A Look Into Lesser Known Poets, A Series, (2.) Poet, Alfred Noyes

A Look Into Lesser Known Poets, A Series, (2.) Alfred Noyes

https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/alfred-noyes

Alfred Noyes
1880–1958

Alfred Noyes was born in England and attended Oxford, where he left before completing his degree. 
He published his first book of poems, The Loom of Years, at age 21, and published five more volumes
 of poetry in the next five years. In 1914, he began teaching at Princeton University, and became 
 noted for his criticisms of such Modernist writers as James Joyce. Though his early work often evokes
 fantastic, dream-like, storybook emotions, his later poetry increasingly deals with religious themes.
 In “The Highwayman,” one of his best-known poems, Noyes displays his skill at writing narrative poetry
 reminiscent of his two biggest influences, Wordsworth and Tennyson.

POEMS BY ALFRED NOYES
At Dawn
The Barrel-Organ
The Highwayman
See All Poems by Alfred Noyes 
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MORE ABOUT THIS POET
Region:
At Dawn
The Barrel-Organ
The Highwayman
The Hill-Flowers
Immortal Sails
Niobe
The Old Meeting House
On The Western Front

Immortal Sails
                  BY ALFRED NOYES
Now, in a breath, we’ll burst those gates of gold,
   And ransack heaven before our moment fails.
Now, in a breath, before we, too, grow old,
   We’ll mount and sing and spread immortal sails.

It is not time that makes eternity.
   Love and an hour may quite out-span the years,
And give us more to hear and more to see
   Than life can wash away with all its tears.

Dear, when we part, at last, that sunset sky
   Shall not be touched with deeper hues than this;
But we shall ride the lightning ere we die
   And seize our brief infinitude of bliss,

With time to spare for all that heaven can tell,
While eyes meet eyes, and look their last farewell.

n/a
Source: Collected Poems (1947)

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https://poets.org/poet/alfred-noyes

Alfred Noyes
1880–1958
Born to Alfred and Amelia Adams Noyes on September 16, 1880, Alfred Noyes grew up in Wolverhampton, England.
 His father, a grocer and a teacher, taught Noyes Latin and Greek. Noyes attended Exeter College, Oxford, but
 left before he earned a degree. At the age of twenty-one he published his first collection of poems,
 The Loom Years (1902), which received praise from respected poets such as William Butler Yeats and George Meredith.

Between 1903 and 1908, Noyes published five volumes of poetry including The Forest of Wild Thyme (1905) and
 The Flower of Old Japan and Other Poems (1907). In his early work, Noyes claimed he was seeking to "follow the
 careless and happy feet of children back into the kingdom of those dreams which...are the sole reality worth
 living and dying for; those beautiful dreams, or those fantastic jests." His books were widely reviewed and were
 published both in Britain and the United States. Among his best-known poems from this time are "The Highwayman"
 and "Drake." "Drake," which appeared serially in Blackwood's Magazine, was a two-hundred page epic about life at sea.
 Both in style and subject, the poem shows a clear influence of Romantic poets such as Tennyson and Wordsworth.

In 1907, Noyes married Garnett Daniels. They had three children. His increasing popularity allowed the family to
 live off royalty checks. In 1914, Noyes accepted a teaching position at Princeton University, where he taught
 English Literature until 1923. He was a noted critic of modernist writers, particularly James Joyce. Likewise,
 his work at this time was criticized by some for its refusal to embrace the modernist movement.

In 1922 he began an epic called The Torch Bearers, which was published in three volumes (Watchers of the Sky, 1922;
 The Book of Earth, 1925; and The Last Voyage, 1930). The book arose out of his visit to a telescope located at 
 Mount Wilson, California and attempted to reconcile his views of science with religion. His wife died in 1926 and
 Noyes turned increasingly to Catholicism and religious themes in his later books, particularly The Unknown God (1934)
 and If Judgment Comes (1941). During the World War II, Noyes lived in Canada and America and was a strong advocate
 of the Allied effort. In 1949, he returned to Britain. As a result of increasing blindness, Noyes dictated all of his
 subsequent work. His autobiography, Two Worlds for Memory, was published in 1953. Alfred Noyes died on June 25, 1958,
 and was buried on Isle of Wight.

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 https://allpoetry.com/A-Song-of-Sherwood
 
 A Song of Sherwood

Sherwood in the twilight, is Robin Hood awake?
Grey and ghostly shadows are gliding through the brake,
Shadows of the dappled deer, dreaming of the morn,
Dreaming of a shadowy man that winds a shadowy horn.

Robin Hood is here again: all his merry thieves
Hear a ghostly bugle-note shivering through the leaves,
Calling as he used to call, faint and far away,
In Sherwood, in Sherwood, about the break of day.

Merry, merry England has kissed the lips of June:
All the wings of fairyland were here beneath the moon,
Like a flight of rose-leaves fluttering in a mist
Of opal and ruby and pearl and amethyst.

Merry, merry England is waking as of old,
With eyes of blither hazel and hair of brighter gold:
For Robin Hood is here again beneath the bursting spray
In Sherwood, in Sherwood, about the break of day.

Love is in the greenwood building him a house
Of wild rose and hawthorn and honeysuckle boughs:
Love is in the greenwood, dawn is in the skies,
And Marian is waiting with a glory in her eyes.

Hark! The dazzled laverock climbs the golden steep!
Marian is waiting: is Robin Hood asleep?
Round the fairy grass-rings frolic elf and fay,
In Sherwood, in Sherwood, about the break of day.

Oberon, Oberon, rake away the gold,
Rake away the red leaves, roll away the mould,
Rake away the gold leaves, roll away the red,
And wake Will Scarlett from his leafy forest bed.

Friar Tuck and Little John are riding down together
With quarter-staff and drinking-can and grey goose-feather.
The dead are coming back again, the years are rolled away
In Sherwood, in Sherwood, about the break of day.

Softly over Sherwood the south wind blows.
All the heart of England his in every rose
Hears across the greenwood the sunny whisper leap,
Sherwood in the red dawn, is Robin Hood asleep?

Hark, the voice of England wakes him as of old
And, shattering the silence with a cry of brighter gold
Bugles in the greenwood echo from the steep,
Sherwood in the red dawn, is Robin Hood asleep?

Where the deer are gliding down the shadowy glen
All across the glades of fern he calls his merry men—
Doublets of the Lincoln green glancing through the May
In Sherwood, in Sherwood, about the break of day—

Calls them and they answer: from aisles of oak and ash
Rings the Follow! Follow! and the boughs begin to crash,
The ferns begin to flutter and the flowers begin to fly,
And through the crimson dawning the robber band goes by.

Robin! Robin! Robin! All his merry thieves
Answer as the bugle-note shivers through the leaves,
Calling as he used to call, faint and far away,
In Sherwood, in Sherwood, about the break of day.

© by owner. provided at no charge for educational purposes

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I recently found and purchased a 1920 published copy of his book,
titled, COLLECTED POEMS OF ALFRED NOYLES, VOLUME III.
It contains 314 poems he produced. After reading this copy for 
two months I've found his poetry is marvelous and evident of a fine
master poet of great depths and immense insights. A great pleasure
to have read. So many truly wonderful poems!! I definitely recommend
that reading this great poet's offerings is time well spent and also
gives much to the reader, especially so- to any reader that also
composes poetry!
-- RJL... 3-09-2020

Farewell, Youthful Days Of Wading In Crystal Clear Streams

Robert J. Lindley, 3-10-2020
A new Sonnet, ( Composed as Tribute to poet, Alfred Noyes )
see new blog on this amazing poet...