The Welsh Marches poem – A. E. Housman
High the vanes of Shrewsbury gleam Islanded in Severn stream; The bridges from the steepled crest Cross the water east and west. The flag of morn in conqueror’s state Enters at the English gate: The vanquished eve, as night prevails, Bleeds upon the road to Wales. Ages since the vanquished bled Round my mother’s marriage-bed; […]
The Welsh Marches poem – A. E. Housman
High the vanes of Shrewsbury gleam Islanded in Severn stream; The bridges from the steepled crest Cross the water east and west. The flag of morn in conqueror’s state Enters at the English gate: The vanquished eve, as night prevails, Bleeds upon the road to Wales. Ages since the vanquished bled Round my mother’s marriage-bed; […]
The True Lover poem – A. E. Housman
The lad came to the door at night, When lovers crown their vows, And whistled soft and out of sight In shadow of the boughs. “I shall not vex you with my face Henceforth, my love, for aye; So take me in your arms a space Before the cast is grey. “When I from hence […]
The Street Sounds to the Soldiers’ Tread poem – A. E. Housman
The street sounds to the soldiers’ tread, And out we troop to see: A single redcoat turns his head, He turns and looks at me. My man, from sky to sky’s so far, We never crossed before; Such leagues apart the world’s ends are, We’re like to meet no more; What thoughts at heart have […]
The Stinging Nettle poem – A. E. Housman
The stinging nettle only Will still be found to stand: The numberless, the lonely, The thronger of the land, The leaf that hurts the hand. That thrives, come sun, come showers; Blow east, blow west, it springs; It peoples towns, and towers Above the courts of Kings, And touch it and it stings. Alfred […]
The Stinging Nettle poem – A. E. Housman
The stinging nettle only Will still be found to stand: The numberless, the lonely, The thronger of the land, The leaf that hurts the hand. That thrives, come sun, come showers; Blow east, blow west, it springs; It peoples towns, and towers Above the courts of Kings, And touch it and it stings. Alfred […]
The Recruit poem – A. E. Housman
Leave your home behind, lad, And reach your friends your hand, And go, and luck go with you While Ludlow tower shall stand. Oh, come you home of Sunday When Ludlow streets are still And Ludlow bells are calling To farm and lane and mill, Or come you home of Monday When Ludlow market hums […]
The Recruit poem – A. E. Housman
Leave your home behind, lad, And reach your friends your hand, And go, and luck go with you While Ludlow tower shall stand. Oh, come you home of Sunday When Ludlow streets are still And Ludlow bells are calling To farm and lane and mill, Or come you home of Monday When Ludlow market hums […]
The rainy Pleiads wester poem – A. E. Housman
The rainy Pleiads wester, Orion plunges prone, The stroke of midnight ceases And I lie down alone. The rainy Pleiads wester, And seek beyond the sea The head that I shall dream of That will not dream of me. Alfred Edward HousemanAlfred Edward Housman (1859-1936) was an English classical scholar and poet. His cycle […]
The rainy Pleiads wester poem – A. E. Housman
The rainy Pleiads wester, Orion plunges prone, The stroke of midnight ceases And I lie down alone. The rainy Pleiads wester, And seek beyond the sea The head that I shall dream of That will not dream of me. Alfred Edward HousemanAlfred Edward Housman (1859-1936) was an English classical scholar and poet. His cycle […]
The Merry Guide poem – A. E. Housman
Once in the wind of morning I ranged the thymy wold; The world-wide air was azure And all the brooks ran gold. There through the dews beside me Behold a youth that trod, With feathered cap on forehead, And poised a golden rod. With mien to match the morning And gay delightful guise And friendly […]
The Lent Lily poem – A. E. Housman
‘Tis spring; come out to ramble The hilly brakes around, For under thorn and bramble About the hollow ground The primroses are found. And there’s the windflower chilly With all the winds at play, And there’s the Lenten lily That has not long to stay And dies on Easter day. And since till girls go […]
The Laws of God, The Laws of Man poem – A. E. Housman
The laws of God, the laws of man, He may keep that will and can; Not I: let God and man decree Laws for themselves and not for me; And if my ways are not as theirs Let them mind their own affairs. Their deeds I judge and much condemn, Yet when did I make […]
The Lads in Their Hundreds poem – A. E. Housman
The lads in their hundreds to Ludlow come in for the fair, There’s men from the barn and the forge and the mill and the fold, The lads for the girls and the lads for the liquor are there, And there with the rest are the lads that will never be old. There’s chaps from […]
The Lads in Their Hundreds poem – A. E. Housman
The lads in their hundreds to Ludlow come in for the fair, There’s men from the barn and the forge and the mill and the fold, The lads for the girls and the lads for the liquor are there, And there with the rest are the lads that will never be old. There’s chaps from […]
The Isle Of Portland poem – A. E. Housman
The star-filled seas are smooth tonight From France to England strown; Black towers above Portland light The felon-quarried stone. On yonder island; not to rise, Never to stir forth free, Far from his folk a dead lad lies That once was friends with me. Lie you easy, dream you light, And sleep you fast for […]
The Immortal Part poem – A. E. Housman
When I meet the morning beam, Or lay me down at night to dream, I hear my bones within me say, “Another night, another day. “When shall this slough of sense be cast, This dust of thoughts be laid at last, The man of flesh and soul be slain And the man of bone remain? […]
The Immortal Part poem – A. E. Housman
When I meet the morning beam, Or lay me down at night to dream, I hear my bones within me say, “Another night, another day. “When shall this slough of sense be cast, This dust of thoughts be laid at last, The man of flesh and soul be slain And the man of bone remain? […]
The Grizzly Bear poem – A. E. Housman
The Grizzly Bear is huge and wild It has devoured the little child. The little child is unaware It has been eaten by the bear. Alfred Edward HousemanAlfred Edward Housman (1859-1936) was an English classical scholar and poet. His cycle of poems, A Shropshire Lad, wistfully evokes the constraints and limited choices of youth […]
The Fairies Break Their Dances poem – A. E. Housman
The fairies break their dances And leave the printed lawn, And up from India glances The silver sail of dawn. The candles burn their sockets, The blinds let through the day, The young man feels his pockets And wonders what’s to pay. Alfred Edward HousemanAlfred Edward Housman (1859-1936) was an English classical scholar and […]
The Chestnut Casts His Flambeaux poem – A. E. Housman
The chestnut casts his flambeaux, and the flowers Stream from the hawthorn on the wind away, The doors clap to, the pane is blind with showers. Pass me the can, lad; there’s an end of May. There’s one spoilt spring to scant our mortal lot, One season ruined of your little store. May will be […]
Tell me not here, it needs not saying poem – Alfred Edward Housman
Tell me not here, it needs not saying, What tune the enchantress plays In aftermaths of soft September Or under blanching mays, For she and I were long acquainted And I knew all her ways. On russet floors, by waters idle, The pine lets fall its cone; The cuckoo shouts all day at nothing In […]
Tell me not here, it needs not saying poem – Alfred Edward Housman
Tell me not here, it needs not saying, What tune the enchantress plays In aftermaths of soft September Or under blanching mays, For she and I were long acquainted And I knew all her ways. On russet floors, by waters idle, The pine lets fall its cone; The cuckoo shouts all day at nothing In […]
Shot? So Quick, So Clean an Ending? poem – A. E. Housman
Shot? so quick, so clean an ending? Oh that was right, lad, that was brave: Yours was not an ill for mending, ‘Twas best to take it to the grave. Oh you had forethought, you could reason, And saw your road and where it led, And early wise and brave in season Put the pistol […]
Shot? So Quick, So Clean an Ending? poem – A. E. Housman
Shot? so quick, so clean an ending? Oh that was right, lad, that was brave: Yours was not an ill for mending, ‘Twas best to take it to the grave. Oh you had forethought, you could reason, And saw your road and where it led, And early wise and brave in season Put the pistol […]
Say, Lad, Have You Things to Do? poem – A. E. Housman
Say, lad, have you things to do? Quick then, while your day’s at prime. Quick, and if ’tis work for two, Here am I man: now’s your time. Send me now, and I shall go; Call me, I shall hear you call; Use me ere they lay me low Where a man’s no use at […]
Say, Lad, Have You Things to Do? poem – A. E. Housman
Say, lad, have you things to do? Quick then, while your day’s at prime. Quick, and if ’tis work for two, Here am I man: now’s your time. Send me now, and I shall go; Call me, I shall hear you call; Use me ere they lay me low Where a man’s no use at […]
Reveille poem – A. E. Housman
Wake: the silver dusk returning Up the beach of darkness brims, And the ship of sunrise burning Strands upon the eastern rims. Wake: the vaulted shadow shatters, Trampled to the floor it spanned, And the tent of night in tatters Straws the sky-pavilioned land. Up, lad, up, ’tis late for lying: Hear the drums of […]
Others, I Am Not the First poem – A. E. Housman
Others, I am not the first, Have willed more mischief than they durst: If in the breathless night I too Shiver now, ’tis nothing new. More than I, if truth were told, Have stood and sweated hot and cold, And through their reins in ice and fire Fear contended with desire. Agued once like me […]
Others, I Am Not the First poem – A. E. Housman
Others, I am not the first, Have willed more mischief than they durst: If in the breathless night I too Shiver now, ’tis nothing new. More than I, if truth were told, Have stood and sweated hot and cold, And through their reins in ice and fire Fear contended with desire. Agued once like me […]
On Your Midnight Pallet Lying poem – A. E. Housman
On your midnight pallet lying, Listen, and undo the door: Lads that waste the light in sighing In the dark should sigh no more; Night should ease a lover’s sorrow; Therefore, since I go to-morrow, Pity me before. In the land to which I travel, The far dwelling, let me say– Once, if here the […]
On Your Midnight Pallet Lying poem – A. E. Housman
On your midnight pallet lying, Listen, and undo the door: Lads that waste the light in sighing In the dark should sigh no more; Night should ease a lover’s sorrow; Therefore, since I go to-morrow, Pity me before. In the land to which I travel, The far dwelling, let me say– Once, if here the […]
On Wenlock Edge The Wood’s In Trouble poem – A. E. Housman
On Wenlock Edge the wood’s in trouble; His forest fleece the Wrekin heaves; The gale, it plies the saplings double, And thick on Severn snow the leaves. ‘Twould blow like this through holt and hanger When Uricon the city stood; ‘Tis the old wind in the old anger, But then it threshed another wood. Then, […]
On Wenlock Edge The Wood’s In Trouble poem – A. E. Housman
On Wenlock Edge the wood’s in trouble; His forest fleece the Wrekin heaves; The gale, it plies the saplings double, And thick on Severn snow the leaves. ‘Twould blow like this through holt and hanger When Uricon the city stood; ‘Tis the old wind in the old anger, But then it threshed another wood. Then, […]
On the Idle Hill of Summer poem – A. E. Housman
On the idle hill of summer, Sleepy with the flow of streams, Far I hear the steady drummer Drumming like a noise in dreams. Far and near and low and louder On the roads of earth go by, Dear to friends and food for powder, Soldiers marching, all to die. East and west on fields […]
On Moonlit Heath and Lonesome Bank poem – A. E. Housman
On moonlit heath and lonesome bank The sheep beside me graze; And yon the gallows used to clank Fast by the four cross ways. A careless shepherd once would keep The flocks by moonlight there, * And high amongst the glimmering sheep The dead man stood on air. They hang us now in Shrewsbury jail: […]
On Moonlit Heath and Lonesome Bank poem – A. E. Housman
On moonlit heath and lonesome bank The sheep beside me graze; And yon the gallows used to clank Fast by the four cross ways. A careless shepherd once would keep The flocks by moonlight there, * And high amongst the glimmering sheep The dead man stood on air. They hang us now in Shrewsbury jail: […]
Oh Who Is That Young Sinner poem – A. E. Housman
Oh who is that young sinner with the handcuffs on his wrists? And what has he been after that they groan and shake their fists? And wherefore is he wearing such a conscience-stricken air? Oh they’re taking him to prison for the color of his hair. ‘Tis a shame to human nature, such a head […]
Oh, when I was in love with you poem – A. E. Housman
Oh, when I was in love with you, Then I was clean and brave, And miles around the wonder grew How well did I behave. And now the fancy passes by, And nothing will remain, And miles around they’ll say that I Am quite myself again. Alfred Edward HousemanAlfred Edward Housman (1859-1936) was an […]
Oh Stay At Home, My Lad poem – A. E. Housman
Oh stay at home, my lad, and plough The land and not the sea, And leave the soldiers at their drill, And all about the idle hill Shepherd your sheep with me. Oh stay with company and mirth And daylight and the air; Too full already is the grave Of fellows that were good and […]