God poems
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The Legend Of St. Sophia Of Kioff
© William Makepeace Thackeray
A worthy priest he was and a stout
You've seldom looked on such a one;
For, though he fasted thrice in a week,
Yet nevertheless his skin was sleek;
His waist it spanned two yards about
And he weighed a score of stone.
Elegy II. On The Death Of The University Beadle At Cambridge (Translated From Milton)
© William Cowper
Thee, whose refulgent staff and summons clear,
Minerva's flock longtime was wont t'obey,
Although thyself an herald, famous here,
The last of heralds, Death, has snatch'd away.
He calls on all alike, nor even deigns
To spare the office that himself sustains.
Praise Of Colonus (From "Oedipus At Colonus")
© Sophocles
STRANGER, thou art standing now
On Colonus' sparry brow;
To My Sister: On Her Twenty-First Birthday
© George MacDonald
Old fables are not all a lie
That tell of wondrous birth,
Of Titan children, father Sky,
And mighty mother Earth.
A Child of the Snows
© Gilbert Keith Chesterton
There is heard a hymn when the panes are dim,
And never before or again,
When the nights are strong with a darkness long,
And the dark is alive with rain.
Rondel
© Algernon Charles Swinburne
THESE many years since we began to be,
What have the gods done with us? what with me,
What with my love? they have shown me fates and fears,
Harsh springs, and fountains bitterer than the sea,
Grief a fixed star, and joy a vane that veers,
These many years.
Psalm LXXXVI. (86)
© John Milton
Thy gracious ear, O Lord, encline,
O hear me I thee pray,
For I am poor, and almost pine
With need, and sad decay.
Horatian Lyrics Odes I, 11.
© Eugene Field
What end the gods may have ordained for me,
And what for thee,
Seek not to learn, Leuconoe; we may not know;
Chaldean tables cannot bring us rest--
'Tis for the best
To bear in patience what may come, or weal or woe.
The Children Of The Lord's Supper. (From The Swedish Of Bishop Tegner)
© Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Closed was the Teacher's task, and with heaven in their hearts and their faces,
Up rose the children all, and each bowed him, weeping full sorely,
Downward to kiss that reverend hand, but all of them pressed he
Moved to his bosom, and laid, with a prayer, his hands full of blessings,
Now on the holy breast, and now on the innocent tresses.
Aux Enfants Perdus
© Theodore de Banville
Sad eyes! the blue sea laughs as heretofore.
Ah, singing birds, your happy music pour;
Ah, poets, leave the sordid earth awhile;
Flit to these ancient gods we still adore:
"It may be we shall touch the happy isle."
Hudibras: Part 3 - Canto I
© Samuel Butler
But she, who well enough knew what
(Before he spoke) he would be at,
Pretended not to apprehend
The mystery of what he mean'd;.
And therefore wish'd him to expound
His dark expressions, less profound.
The Gathering of the Brown-Eyed
© Henry Lawson
THE BROWN EYES came from Asia, where all mystery is true,
Ere the masters of Soul Secrets dreamed of hazel, grey, and blue;
And the Brown Eyes came to Egypt, which is called the gypsies home,
And the Brown Eyes went from Egypt and Jerusalem to Rome.
The Columbiad: Book IV
© Joel Barlow
Yet must we mark, the bondage of the mind
Spreads deeper glooms, and subj ugates mankind;
The zealots fierce, whom local creeds enrage,
In holy feuds perpetual combat wage,
Support all crimes by full indulgence given,
Usurp the power and wield the sword of heaven,
Fuscara; or, the Bee Errant
© John Cleveland
Nature's confectioner, the bee
(Whose suckets are moist alchemy,
Ballade Of The Midnight Forest
© Andrew Lang
Prince, let us leave the din, the dust, the spite,
The gloom and glare of towns, the plague, the blight:
Amid the forest leaves and fountain spray
There is the mystic home of our delight,
And through the dim wood Dian threads her way.
Dr. Parnel To Dr. Swift, On His Birth-day, November 30th, MDCCXIII
© Thomas Parnell
Urg'd by the warmth of Friendship's sacred flame,
But more by all the glories of thy fame;
By all those offsprings of thy learned mind,
In judgment solid, as in wit refin'd,
Resolv'd I sing: Tho' lab'ring up the way
To reach my theme, O Swift, accept my lay.
