Happy poems
/ page 242 of 254 /
I Told You
© Wilcox Ella Wheeler
I told you the winter would go, love,
I told you the winter would go,
That he'd flee in shame when the south wind came,
And you smiled when I told you so.
Custer
© Wilcox Ella Wheeler
BOOK FIRST.I.ALL valor died not on the plains of Troy.
Awake, my Muse, awake! be thine the joy
To sing of deeds as dauntless and as brave
As e'er lent luster to a warrior's grave.
An Answer
© Wilcox Ella Wheeler
If all the year was summer-time,
And all the aim of life
Was just to lilt on like a rhyme
Then I would be your wife.
Momus, God Of Laughter
© Wilcox Ella Wheeler
Though with gods the world is cumbered,
Gods unnamed, and gods unnumbered,
Never god was known to be
Who had not his devotee.
So I dedicate to mine,
Here in verse, my temple-shrine.
Thanksgiving
© Wilcox Ella Wheeler
There's not a day in all the year
But holds some hidden pleasure,
And looking back, joys oft appear
To brim the past's wide measure.
Answered Prayers
© Wilcox Ella Wheeler
I prayed for riches, and achieved success;
All that I touched turned into gold. Alas!
My cares were greater and my peace was less,
When that wish came to pass.
Joy
© Wilcox Ella Wheeler
My heart is like a little bird
That sits and sings for very gladness.
Sorrow is some forgotten word,
And so, except in rhyme, is sadness.
Reunited
© Wilcox Ella Wheeler
Let us begin, dear love, where we left off;
Tie up the broken threads of that old dream;
And go on happy as before; and seem
Lovers again, though all the world may scoff.
A Song Of Life
© Wilcox Ella Wheeler
In the rapture of life and of living,
I lift up my head and rejoice,
And I thank the great Giver for giving
The soul of my gladness a voice.
Love is Enough
© Wilcox Ella Wheeler
Love is enough. Let us not ask for gold.
Wealth breeds false aims, and pride and selfishness;
In those serene, Arcadian days of old
Men gave no thought to princely homes and dress.
The River Scamander
© Jean de La Fontaine
O TROY! for me thy very name has got
Superior charms:--in story fruitful spot;
Thy famed remains I ne'er can hope to view,
That gods by labour raised, and gods o'erthrew;
Those fields where daring acts of valour shone;
So many fights were lost:--so many won.
The Rhemese
© Jean de La Fontaine
THE wife just then, it seems, no servant kept;
More wine to get, she to the cellar stept.
But dreading ghosts, she Simonetta prayed;
To light her down, she was so much afraid.
The Princess Betrothed To The King Of Garba
© Jean de La Fontaine
WHAT various ways in which a thing is told
Some truth abuse, while others fiction hold;
In stories we invention may admit;
But diff'rent 'tis with what historick writ;
Posterity demands that truth should then
Inspire relation, and direct the pen.
The Old Man's Calendar
© Jean de La Fontaine
THIS calendar o'erspread with rubrick days;
She soon forgot and learn'd the pirate's ways;
The matrimonial zone aside was thrown,
And only mentioned where the fact was known:
The Nightingale
© Jean de La Fontaine
NO easy matter 'tis to hold,
Against its owner's will, the fleece
Who troubled by the itching smart
Of Cupid's irritating dart,
The Mandrake
© Jean de La Fontaine
OUR youth, Calimachus, no sooner came,
But he howe'er appeared to please the dame;
His camp he pitched and entered on the siege
Of fair Lucretia, faithful to her liege,
Who presently the haughty tigress played,
And sent him, like the rest, away dismayed.
The Impossible Thing
© Jean de La Fontaine
ONE morn the devil to the other went:
Said he, to give thee up I'll be content;
If solely thou wilt openly declare
What 'tis I hold, for truly I despair;
I'm victus I confess, and can't succeed:
No doubt the thing's impossible decreed.
The Dog
© Jean de La Fontaine
'TWOULD endless prove, and nothing would avail,
Each lover's pain minutely to detail:
Their arts and wiles; enough 'twill be no doubt,
To say the lady's heart was found so stout,
She let them sigh their precious hours away,
And scarcely seemed emotion to betray.
The Clyster
© Jean de La Fontaine
NOT much examination Cupid made,
As parent, lawyer, priest, he lent his aid,
And soon concluded matters as desired;
The Mansian wisdom no ways was required.
The Amorous Courtesan
© Jean de La Fontaine
THE supper o'er the company withdrew,
But Constance suddenly was lost to view;
Beside a certain bed she took her seat,
Where no one ever dreamed she would retreat,
And all supposed, that ill, or spirits weak,
She home had run, or something wished to seek.
