A Book of Nonsense, part 7 by Edward Lear

There was an Old Man of the West,
Who never could get any rest;
So they set him to spin
on his nose and his chin,
Which cured that Old Man of the West.

There was an Old Person of Cheadle
Was put in the stocks by the Beadle
For stealing some pigs,
some coats, and some wigs,
That horrible person of Cheadle.

There was an Old Person of Anerley,
Whose conduct was strange and unmannerly;
He rushed down the Strand
with a Pig in each hand,
But returned in the evening to Anerley.

There was a Young Lady of Wales,
Who caught a large Fish without scales;
When she lifted her hook,
she exclaimed, “Only look!”
That ecstatic Young Lady of Wales.

There was a Young Lady of Welling,
Whose praise all the world was a-telling;
She played on the harp,
and caught several Carp,
That accomplished Young Lady of Welling.

There was an Old Person of Tartary,
Who divided his jugular artery;
But he screeched to his Wife,
and she said, “Oh, my life!
Your death will be felt by all Tartary!”

There was an Old Man of Whitehaven,
Who danced a quadrille with a Raven;
But they said, “It’s absurd
to encourage this bird!”
So they smashed that Old Man of Whitehaven.

There was a Young Lady of Sweden,
Who went by the slow train to Weedon;
When they cried, “Weedon Station!”
she made no observation,
But thought she should go back to Sweden.

There was an Old Person of Chester,
Whom several small children did pester;
They threw some large stones,
which broke most of his bones,
And displeased that Old Person of Chester.

There was an Old Man of the Cape,
Who possessed a large Barbary Ape;
Till the Ape, one dark night,
set the house all alight,
Which burned that Old Man of the Cape.

There was an Old Person of Burton,
Whose answers were rather uncertain;
When they said, “How d’ ye do?”
he replied, “Who are you?”
That distressing Old Person of Burton.

There was an Old Person of Ems
Who casually fell in the Thames;
And when he was found,
they said he was drowned,
That unlucky Old Person of Ems.

There was a Young Girl of Majorca,
Whose Aunt was a very fast walker;
She walked seventy miles,
and leaped fifteen stiles,
Which astonished that Girl of Majorca.

There was a Young Lady of Poole,
Whose soup was excessively cool;
So she put it to boil
by the aid of some oil,
That ingenious Young Lady of Poole.

There was an Old Lady of Prague,
Whose language was horribly vague;
When they said, “Are these caps?”
she answered, “Perhaps!”
That oracular Lady of Prague.

A Book of Nonsense, part 6 by Edward Lear

There was an Old Man who said, “How
Shall I flee from this horrible Cow?
I will sit on this stile,
and continue to smile,
Which may soften the heart of that Cow.”

There was a Young Lady of Troy,
Whom several large flies did annoy;
Some she killed with a thump,
some she drowned at the pump,
And some she took with her to Troy.

There was a Young Lady of Hull,
Who was chased by a virulent Bull;
But she seized on a spade,
and called out, “Who’s afraid?”
Which distracted that virulent Bull.

There was an Old Person of Dutton,
Whose head was as small as a button;
So to make it look big
he purchased a wig,
And rapidly rushed about Dutton.

There was an Old Man who said, “Hush!
I perceive a young bird in this bush!”
When they said, “Is it small?”
he replied, “Not at all;
It is four times as big as the bush!”

There was a Young Lady of Russia,
Who screamed so that no one could hush her;
Her screams were extreme,--
no one heard such a scream
As was screamed by that Lady of Russia.

There was a Young Lady of Tyre,
Who swept the loud chords of a lyre;
At the sound of each sweep
she enraptured the deep,
And enchanted the city of Tyre.

There was an Old Person of Bangor,
Whose face was distorted with anger;
He tore off his boots,
and subsisted on roots,
That borascible Person of Bangor.

There was an Old Man of the East,
Who gave all his children a feast;
But they all ate so much,
and their conduct was such,
That it killed that Old Man of the East.

There was an Old Man of the Coast,
Who placidly sat on a post;
But when it was cold
he relinquished his hold,
And called for some hot buttered toast.

There was an Old Man of Kamschatka,
Who possessed a remarkably fat Cur;
His gait and his waddle
were held as a model
To all the fat dogs in Kamschatka.

There was an Old Person of Gretna,
Who rushed down the crater of Etna;
When they said, “Is it hot?”
he replied, “No, it’s not!”
That mendacious Old Person of Gretna.

There was an Old Man with a beard,
Who sat on a Horse when he reared;
But they said, “Never mind!
you will fall off behind,
You propitious Old Man with a beard!”

There was an Old Man of Berlin,
Whose form was uncommonly thin;
Till he once, by mistake,
was mixed up in a cake,
So they baked that Old Man of Berlin.

A Book of Nonsense, part 5 by Edward Lear

There was an Old Person of Rhodes,
Who strongly objected to toads;
He paid several cousins
to catch them by dozens,
That futile Old Person of Rhodes.

There was an Old Man of the South,
Who had an immoderate mouth;
But in swallowing a dish
that was quite full of Fish,
He was choked, that Old Man of the South.

There was an Old Man of Melrose,
Who walked on the tips of his toes;
But they said, “It ain’t pleasant
to see you at present,
You stupid Old Man of Melrose.”

There was an Old Man of the Dee,
Who was sadly annoyed by a Flea;
When he said, “I will scratch it!”
they gave him a hatchet,
Which grieved that Old Man of the Dee.

There was a Young Lady of Lucca,
Whose lovers completely forsook her;
She ran up a tree,
and said “Fiddle-de-dee!”
Which embarrassed the people of Lucca.

There was an Old Man of Coblenz,
The length of whose legs was immense;
He went with one prance
from Turkey to France,
That surprising Old Man of Coblenz.

There was an Old Man of Bohemia,
Whose daughter was christened Euphemia;
But one day, to his grief,
she married a thief,
Which grieved that Old Man of Bohemia.

There was an Old Man of Corfu,
Who never knew what he should do;
So he rushed up and down,
till the sun made him brown,
That bewildered Old Man of Corfu.

There was an Old Man of Vesuvius,
Who studied the works of Vitruvius;
When the flames burnt his book,
to drinking he took,
That morbid Old Man of Vesuvius.

There was an Old Man of Dundee,
Who frequented the top of a tree;
When disturbed by the Crows,
he abruptly arose,
And exclaimed, “I’ll return to Dundee!”

There was an Old Lady whose folly
Induced her to sit in a holly;
Whereon, by a thorn
her dress being torn,
She quickly became melancholy.

There was an Old Man on some rocks,
Who shut his Wife up in a box:
When she said, “Let me out,”
he exclaimed, “Without doubt
You will pass all your life in that box.”

There was an Old Person of Rheims,
Who was troubled with horrible dreams;
So to keep him awake
they fed him with cake,
Which amused that Old Person of Rheims.

There was an Old Man of Leghorn,
The smallest that ever was born;
But quickly snapt up he
was once by a Puppy,
Who devoured that Old Man of Leghorn.

There was an Old Man in a pew,
Whose waistcoat was spotted with blue;
But he tore it in pieces,
to give to his Nieces,
That cheerful Old Man in a pew.

A Book of Nonsense, part 4 by Edward Lear

There was an Old Person of Philoe,
Whose conduct was scroobious and wily;
He rushed up a Palm
when the weather was calm,
And observed all the ruins of Philoe.

There was an Old Man with a poker,
Who painted his face with red ochre.
When they said, “You ‘re a Guy!”
he made no reply,
But knocked them all down with his poker.

There was an Old Person of Prague,
Who was suddenly seized with the plague;
But they gave him some butter,
which caused him to mutter,
And cured that Old Person of Prague.

There was an Old Man of Peru,
Who watched his wife making a stew;
But once, by mistake,
in a stove she did bake
That unfortunate Man of Peru.

There was an Old Man of the North,
Who fell into a basin of broth;
But a laudable cook
fished him out with a hook,
Which saved that Old Man of the North.

There was an Old Person of Troy,
Whose drink was warm brandy and soy,
Which he took with a spoon,
by the light of the moon,
In sight of the city of Troy.

There was an Old Person of Mold,
Who shrank from sensations of cold;
So he purchased some muffs,
some furs, and some fluffs,
And wrapped himself well from the cold.

There was an Old Person of Tring,
Who embellished his nose with a ring;
He gazed at the moon
every evening in June,
That ecstatic Old Person of Tring.

There was an Old Man of Nepaul,
From his horse had a terrible fall;
But, though split quite in two,
with some very strong glue
They mended that man of Nepaul.

There was an Old Man of the Nile,
Who sharpened his nails with a file,
Till he cut off his thumbs,
and said calmly, “This comes
Of sharpening one’s nails with a file!”

There was an Old Man of th’ Abruzzi,
So blind that he couldn’t his foot see;
When they said, “That’s your toe,”
he replied, “Is it so?”
That doubtful Old Man of th’ Abruzzi.

There was an Old Man of Calcutta,
Who perpetually ate bread and butter;
Till a great bit of muffin,
on which he was stuffing,
Choked that horrid Old Man of Calcutta.

A Book of Nonsense, part 3 by Edward Lear

There was an Old Man of the Isles,
Whose face was pervaded with smiles;
He sang “High dum diddle,”
and played on the fiddle,
That amiable Man of the Isles.

There was an Old Person of Basing,
Whose presence of mind was amazing;
He purchased a steed,
which he rode at full speed,
And escaped from the people of Basing.

There was an Old Man who supposed
That the street door was partially closed;
But some very large Rats
ate his coats and his hats,
While that futile Old Gentleman dozed.

There was an Old Person whose habits
Induced him to feed upon Rabbits;
When he’d eaten eighteen,
he turned perfectly green,
Upon which he relinquished those habits.

There was an Old Man of the West,
Who wore a pale plum-colored vest;
When they said, “Does it fit?”
he replied, “Not a bit!”
That uneasy Old Man of the West.

There was an Old Man of Marseilles,
Whose daughters wore bottle-green veils:
They caught several Fish,
which they put in a dish,
And sent to their Pa at Marseilles.

There was an Old Man of the Wrekin,
Whose shoes made a horrible creaking;
But they said, “Tell us whether
your shoes are of leather,
Or of what, you Old Man of the Wrekin?”

There was a Young Lady whose nose
Was so long that it reached to her toes;
So she hired an Old Lady,
whose conduct was steady,
To carry that wonderful nose.

There was a Young Lady of Norway,
Who casually sat in a doorway;
When the door squeezed her flat,
she exclaimed, “What of that?”
This courageous Young Lady of Norway.

There was an Old Man of Apulia,
Whose conduct was very peculiar;
He fed twenty sons
upon nothing but buns,
That whimsical Man of Apulia.

There was an Old Man of Quebec,--
A beetle ran over his neck;
But he cried, “With a needle
I’ll slay you, O beadle!”
That angry Old Man of Quebec.

There was a Young Lady of Bute,
Who played on a silver-gilt flute;
She played several jigs
to her Uncle’s white Pigs:
That amusing Young Lady of Bute.

A Book of Nonsense, part 2 by Edward Lear

There was an Old Man with a flute,--
A “sarpint” ran into his boot!
But he played day and night,
till the “sarpint” took flight,
And avoided that Man with a flute.

There was a Young Lady of Portugal,
Whose ideas were excessively nautical;
She climbed up a tree
to examine the sea,
But declared she would never leave Portugal.

There was an Old Person of Ischia,
Whose conduct grew friskier and friskier;
He danced hornpipes and jigs,
and ate thousands of figs,
That lively Old Person of Ischia.

There was an Old Man of Vienna,
Who lived upon Tincture of Senna;
When that did not agree,
he took Camomile Tea,
That nasty Old Man of Vienna.

There was an Old Man in a boat,
Who said, “I’m afloat! I’m afloat!”
When they said, “No, you ain’t!”
he was ready to faint,
That unhappy Old Man in a boat.

There was an Old Person of Buda,
Whose conduct grew ruder and ruder,
Till at last with a hammer
they silenced his clamor.
By smashing that Person of Buda.

There was an Old Man of Moldavia,
Who had the most curious behavior;
For while he was able,
he slept on a table,
That funny Old Man of Moldavia.

There was an Old Person of Hurst,
Who drank when he was not athirst;
When they said, “You’ll grow fatter!”
he answered “What matter?”
That globular Person of Hurst.

There was an Old Man of Madras,
Who rode on a cream-colored Ass;
But the length of its ears
so promoted his fears,
That it killed that Old Man of Madras.

There was an Old Person of Dover,
Who rushed through a field of blue clover;
But some very large Bees
stung his nose and his knees,
So he very soon went back to Dover.

There was an Old Person of Leeds,
Whose head was infested with beads;
She sat on a stool
and ate gooseberry-fool,
Which agreed with that Person of Leeds.

There was an Old Person of Cadiz,
Who was always polite to all ladies;
But in handing his daughter,
he fell into the water,
Which drowned that Old Person of Cadiz.

A Book of Nonsense, part 1 by Edward Lear

There was an Old Derry down Derry,
who loved to see little folks merry;
So he made them a Book,
and with laughter they shook
At the fun of that Derry down Derry.

There was an Old Man with a nose,
Who said, “If you choose to suppose
That my nose is too long,
you are certainly wrong!”
That remarkable Man with a nose.

There was a Young Person of Smyrna,
Whose Grandmother threatened to burn her;
But she seized on the Cat,
and said, “Granny, burn that!
You incongruous Old Woman of Smyrna!”

There was an Old Man on a hill,
Who seldom, if ever, stood still;
He ran up and down
in his Grandmother’s gown,
Which adorned that Old Man on a hill.

There was an Old Person of Chili,
Whose conduct was painful and silly;
He sate on the stairs,
eating apples and pears,
That imprudent Old Person of Chili.

There was an Old Man with a gong,
Who bumped at it all the day long;
But they called out, “Oh, law!
you’re a horrid old bore!”
So they smashed that Old Man with a gong.

There was an Old Man of Kilkenny,
Who never had more than a penny;
He spent all that money
in onions and honey,
That wayward Old Man of Kilkenny.

There was an Old Man of Columbia,
Who was thirsty, and called out for some beer;
But they brought it quite hot,
in a small copper pot,
Which disgusted that man of Columbia.

There was an Old Man in a tree,
Who was horribly bored by a Bee;
When they said, “Does it buzz?”
he replied, “Yes, it does!
It’s a regular brute of a Bee.”

There was an Old Lady of Chertsey,
Who made a remarkable curtsey;
She twirled round and round,
till she sank underground,
Which distressed all the people of Chertsey.

There was a Young Lady whose chin
Resembled the point of a pin;
So she had it made sharp,
and purchased a harp,
And played several tunes with her chin.

Music, when soft voices die by Percy Bysshe Shelley

Music, when soft voices die,
Vibrates in the memory;
Odours, when sweet violets sicken,
Live within the sense they quicken;

Rose leaves, when the rose is dead,
Are heap'd for the belovèd's bed:
And so thy thoughts, when thou art gone,
Love itself shall slumber on.

Ode on Intimations of Immortality by William Wordsworth

There was a time when meadow, grove, and stream,
The earth, and every common sight,
To me did seem
Apparell'd in celestial light,
The glory and the freshness of a dream.
It is not now as it hath been of yore;—
Turn wheresoe'er I may,
By night or day,
The things which I have seen I now can see no more.

The rainbow comes and goes,
And lovely is the rose;
The moon doth with delight
Look round her when the heavens are bare;
Waters on a starry night
Are beautiful and fair;
The sunshine is a glorious birth;
But yet I know, where'er I go,
That there hath pass'd away a glory from the earth.

Now, while the birds thus sing a joyous song,
And while the young lambs bound
As to the tabor's sound,
To me alone there came a thought of grief:
A timely utterance gave that thought relief,
And I again am strong.
The cataracts blow their trumpets from the steep;—
No more shall grief of mine the season wrong:
I hear the echoes through the mountains throng,
The winds come to me from the fields of sleep,
And all the earth is gay;
Land and sea
Give themselves up to jollity,
And with the heart of May
Doth every beast keep holiday;—
Thou child of joy,
Shout round me; let me hear thy shouts, thou happy Shepherd boy!

Ye blessed creatures, I have heard the call
Ye to each other make; I see
The heavens laugh with you in your jubilee;
My heart is at your festival,
My head hath its coronal,
The fullness of your bliss, I feel—I feel it all.
O evil day! if I were sullen
While Earth herself is adorning
This sweet May morning;
And the children are pulling
On every side,
In a thousand valleys far and wide,
Fresh flowers; while the sun shines warm,
And the babe leaps up on his mother's arm:—
I hear, I hear, with joy I hear!
—But there's a tree, of many, one,
A single field which I have look'd upon,
Both of them speak of something that is gone:
The pansy at my feet
Doth the same tale repeat:
Whither is fled the visionary gleam?
Where is it now, the glory and the dream?

Our birth is but a sleep and a forgetting;
The Soul that rises with us, our life's Star,
Hath had elsewhere its setting
And cometh from afar;
Not in entire forgetfulness,
And not in utter nakedness,
But trailing clouds of glory do we come
From God, who is our home:
Heaven lies about us in our infancy!
Shades of the prison-house begin to close
Upon the growing Boy,
But he beholds the light, and whence it flows,
He sees it in his joy;
The Youth, who daily farther from the east
Must travel, still is Nature's priest,
And by the vision splendid
Is on his way attended;
At length the Man perceives it die away,
And fade into the light of common day.

Earth fills her lap with pleasures of her own;
Yearnings she hath in her own natural kind,
And, even with something of a mother's mind
And no unworthy aim,
The homely nurse doth all she can
To make her foster-child, her inmate, Man,
Forget the glories he hath known,
And that imperial palace whence he came.

Behold the Child among his new-born blisses,
A six years' darling of a pigmy size!
See, where 'mid work of his own hand he lies,
Fretted by sallies of his mother's kisses,
With light upon him from his father's eyes!
See, at his feet, some little plan or chart,
Some fragment from his dream of human life,
Shaped by himself with newly-learnèd art;
A wedding or a festival,
A mourning or a funeral;
And this hath now his heart,
And unto this he frames his song:
Then will he fit his tongue
To dialogues of business, love, or strife;
But it will not be long
Ere this be thrown aside,
And with new joy and pride
The little actor cons another part;
Filling from time to time his "humorous stage"
With all the Persons, down to palsied Age,
That Life brings with her in her equipage;
As if his whole vocation
Were endless imitation.

Thou, whose exterior semblance doth belie
Thy soul's immensity;
Thou best philosopher, who yet dost keep
Thy heritage, thou eye among the blind,
That, deaf and silent, read'st the eternal deep,
Haunted for ever by the eternal Mind,—
Mighty Prophet! Seer blest!
On whom those truths do rest
Which we are toiling all our lives to find;
Thou, over whom thy immortality
Broods like the day, a master o'er a slave,
A Presence which is not to be put by;
Thou little Child, yet glorious in the might
Of heaven-born freedom on thy being's height,
Why with such earnest pains dost thou provoke
The years to bring the inevitable yoke,
Thus blindly with thy blessedness at strife?
Full soon thy soul shall have her earthly freight,
And custom lie upon thee with a weight
Heavy as frost, and deep almost as life!

O joy! that in our embers
Is something that doth live;
That Nature yet remembers
What was so fugitive!
The thought of our past years in me doth breed
Perpetual benediction: not indeed
For that which is most worthy to be blest,
Delight and liberty, the simple creed
Of childhood, whether busy or at rest,
With new-fledged hope still fluttering in his breast:—
Not for these I raise
The song of thanks and praise;
But for those obstinate questionings
Of sense and outward things,
Fallings from us, vanishings;
Blank misgivings of a creature
Moving about in worlds not realized,
High instincts, before which our mortal nature
Did tremble like a guilty thing surprised:
But for those first affections,
Those shadowy recollections,
Which, be they what they may,
Are yet the fountain-light of all our day,
Are yet a master-light of all our seeing;
Uphold us, cherish, and have power to make
Our noisy years seem moments in the being
Of the eternal Silence: truths that wake,
To perish never;
Which neither listlessness, nor mad endeavour,
Nor man nor boy,
Nor all that is at enmity with joy,
Can utterly abolish or destroy!
Hence, in a season of calm weather,
Though inland far we be,
Our souls have sight of that immortal sea
Which brought us hither;
Can in a moment travel thither—
And see the children sport upon the shore,
And hear the mighty waters rolling evermore.

Then sing, ye birds, sing, sing a joyous song!
And let the young lambs bound
As to the tabor's sound!
We, in thought, will join your throng,
Ye that pipe and ye that play,
Ye that through your hearts to-day
Feel the gladness of the May!
What though the radiance which was once so bright
Be now for ever taken from my sight,
Though nothing can bring back the hour
Of splendour in the grass, of glory in the flower;
We will grieve not, rather find
Strength in what remains behind;
In the primal sympathy,
Which having been must ever be;
In the soothing thoughts that spring
Out of human suffering;
In the faith that looks through death;
In years that bring the philosophic mind.

And, O ye Fountains, Meadows, Hills, and Groves,
Forbode not any severing of our loves!
Yet in my heart of hearts I feel your might;
I only have relinquish'd one delight
To live beneath your more habitual sway:
I love the brooks which down their channels fret
Even more than when I tripp'd lightly as they;
The innocent brightness of a new-born day
Is lovely yet;
The clouds that gather round the setting sun
Do take a sober colouring from an eye
That hath kept watch o'er man's mortality;
Another race hath been, and other palms are won.
Thanks to the human heart by which we live,
Thanks to its tenderness, its joys and fears,
To me the meanest flower that blows can give
Thoughts that do often lie too deep for tears.

My heart leaps up when I behold by William Wordsworth

My heart leaps up when I behold
A rainbow in the sky:
So was it when my life began,
So is it now I am a man,
So be it when I shall grow old
Or let me die!
The child is father of the man:
And I could wish my days to be
Bound each to each by natural piety.

A Lament by Percy Bysshe Shelley

O World! O Life! O Time!
On whose last steps I climb,
Trembling at that where I had stood before;
When will return the glory of your prime?
No more—oh, never more!
Out of the day and night
A joy has taken flight:
Fresh spring, and summer, and winter hoar
Move my faint heart with grief, but with delight
No more—oh, never more!

The Human Seasons by John Keats

Four Seasons fill the measure of the year;
There are four seasons in the mind of man:—
He has his lusty Spring, when fancy clear
Takes in all beauty with an easy span:

He has his Summer, when luxuriously
Spring's honey'd cud of youthful thought he loves
To ruminate, and by such dreaming high
Is nearest unto heaven: quiet coves

His soul has in its Autumn, when his wings
He furleth close; contented so to look
On mists in idleness—to let fair things
Pass by unheeded as a threshold brook:

He has his Winter too of pale misfeature,
Or else he would forego his mortal nature.

The River of Life by Thomas Campbell

The more we live, more brief appear
Our life's succeeding stages;
A day to childhood seems a year,
And years like passing ages.

The gladsome current of our youth,
Ere passion yet disorders,
Steals lingering like a river smooth
Along its grassy borders.

But as the careworn cheek grows wan,
And sorrow's shafts fly thicker,
Ye stars, that measure life to man,
Why seem your courses quicker?

When joys have lost their bloom and breath,
And life itself is vapid,
Why, as we reach the Falls of Death
Feel we its tide more rapid?

It may be strange—yet who would change
Time's course to slower speeding,
When one by one our friends have gone,
And left our bosoms bleeding?

Heaven gives our years of fading strength
Indemnifying fleetness;
And those of youth, a seeming length,
Proportion'd to their sweetness.

The Fountain by William Wordsworth

We talk'd with open heart, and tongue
Affectionate and true—
A pair of friends, though I was young,
And Matthew seventy-two.

We lay beneath a spreading oak,
Beside a mossy seat;
And from the turf a fountain broke
And gurgled at our feet.

"Now, Matthew," said I, "let us match
This water's pleasant tune
With some old border-song, or catch
That suits a summer's noon;

"Or of the church-clock and the chimes
Sing here beneath the shade
That half-mad thing of witty rhymes
Which you last April made!"

In silence Matthew lay, and eyed
The spring beneath the tree;
And thus the dear old man replied,
The gray-hair'd man of glee:

"No check, no stay this streamlet fears,
How merrily it goes!
'Twill murmur on a thousand years,
And flow as now it flows.

"And here, on this delightful day,
I cannot choose but think
How oft, a vigorous man, I lay
Beside this fountain's brink.

"My eyes are dim with childish tears,
My heart is idly stirr'd,
For the same sound is in my ears
Which in those days I heard.

"Thus fares it still in our decay:
And yet the wiser mind
Mourns less for what age takes away,
Than what it leaves behind.

"The blackbird amid leafy trees,
The lark above the hill,
Let loose their carols when they please,
Are quiet when they will.

"With Nature never do they wage
A foolish strife; they see
A happy youth, and their old age
Is beautiful and free.

"But we are press'd by heavy laws;
And often, glad no more,
We wear a face of joy, because
We have been glad of yore.

"If there be one who need bemoan
His kindred laid in earth,
The household hearts that were his own,—
It is the man of mirth.

"My days, my friend, are almost gone,
My life has been approved,
And many love me; but by none
Am I enough beloved."

"Now both himself and me he wrongs,
The man who thus complains!
I live and sing my idle songs
Upon these happy plains:

"And, Matthew, for thy children dead,
I'll be a son to thee!"
At this he grasp'd my hand and said,
"Alas, that cannot be!"

We rose up from the fountain-side,
And down the smooth descent
Of the green sheep-track did we glide,
And through the wood we went;

And ere we came to Leonard's Rock
He sang those witty rhymes
About the crazy old church-clock,
And the bewilder'd chimes.

The Two April Mornings by William Wordsworth

We walk'd along, while bright and red
Uprose the morning sun;
And Matthew stopp'd, he look'd, and said,
"The will of God be done!"

A village schoolmaster was he,
With hair of glittering gray;
As blithe a man as you could see
On a spring holiday.

And on that morning, through the grass
And by the steaming rills
We travell'd merrily, to pass
A day among the hills.

"Our work," said I, "was well begun;
Then, from thy breast what thought,
Beneath so beautiful a sun,
So sad a sigh has brought?"

A second time did Matthew stop;
And fixing still his eye
Upon the eastern mountain-top,
To me he made reply:

"Yon cloud with that long purple cleft
Brings fresh into my mind
A day like this, which I have left
Full thirty years behind.

"And just above yon slope of corn
Such colours, and no other,
Were in the sky that April morn,
Of this the very brother.

"With rod and line I sued the sport
Which that sweet season gave,
And coming to the church, stopp'd short
Beside my daughter's grave.

"Nine summers had she scarcely seen,
The pride of all the vale;
And then she sang,—she would have been
A very nightingale.

"Six feet in earth my Emma lay;
And yet I loved her more—
For so it seem'd—than till that day
I e'er had loved before.

"And turning from her grave, I met,
Beside the churchyard yew,
A blooming girl, whose hair was wet
With points of morning dew.

"A basket on her head she bare;
Her brow was smooth and white:
To see a child so very fair,
It was a pure delight!

"No fountain from its rocky cave
E'er tripp'd with foot so free;
She seem'd as happy as a wave
That dances on the sea.

"There came from me a sigh of pain,
Which I could ill confine;
I look'd at her, and look'd again:
And did not wish her mine!"

Matthew is in his grave, yet now
Methinks I see him stand
As at that moment, with a bough
Of wilding in his hand.

Youth and Age by Samuel Taylor Coleridge

Verse, a breeze 'mid blossoms straying,
Where Hope clung feeding, like a bee—
Both were mine! Life went a-Maying
With Nature, Hope, and Poesy,
When I was young!
When I was young?—Ah, woeful when!
Ah, for the change 'twixt Now and Then!
This breathing house not built with hands,
This body that does me grievous wrong,
O'er aery cliffs and glittering sands
How lightly then it flash'd along:
Like those trim skiffs, unknown of yore,
On winding lakes and rivers wide,
That ask no aid of sail or oar,
That fear no spite of wind or tide!
Nought cared this body for wind or weather
When Youth and I lived in't together.

Flowers are lovely; Love is flower-like;
Friendship is a sheltering tree;
Oh the joys that came down shower-like,
Of Friendship, Love, and Liberty,
Ere I was old!
Ere I was old?—Ah, woeful ere,
Which tells me, Youth's no longer here!
O Youth! for years so many and sweet,
'Tis known that thou and I were one,
I'll think it but a fond conceit—
It cannot be, that thou art gone!
Thy vesper-bell hath not yet toll'd—
And thou wert aye a masker bold!
What strange disguise hast now put on
To make-believe that thou art gone?
I see these locks in silvery slips,
This drooping gait, this alter'd size;
But Springtide blossoms on thy lips,
And tears take sunshine from thine eyes!
Life is but thought: so think I will
That Youth and I are house-mates still.

Dewdrops are the gems of morning,
But the tears of mournful eve!
Where no hope is, life's a warning
That only serves to make us grieve
When we are old:—
That only serves to make us grieve
With oft and tedious taking-leave,
Like some poor nigh-related guest
That may not rudely be dismiss'd,
Yet hath out-stay'd his welcome while,
And tells the jest without the smile.

Within King's College Chapel, Cambridge by William Wordsworth

Tax not the royal Saint with vain expense,
With ill-match'd aims the Architect who plann'd
(Albeit labouring for a scanty band
Of white-robed scholars only) this immense
And glorious work of fine intelligence!—
Give all thou canst; high Heaven rejects the lore
Of nicely-calculated less or more:—
So deem'd the man who fashion'd for the sense
These lofty pillars, spread that branching roof
Self-poised, and scoop'd into ten thousand cells
Where light and shade repose, where music dwells
Lingering—and wandering on as loth to die;
Like thoughts whose very sweetness yieldeth proof
That they were born for immortality.

The world is too much with us by William Wordsworth

The World is too much with us; late and soon,
Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers:
Little we see in Nature that is ours;
We have given our hearts away, a sordid boon!
This Sea that bares her bosom to the moon,
The winds that will be howling at all hours
And are up-gather'd now like sleeping flowers,
For this, for everything, we are out of tune;
It moves us not.—Great God! I'd rather be
A pagan suckled in a creed outworn,—
So might I, standing on this pleasant lea,
Have glimpses that would make me less forlorn;
Have sight of Proteus rising from the sea;
Or hear old Triton blow his wreathèd horn.

The Poet's Dream by Percy Bysshe Shelley

On a Poet's lips I slept,
Dreaming like a love-adept
In the sound his breathing kept;
Nor seeks nor finds he mortal blisses,
But feeds on the aerial kisses
Of shapes that haunt Thought's wildernesses.
He will watch from dawn to gloom
The lake-reflected sun illume
The yellow bees in the ivy-bloom,
Nor heed nor see what things they be—
But from these create he can
Forms more real than living man,
Nurslings of Immortality!

Nature and the Poet by William Wordsworth

Suggested by a Picture of Peel Castle in a Storm, painted by Sir George Beaumont

I was thy neighbour once, thou rugged Pile!
Four summer weeks I dwelt in sight of thee:
I saw thee every day; and all the while
Thy form was sleeping on a glassy sea.

So pure the sky, so quiet was the air!
So like, so very like, was day to day!
Whene'er I look'd, thy image still was there;
It trembled, but it never pass'd away.

How perfect was the calm! It seem'd no sleep,
No mood, which season takes away, or brings;
I could have fancied that the mighty Deep
Was even the gentlest of all gentle things.

Ah! then, if mine had been the painter's hand
To express what then I saw, and add the gleam,
The light that never was on sea or land,
The consecration, and the Poet's dream,—

I would have planted thee, thou hoary pile,
Amid a world how different from this!
Beside a sea that could not cease to smile;
On tranquil land, beneath a sky of bliss.

A picture had it been of lasting ease,
Elysian quiet, without toil or strife;
No motion but the moving tide—a breeze—
Or merely silent Nature's breathing life.

Such, in the fond illusion of my heart,
Such picture would I at that time have made;
And seen the soul of truth in every part,
A steadfast peace that might not be betray'd.

So once it would have been—'tis so no more;
I have submitted to a new control:
A power is gone, which nothing can restore;
A deep distress hath humanized my soul.

Not for a moment could I now behold
A smiling sea, and be what I have been:
The feeling of my loss will ne'er be old;
This, which I know, I speak with mind serene.

Then, Beaumont, Friend! who would have been the friend
If he had lived, of him whom I deplore,
This work of thine I blame not, but commend;
This sea in anger, and that dismal shore.

Oh 'tis a passionate work!—yet wise and well,
Well chosen is the spirit that is here:
That hulk which labours in the deadly swell,
This rueful sky, this pageantry of fear;

And this huge castle, standing here sublime,
I love to see the look with which it braves—
Cased in the unfeeling armour of old time—
The lightning, the fierce wind, and trampling waves.

—Farewell, farewell the heart that lives alone,
Housed in a dream, at distance from the kind!
Such happiness, wherever it be known,
Is to be pitied, for 'tis surely blind.

But welcome fortitude, and patient cheer,
And frequent sights of what is to be borne!
Such sights, or worse, as are before me here:—
Not without hope we suffer and we mourn.

Ode to the West Wind by Percy Bysshe Shelley

O wild West Wind, thou breath of Autumn's being—
Thou from whose unseen presence the leaves dead
Are driven, like ghosts from an enchanter fleeing,
Yellow, and black, and pale, and hectic red,
Pestilence-stricken multitudes!—O thou
Who chariotest to their dark wintry bed
The wingèd seeds, where they lie cold and low,
Each like a corpse within its grave, until
Thine azure sister of the Spring shall blow
Her clarion o'er the dreaming earth, and fill
(Driving sweet buds like flocks to feed in air)
With living hues and odours plain and hill—
Wild Spirit, which art moving everywhere—
Destroyer and Preserver—hear, O hear!

Thou on whose stream, 'mid the steep sky's commotion,
Loose clouds like earth's decaying leaves are shed,
Shook from the tangled boughs of Heaven and Ocean,
Angels of rain and lightning! they are spread
On the blue surface of thine airy surge,
Like the bright hair uplifted from the head
Of some fierce Mænad, ev'n from the dim verge
Of the horizon to the zenith's height—
The locks of the approaching storm. Thou dirge
Of the dying year, to which this closing night
Will be the dome of a vast sepulchre,
Vaulted with all thy congregated might
Of vapours, from whose solid atmosphere
Black rain, and fire, and hail will burst:—O hear!

Thou who didst waken from his summer-dreams
The blue Mediterranean, where he lay,
Lull'd by the coil of his crystalline streams,
Beside a pumice isle in Baiæ's bay,
And saw in sleep old palaces and towers
Quivering within the wave's intenser day,
All overgrown with azure moss, and flowers
So sweet, the sense faints picturing them! Thou
For whose path the Atlantic's level powers
Cleave themselves into chasms, while far below
The sea-blooms and the oozy woods which wear
The sapless foliage of the ocean, know
Thy voice, and suddenly grow gray with fear
And tremble and despoil themselves:—O hear!

If I were a dead leaf thou mightest bear;
If I were a swift cloud to fly with thee;
A wave to pant beneath thy power, and share
The impulse of thy strength, only less free
Than thou, O uncontrollable!—if even
I were as in my boyhood, and could be
The comrade of thy wanderings over heaven,
As then, when to outstrip thy skiey speed
Scarce seem'd a vision,—I would ne'er have striven
As thus with thee in prayer in my sore need.
O lift me as a wave, a leaf, a cloud!
I fall upon the thorns of life! I bleed!
A heavy weight of hours has chain'd and bow'd
One too like thee—tameless, and swift, and proud.

Make me thy lyre, ev'n as the forest is:
What if my leaves are falling like its own!
The tumult of thy mighty harmonies
Will take from both a deep autumnal tone,
Sweet though in sadness. Be thou, Spirit fierce,
My spirit! be thou me, impetuous one!
Drive my dead thoughts over the universe,
Like wither'd leaves, to quicken a new birth;
And, by the incantation of this verse,
Scatter, as from an unextinguish'd hearth
Ashes and sparks, my words among mankind!
Be through my lips to unawaken'd earth
The trumpet of a prophecy! O Wind,
If Winter comes, can Spring be far behind?