OUR children are our monuments,
The little ones we leave behind,
If they are good and brave and kind,
And labor here with true intents,
Our lives and work perpetuate
Far more than marble tablets great.

Marianna Alcoforando

© Sara Teasdale

But I have seen my day grow calm again.
The sun sets slowly on a peaceful world,
And sheds a quiet light across the fields.

Tasso And His Sister

© Felicia Dorothea Hemans

She sat, where on each wind that sigh'd,

The citron's breath went by,

The Last Bullet

© John Farrell

for revenge upon those who were strong
Cattle speared at the first, blacks shot down,
and the blood of their babes, even, shed;
Blood that stains the same hue as our own.
It is written, red blood will have red !

Reflections Suggested By Winter

© James Thomson

'Tis done! dread winter spreads its latest glooms,
And reigns tremendous o'er the conquer'd year.
How dead the vegetable kingdom lies!
How dumb the tuneful! Horror wide extends

Drawing Near The Light

© William Morris

Lo, when we wade the tangled wood,
In haste and hurry to be there,
Nought seem its leaves and blossoms good,
For all that they be fashioned fair.

The Soldier's Return to His Home

© Robert Bloomfield

My untried muse shall no high tone assume,

Nor strut in arms - farewell, my cap and plume!

Knowledge

Oh for a life of leisure and broad hours,
To think and dream, to put away small things,
This world's perpetual leaguer of dull naughts;
To wander like the bee among the flowers
Till old age find us weary, feet and wings
Grown heavy with the gold of many thoughts.

Niagara

My lyre! give me my lyre! My bosom feels
The glow of inspiration. Oh how long
Have I been left in darkness since this light
Last visited my brow, Niagara!
Thou with thy rushing waters dost restore
The heavenly gift that sorrow took away.

The Task: Book I. -- The Sofa

I sing the Sofa. I who lately sang

Truth, Hope, and Charity, and touched with awe

Music

Surely not painful ever, yet not glad,
Shall such hours be to me, but blindly sweet,
Sharp with all yearning and all fact at strife,
Dreams that shine by with unremembered feet,
And tones that like far distance make this life
Spectral and wonderful and strangely sad.

Periander

How died Melissa none dares shape in words.
A woman who is wife despotic lords
Count faggot at the question, Shall she live!
Her son, because his brows were black of her,
Runs barking for his bread, a fugitive,
And Corinth frowns on them that feed the cur.