Delphi Poetry Anthology: The World's Greatest Poems (Delphi Poets Series Book 50)

by Homer

  I dare not: ’tis too easy to go mad,

  And ape a Bourbon in a crown of straws;

  The thing’s too common.

  Many fervent souls

  Strike rhyme on rhyme, who would strike steel on steel

  If steel had offered, in a restless heat

  Of doing something. Many tender souls

  Have strung their losses on a rhyming thread.

  As children, cowslips:–the more pains they take,

  The work more withers. Young men, ay, and maids,

  Too often sow their wild oats in tame verse.

  Before they sit down under their own vine

  And live for use. Alas, near all the birds

  Will sing at dawn,–and yet we do not take

  The chaffering swallow for the holy lark.

  In those days, though, I never analysed

  Myself even. All analysis comes late.

  You catch a sight of Nature, earliest,

  In full front sun-face, and your eyelids wink

  And drop before the wonder of ‘t; you miss

  The form, through seeing the light. I lived, those days,

  And wrote because I lived–unlicensed else:

  My heart beat in my brain. Life’s violent flood

  Abolished bounds,–and, which my neighbour’s field,

  Which mine, what mattered ? It is so in youth.

  We play at leap-frog over the god Term;

  The love within us and the love without

  Are mixed, confounded; if we are loved or love,

  We scarce distinguish. So, with other power.

  Being acted on and acting seem the same:

  In that first onrush of life’s chariot-wheels,

  We know not if the forests move or we.

  And so, like most young poets, in a flush

  Of individual life, I poured myself

  Along the veins of others, and achieved

  Mere lifeless imitations of life verse,

  And made the living answer for the dead,

  Profaning nature. ‘Touch not, do not taste,

  Nor handle,’–we’re too legal, who write young:

  We beat the phorminx till we hurt our thumbs,

  As if still ignorant of counterpoint;

  We call the Muse . . ‘O Muse, benignant Muse !’–

  As if we had seen her purple-braided head .

  With the eyes in it start between the boughs

  As often as a stag’s. What make-believe,

  With so much earnest! what effete results,

  From virile efforts! what cold wire-drawn odes

  From such white heats!–bucolics, where the cows

  Would scare the writer if they splashed the mud

  In lashing off the flies,–didactics, driven

  Against the heels of what the master said;

  And counterfeiting epics, shrill with trumps

  A babe might blow between two straining cheeks

  Of bubbled rose, to make his mother laugh;

  And elegiac griefs, and songs of love,

  Like cast-off nosegays picked up on the road,

  The worse for being warm: all these things, writ

  On happy mornings, with a morning heart,

  That leaps for love, is active for resolve,

  Weak for art only. Oft, the ancient forms

  Will thrill, indeed, in carrying the young blood.

  The wine-skins, now and then, a little warped,

  Will crack even, as the new wine gurgles in.

  Spare the old bottles!–spill not the new wine.

  By Keats’s soul, the man who never stepped

  In gradual progress like another man,

  But, turning grandly on his central self,

  Ensphered himself in twenty perfect years

  And died, not young,–(the life of a long life,

  Distilled to a mere drop, falling like a tear

  Upon the world’s cold cheek to make it burn

  For ever;) by that strong excepted soul,

  I count it strange, and hard to understand,

  That nearly all young poets should write old;

  That Pope was sexagenarian at sixteen,

  And beardless Byron academical,

  And so with others. It may be, perhaps,

  Such have not settled long and deep enough

  In trance, to attain to clairvoyance,–and still

  The memory mixes with the vision, spoils,

  And works it turbid.

  Or perhaps, again,

  In order to discover the Muse-Sphinx,

  The melancholy desert must sweep round,

  Behind you, as before.–

  For me, I wrote

  False poems, like the rest, and thought them true.

  Because myself was true in writing them.

  I, peradventure, have writ true ones since

  With less complacence.

  But I could not hide

  My quickening inner life from those at watch.

  They saw a light at a window now and then,

  They had not set there. Who had set it there?

  My father’s sister started when she caught

  My soul agaze in my eyes. She could not say

  I had no business with a sort of soul,

  But plainly she objected,–and demurred,

  That souls were dangerous things to carry straight

  Through all the spilt saltpetre of the world.

  She said sometimes, ‘Aurora, have you done

  Your task this morning?–have you read that book?

  And are you ready for the crochet here?’–

  As if she said, ‘I know there’s something wrong,

  I know I have not ground you down enough

  To flatten and bake you to a wholesome crust

  For household uses and proprieties,

  Before the rain has got into my barn

  And set the grains a-sprouting. What, you’re green

  With out-door impudence? you almost grow?’

  To which I answered, ‘Would she hear my task,

  And verify my abstract of the book?

  And should I sit down to the crochet work?

  Was such her pleasure?’ . . Then I sate and teased

  The patient needle til it split the thread,

  Which oozed off from it in meandering lace

  From hour to hour. I was not, therefore, sad;

  My soul was singing at a work apart

  Behind the wall of sense, as safe from harm

  As sings the lark when sucked up out of sight,

  In vortices of glory and blue air.

  And so, through forced work and spontaneous work,

  The inner life informed the outer life,

  Reduced the irregular blood to settled rhythms,

  Made cool the forehead with fresh-sprinkling dreams,

  And, rounding to the spheric soul the thin

  Pined body, struck a colour up the cheeks,

  Though somewhat faint. I clenched my brows across

  My blue eyes greatening in the looking-glass,

  And said, ‘We’ll live, Aurora! we’ll be strong.

  The dogs are on us–but we will not die.’

  Whoever lives true life, will love true love.

  I learnt to love that England. Very oft,

  Before the day was born, or otherwise

  Through secret windings of the afternoons,

  I threw my hunters off and plunged myself

  Among the deep hills, as a hunted stag

  Will take the waters, shivering with the fear

  And passion of the course. And when, at last

  Escaped,–so many a green slope built on slope

  Betwixt me and the enemy’s house behind,

  I dared to rest, or wander,–like a rest

  Made sweeter for the step upon the grass,–

  And view the ground’s most gentle dimplement,

  (As if God’s finger touched but di
d not press

  In making England!) such an up and down

  Of verdure,–nothing too much up or down,

  A ripple of land; such little hills, the sky

  Can stoop to tenderly and the wheatfields climb;

  Such nooks of valleys, lined with orchises,

  Fed full of noises by invisible streams;

  And open pastures, where you scarcely tell

  White daisies from white dew,–at intervals

  The mythic oaks and elm-trees standing out

  Self-poised upon their prodigy of shade,–

  I thought my father’s land was worthy too

  Of being my Shakspeare’s.

  Very oft alone,

  Unlicensed; not unfrequently with leave

  To walk the third with Romney and his friend

  The rising painter, Vincent Carrington,

  Whom men judge hardly, as bee-bonneted,

  Because he holds that, paint a body well,

  You paint a soul by implication, like

  The grand first Master. Pleasant walks! for if

  He said . . ‘When I was last in Italy’ . .

  It sounded as an instrument that’s played

  Too far off for the tune–and yet it’s fine

  To listen.

  Often we walked only two,

  If cousin Romney pleased to walk with me.

  We read, or talked, or quarrelled, as it chanced;

  We were not lovers, nor even friends well-matched–

  Say rather, scholars upon different tracks,

  And thinkers disagreed; he, overfull

  Of what is, and I, haply, overbold

  For what might be.

  But then the thrushes sang,

  And shook my pulses and the elms’ new leaves,–

  And then I turned, and held my finger up,

  And bade him mark that, howsoe’er the world

  Went ill, as he related, certainly

  The thrushes still sang in it.–At which word

  His brow would soften,–and he bore with me

  In melancholy patience, not unkind,

  While, breaking into voluble ecstasy,

  I flattered all the beauteous country round,

  As poets use . . .the skies, the clouds, the fields,

  The happy violets hiding from the roads

  The primroses run down to, carrying gold,–

  The tangled hedgerows, where the cows push out

  Impatient horns and tolerant churning mouths

  ‘Twixt dripping ash-boughs,–hedgerows all alive

  With birds and gnats and large white butterflies

  Which look as if the May-flower had sought life

  And palpitated forth upon the wind,–

  Hills, vales, woods, netted in a silver mist,

  Farms, granges, doubled up among the hills,

  And cattle grazing in the watered vales,

  And cottage-chimneys smoking from the woods,

  And cottage-gardens smelling everywhere,

  Confused with smell of orchards. ‘See,’ I said,

  ‘And see! is God not with us on the earth?

  And shall we put Him down by aught we do?

  Who says there’s nothing for the poor and vile

  Save poverty and wickedness? behold!’

  And ankle-deep in English grass I leaped,

  And clapped my hands, and called all very fair.

  In the beginning when God called all good,

  Even then, was evil near us, it is writ.

  But we, indeed, who call things good and fair,

  The evil is upon us while we speak;

  Deliver us from evil, let us pray.

  List of Poems in Alphabetical Order

  List of Poets in Alphabetical Order

  Edward Fitzgerald

  List of Poems in Alphabetical Order

  List of Poets in Alphabetical Order

  Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam of Naishapur

  Second Edition

  Edward Fitzgerald (1809–1883)

  I

  WAKE! For the Sun behind yon Eastern height

  Has chased the Session of the Stars from Night;

  And to the field of Heav’n ascending, strikes

  The Sulta´n’s Turret with a Shaft of Light.

  II

  Before the phantom of False morning died, 5

  Methought a Voice within the Tavern cried,

  “When all the Temple is prepared within,

  Why lags the drowsy Worshipper outside?”

  III

  And, as the Cock crew, those who stood before

  The Tavern shouted— “Open then the Door! 10

  You know how little while we have to stay,

  And, once departed, may return no more.”

  IV

  Now the New Year reviving old Desires,

  The thoughtful Soul to Solitude retires,

  Where the WHITE HAND OF MOSES on the Bough 15

  Puts out, and Jesus from the Ground suspires.

  V

  Iram indeed is gone with all his Rose,

  And Jamshy´d’s Sev’n-ring’d Cup where no one knows;

  But still a Ruby gushes from the Vine,

  And many a Garden by the Water blows. 20

  VI

  And David’s lips are lockt; but in divine

  High-piping Pe´hlevi, with “Wine! Wine! Wine!

  Red Wine!” — the Nightingale cries to the Rose

  That sallow cheek of hers to incarnadine.

  VII

  Come, fill the Cup, and in the fire of Spring 25

  Your Winter-garment of Repentance fling:

  The Bird of Time has but a little way

  To flutter — and the Bird is on the Wing.

  VIII

  Whether at Naisha´pu´r or Babylon,

  Whether the Cup with sweet or bitter run, 30

  The Wine of Life keeps oozing drop by drop,

  The Leaves of Life keep falling one by one.

  IX

  Morning a thousand Roses brings, you say;

  Yes, but where leaves the Rose of Yesterday?

  And this first Summer month that brings the Rose 35

  Shall take Jamshy´d and Kaikoba´d away.

  X

  Well, let it take them! What have we to do

  With Kaikoba´d the Great, or Kaikhosru´?

  Let Rustum cry “To Battle!” as he likes,

  Or Ha´tim Tai “To supper!” — heed not you. 40

  XI

  With me along the strip of Herbage strown

  That just divides the desert from the sown,

  Where name of Slave and Sulta´n is forgot —

  And Peace to Ma´hmu´d on his golden Throne!

  XII

  Here with a little Bread beneath the Bough, 45

  A Flask of Wine, a Book of Verse — and Thou

  Beside me singing in the Wilderness —

  Oh, Wilderness were Paradise enow!

  XIII

  Some for the Glories of This World; and some

  Sigh for the Prophet’s Paradise to come; 50

  Ah, take the Cash, and let the Promise go,

  Nor heed the music of a distant Drum!

  XIV

  Were it not Folly, Spider-like to spin

  The Thread of present Life away to win —

  What? for ourselves, who know not if we shall 55

  Breathe out the very Breath we now breathe in!

  XV

  Look to the blowing Rose about us— “Lo,

  Laughing,” she says, “into the world I blow,

  At once the silken tassel of my Purse

  Tear, and its Treasure on the Garden throw.” 60

  XVI

  For those who husbanded the Golden grain,

  And those who flung it to the winds like Rain,

  Alike to no such aureate Earth are turn’d

  As, buried once, Men want dug up again.

  XVII

  The Wo
rldly Hope men set their Hearts upon 65

  Turns Ashes — or it prospers; and anon,

  Like Snow upon the Desert’s dusty Face,

  Lighting a little hour or two — was gone.

  XVIII

  Think, in this batter’d Caravanserai

  Whose Portals are alternate Night and Day, 70

  How Sulta´n after Sulta´n with his Pomp

  Abode his destined Hour, and went his way.

  XIX

  They say the Lion and the Lizard keep

  The Courts where Jamshy´d gloried and drank deep:

  And Bahra´m, that great Hunter — the Wild Ass 75

  Stamps o’er his Head, but cannot break his Sleep.

  XX

  The Palace that to Heav’n his pillars threw,

  And Kings the forehead on his threshold drew —

  I saw the solitary Ringdove there,

  And “Coo, coo, coo,” she cried; and “Coo, coo, coo.” 80

  XXI

  Ah, my Belove´d, fill the Cup that clears

  TO-DAY of past Regret and Future Fears:

  To-morrow! — Why, To-morrow I may be

  Myself with Yesterday’s Sev’n thousand Years.

  XXII

  For some we loved, the loveliest and the best 85

  That from his Vintage rolling Time has prest,

  Have drunk their Cup a Round or two before,

  And one by one crept silently to rest.

  XXIII

  And we, that now make merry in the Room

  They left, and Summer dresses in new bloom, 90

  Ourselves must we beneath the Couch of Earth

  Descend — ourselves to make a Couch — for whom?

  XXIV

  I sometimes think that never blows so red

  The Rose as where some buried Cæsar bled;

  That every Hyacinth the Garden wears 95

  Dropt in her Lap from some once lovely Head.

  XXV

  And this delightful Herb whose living Green

  Fledges the River’s Lip on which we lean —