Late, late, the prize is drawn, the goal attained,
The Heart’s Desire fulfilled, Love’s guerdon gained.
Wealth’s use is past, Fame’s crown of laurel mocks
The downward-drooping head and grizzled locks.
The end is reached-the end of toil and strife-
The end of life.
Love flowers and fades like grass, and flowers again;
The spendthrift lovers waste themselves in vain;
Their fiery passions burn out one by one,
And then, alas! when their best days are done,
Spirit and body find their perfect mate-
So late! So late!
Long-sought, long seeking, through the lonely years,
The wanderers meet to weep their useless tears
For time and chance irrevocably flown,
Dear hopes outlived and happy faiths outgrown,
Children unborn, the myriad joys unseen
That might have been.
Not for the spring and morning-time of youth
The perfect flower of slow-unfolding truth,
The perfect love, that dreams of youth foretell,
But youth knows not and youth could never tell;
That light celestial, as of sunset fires
When day expires.
Late comes the gift that crowns the hungry quest,
Like ripe wheat-harvest in a land at rest,
And comes alone, a consecrated cup,
To those proved worthy to sit down and sup.
To them-aye, aye, despite their treasure lost,
‘T’is worth the cost.
‘T’is worth the cost to reach the heights at last,
Ere eyes are dim and daylight overpast.
To see one aim achieved, one dream fulfilled,
Ere striving brain and trusting heart are stilled.
To live one glorious hour-its price of pain
Is never paid in vain.
A few random poems:
- Gorgeous Surfaces by Thomas Lux
- Robert Burns: Inscription For An Altar Of Independence: At Kerroughtree, the Seat of Mr. Heron.
- Владимир Корнилов – Платформа 126-го км
- poem6474.html
- Владимир Корнилов – Яблоки
- Джон Донн – Я весь боренье, на беду мою
- Days Are Gone by Mary Etta Metcalf
- As Kingfishers Catch Fire poem – Gerard Manley Hopkins poems
- Sonnet 23 poem – John Milton poems
- The Last Department by Rudyard Kipling
- Cold Iron by Rudyard Kipling
- An Adventure in the Life of King James V of Scotland by William Topaz McGonagall
- Absolution by Siegfried Sassoon
- Ages and Ages, Returning at Intervals. by Walt Whitman
- The Passing Of The Century poem – Alfred Austin
External links
Bat’s Poetry Page – more poetry by Fledermaus
Talking Writing Monster’s Page –
Batty Writing – the bat’s idle chatter, thoughts, ideas and observations, all original, all fresh
Poems in English
- Sonnet CXXX: My mistress’ eyes are nothing like the sun by William Shakespeare
- Sonnet CXXX by William Shakespeare
- Winter by William Shakespeare
- When to the sessions of sweet silent thought (Sonnet 30) by William Shakespeare
- When that I was and a little tiny boy by William Shakespeare
- When in disgrace with fortune and men’s eyes (Sonnet 29) by William Shakespeare
- Venus and Adonis by William Shakespeare
- Under the Greenwood Tree by William Shakespeare
- Three Songs by William Shakespeare
- The Quality of Mercy by William Shakespeare
- The Phoenix and the Turtle by William Shakespeare
- Spring in New Hampshire by William Shakespeare
- Sonnets CXVI: Let me not to the marriage of true minds by William Shakespeare
- Sonnet LXXI by William Shakespeare
- Sonnet LXX by William Shakespeare
- Sonnet LXVII by William Shakespeare
- Sonnet LXVI by William Shakespeare
- Sonnet LXV by William Shakespeare
- Sonnet LXIX by William Shakespeare
- Sonnet LXIV: When I Have Seen by Time’s Fell Hand Defac’d by William Shakespeare
More external links (open in a new tab):
Doska or the Board – write anything
Search engines:
Yandex – the best search engine for searches in Russian (and the best overall image search engine, in any language, anywhere)
Qwant – the best search engine for searches in French, German as well as Romance and Germanic languages.
Ecosia – a search engine that supposedly… plants trees
Duckduckgo – the real alternative and a search engine that actually works. Without much censorship or partisan politics.
Yahoo– yes, it’s still around, amazingly, miraculously, incredibly, but now it seems to be powered by Bing.
Parallel Translations of Poetry
The Poetry Repository – an online library of poems, poetry, verse and poetic works

Ada Cambridge (1844 – 1926), also known as Ada Cross, was an English-born Australian author and poetess. She wrote more than 25 works of fiction, three volumes of poetry and two autobiographical works.