Gus: The Theatre Cat by T. S. Eliot
Gus is the Cat at the Theatre Door. His name, as I ought to have told you before, Is really Asparagus. That’s such a fuss To pronounce, that we usually call him just Gus. His coat’s very shabby, he’s thin as a rake, And he suffers from palsy that makes his paw shake. Yet he […]
Growltiger’s Last Stand by T. S. Eliot
GROWLTIGER was a Bravo Cat, who lived upon a barge; In fact he was the roughest cat that ever roamed at large. From Gravesend up to Oxford he pursued his evil aims, Rejoicing in his title of “The Terror of the Thames.” His manners and appearance did not calculate to please; His coat was torn […]
Gerontion by T. S. Eliot
Thou hast nor youth nor age But as it were an after dinner sleep Dreaming of both. HERE I am, an old man in a dry month, Being read to by a boy, waiting for rain. I was neither at the hot gates Nor fought in the warm rain Nor knee deep in the salt […]
Four Quartets 4: Little Gidding by T. S. Eliot
I Midwinter spring is its own season Sempiternal though sodden towards sundown, Suspended in time, between pole and tropic. When the short day is brightest, with frost and fire, The brief sun flames the ice, on pond and ditches, In windless cold that is the heart’s heat, Reflecting in a watery mirror A glare that […]
Four Quartets 3: The Dry Salvages by T. S. Eliot
(The Dry Salvages—presumably les trois sauvages—is a small group of rocks, with a beacon, off the N.E. coast of Cape Ann, Massachusetts. Salvages is pronounced to rhyme with assuages. Groaner: a whistling buoy.) I I do not know much about gods; but I think that the river Is a strong brown god—sullen, untamed and intractable, […]
Four Quartets 2: East Coker by T. S. Eliot
I In my beginning is my end. In succession Houses rise and fall, crumble, are extended, Are removed, destroyed, restored, or in their place Is an open field, or a factory, or a by-pass. Old stone to new building, old timber to new fires, Old fires to ashes, and ashes to the earth Which is […]
Four Quartets 1: Burnt Norton by T. S. Eliot
I Time present and time past Are both perhaps present in time future, And time future contained in time past. If all time is eternally present All time is unredeemable. What might have been is an abstraction Remaining a perpetual possibility Only in a world of speculation. What might have been and what has been […]
Dans le Restaurant by T. S. Eliot
LE garçon délabré qui n’a rien à faire Que de se gratter les doigts et se pencher sur mon épaule: “Dans mon pays il fera temps pluvieux, Du vent, du grand soleil, et de la pluie; C’est ce qu’on appelle le jour de lessive des gueux.” (Bavard, baveux, à la croupe arrondie, Je te prie, […]
Cousin Nancy by T. S. Eliot
MISS NANCY ELLICOTT Strode across the hills and broke them, Rode across the hills and broke them— The barren New England hills— Riding to hounds Over the cow-pasture. Miss Nancy Ellicott smoked And danced all the modern dances; And her aunts were not quite sure how they felt about it, But they knew that it […]
Conversation Galante by T. S. Eliot
I OBSERVE: “Our sentimental friend the moon! Or possibly (fantastic, I confess) It may be Prester John’s balloon Or an old battered lantern hung aloft To light poor travellers to their distress.” She then: “How you digress!” And I then: “Someone frames upon the keys That exquisite nocturne, with which we explain The night and […]
Bustopher Jones: The Cat About Town by T. S. Eliot
Bustopher Jones is not skin and bones– In fact, he’s remarkably fat. He doesn’t haunt pubs–he has eight or nine clubs, For he’s the St. James’s Street Cat! He’s the Cat we all greet as he walks down the street In his coat of fastidious black: No commonplace mousers have such well-cut trousers Or such […]
Burbank with a Baedeker: Bleistein with a Cigar by T. S. Eliot
Tra-la-la-la-la-la-laire—nil nisi divinum stabile est; caetera fumus—the gondola stopped, the old palace was there, how charming its grey and pink—goats and monkeys, with such hair too!—so the countess passed on until she came through the little park, where Niobe presented her with a cabinet, and so departed. BURBANK crossed a little bridge Descending at a […]
Aunt Helen by T. S. Eliot
MISS HELEN SLINGSBY was my maiden aunt, And lived in a small house near a fashionable square Cared for by servants to the number of four. Now when she died there was silence in heaven And silence at her end of the street. The shutters were drawn and the undertaker wiped his feet— He was […]
Ash Wednesday by T. S. Eliot
I Because I do not hope to turn again Because I do not hope Because I do not hope to turn Desiring this man’s gift and that man’s scope I no longer strive to strive towards such things (Why should the agèd eagle stretch its wings?) Why should I mourn The vanished power of the […]
A Cooking Egg by T. S. Eliot
En l’an trentiesme do mon aage Que toutes mes hontes j’ay beues… PIPIT sate upright in her chair Some distance from where I was sitting; Views of the Oxford Colleges Lay on the table, with the knitting. Daguerreotypes and silhouettes, Here grandfather and great great aunts, Supported on the mantelpiece An Invitation to the Dance. […]
Specula by Thomas Edward Brown
Specula by Thomas Edward Brown When He appoints to meet thee, go thou forth— It matters not If south or north, Bleak waste or sunny plot. Nor think, if haply He thou seek’st be late, He does thee wrong. To stile or gate Lean thou thy head, and long! It may be that to spy […]
Salve! by Thomas Edward Brown
Salve! by Thomas Edward Brown TO live within a cave–it is most good; But, if God make a day, And some one come, and say, ‘Lo! I have gather’d faggots in the wood!’ E’en let him stay, And light a fire, and fan a temporal mood! So sit till morning! when the light is grown […]
Risus Dei by Thomas Edward Brown
Risus Dei by Thomas Edward Brown Methinks in Him there dwells alway A sea of laughter very deep, Where the leviathans leap, And little children play, Their white feet twinkling on its crisped edge; But in the outer bay The strong man drives the wedge Of polished limbs, And swims. Yet there is one will […]
Pain by Thomas Edward Brown
Pain by Thomas Edward Brown The Man that hath great griefs I pity not; ’Tis something to be great In any wise, and hint the larger state, Though but in shadow of a shade, God wot! Moreover, while we wait the possible, This man has touched the fact, And probed till he has felt the […]
Opifex by Thomas Edward Brown
Opifex by Thomas Edward Brown As I was carving images from clouds, And tinting them with soft ethereal dyes Pressed from the pulp of dreams, one comes, and cries:– “Forbear!” and all my heaven with gloom enshrouds. “Forbear!” Thou hast no tools wherewith to essay The delicate waves of that elusive grain: Wouldst have due […]
My Garden by Thomas Edward Brown
My Garden by Thomas Edward Brown A garden is a lovesome thing, God wot! Rose plot, Fringed pool, Ferned grot– The veriest school Of peace; and yet the fool Contends that God is not– Not God! in gardens! when the eve is cool? Nay, but I have a sign; ‘Tis very sure God walks in […]
Land, Ho! by Thomas Edward Brown
Land, Ho! by Thomas Edward Brown I know ’tis but a loom of land, Yet is it land, and so I will rejoice, I know I cannot hear His voice Upon the shore, nor see Him stand; Yet is it land, ho! land. The land! the land! the lovely land! ‘Far off,’ dost say? Far […]
Jessie by Thomas Edward Brown
Jessie by Thomas Edward Brown WHEN Jessie comes with her soft breast, And yields the golden keys, Then is it as if God caress’d Twin babes upon His knees– Twin babes that, each to other press’d, Just feel the Father’s arms, wherewith they both are bless’d. But when I think if we must part, And […]
If Thou Could’st Empty All Thyself Of Self by Thomas Edward Brown
If Thou Could’st Empty All Thyself Of Self by Thomas Edward Brown If thou could’st empty all thyself of self, Like to a shell dishabited, Then might He find thee on the ocean shelf, And say, “This is not dead,” And fill thee with Himself instead. But thou are all replete with very thou And […]
Ibant Obscur? by Thomas Edward Brown
Ibant Obscur? by Thomas Edward Brown To-night I saw three maidens on the beach, Dark-robed descending to the sea, So slow, so silent of all speech, And visible to me Only by that strange drift-light, dim, forlorn, Of the sun’s wreck and clashing surges born. Each after other went, And they were gathered to his […]
I bended unto me a Bough by Thomas Edward Brown
I bended unto me a Bough by Thomas Edward Brown I bended unto me a bough of May, That I might see and smell: It bore it in a sort of way, It bore it very well. But, when I let it backward sway, Then it were hard to tell With what a toss, with […]
Dora by Thomas Edward Brown
Dora by Thomas Edward Brown SHE knelt upon her brother’s grave, My little girl of six years old– He used to be so good and brave, The sweetest lamb of all our fold; He used to shout, he used to sing, Of all our tribe the little king– And so unto the turf her ear […]
Disguises by Thomas Edward Brown
Disguises by Thomas Edward Brown High stretched upon the swinging yard, I gather in the sheet; But it is hard And stiff, and one cries haste. Then He that is most dear in my regard Of all the crew gives aidance meet; But from His hands, and from His feet, A glory spreads wherewith the […]
Time of Roses by Thomas Hood
Time of Roses by Thomas Hood It was not in the Winter Our loving lot was cast; It was the time of roses— We pluck’d them as we pass’d! That churlish season never frown’d On early lovers yet: O no—the world was newly crown’d With flowers when first we met! ‘Twas twilight, and I bade […]
Tim Turpin by Thomas Hood
Tim Turpin by Thomas Hood Tim Turpin he was gravel-blind, And ne’er had seen the skies : For Nature, when his head was made, Forgot to dot his eyes. So, like a Christmas pedagogue, Poor Tim was forced to do – Look out for pupils; for he had A vacancy for two. There’s some have […]
The World is with Me by Thomas Hood
The World is with Me by Thomas Hood The world is with me, and its many cares, Its woes–its wants–the anxious hopes and fears That wait on all terrestrial affairs– The shades of former and of future years– Forboding fancies and prophetic tears, Quelling a spirit that was once elate. Heavens! what a wilderness the […]
The Sun Was Slumbering in the West by Thomas Hood
The Sun Was Slumbering in the West by Thomas Hood The sun was slumbering in the West, My daily labors past; On Anna’s soft and gentle breast My head reclined at last; The darkness closed around, so dear To fond congenial souls, And thus she murmur’d at my ear, “My love, we’re out of coals! […]
The Song of the Shirt by Thomas Hood
The Song of the Shirt by Thomas Hood With fingers weary and worn, With eyelids heavy and red, A woman sat, in unwomanly rags, Plying her needle and thread– Stitch! stitch! stitch! In poverty, hunger, and dirt, And still with a voice of dolorous pitch She sang the “Song of the Shirt.” “Work! work! work! […]
The Haunted House by Thomas Hood
The Haunted House by Thomas Hood Oh, very gloomy is the house of woe, Where tears are falling while the bell is knelling, With all the dark solemnities that show That Death is in the dwelling! Oh, very, very dreary is the room Where Love, domestic Love, no longer nestles, But smitten by the common […]
The Dream of Eugene Aram by Thomas Hood
The Dream of Eugene Aram by Thomas Hood ‘Twas in the prime of summer-time An evening calm and cool, And four-and-twenty happy boys Came bounding out of school: There were some that ran and some that leapt, Like troutlets in a pool. Away they sped with gamesome minds, And souls untouched by sin; To a […]
The Death Bed by Thomas Hood
The Death Bed by Thomas Hood We watch’d her breathing thro’ the night, Her breathing soft and low, As in her breast the wave of life Kept heaving to and fro. But when the morn came dim and sad And chill with early showers, Her queit eyelids closed; she had Another morn than ours. ————— […]
The Bridge of Sighs by Thomas Hood
The Bridge of Sighs by Thomas Hood One more Unfortunate, Weary of breath, Rashly importunate, Gone to her death! Take her up tenderly, Lift her with care; Fashion’d so slenderly Young, and so fair! Look at her garments Clinging like cerements; Whilst the wave constantly Drips from her clothing; Take her up instantly, Loving, not […]
Silence by Thomas Hood
Silence by Thomas Hood There is a silence where hath been no sound, There is a silence where no sound may be, In the cold grave—under the deep, deep sea, Or in wide desert where no life is found, Which hath been mute, and still must sleep profound; No voice is hush’d—no life treads silently, […]
Ruth by Thomas Hood
Ruth by Thomas Hood She stood breast-high amid the corn, Clasp’d by the golden light of morn, Like the sweetheart of the sun, Who many a glowing kiss had won. On her cheek an autumn flush, Deeply ripen’d;—such a blush In the midst of brown was born, Like red poppies grown with corn. Round her […]
Past and Present by Thomas Hood
Past and Present by Thomas Hood I remember, I remember The house where I was born, The little window where the sun Came peeping in at morn; He never came a wink too soon Nor bought too long a day; But now, I often wish the night Had borne my breath away. I remember, I […]