Poems begining by F
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From The Conflict Of Convictions
© Herman Melville
_Yea and Nay--_
_Each hath his say;_
_But God He keeps the middle way._
_None was by_
_When He spread the sky;_
_Wisdom is vain, and prophecy._
Freedom in Faith
© Charles Harpur
HIS MIND alone is kingly who (though one)
But venerates of present things or past
From "Hugh Selwyn Mauberley" (June 1920)
© Ezra Pound
IV
These fought in any case,
and some believing,
pro domo, in any case
From: Dedicatory Ode
© Hilaire Belloc
I mean to write with all my strength
(It lately has been sadly waning)
A ballad of enormous length -
Some parts of which will need explaining. 1
Because (unlike the bulk of men
Who write for fame or public ends)
I turn a lax and fluent pen
To talking of my private friends. 2
For no one, in our long decline,
So dusty, spiteful and divided,
Had quite such pleasant friends as mine,
Or loved them half as much as I did.
[1 But do not think I shall explain
To any great extent. Believe me,
I partly write to give you pain,
And if you do not like me, leave me.]
[2 And least of all can you complain,
Reviewers, whose unholy trade is,
To puff with all your might and main
Biographers of single ladies.]
. . .
The Freshman ambles down the High,
In love with everything he sees,
He notes the very Midland sky,
He sniffs a more than Midland breeze.
"Can this be Oxford? This the place
(He cries) "of which my father said
The tutoring was a damned disgrace,
The creed a mummery, stuffed and dead?
"Can it be here that Uncle Paul
Was driven by excessive gloom,
To drink and debt, and, last of all,
To smoking opium in his room?
"Is it from here the people come,
Who talk so loud, and roll their eyes,
And stammer? How extremely rum!
How curious! What a great surprise!
"Some influence of a nobler day
Than theirs (I mean than Uncle Paul's)
Has roused the sleep of their decay,
And flecked with light their ancient walls.
"O! dear undaunted boys of old,
Would that your names were carven here,
For all the world in stamps of gold,
That I might read them and revere.
"Who wrought and handed down for me
This Oxford of the larger air,
Laughing, and full of faith, and free,
With youth resplendent everywhere?"
Then learn: thou ill-instructed, blind,
Young, callow, and untutored man,
Their private names were . . .3
Their club was called REPUBLICAN.
[3 Never mind.]
. . .
Where on their banks of light they lie,
The happy hills of Heaven between,
The Gods that rule the morning sky
Are not more young, nor more serene
Than were the intrepid Four that stand,
The first who dared to live their dream.
And on this uncongenial land
To found the Abbey of Theleme.
We kept the Rabelaisian plan: 4
We dignified the dainty cloisters
With Natural Law, the Rights of Man,
Song, Stoicism, Wine and Oysters.
The library was most inviting:
The books upon the crowded shelves
Were mainly of our private writing:
We kept a school and taught ourselves.
We taught the art of writing things
On men we still should like to throttle:
And where to get the Blood of Kings
At only half a crown a bottle.
[4 The plan forgot (I know not how,
Perhaps the Refectory filled it),
To put a chapel in; and now
We're mortgaging the rest to build it.]
. . .
Eheu Fugaces! Postume!
(An old quotation out of mode);
My coat of dreams is stolen away
My youth is passing down the road.
The wealth of youth, we spent it well
And decently, as very few can.
And is it lost? I cannot tell:
And what is more, I doubt if you can.
The question's very much too wide,
And much too deep, and much too hollow,
And learned men on either side
Use arguments I cannot follow.
They say that in the unchanging place,
Where all we loved is always dear,
We meet our morning face to face
And find at last our twentieth year...
They say (and I am glad they say)
It is so ; and it may be so:
It may be just the other way,
I cannot tell. But this I know:
From quiet homes and first beginning,
Out to the undiscovered ends,
There's nothing worth the wear of winning,
But laughter and the love of friends.
. . .
But something dwindles, oh! my peers,
And something cheats the heart and passes,
And Tom that meant to shake the years
Has come to merely rattling glasses.
And He, the Father of the Flock,
Is keeping Burmesans in order,
An exile on a lonely rock
That overlooks the Chinese border.
And One (Myself I mean no less),
Ah! will Posterity believe it
Not only don't deserve success,
But hasn't managed to achieve it.
Not even this peculiar town
Has ever fixed a friendship firmer,
But - one is married, one's gone down,
And one's a Don, and one's in Burmah.
. . .
And oh ! the days, the days, the days,
When all the four were off together:
The infinite deep of summer haze,
The roaring charge of autumn weather!
. . .
I will not try the reach again,
I will not set my sail alone,
To moor a boat bereft of men
At Yarnton's tiny docks of stone.
From Perugia
© John Greenleaf Whittier
HARRIET BEECHER STOWE'S Letters from Italy.
THE tall, sallow guardsmen their horsetails have spread,
Flaming out in their violet, yellow, and red;
And behind go the lackeys in crimson and buff,
Fourth Sunday After Easter
© John Keble
My Saviour, can it ever be
That I should gain by losing Thee?
For What She Had Done
© Sheldon Allan Silverstein
She had to die.
This Omoo knew.
He also knew he could not kill her.
Not even try to kill her.
Frank Little At Calvary
© Lola Ridge
Life thunders on…
Over the black bridge
The line of lighted cars
Creeps like a monstrous serpent
Spooring gold…
First Sunday In Lent
© John Keble
"Angel of wrath! why linger in mid-air,
While the devoted city's cry
Faint With Love, The Lady Of The South
© Percy Bysshe Shelley
Faint with love, the Lady of the South
Lay in the paradise of Lebanon
Under a heaven of cedar boughs: the drouth
Of love was on her lips; the light was gone
Out of her eyes--
For The Burns Centennial Celebration
© Oliver Wendell Holmes
His birthday.--Nay, we need not speak
The name each heart is beating,--
Each glistening eye and flushing cheek
In light and flame repeating!
Fragments - Lines 1337 - 1340
© Theognis of Megara
No longer do I love a boy. I have kicked aside harsh torments;
From grievous hardships I have gladly escaped;
I am set loose from longing by fair-wreathed Kythereia.
As for you, my boy, you have no attractiveness in my eyes.
For The Same Book ( To Louisa C, For Her Album)
© John Kenyon
With all its best of sense and wit
Each Album's earlier leaves are writ;
No pagebut Love and Friendship on it
Shower dainty prose and perfumed sonnet;
While not one troubling thought comes nigh
Of future dearth and vacancy.
From Tuscan Came My Lady's Worthy Race
© Henry Howard
From Tuscan came my lady's worthy race;
Fair Florence was sometime her ancient seat.
From 'The Cupboard' (Le buffet)
© Arthur Rimbaud
A large carved cupboard of white oak
emanates that relaxed gentle air
Old people have; open, it's kindly
shadows give off fragrances like fine
Freedom's Star
© Anonymous
On thee he depends when he threads the dark woods
Ere the bloodhounds have hunted him back;
Thou leadest him on over mountains and floods,
With thy beams shining full on his track.
Shine on, &c.
Fragment V
© James Macpherson
Dargo the mighty came on, like a
cloud of thunder. His brows were contracted
and dark. His eyes like two
caves in a rock. Bright rose their
swords on each side; dire was the clang
of their steel.
Fragment of a Ballad
© Elizabeth Eleanor Siddal
Many a mile over land and sea
Unsummoned my love returned to me;
I remember not the words he said
But only the trees moaning overhead.
