Looking Fire

The snow falls soft and thick. My cedar bough

Sways up and down, and scratches on the glass.

The wind sighs in the chimney, as I sit,

With elbows on my knees, before the fire,

Resting a crumpled chin in hollow’d palms.

There is great trouble in the cold and dark;

And other girls shrink off and steal away,

To crouch in lonely rooms and look at fires,

And look at their dead joys and living griefs,-

But they are pitied. None would pity me.

Friends come to seek them, and lay tender hands

On their bow’d heads and sore and restless hearts.

They find the wound, and drop the healing oil;

They lift the burden off, or make it light.

But they would smile, unless they laugh’d, at mine.

O still, warm fire, you will not bubble up

In mocking flames,-your heart will soon be cold!

O wind-for you have seen the roses bloom,

And the shrunk petals fall and drift away-

You hear, and sob and sigh as you go past!

Is unrequited love so sad a thing?

Ay, ay,-but this is even sadder still;

To want to love, and not to have the power-

To meet your king at last with empty hands-

To be so young, and to have squander’d all!

Alas, alas! to know your wine is sour-

To have loved wrong, with love despoil’d of trust,

Dishonour’d love, that mix’d itself with hate,-

To see the pearl of price laid at your feet,

And know your wealth is gone for dross and lies!

Ay, ’tis the saddest thing to want to love,

To want to cling, when you have lost your strength-

To feel the ashes choking up the hearth,

And think how bright a fire there might have been,-

To know when you are loved, too late-too late!

Poetry Monster – Home

A few random poems:

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 

• An Epistle To Robert Lloyd, Esq. by William Cowper by William Cowper
• An Epistle To Joseph Hill, Esq. by William Cowper by William Cowper
• An Epigram From Homer by William Cowper by William Cowper
• An Enigma by William Cowper by William Cowper
• An Attempt At The Manner Of Waller by William Cowper by William Cowper
• An Apology For Not Showing Her What I Had Wrote by William Cowper by William Cowper
• Addressed To Miss Macartney, Afterwards Mrs. Greville, On Reading The Prayer For Indifference by William Cowper by William Cowper
• Adam: A Sacred Drama. Act 5. by William Cowper by William Cowper
• Adam: A Sacred Drama. Act 4. by William Cowper by William Cowper
• Adam: A Sacred Drama. Act 3. by William Cowper by William Cowper
• Adam: A Sacred Drama. Act 2. by William Cowper by William Cowper
• Adam: A Sacred Drama. Act 1. by William Cowper by William Cowper
• A Tale. June 1793 by William Cowper by William Cowper
• A Tale, Founded On A Fact, Which Happened In January, 1779 by William Cowper by William Cowper
• A Song : The Sparkling Eye by William Cowper by William Cowper
• A Song : On The Green Margin by William Cowper by William Cowper
• A Riddle by William Cowper by William Cowper
• A Poetical Epistle To Lady Austen by William Cowper by William Cowper
• A Manual, More Ancient Than The Art Of Printing, And Not To Be Found In Any Catalogue by William Cowper by William Cowper
• A Figurative Description Of The Procedure Of Divine Love by William Cowper by William Cowper

More external links (open in a new tab):

Russian Commerce Agency

Dealing Monster

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

Poems by Author and Category

The Poetry Repository – an online library of poems, poetry, verse and poetic works