me to transplant the muse of Germany to the 
shores of Britain, by the criticisms, whether friendly or hostile, 
that have been evoked or provoked by the appearance of its elder 
brother.

As already mentioned, the latter contained the whole of the Poems 
of Schiller. It is impossible, in anything like the same compass, 
to give all the writings of Goethe comprised under the general title 
of Gedichte, or poems. They contain between 30,000 and 40,000 verses, 
exclusive of his plays. and similar works. Very many of these would 
be absolutely without interest to the English reader,--such as those 
having only a local application, those addressed to individuals, 
and so on. Others again, from their extreme length, could only be 
published in separate volumes. But the impossibility of giving all 
need form no obstacle to giving as much as possible; and it so happens 
that the real interest of Goethe's Poems centres in those classes 
of them which are not too diffuse to run any risk when translated 
of offending the reader by their too great number. Those by far 
the more generally admired are the Songs and Ballads, which are 
about 150 in number, and the whole of which are contained in this 
volume (with the exception of one or two of the former, which have 
been, on consideration, left out by me owing to their trifling and 
uninteresting nature). The same may be said of the Odes, Sonnets, 
Miscellaneous Poems, &c.

In addition to those portions of Goethe's poetical works which 
are given in this complete form, specimens of the different other 
classes of them, such as the Epigrams, Elegies, &c., are added, 
as well as a collection of the various Songs found in his Plays, 
making a total number of about 400 Poems, embraced in the present 
volume.

A sketch of the life of Goethe is prefixed, in order that the 
reader may have before him both the Poet himself and the Poet's 
offspring, and that he may see that the two are but one--that Goethe 
lives in his works, that his works lived in him.

The dates of the different Poems are appended throughout, that 
of the first publication being given, when that of the composition 
is unknown. The order of arrangement adopted is that of the authorized 
German editions. As Goethe would never arrange them himself in the 
chronological order of their composition, it has become impossible 
to do so, now that he is dead. The plan adopted in the present volume 
would therefore seem to be the best, as it facilitates reference 
to the original. The circumstances attending or giving rise to the 
production of any of the Poems will be found specified in those 
cases in which they have been ascertained by me.

Having said thus much by way of explanation, I now leave the book 
to speak for itself, and to testify to its own character. Whether 
viewed with a charitable eye by the kindly reader, who will make 
due allowance for the difficulties attending its execution, or received 
by the critic, who will judge of it only by its own merits, with 
the unfriendly welcome which it very probably deserves, I trust 
that I shall at least be pardoned for making an attempt, a failure 
in which does not necessarily imply disgrace, and which, by leading 
the way, may perhaps become the means of inducing some abler and 
more worthy (but not more earnest) labourer to enter upon the same 
field, the riches of which will remain unaltered and undiminished 
in value, even although they may be for the moment tarnished by 
the hands of the less skilful workman who first endeavours to transplant 
them to a foreign soil.

 If you meet literature from Africa
Or even their mentors
In such works
You realize a trait of madness
Pumping into the throbbing poetics.
There is a knack in it that sparks alight
The nearest shrubs;
Intrigue and sensation incomparable.
The heart of African literature
Pumping wordy blood into fragile young minds.
Rejuvenating the African word
That merges into a whirlpool mixture
Of creativity, and strengthen our verbosity.
Impregnated words
Be borne from fertility the center.

 The dark wings of night enfolded the city upon which Nature had spread a pure white garment of snow; and men deserted the streets for their houses in search of warmth, while the north wind probed in contemplation of laying waste the gardens. There in the suburb stood an old hut heavily laden with snow and on the verge of falling. In a dark recess of that hovel was a poor bed in which a dying youth was lying, staring at the dim light of his oil lamp, made to flicker by the entering winds. He a man in the spring of life who foresaw fully that the peaceful hour of freeing himself from the clutches of life was fast nearing. He was awaiting Death's visit gratefully, and upon his pale face appeared the dawn of hope; and on his lops a sorrowful smile; and in his eyes forgiveness. 

He was poet perishing from hunger in the city of living rich. He was placed in the earthly world to enliven the heart of man with his beautiful and profound sayings. He as noble soul, sent by the Goddess of Understanding to soothe and make gentle the human spirit. But alas! He gladly bade the cold earth farewell without receiving a smile from its strange occupants. 

He was breathing his last and had no one at his bedside save the oil lamp, his only companion, and some parchments upon which he had inscribed his heart's feeling. As he salvaged the remnants of his withering strength he lifted his hands heavenward; he moved his eyes hopelessly, as if wanting to penetrate the ceiling in order to see the stars from behind the veil clouds. 

And he said, "Come, oh beautiful Death; my soul is longing for you. Come close to me and unfasten the irons life, for I am weary of dragging them. Come, oh sweet Death, and deliver me from my neighbors who looked upon me as a stranger because I interpret to them the language of the angels. Hurry, oh peaceful Death, and carry me from these multitudes who left me in the dark corner of oblivion because I do not bleed the weak as they do. Come, oh gentle Death, and enfold me under your white wings, for my fellowmen are not in want of me. Embrace me, oh Death, full of love and mercy; let your lips touch my lips which never tasted a mother's kiss, not touched a sister's cheeks, not caresses a sweetheart's fingertips. Come and take me, by beloved Death." 

Then, at the bedside of the dying poet appeared an angel who possessed a supernatural and divine beauty, holding in her hand a wreath of lilies. She embraced him and closed his eyes so he could see no more, except with the eye of his spirit. She impressed a deep and long and gently withdrawn kiss that left and eternal smile of fulfillment upon his lips. Then the hovel became empty and nothing was lest save parchments and papers which the poet had strewn with bitter futility. 

Hundreds of years later, when the people of the city arose from the diseases slumber of ignorance and saw the dawn of knowledge, they erected a monument in the most beautiful garden of the city and celebrated a feast every year in honor of that poet, whose writings had freed them. Oh, how cruel is man's ignorance!