Learning poems
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Reynard the Fox - Part 1
© John Masefield
Poor Polly's dying struck him queer,
He was a darkened man thereafter,
Cowed, silent, he would wince at laughter
And be so gentle it was strange
Even to see. Life loves to change.
Wide Lies Australia
© Henry Lawson
Wide lies Australia! The seas that surround her
Flow for her unity all states in one.
Never has Custom nor Tyranny bound her
Never was conquest so peacefully won.
The Old Bark School
© Henry Lawson
It was built of bark and poles, and the floor was full of holes
Where each leak in rainy weather made a pool;
And the walls were mostly cracks lined with calico and sacks
There was little need for windows in the school.
Here Died
© Henry Lawson
There's many a schoolboy's bat and ball that are gathering dust at home,
For he hears a voice in the future call, and he trains for the war to come;
A serious light in his eyes is seen as he comes from the schoolhouse gate;
He keeps his kit and his rifle clean, and he sees that his back is straight.
Sonnet XVIII: To This Our World
© Michael Drayton
To the Celestial NumbersTo this our world, to Learning, and to Heav'n,
Three Nines there are, to every one a Nine,
One number of the Earth, the other both divine;
One woman now makes three odd numbers ev'n.
The Rape of the Trap. A Ballad
© William Shenstone
'Twas in a land of learning,
The Muse's favourite city,
Such pranks of late
Were play'd by a rat,
As-tempt one to be witty.
The First Anniversary Of The Government Under O.C.
© Andrew Marvell
Like the vain Curlings of the Watry maze,
Which in smooth streams a sinking Weight does raise;
So Man, declining alwayes, disappears.
In the Weak Circles of increasing Years;
The Child Of The Islands - Winter
© Caroline Norton
I.
ERE the Night cometh! On how many graves
Rests, at this hour, their first cold winter's snow!
Wild o'er the earth the sleety tempest raves;
First Anniversary
© Andrew Marvell
Like the vain curlings of the watery maze,
Which in smooth streams a sinking weight does raise,
So Man, declining always, disappears
In the weak circles of increasing years;
And his short tumults of themselves compose,
While flowing Time above his head does close.
Dark August
© Derek Walcott
So much rain, so much life like the swollen sky
of this black August. My sister, the sun,
broods in her yellow room and won't come out.
The New School
© Joyce Kilmer
(For My Mother)The halls that were loud with the merry tread of
young and careless feet
Are still with a stillness that is too drear to seem like holiday,
And never a gust of laughter breaks the calm of the dreaming street
The Butterfly
© Ann Taylor
THE Butterfly, an idle thing,
Nor honey makes, nor yet can sing,
As do the bee and bird;
Nor does it, like the prudent ant,
Lay up the grain for times of want,
A wise and cautious hoard.
The Search After Happiness. A Pastoral Drama
© Hannah More
"To rear the tender thought,
To teach the young idea how to shoot,
To pour the fresh instruction o'er the mind,
To breathe th' enlivening spirit, and to fix
The generous purpose in the female breast." ~Thomson.
The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam 1 - 250 (Whinfield Translation)
© Omar Khayyám
At dawn a cry through all the tavern shrilled,
"Arise, my brethren of the revelers' guild,
That I may fill our measure full of wine,
Or e'er the measure of our days be filled."
Tulips
© Sylvia Plath
The tulips are too excitable, it is winter here.
Look how white everything is, how quiet, how snowed-in
A Tale of the Miser and the Poet
© Anne Kingsmill Finch
Noquoth the Man of broken Slumbers:
Yet we have Patrons for our Numbers;
There are Mecænas's among 'em.
Of the four Humours in Mans Constitution.
© Anne Bradstreet
The former four now ending their discourse,
Ceasing to vaunt their good, or threat their force.
