my favorite poems and such

7/31/2019 My Favorite Poems and Such

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Do not go gentle into that good night

by Dylan Thomas

Do not go gentle into that good night,

Old age should burn and rave at close of day;

Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Though wise men at their end know dark is right,

Because their words had forked no lightning they

Do not go gentle into that good night.

Good men, the last wave by, crying how bright

Their frail deeds might have danced in a green bay,


Wild men who caught and sang the sun in flight,

And learn, too late, they grieved it on its way,


Grave men, near death, who see with blinding sight

Blind eyes could blaze like meteors and be gay,


And you, my father, there on the sad height,

Curse, bless, me now with your fierce tears, I pray.




2/33

A Soft Breeze in a Sultry Place By R. C Trench

'That doubt and trouble, fear and pain,

And anguish, all, are shadows vain,

That death itself shall not remain;

That weary deserts we may tread,

A dreary labyrinth may thread,

Thro' dark ways underground be led;

Yet, if we will one Guide obey,

The dreariest path, the darkest way

Shall issue out in heavenly day;

And we, on divers shores now cast,

Shall meet, our perilous voyage past,

All in our Father's house at last!'


3/33

The Bridge Builder

By Will Allen Dromgoole

An old man, going a lone highway,Came, at the evening, cold and gray,

To a chasm, vast, and deep, and wide,Through which was flowing a sullen tide.

The old man crossed in the twilight dim;

The sullen stream had no fear for him;

But he turned, when safe on the other side,And built a bridge to span the tide.

"Old man," said a fellow pilgrim, near,

"You are wasting strength with building here;Your journey will end with the ending day;

You never again will pass this way;You've crossed the chasm, deep and wide-Why build you this bridge at the evening tide?"

The builder lifted his old gray head:"Good friend, in the path I have come," he said,

"There followeth after me today,

A youth, whose feet must pass this way.

This chasm, that has been naught to me,

To that fair-haired youth may a pitfall be.

He, too, must cross in the twilight dim;Good friend, I am building this bridge for him."


4/33

Grandma Pikes Nose Poem

Inside everybodies nose there lives a sharptoothed snail.

So if you stick your finger in he may bite off you nail. \

Stick it farther up inside he may bite your ring off.

Stick it all the way up and he may bite the whole darn thing off.


5/33

Brotherly Love; or, The Site of King Solomons's Temple.

There is a sweet traditionary tale.

(Dear to each brother of the Mystic Tie)

Which, though recording but a simple deed,

A simple deed

and yet how full of love

I would that men might hear and take to heart.

That tale's clear echo, like some lute that thril"Mid lordlier instruments, hath floated down

Borne, like a perfume, on the breath of Time,

From the dim age of Solomon the King.And even now its music is not dead.

Nor can it die, so long as human hearts

Feel the quick pulse of brotherhood leap high.

The harvest moon was shining on the grainThat waved all golden in the fields around

The stately city of Jerusalem.Therea few acres all the wealth they owned

Two brothers dwelt together, most unlike

In outward form and aspect, but the same

In deep unfailing tenderness of soul.Stalwart and strong, one brother drove the plough.

Or plied the sickle with untiring arm,

The while his fragile comrade seemed to droopBeneath the heat and burden of the day

As one not fitted for the toils of life.

Well knowing this, the elder brother roseAt dead of night and woke his sleeping wife

And said: "Dear heart, my brother is not strong:

111 hath he borne the burden of the day.Reaped the full grain, and bound the yellow sheaves.

I will arise and while my brother sleeps

Will of my shocks take here and there a sheafAt randomthat he may not note the loss-

And add the grain, thus pilfered, to his store;

And God well knoweth that we shall not miss

The sheaves devoted to a brother's need."

So, the man rose up in the dead of night

And, as his great heart prompted, so he did.

Now, while the younger pondered on his bed,

l^nwitting of his brother's gracious deed.


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Kind thoughts, like Angels, visited his soul

And thus lie spake, communing with himself," Scant is my harvest-but I am alone,

And thus it haps my harvest is not scant,

Nor have I need to lay up store on earth,For death treads closely on the heels of life!

Seeing that these things are so, let me do

What good I may, before I travel henceAnd be no more. My brother has a wife

And babes to work forand he is not rich

From sunrise unto sunset though he toils.I will arise and while my brother sleeps,

Will of my shocks take here and there a sheaf,

And add the grain, thus pilfered, to his store;

For 'tis not fitting that my share should be

Equal to his, who hath more need than I."

So he, too, rose up in the dead of night.And, as his great heart prompted, so he did.

But all the time he wrought that loving deed,

He trod the field with feather-footed care.And paused at times, and listenedwhile the sheaves

Shook in his arms and every grain that dropped

Left his face pallid as the moon's white ray.So, like a man with guilt upon his soul.

Full of vain fears he wrought his task, and then

Stole, like a shadow, to his lonely bed.

And slept the sleep that cometh to the good.And thus these two, moved by the self-same love,

Each on the other nightly did bestow

The kindly boon, much wondering that his shocksDid show no loss, though robbed of many sheaves.

At length one nightwhile tenderly the MoonLooked down from Heav'n on their unselfish love

The brothers met; the arms of both were filled

With golden sheaves and then they understoodThe riddle that they could not read before.

The simple tale (for, to the neighbours round

Each brother fondly told his brother's deed),Soon through the garrulous streets was noised abroad

Until 'twas whispered in the Royal Court


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And reached the ears of Solomon the King.

Its pathos stole, like music, to his heartAnd stirred the fountain of delicious tears

And thus he spake: "The ground whereon that deed

Was wrought, henceforth is consecrated earth ;

For, surely, it is sanctified by love.The love that loveth to do good by stealth.

I, therefore, leagued with Hiram, King of Tyre.

Who hews me cedar-trees on LebanonAnd aided also by the Widow's Son,

Cunning to work in silver and in gold,

Will on that field erect the House of GodExceedingly magnifical and high

Because I ween that nowhere in the world

A site more holy shall I ever find."

So it was done according to his word :And God's own House was builded on the spot

Where those two brothers in the moonlight metEach with the golden sheaves within his arms.


8/33

Ocean's ChildrenOld Mother Ocean moaned and called,

"Where are my children all?"And from far and near the wide world o'er

They answered their mother's call.

I am a drop of pearly dewDecking the flowers at night;

But a sudden sunbeam changes meTo a flashing diamond bright.

I am a shower of summer rain,And within my drops I hold

An arching rainbow gloriousWith sapphire, ruby, and gold.

And we are the snow and the icy hail;By a law that the North Wind knows

He calls us to march in crystal ranksWhenever his trumpet blows.

I am a spring like a mossy cupWhere the wild deer come to drink;

And I mirror the sky and feed the flowers

That blossom upon my brink.

And I am a rivulet leaping downFrom my home on the green hillside

In a bright cascade with a shower of sprayLike a veil for a fairy bride.

And I am a river broad and strong;A highway to the sea

I make for men, and they love me well,

For I serve them faithfully.

And we all are Ocean's children.'T was the sun that lured us away.

We may wander far; she may wait us long,But we 'll surely come home some day.


9/33

The Sensitive Plant

PART 1.

A Sensitive Plant in a garden grew,

And the young winds fed it with silver dew,

And it opened its fan-like leaves to the light.

And closed them beneath the kisses of Night.

And the Spring arose on the garden fair,

Like the Spirit of Love felt everywhere;

And each flower and herb on Earth's dark breast

Rose from the dreams of its wintry rest.

But none ever trembled and panted with bliss

In the garden, the field, or the wilderness,

Like a doe in the noontide with love's sweet want,

As the companionless Sensitive Plant.

The snowdrop, and then the violet,

Arose from the ground with warm rain wet,

And their breath was mixed with fresh odour, sent

From the turf, like the voice and the instrument.

Then the pied wind-flowers and the tulip tall,

And narcissi, the fairest among them all,

Who gaze on their eyes in the stream's recess,

Till they die of their own dear loveliness;

And the Naiad-like lily of the vale,

Whom youth makes so fair and passion so pale

That the light of its tremulous bells is seen

Through their pavilions of tender green;

And the hyacinth purple, and white, and blue,

Which flung from its bells a sweet peal anew

Of music so delicate, soft, and intense,

It was felt like an odour within the sense;

And the rose like a nymph to the bath addressed,

Which unveiled the depth of her glowing breast,


10/33

Till, fold after fold, to the fainting air

The soul of her beauty and love lay bare:

And the wand-like lily, which lifted up,

As a Maenad, its moonlight-coloured cup,

Till the fiery star, which is its eye,

Gazed through clear dew on the tender sky;

And the jessamine faint, and the sweet tuberose,

The sweetest flower for scent that blows;

And all rare blossoms from every clime

Grew in that garden in perfect prime.

And on the stream whose inconstant bosom

Was pranked, under boughs of embowering blossom,

With golden and green light, slanting through

Their heaven of many a tangled hue,

Broad water-lilies lay tremulously,

And starry river-buds glimmered by,

And around them the soft stream did glide and dance

With a motion of sweet sound and radiance.

And the sinuous paths of lawn and of moss,

Which led through the garden along and across,

Some open at once to the sun and the breeze,

Some lost among bowers of blossoming trees,

Were all paved with daisies and delicate bells

As fair as the fabulous asphodels,

And flow'rets which, drooping as day drooped too,

Fell into pavilions, white, purple, and blue,

To roof the glow-worm from the evening dew.

And from this undefiled Paradise

The flowers (as an infant's awakening eyes

Smile on its mother, whose singing sweet

Can first lull, and at last must awaken it),

When Heaven's blithe winds had unfolded them,

As mine-lamps enkindle a hidden gem,

Shone smiling to Heaven, and every one


11/33

Shared joy in the light of the gentle sun;

For each one was interpenetrated

With the light and the odour its neighbour shed,

Like young lovers whom youth and love make dear

Wrapped and filled by their mutual atmosphere.

But the Sensitive Plant which could give small fruit

Of the love which it felt from the leaf to the root,

Received more than all, it loved more than ever,

Where none wanted but it, could belong to the giver,-

-

For the Sensitive Plant has no bright flower;

Radiance and odour are not its dower;

It loves, even like Love, its deep heart is full,

It desires what it has not, the Beautiful!

The light winds which from unsustaining wings

Shed the music of many murmurings;

The beams which dart from many a star

Of the flowers whose hues they bear afar;

The plumed insects swift and free,

Like golden boats on a sunny sea,

Laden with light and odour, which pass

Over the gleam of the living grass;

The unseen clouds of the dew, which lie

Like fire in the flowers till the sun rides high,

Then wander like spirits among the spheres,

Each cloud faint with the fragrance it bears;

The quivering vapours of dim noontide,

Which like a sea o'er the warm earth glide,

In which every sound, and odour, and beam,

Move, as reeds in a single stream;

Each and all like ministering angels were

For the Sensitive Plant sweet joy to bear,

Whilst the lagging hours of the day went by

Like windless clouds o'er a tender sky.


12/33

And when evening descended from Heaven above,

And the Earth was all rest, and the air was all love,

And delight, though less bright, was far more deep,

And the day's veil fell from the world of sleep,

And the beasts, and the birds, and the insects were

drowned

In an ocean of dreams without a sound;

Whose waves never mark, though they ever impress

The light sand which paves it, consciousness;

(Only overhead the sweet nightingale

Ever sang more sweet as the day might fail,

And snatches of its Elysian chant

Were mixed with the dreams of the Sensitive Plant);-

-

The Sensitive Plant was the earliest

Upgathered into the bosom of rest;

A sweet child weary of its delight,

The feeblest and yet the favourite,

Cradled within the embrace of Night.

PART 2.

There was a Power in this sweet place,

An Eve in this Eden; a ruling Grace

Which to the flowers, did they waken or dream,

Was as God is to the starry scheme.

A Lady, the wonder of her kind,

Whose form was upborne by a lovely mind

Which, dilating, had moulded her mien and motion

Like a sea-flower unfolded beneath the ocean,

Tended the garden from morn to even:

And the meteors of that sublunar Heaven,

Like the lamps of the air when Night walks forth,

Laughed round her footsteps up from the Earth!

She had no companion of mortal race,

But her tremulous breath and her flushing face


13/33

Told, whilst the morn kissed the sleep from her eyes,

That her dreams were less slumber than Paradise:

As if some bright Spirit for her sweet sake

Had deserted Heaven while the stars were awake,

As if yet around her he lingering were,

Though the veil of daylight concealed him from her.

Her step seemed to pity the grass it pressed;

You might hear by the heaving of her breast,

That the coming and going of the wind

Brought pleasure there and left passion behind.

And wherever her aery footstep trod,

Her trailing hair from the grassy sod

Erased its light vestige, with shadowy sweep,

Like a sunny storm o'er the dark green deep.

I doubt not the flowers of that garden sweet

Rejoiced in the sound of her gentle feet;

I doubt not they felt the spirit that came

From her glowing fingers through all their frame.

She sprinkled bright water from the stream

On those that were faint with the sunny beam;

And out of the cups of the heavy flowers

She emptied the rain of the thunder-showers.

She lifted their heads with her tender hands,

And sustained them with rods and osier-bands;

If the flowers had been her own infants, she

Could never have nursed them more tenderly.

And all killing insects and gnawing worms,

And things of obscene and unlovely forms,

She bore, in a basket of Indian woof,

Into the rough woods far aloof,--

In a basket, of grasses and wild-flowers full,

The freshest her gentle hands could pull

For the poor banished insects, whose intent,

Although they did ill, was innocent.


14/33

But the bee and the beamlike ephemeris

Whose path is the lightning's, and soft moths that kiss

The sweet lips of the flowers, and harm not, did she

Make her attendant angels be.

And many an antenatal tomb,

Where butterflies dream of the life to come,

She left clinging round the smooth and dark

Edge of the odorous cedar bark.

This fairest creature from earliest Spring

Thus moved through the garden ministering

Mi the sweet season of Summertide,

And ere the first leaf looked brown--she died!

PART 3.

Three days the flowers of the garden fair,

Like stars when the moon is awakened, were,

Or the waves of Baiae, ere luminous

She floats up through the smoke of Vesuvius.

And on the fourth, the Sensitive Plant

Felt the sound of the funeral chant,

And the steps of the bearers, heavy and slow,

And the sobs of the mourners, deep and low;

The weary sound and the heavy breath,

And the silent motions of passing death,

And the smell, cold, oppressive, and dank,

Sent through the pores of the coffin-plank;

The dark grass, and the flowers among the grass,

Were bright with tears as the crowd did pass;

From their sighs the wind caught a mournful tone,

And sate in the pines, and gave groan for groan.

The garden, once fair, became cold and foul,

Like the corpse of her who had been its soul,

Which at first was lovely as if in sleep,

Then slowly changed, till it grew a heap


15/33

To make men tremble who never weep.

Swift Summer into the Autumn flowed,

And frost in the mist of the morning rode,

Though the noonday sun looked clear and bright,

Mocking the spoil of the secret night.

The rose-leaves, like flakes of crimson snow,

Paved the turf and the moss below.

The lilies were drooping, and white, and wan,

Like the head and the skin of a dying man.

And Indian plants, of scent and hue

The sweetest that ever were fed on dew,

Leaf by leaf, day after day,

Were massed into the common clay.

And the leaves, brown, yellow, and gray, and red,

And white with the whiteness of what is dead,

Like troops of ghosts on the dry wind passed;

Their whistling noise made the birds aghast.

And the gusty winds waked the winged seeds,

Out of their birthplace of ugly weeds,

Till they clung round many a sweet flower's stem,

Which rotted into the earth with them.

The water-blooms under the rivulet

Fell from the stalks on which they were set;

And the eddies drove them here and there,

As the winds did those of the upper air.

Then the rain came down, and the broken stalks

Were bent and tangled across the walks;

And the leafless network of parasite bowers

Massed into ruin; and all sweet flowers.

Between the time of the wind and the snow

All loathliest weeds began to grow,

Whose coarse leaves were splashed with many a

speck,

Like the water-snake's belly and the toad's back.


16/33

And thistles, and nettles, and darnels rank,

And the dock, and henbane, and hemlock dank,

Stretched out its long and hollow shank,

And stifled the air till the dead wind stank.

And plants, at whose names the verse feels loath,

Filled the place with a monstrous undergrowth,

Prickly, and pulpous, and blistering, and blue,

Livid, and starred with a lurid dew.

And agarics, and fungi, with mildew and mould

Started like mist from the wet ground cold;

Pale, fleshy, as if the decaying dead

With a spirit of growth had been animated!

Spawn, weeds, and filth, a leprous scum,

Made the running rivulet thick and dumb,

And at its outlet flags huge as stakes

Dammed it up with roots knotted like water-snakes.

And hour by hour, when the air was still,

The vapours arose which have strength to kill;

At morn they were seen, at noon they were felt,

At night they were darkness no star could melt.

And unctuous meteors from spray to spray

Crept and flitted in broad noonday

Unseen; every branch on which they alit

By a venomous blight was burned and bit.

The Sensitive Plant, like one forbid,

Wept, and the tears within each lid

Of its folded leaves, which together grew,

Were changed to a blight of frozen glue.

For the leaves soon fell, and the branches soon

By the heavy axe of the blast were hewn;

The sap shrank to the root through every pore

As blood to a heart that will beat no more.

For Winter came: the wind was his whip:


17/33


18/33

Whether that Lady's gentle mind,

No longer with the form combined

Which scattered love, as stars do light,

Found sadness, where it left delight,

I dare not guess; but in this life

Of error, ignorance, and strife,

Where nothing is, but all things seem,

And we the shadows of the dream,

It is a modest creed, and yet

Pleasant if one considers it,

To own that death itself must be,

Like all the rest, a mockery.

That garden sweet, that lady fair,

And all sweet shapes and odours there,

In truth have never passed away:

'Tis we, 'tis ours, are changed; not they.

For love, and beauty, and delight,

There is no death nor change: their might

Exceeds our organs, which endure

No light, being themselves obscure.


19/33

Godiva

Alfred, Lord Tennyson

I waited for the train at Coventry;

I hung with grooms and porters on the bridge,To watch the three tall spires; and there I shaped

The city's ancient legend into this:

Not only we, the latest seed of Time,

New men, that in the flying of a wheel

Cry down the past, not only we, that prate

Of rights and wrongs, have loved the people well,

And loathed to see them overtax'd; but she

Did more, and underwent, and overcame,

The woman of a thousand summers back,

Godiva, wife to that grim Earl, who ruled

In Coventry: for when he laid a tax

Upon his town, and all the mothers broughtTheir children, clamoring, "If we pay, we starve!"

She sought her lord, and found him, where he strode

About the hall, among his dogs, alone,

His beard a foot before him and his hair

A yard behind. She told him of their tears,

And pray'd him, "If they pay this tax, they starve."

Whereat he stared, replying, half-amazed,

"You would not let your little finger ache

For such as these?" -- "But I would die," said she.

He laugh'd, and swore by Peter and by Paul;

Then fillip'd at the diamond in her ear;

"Oh ay, ay, ay, you talk!" -- "Alas!" she said,

"But prove me what I would not do."

And from a heart as rough as Esau's hand,

He answer'd, "Ride you naked thro' the town,

And I repeal it;" and nodding, as in scorn,

He parted, with great strides among his dogs.

So left alone, the passions of her mind,

As winds from all the compass shift and blow,

Made war upon each other for an hour,

Till pity won. She sent a herald forth,

And bade him cry, with sound of trumpet, all

The hard condition; but that she would loose

The people: therefore, as they loved her well,

From then till noon no foot should pace the street,

No eye look down, she passing; but that all

Should keep within, door shut, and window barr'd.

Then fled she to her inmost bower, and there

Unclasp'd the wedded eagles of her belt,

The grim Earl's gift; but ever at a breath

She linger'd, looking like a summer moon

Half-dipt in cloud: anon she shook her head,

And shower'd the rippled ringlets to her knee;

Unclad herself in haste; adown the stair

Stole on; and, like a creeping sunbeam, slid

From pillar unto pillar, until she reach'd

The Gateway, there she found her palfrey trapt

In purple blazon'd with armorial gold.

Then she rode forth, clothed on with chastity:The deep air listen'd round her as she rode,

And all the low wind hardly breathed for fear.

The little wide-mouth'd heads upon the spout

Had cunning eyes to see: the barking cur

Made her cheek flame; her palfrey's foot-fall shot

Light horrors thro' her pulses; the blind walls

Were full of chinks and holes; and overhead

Fantastic gables, crowding, stared: but she

Not less thro' all bore up, till, last, she saw

The white-flower'd elder-thicket from the field,

Gleam thro' the Gothic archway in the wall.

Then she rode back, clothed on with chastity;And one low churl, compact of thankless earth,

The fatal byword of all years to come,

Boring a little auger-hole in fear,

Peep'd -- but his eyes, before they had their will,

Were shrivel'd into darkness in his head,

And dropt before him. So the Powers, who wait

On noble deeds, cancell'd a sense misused;

And she, that knew not, pass'd: and all at once,

With twelve great shocks of sound, the shameless

noon

Was clash'd and hammer'd from a hundred towers,

One after one: but even then she gain'd

Her bower; whence reissuing, robed and crown'd,

To meet her lord, she took the tax away

And built herself an everlasting name.


20/33

Crossing the Bar

By Tennyson

Sunset and evening star,And one clear call for me!

And may there be no moaning of the bar,When I put out to sea,

But such a tide as moving seems asleep,Too full for sound and foam,

When that which drew from out the boundless deepTurns again home.

Twilight and evening bell,And after that the dark!And may there be no sadness of farewell,

When I embark;

For tho' from out our bourne of Time and PlaceThe flood may bear me far,

I hope to see my Pilot face to faceWhen I have crost the bar.


21/33

Poetry

By Marrianne Moore

I, too, dislike it: there are things that are important beyond allthis fiddle.

Reading it, however, with a perfect contempt for it, onediscovers init after all, a place for the genuine.Hands that can grasp, eyesthat can dilate, hair that can riseif it must, these things are important not because a

high-sounding interpretation can be put upon them but becausethey areuseful. When they become so derivative as to becomeunintelligible,the same thing may be said for all of us, that wedo not admire what

we cannot understand: the batholding on upside down or in quest of something to

eat, elephants pushing, a wild horse taking a roll, a tireless wolfundera tree, the immovable critic twitching his skin like a horse thatfeels aflea, the base-ball fan, the statistician--nor is it validto discriminate against 'business documents and

school-books'; all these phenomena are important. One mustmake a distinctionhowever: when dragged into prominence by half poets, theresult is not poetry,nor till the poets among us can be'literalists ofthe imagination'--aboveinsolence and triviality and can present

for inspection, 'imaginary gardens with real toads in them', shallwe haveit. In the meantime, if you demand on the one hand,the raw material of poetry in

all its rawness andthat which is on the other handgenuine, you are interested in poetry.


22/33

JABBERWOCKY

Lewis Carroll

(from Through the Looking-Glass and What Alice Found There, 1872)

`Twas brillig, and the slithy tovesDid gyre and gimble in the wabe:

All mimsy were the borogoves,And the mome raths outgrabe.

"Beware the Jabberwock, my son!The jaws that bite, the claws that catch!

Beware the Jubjub bird, and shun

The frumious Bandersnatch!"

He took his vorpal sword in hand:

Long time the manxome foe he sought --

So rested he by the Tumtum tree,

And stood awhile in thought.

And, as in uffish thought he stood,

The Jabberwock, with eyes of flame,

Came whiffling through the tulgey wood,

And burbled as it came!

One, two! One, two! And through and through

The vorpal blade went snicker-snack!

He left it dead, and with its head

He went galumphing back.

"And, has thou slain the Jabberwock?

Come to my arms, my beamish boy!

O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!'

He chortled in his joy.

`Twas brillig, and the slithy toves

Did gyre and gimble in the wabe;

All mimsy were the borogoves,

And the mome raths outgrabe.


23/33

Terence, This is Stupid Stuff.

By A. E. Houseman

1 "Terence, this is stupid stuff:

2 You eat your victuals fast enough;3 There can't be much amiss, 'tis clear,

4 To see the rate you drink your beer.5 But oh, good Lord, the verse you make,

6 It gives a chap the belly-ache.

7 The cow, the old cow, she is dead;8 It sleeps well, the horned head:

9 We poor lads, 'tis our turn now

10 To hear such tunes as killed the cow.

11 Pretty friendship 'tis to rhyme12 Your friends to death before their time

13 Moping melancholy mad:14 Come, pipe a tune to dance to, lad."

15 Why, if 'tis dancing you would be,

16 There's brisker pipes than poetry.17 Say, for what were hop-yards meant,

18 Or why was Burton built on Trent?

19 Oh many a peer of England brews20 Livelier liquor than the Muse,

21 And malt does more than Milton can

22 To justify God's ways to man.

23 Ale, man, ale's the stuff to drink24 For fellows whom it hurts to think:

25 Look into the pewter pot

26 To see the world as the world's not.27 And faith, 'tis pleasant till 'tis past:

28 The mischief is that 'twill not last.

29 Oh I have been to Ludlow fair30 And left my necktie God knows where,

31 And carried half-way home, or near,

32 Pints and quarts of Ludlow beer:

33 Then the world seemed none so bad,34 And I myself a sterling lad;

35 And down in lovely muck I've lain,

36 Happy till I woke again.

37 Then I saw the morning sky:38 Heigho, the tale was all a lie;

39 The world, it was the old world yet,

40 I was I, my things were wet,


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41 And nothing now remained to do

42 But begin the game anew.

43 Therefore, since the world has still

44 Much good, but much less good than ill,

45 And while the sun and moon endure46 Luck's a chance, but trouble's sure,

47 I'd face it as a wise man would,48 And train for ill and not for good.

49 'Tis true, the stuff I bring for sale

50 Is not so brisk a brew as ale:51 Out of a stem that scored the hand

52 I wrung it in a weary land.

53 But take it: if the smack is sour,

54 The better for the embittered hour;55 It should do good to heart and head

56 When your soul is in my soul's stead;57 And I will friend you, if I may,

58 In the dark and cloudy day.

59 There was a king reigned in the East:60 There, when kings will sit to feast,

61 They get their fill before they think

62 With poisoned meat and poisoned drink.

63 He gathered all that springs to birth64 From the many-venomed earth;

65 First a little, thence to more,

66 He sampled all her killing store;67 And easy, smiling, seasoned sound,

68 Sate the king when healths went round.

69 They put arsenic in his meat

70 And stared aghast to watch him eat;71 They poured strychnine in his cup

72 And shook to see him drink it up:

73 They shook, they stared as white's their shirt:74 Them it was their poison hurt.

75 --I tell the tale that I heard told.

76 Mithridates, he died old.


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A Gleam of Sunshine

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

This is the place. Stand still, my steed,Let me review the scene,And summon from the shadowy PastThe forms that once have been.

The Past and Present here uniteBeneath Time's flowing tide,Like footprints hidden by a brook,But seen on either side.

Here runs the highway to the town;There the green lane descends,Through which I walked to church with thee,

O gentlest of my friends!

The shadow of the linden-treesLay moving on the grass;Between them and the moving boughs,

A shadow, thou didst pass.

Thy dress was like the lilies,And thy heart as pure as they:One of God's holy messengersDid walk with me that day.

I saw the branches of the treesBend down thy touch to meet,The clover-blossoms in the grassRise up to kiss thy feet,

"Sleep, sleep to-day, tormenting cares,Of earth and folly born!"Solemnly sang the village choirOn that sweet Sabbath morn.

Through the closed blinds the golden sunPoured in a dusty beam,Like the celestial ladder seen

By Jacob in his dream.

And ever and anon, the wind,Sweet-scented with the hay,Turned o'er the hymn-book's fluttering leavesThat on the window lay.

Long was the good man's sermon,Yet it seemed not so to me;


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For he spake of Ruth the beautiful,And still I thought of thee.

Long was the prayer he uttered,Yet it seemed not so to me;For in my heart I prayed with him,

And still I thought of thee.

But now, alas! the place seems changed;Thou art no longer here:Part of the sunshine of the sceneWith thee did disappear.

Though thoughts, deep-rooted in my heart,Like pine-trees dark and high,Subdue the light of noon, and breathe

A low and ceaseless sigh;

This memory brightens o'er the past,

As when the sun, concealedBehind some cloud that near us hangsShines on a distant field.


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A Psalm of Life

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Tell me not in mournful numbers,Life is but an empty dream!

For the soul is dead that slumbers,And things are not what they seem.

Life is real! Life is earnest!And the grave is not its goal;Dust thou are, to dust thou returnest,Was not spoken of the soul.

Not enjoyment, and not sorrow,Is our destined end or way;But to act, that each tomorrowFind us farther than today.

Art is long, and Time is fleeting,And our hearts, though stout and brave,Still, like muffled drums, are beatingFuneral marches to the grave.

In the world's broad field of battle,In the bivouac of Life,Be not like dumb, driven cattle!Be a hero in the strife!

Trust no Future, howe'er pleasant!Let the dead Past bury its dead!

Act, - act in the living Present!Heart within, and God o'erhead!

Lives of great men all remind usWe can make our lives sublime,

And, departing, leave behind usFootprints on the sand of time;

Footprints, that perhaps another,Sailing o'er life's solenm main,

A forlorn and shipwrecked brother,Seeing, shall take heart again.

Let us then be up and doing,With a heart for any fate;Still achieving, still pursuing,Learn to labor and to wait.


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A Prayer in Spring

Oh, give us pleasure in the flowers to-day;And give us not to think so far awayAs the uncertain harvest; keep us hereAll simply in the springing of the year.

Oh, give us pleasure in the orchard white,Like nothing else by day, like ghosts by night;

And make us happy in the happy bees,The swarm dilating round the perfect trees.

And make us happy in the darting birdThat suddenly above the bees is heard,The meteor that thrusts in with needle bill,

And off a blossom in mid air stands still.

For this is love and nothing else is love,The which it is reserved for God above

To sanctify to what far ends He will,But which it only needs that we fulfil.

Robert Frost


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Credenda Og Mandino, "The Gift of Acabar"

Turn away from the crowd and its fruitful pursuit of fame and gold.

Never look back as you close your door to the sorry tumult of greed and ambition.

Wipe away your tears of failure and misfortune.

Lay aside your heavy load and rest until your heart is still.

Be at peace.

Already, it is later than you think, for your earthly life, at best, is only the blink of an eye between twoeternities.

Be unafraid.

Nothing here can harm you except yourself.

Do that which you dread and cherish those victories with pride.

Concentrate your energy.

To be everywhere is to be nowhere.

Be jealous of your time, since it is your greatest treasure.

Reconsider your goals.

Before you set your heart too much on anything, examine how happy they are who already possess whatyou desire.

Love your family and count your blessings.

Reflect on how eagerly they would be sought if you did not have them.

Put aside your impossible dreams and complete the task at hand no matter how distasteful.

All great achievements come from working and waiting.

Be patient.

God's delays are never God's denials.

Hold on.

Hold fast.

Know that your paymaster is always near.

What you sow, good or evil, that you will reap.

Never blame your condition on others.

You are what you are through your choice alone.

Learn to live with honest poverty, if you must, and turn to more important matters than transporting gold toyour grave.

Never meet trouble halfway.

Anxiety is the rust of life; when you add tomorrow's burdens to today's their weight becomes unbearable.

Avoid the mourner's bench and give thanks, instead, for your defeats.

You would not received them if you did not need them.


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Always learn from others.

He who teaches himself has a fool for a master.

Be careful.

Do not overload your conscience.

Conduct your life as if it were spent in an arena filled with tattlers.

Avoid breasting. If you see anything in you that puffs you with pride look closer and you will find morethan enough to make you humble.

Be wise.

Realize that all men are not created equal, for there is no equality in nature, yet no man was ever bornwhose work was not born with him.

Work everyday as if it were your first, yet tenderly treat the lives you touch as if they will all end atmidnight.

Love everyone, even those who deny you, for hate is a luxury you cannot afford.

Seek out those in need.

Learn that he who delivers in one hand will always gather with two.

Be of good cheer.

Above all, remember that very little is needed to make a happy life.

Look up.

Reach out.

Cling simply to God and journey quietly on your pathway to foreverwith charity and smile.When you depart it will be said by all that your legacy was a better world than the one you found.

Definition of Credenda: (credendum) article of faith: (Christianity) any of the sections into which a creed orother statement of doctrine is divided.

Credenda Og Mandino, "The Gift of Acabar"


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Turn away from the crowd and its fruitful pursuit of fame and gold.

Never look back as you close your door to the sorry tumult of greed and ambition.

Wipe away your tears of failure and misfortune.

Lay aside your heavy load and rest until your heart is still.

Be at peace.

Already, it is later than you think, for your earthly life, at best, is only the blink of an eye between twoeternities.

Be unafraid.

Nothing here can harm you except yourself.

Do that which you dread and cherish those victories with pride.

Concentrate your energy.

To be everywhere is to be nowhere.

Be jealous of your time, since it is your greatest treasure.

Reconsider your goals.

Before you set your heart too much on anything, examine how happy they are who already possess whatyou desire.

Love your family and count your blessings.

Reflect on how eagerly they would be sought if you did not have them.

Put aside your impossible dreams and complete the task at hand no matter how distasteful.

All great achievements come from working and waiting.

Be patient.

God's delays are never God's denials.

Hold on.

Hold fast.

Know that your paymaster is always near.

What you sow, good or evil, that you will reap.

Never blame your condition on others.

You are what you are through your choice alone.

Learn to live with honest poverty, if you must, and turn to more important matters than transporting gold to

your grave.Never meet trouble halfway.

Anxiety is the rust of life; when you add tomorrow's burdens to today's their weight becomes unbearable.

Avoid the mourner's bench and give thanks, instead, for your defeats.

You would not received them if you did not need them.

Always learn from others.


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He who teaches himself has a fool for a master.

Be careful.

Do not overload your conscience.

Conduct your life as if it were spent in an arena filled with tattlers.

Avoid breasting. If you see anything in you that puffs you with pride look closer and you will find morethan enough to make you humble.

Be wise.

Realize that all men are not created equal, for there is no equality in nature, yet no man was ever bornwhose work was not born with him.

Work everyday as if it were your first, yet tenderly treat the lives you touch as if they will all end atmidnight.

Love everyone, even those who deny you, for hate is a luxury you cannot afford.

Seek out those in need.

Learn that he who delivers in one hand will always gather with two.

Be of good cheer.

Above all, remember that very little is needed to make a happy life.

Look up.

Reach out.

Cling simply to God and journey quietly on your pathway to foreverwith charity and smile.When you depart it will be said by all that your legacy was a better world than the one you found.

Definition of Credenda: (credendum) article of faith: (Christianity) any of the sections into which a creed or

other statement of doctrine is divided.

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