The Pleasure of Princes

What pleasures have great princes? These: to know

Themselves reputed mad with pride or power;

To speak few words — few words and short bring low

This ancient house, that city with flame devour;

To make old men, their father’s enemies,

Drunk on the vintage of the former age;

To have great painters show their mistresses

Naked to the succeeding time; engage

The cunning of able, treacherous ministers

To serve, despite themselves, the cause they hate,

And leave a prosperous kingdom to their heirs

Nursed by the caterpillars of the state;

To keep their spies in good men’s hearts; to read

The malice of the wise, and act betimes;

To hear the Grand Remonstrances of greed

Led by the pure; cheat justice of her crimes;

To beget worthless sons and, being old,

By starlight climb the battlements, and while

The pacing sentry hugs himself for cold,

Keep vigil like a lover, muse and smile,

And think, to see from the grim castle steep

The midnight city below rejoice and shine:

“There my great demon grumbles in his sleep

And dreams of his destruction, and of mine.”

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 

• Time’s Defence poem – Alfred Austin by Alfred Austin
• Through Liberty To Light poem – Alfred Austin by Alfred Austin
• Three Sonnets Written In Mid-Channel poem – Alfred Austin by Alfred Austin
• Though All The World poem – Alfred Austin by Alfred Austin
• The Wind Speaks poem – Alfred Austin by Alfred Austin
• The White Pall Of Peace poem – Alfred Austin by Alfred Austin
• The Spring-Time, O The Spring–Time poem – Alfred Austin by Alfred Austin
• “`The smiling slopes with olive groves bedecked” poem – Alfred Austin by Alfred Austin
• The Silent Muse poem – Alfred Austin by Alfred Austin
• The Season poem – Alfred Austin by Alfred Austin
• The Reply Of Q. Horatius Flaccus To A Roman “Round-Robin” poem – Alfred Austin by Alfred Austin
• The Poet And The Muse poem – Alfred Austin by Alfred Austin
• The Passing Of The Primroses poem – Alfred Austin by Alfred Austin
• The Passing Of The Century poem – Alfred Austin by Alfred Austin
• The Passing Of Spring poem – Alfred Austin by Alfred Austin
• The Owl And The Lark poem – Alfred Austin by Alfred Austin
• The Old Land And The Young Land poem – Alfred Austin by Alfred Austin
• The Lover’s Song poem – Alfred Austin by Alfred Austin
• The Last Redoubt poem – Alfred Austin by Alfred Austin
• “The lark confinèd in his cage” poem – Alfred Austin by Alfred Austin

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