by Allie Esiri
Had I the heavens’ embroidered cloths
Have you ever heard of the Sugar-Plum Tree?
He has opened all his parcels
He thought he saw an Elephant
Her spirit is to France a living spring
Here come I, old April Fool
His face is what I like
‘Hope’ is the thing with feathers
How doth the little busy bee
How doth the little crocodile
I am of Ireland
I am Taliesin. I sing perfect metre
I am: yet what I am none cares or knows
I beckoned to the floor
I dreamed I was back in the playground
I found a ball of grass among the hay
I had a dove, and the sweet dove died
I had a little brother
I have eaten
I have seen the sun break through
I hold you in my arms
I know not whether Laws be right
I remember, I remember
I wandered lonely as a cloud
I was angry when it happened
I watched a blackbird on a budding sycamore
I went out to the hazel wood
Ich am of Irlaunde
If ever there were a spring day so perfect
If I were Lord of Tartary
In a solitude of the sea
In April one seldom feels cheerful
in Just-
Into my heart an air that kills
Into the scented woods we’ll go
It is the day of all the year
It is the first mild day in March
It showed how friendship
Jenny kissed me when we met
Knocks on the door
Let us go then, you and I
Listen, my children, and you shall hear
Little Orphant Annie’s come to our house to stay
Lord, who createdst man in wealth and store
Loveliest of trees, the cherry now
March yeans the lammie
Mary stood in the kitchen
Matilda told such Dreadful Lies
Morning has broken
Mother, I love you so
My black face fades
My love gave me a chicken, but it had no bone
Nothing is so beautiful as Spring
Now the river is rich, but her voice is low
o by the by
O Captain! my Captain! our fearful trip is done
O! the month of May, the merry month of May
O young Lochinvar is come out of the west
Oh, to be in England
Old Mother Hubbard
On either side the river lie
Once upon a time a frog
Once, when the moon was as bright as the sun
One fine day in the middle of the night
Only a man harrowing clods
Oranges and lemons
Orpheus with his lute made trees
Others abide our question. Thou art free
Pretty women wonder where my secret lies
Prior Knowledge was a strange boy
Remember me when I am gone away
7 April 1852
Shadows on the wall
Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?
She was wearing coral taffeta trousers
Snowflakes
Sound the Flute
Speed, bonnie boat, like a bird on the wing
Stop looking like a purse
Swans sing before they die – ’twere no bad thing
Take this kiss upon the brow!
The apparition of these faces
The art of losing isn’t hard to master
The Buddha is not a god
The Buddha sat silently
The evening river is level and motionless
The first blossom was the best blossom
The flowers left thick at nightfall in the wood
The grey sea and the long black land
The gulls had quietened on the chimneypots
The hook of adrenalin shoves
The King of Peru
The moment when, after many years
The M.O.R.E.R.A.P.S are a trick
The old pond
The other day as I was ricocheting slowly
The People of the Eastern Ice, they are melting like the snow
The Pobble who has no toes
The Queen has lately lost a Part
The shining line of motors
The Silver Birch is a dainty lady
The silver trumpets rang across the Dome
The spring is coming by a many signs
The sun was shining on the sea
The trees are coming into leaf
The wind flapped loose, the wind was still
The woods and banks of England now
The world is charged with the grandeur of God
The year’s at the spring
There is one that has a head without an eye
There it was I saw what I shall never forget
There lived a sage in days of yore
There was a Boy whose name was Jim
There was a Young Lady whose chin
There was an apple tree in the yard
They went to sea in a Sieve, they did
They’re changing guard at Buckingham Palace
Think how fast a year flies by
This morning I’ve got too much energy
This royal throne of kings, this sceptred isle
This thing she’s feeling
Thriving against façades the ignorant sea
Today is very boring
Touch the wooden gate in the wall you never saw before
Touris’, white man, wipin’ his face
’Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
Was this the face that launch’d a thousand ships?
Whan that Aprille with his shoures soote
What is this life, if full of care
When fishes flew and forests walked
When I am an old woman I shall wear purple
When man first flew beyond the sky
Where is the grave of Sir Arthur O’Kellyn?
Who is it in the press that calls on me?
Who killed Cock Robin?
‘Who’s that tickling my back?’ said the wall
Will ye no come back again?
‘Will you walk a little faster?’ said a whiting to a snail
‘Will you walk into my parlour?’ said the Spider to the Fly
Wynken, Blynken, and Nod one night
You ain’t nothing but a hedgehog
‘You are old, Father William,’ the young man said
You can never have too many turtle eggs
You know, we French storm’d Ratisbon
Young Donallan lived alone
Index of Poets and Translators
Agard, John ref1, ref2
al-Massri, Maram ref1
Alexander, Michael ref1
Angelou, Maya ref1, ref2
Anon. ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9, ref10
Arnold, Matthew ref1
Atwood, Margaret ref1
Bashō, Matsuo ref1, ref2
Belloc, Hilaire ref1, ref2, ref3
Berry, Wendell ref1
Bishop, Elizabeth ref1
Blake, William ref1
Boulton, Sir Harold ref1
Brooke, Rupert ref1
Browning, Robert ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4
Brownlee, Liz ref1
Calder, Dave ref1
Carroll, Lewis ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7
Carter, James ref1
Causley, Charles ref1
Chaucer, Geoffrey ref1
Chesterton, G. K. ref1
Clare, John ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4
Clark, Polly ref1
Clarke, John Cooper ref1
Coates, Florence Earle ref1
Coelho, Joseph ref1
Coleridge, Samuel Taylor r
ef1, ref2
Collins, Billy ref1, ref2
Cope, Wendy ref1
Cummings, E. E. ref1, ref2
Davies, W. H. ref1, ref2
de la Mare, Walter ref1
Dean, Jan ref1
Dekker, Thomas ref1
Dickinson, Emily ref1, ref2
Donne, John ref1
Duffy, Carol Ann ref1, ref2
Earhart, Amelia ref1
Ehrmann, Max ref1
Eliot, T. S. ref1, ref2
Emerson, Ralph Waldo ref1
Farjeon, Eleanor ref1
Field, Eugene ref1, ref2
Foster, John ref1
Frye, Mary Elizabeth ref1
Gaiman, Neil ref1
Gittins, Chrissie ref1
Glück, Louise ref1
Hardy, Thomas ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4
Hass, Robert ref1, ref2
Herbert, George ref1
Herrick, Robert ref1
Hill, Geoffrey ref1
Hoberman, Mary Ann ref1, ref2
Hollander, John ref1
Hood, Thomas ref1
Hopkins, Gerard Manley ref1, ref2
Housman, A. E. ref1, ref2
Howitt, Mary Botham ref1
Hughes, Ted ref1, ref2
Hugo, Victor ref1
Hunt, Leigh ref1
Johnson, Linton Kwesi ref1
Jones, Evan ref1
Joseph, Jenny ref1
Keats, John ref1
Kipling, Rudyard ref1
Komunyakaa, Yusef ref1
Larkin, Philip ref1
Lear, Edward ref1, ref2, ref3
Leonard, George Hare ref1
Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth ref1
MacCaig, Norman ref1, ref2
McGough, Roger ref1
McMillan, Ian ref1
MacNeice, Louis ref1, ref2
Marlowe, Christopher ref1
Mattawa, Khaled ref1
Millay, Edna St Vincent ref1
Milne, A. A. ref1, ref2
Mitchell, Adrian ref1, ref2, ref3
Mitton, Tony ref1, ref2, ref3
Moses, Brian ref1
Nesbit, Edith ref1
Oliphant, Carolina, Lady Nairne ref1
Palin, Michael ref1
Perera, Duranka ref1
Poe, Edgar Allan ref1
Pound, Ezra ref1
Prelutsky, Jack ref1
Rieu, E. V. ref1
Riley, James Whitcomb ref1
Robertson, Shauna Darling ref1
Rooney, Rachel ref1
Rossetti, Christina ref1, ref2, ref3
Rossetti, Dante Gabriel ref1
Sackville-West, Vita ref1
Scott, Sir Walter ref1
Serraillier, Ian ref1, ref2
Seth, Vikram ref1
Shakespeare, William ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6
Smith, Stevie ref1
Stevens, Roger ref1
Stevenson, Robert Louis ref1
Swift, Jonathan ref1
Teasdale, Sara ref1
Tempest, Kae ref1
Tennyson, Alfred Lord ref1
Thackeray, William Makepeace ref1
Thomas, Dylan ref1
Thomas, Edward ref1, ref2
Thomas, R. S. ref1, ref2
Waley, Arthur ref1
Watson, William ref1
Watts, Isaac ref1
Webb, Mary ref1
Whitman, Walt ref1
Wilde, Oscar ref1, ref2
Williams, William Carlos ref1
Wilmot, John, Earl of Rochester ref1
Wordsworth, William ref1, ref2
Yang-Ti ref1
Yeats, W. B. ref1, ref2, ref3
Acknowledgements
The compiler and publisher would like to thank the following for permission to use copyright material:
Agard, John: ‘What the teacher said when asked: what er we vain for georgraphy, Miss?’ and ‘A Date with Spring’ copyright © John Agard 1983. Reproduced by kind permission of John Agard c/o Caroline Sheldon Literary Agency Ltd; Al-Massri, Maram: ‘Knocks on the Door’ from A Red Cherry on a White-tiled Floor, trans Khaled Mattawa (Bloodaxe Books, 2004). Reproduced with permission of Bloodaxe Books; Angelou, Maya: ‘Life doesn’t frighten me’ and ‘Phenomenal Woman’ from The Complete Poetry copyright © Maya Angelou 2015. Reprinted by permission of Virago, an imprint of Little, Brown Book Group; Atwood, Margaret: ‘The Moment’ reproduced with permission of Curtis Brown Group Ltd, London on behalf of Margaret Atwood, Morning in the Burned House, Copyright © Margaret Atwood 1995; Belloc, Hilaire: ‘Matilda: Who Told Lies, and was Burned to Death’ from Cautionary Verses by Hilaire Belloc (Red Fox, 1995) copyright © Hilaire Belloc. Reprinted by permission of Peters Fraser & Dunlop Ltd (www.petersfraserdunlop.com) ‘Tarantella’ from Sonnets and Verse by Hilaire Belloc reprinted by permission of Peters Fraser & Dunlop (www.petersfraserdunlop.com) on behalf of the Estate of Hilaire Belloc, ‘Jim, Who Ran Away from His Nurse and Was Eaten by a Lion’ from Cautionary Tales for Children by Hilaire Belloc reprinted by permission of Peters Fraser & Dunlop (www.petersfraserdunlop.com) on behalf of the Estate of Hilaire Belloc; Berry, Wendell: ‘Anger Against Beast’ from New Collected Poems. Copyright © 2012 by Wendell Berry. Reprinted by permission of Counterpoint Press; Bishop, Elizabeth: ‘One Art’ from Poems: The Centenery Edtion by Elizabeth Bishop (Chatto & Windus, 2011) by permission of Penguin Random House; Brownlee, Liz: ‘Battle of the Sexes’ by permission of the author; Calder, Dave: ‘Silkie’ by permission of the author; Carter, James: ‘Love You More’ by James Carter, reproduced with permission by Otter-Barry Books Ltd; Causley, Charles: ‘Ballad of the Bread Man’ copyright © Charles Causley, from Collected Poems for Children (Macmillan Children’s Books, 2016), used with permission of David Higham Associates on behalf of the estate of the author; Clarke, Polly: ‘Friends’ from Farewell My Lovely (Bloodaxe Books, 2009). Reproduced with permission of Bloodaxe Books; Clarke, John Cooper: ‘You Ain’t Nothing but a Hedgehog’ © John Cooper Clare, from The Luckiest Guy Alive (Picador, 2018). Used with permission Picador, London; Coelho, Joseph: ‘The M.O.R.E.R.A.P.S.’ from Werewolf Club Rules, written by Joseph Coelho, published by Frances Lincoln Children’s Books, an imprint of The Quarto Group, copyright © 2014. Reproduced by permission of Quarto; Publishing Plc; Collins, Billy: ‘Today’ from Nine Horses (Picador, 2003) and ‘The Lanyard’ from The Trouble with Poetry and other poems (Picador, 2006) copyright © Billy Collins. All published by permission of Picador, London; Cope, Wendy: ‘Waste Land Limericks’ from Two Cures for Love (Faber & Faber, 2009) copyright © Wendy Cope 2016. Printed by permission of Faber & Faber Ltd; Cummings, E.E.: ‘O by the by’ copyright 1944, © 1972, 1991 by the Trustees for the E. E. Cummings Trust, from Completed Poems: 1904–1962 by E. E. Cummings, edited by George J. Firmage and ‘In Just’ copyright 1923, 1951 © 1991 by the Trustees of E. E. Cummings Trust. Copyright © 1976 by George James Firmage; De La Mare, Walter: ‘Tartary’ copyright © Walter de la Mare. Reprinted by permission of The Literary Trustees of Walter de la Mare and The Society of Authors as their Representative; Dean, Jan: ‘Three Good Things’ by permission of the author; Duffy, Carol Ann: ‘Prior Knowledge’ and ‘Mrs. Darwin’ from New and Collected Poems for Children by Carol Ann Duffy. Published by Faber & Faber, 2017. Copyright © Carol Ann Duffy. Reproduced by permission of the author c/o Rogers, Coleridge & White Ltd., 20 Powis Mews, London W11 1JN; Eliot, T.S.: extract from ‘The Wasteland from Wasteland and Other Poems (Faber & Faber, 2002) copyright Set Copyrights Limited, 2015. All reproduced by permission of Faber & Faber Ltd; Farjeon, Eleanor: ‘A Morning Song’ from Blackbird Has Spoken by Eleanor Farjeon (Macmillan Children’s Books, 2000) copyright © Eleanor Farjeon; Foster, John: ‘Spring Sorrow’ from The Poetry Chest (Oxford University Press) copyright © John Foster 2007, included by permission of the author; Gaiman, Neil: ‘Instructions’, copyright © 2000 by Neil Gaiman. Reprinted by permission of Writers House LLC acting as agent for the author; Gittins, Chrissie: ‘Holi’ by permi
ssion of the author; Glück, Louise: ‘Nostos’ from Meadlowlands by Louise Glück (Carcanet Press Limited, 1998) published by permission of Carcanet Press Limited; Hill, Geoffrey: ‘Ode to the loss of the titanic’ from Selected Poems (Penguin, 2006) copyright © Geoffrey Hill, 2006. Reprinted by permission of Penguin Random House; Hoberman, Mary Ann: ‘Mayfly’ copyright © 1976 by Mary Ann Hoberman, ‘Brother’ copyright © 1959 by Mary Ann Hoberman. Reprinted by permission of The Gina Maccoby Literary Agency; Hollander, John: ‘Swan and Shadow’ from Types of Shape originally published by Yale University Press. Copyright © 1967, 1968, 1969, 1991 by John Hollander. Reproduced with permission of the Licensor through PLSclear; Hughes, Ted: ‘The River in March’ from Season Songs by Ted Hughes (Faber & Faber Ltd, 1985) copyright © The Estate of Ted Hughes, 2003, ‘A Donkey’ from Collected Poems for Children by Ted Hughes (Faber and Faber Ltd). All poems published by permission of Faber and Faber Ltd; Johnson, Linton Kwesi: ‘Seasons of the Heart’ from Give the Ball to the Poet (Commonwealth Education Trust, 2014); Jones, Evan: ‘The Song of the Banana Man’ by permission of Sadie Jones on behalf of the author; Joseph, Jenny: ‘Warning’ by permission of Johnson & Alcock Ltd; Komunyakaa, Yusef: ‘Facing It’ from Pleasure Dome (Wesleyan University Press, 2014) copyright © Yusef Komunyakaa. Used with permission of the publisher; Larkin, Philip: ‘The Trees’ from The Complete Poems (Faber & Faber, 2014) copyright © Philip Larkin. Printed by permission of Faber & Faber Ltd; MacCaig, Norman: ‘Toad’ and ‘Aunt Julia’from The Poems of Norman MacCaig, reproduced by permission of Polygon, an imprint of Birlinn Ltd (www.birlinn.co.uk); MacNeice, Louis: ‘April Fool’ and ‘Apple Blossom’ from Collected Poems (Faber & Faber, 2016) © Louise MacNeice. All poems published by permission of David Higham associates on behalf of the estate of the author; McGough, Roger: ‘The Sound Collector’ from You Tell Me, Viking Kestrel, by permission of Peters Fraser and Dunlop on behalf of the author; McMillan, Ian: ‘Robinson Crusoe’s Wise Sayings’ by permission of the author; Millay, Edna St. Vincent: ‘The Fawn’ by Edna St Vincent Millay. Copyright © Edna St Vincent Millay. Reproduced by permission of A.M. Heath & Co Ltd; Milne, A. A.: ‘Buckingham Palace’ an extract from When We Were Very Young by A. A. Milne. ‘The Emperor’s Rhyme’ from Now We Are Six by A. A. Milne. Text copyright © The Trustees of the Pooh Properties 1927. Published by Egmont UK Ltd and used with permission; Mitchell, Adrian: ‘Back in the Playground Blues’, ‘Song in Space’ and ‘Yes’, copyright © Adrian Mitchell. Reproduced by permission of United Agents on behalf of The Estate of Adrian Mitchell; Mitton, Tony: ‘Buddha’ Copyright © Tony Mitton 2020. This poem was first published in Come Into This Poem (Frances Lincoln, 2011). ‘Awakening’ and ‘The Selkie Bride’ Copyright © Tony Mitton 2020. These poems were first published in Plum (Scholastic, 1998) and is currently published by Frances Lincoln (2010). These poems have been reproduced with permission from David Higham Associates UK; Moses, Brian: ‘Dear Yuri’ from Lost Magic: The Very Best of Brian Moses copyright © Brian Moses 2016; Palin, Michael: ‘A Handsome Young Fellow Called Frears’ from A Sackful of Limericks (Random House Books, 2016) copyright © Michael Palin. Reprinted by permission of Penguin Random House; Perrara, Duranka: ‘Bitter State’ with permission of the author; Pound, Ezra: ‘In A Station of the Metro’ from Personae by Ezra Pound (Faber and Faber Ltd) published by permission of Faber and Faber Ltd; Prelutsky, Jack: ‘Today is Very Boring’ ‘Today Is Very Boring’ from The New Kid on the Block (Greenwillow Books, 1984) copyright © Jack Prelutsky, 1984; Rieu, E.V.: The Hippopotamus’s Birthday’, by permission of D. C. H. Rieu, Executor of the Estate of the author; Robertson, Shauna Darling: ‘Dancing with Life’ copyright © Shauna Darling Robertson. Printed with permission of the author; Rooney, Rachel: ‘First Word’ (After Helen Keller)’ copyright © Rachel Rooney. Printed by permission of the author; Sackville-West, Vita: ‘Full Moon’ copyright © Vita Sackville-West. Reproduced with permission of Curtis Brown Group Ltd, London, on behalf of The Estate of Vita Sackville-West; Seth, Vikram: ‘The Frog and the Nightingale’ by Vikram Seth, copyright © Vikram Seth; Smith, Stevie: ‘Human Affection’ from Collected Poems and Drawings by Stevie Smith (Faber & Faber Ltd) published by permission of Faber & Faber Ltd; Stevens, Roger: ‘Why the Bat Flies at Night’ by permission of the author; Tempest, Kae: ‘For my Niece’ from Hold Your Own copyright © Kae Tempest (Picador, 2014). Printed by permission of Picador; Thomas, Dylan: ‘Evening hymn of the Reverend Eli Jenkins’ excerpt from Under Milk Wood copyright © The Dylan Thomas Trust (Phoenix, 2014). Used with permission of David Higham Associates on behalf of the estate of the author; Thomas, R.S: ‘The Bright Field’ and ‘Cynddylan on a Tractor’ from Collected Poems 1945-1990 (Orion, 2001). Copyright © R. S Thomas. Printed by permission of The Orion Publishing Group, London; Williams, William Carlos: ‘This is Just to Say’ from Collected Poems Vol. 1 1909–1939 by William Carlos Williams (Carcanet Press Limited) published by permission of Carcanet Press Limited.