With love of my own race I cling unto my country,
Whatever dubious reason may protesting cry;
The shame alone of all her blood bought glory,
Her haughty self-assurance, conscious pride,
And the ancestral faith's traditions dark,
With woe have penetrated all my heart.

O'Hara, J.P.

© Henry Lawson

James Patrick O'Hara the Justice of Peace,
He bossed the P.M. and he bossed the police;
A parent, a deacon, a landlord was he
A townsman of weight was OHara, J.P.

General Grant -- The Hero Of The War

© George Moses Horton

Brave Grant, thou hero of the war,

Thou art the emblem of the morning star,

Sunflower by Frank Steele: American Life in Poetry #176 Ted Kooser, U.S. Poet Laureate 2004-2006

© Ted Kooser

Hearts and flowers, that's how some people dismiss poetry, suggesting that's all there is to it, just a bunch of sappy poets weeping over love and beauty. Well, poetry is lots more than that. At times it's a means of honoring the simple things about us. To illustrate the care with which one poet observes a flower, here's Frank Steele, of Kentucky, paying such close attention to a sunflower that he almost gets inside it.

Sunflower

Elegy to the Old Man Hokuju

© Yosa Buson

You left in the morning, at evening my heart is in a
thousand pieces.
Why is it so far away?

The Alps at Day-break

© Samuel Rogers

The sun-beams streak the azure skies,
And line with light the mountain's brow:
With hounds and horns the hunters rise,
And chase the roebuck thro' the snow.

The Days

© Edwin Muir

Issuing from the Word

The seven days came,

The Sea-Seekers

© Roderic Quinn

ALL four of us were inland born
And inland reared from birth were we,
And though the tale be food for scorn
We four had never seen the Sea.

Dawn in the Mountains

It is the morning star, arising slow

Out of yon hills dark bulk, as she were born

Maha-Bharata, The Epic Of Ancient India - Book I - Astra Darsana (The Tournament)

The scene of the Epic is the ancient kingdom of the Kurus which
flourished along the upper course of the Ganges; and the historical
fact on which the Epic is based is a great war which took place
between the Kurus and a neighbouring tribe, the Panchalas, in the
thirteenth or fourteenth century before Christ.

Paradise Regain'd : Book IV.

© John Milton

Perplexed and troubled at his bad success
The Tempter stood, nor had what to reply,
Discovered in his fraud, thrown from his hope
So oft, and the persuasive rhetoric

The Inquisitive Mans Dream

Á Nadar
Do you know, as I do, delicious sadness
and make others say of you: Strange man!
- I was dying. In my soul, singular illness,

The Pioneer

From the wide miles of autumn corn,
Here to this sun-lit hill,
The wind wails for a hope forlorn,
And the grief of a ruined will.

The Progress Of Refinement. Part II.

CONTENTS OF PART II. Introduction.Sketch of the Northern barbarians.Feudal system.Origin of Chivalry.Superstition.Crusades. Hence the enfranchisement of Vassals, and Commerce encouraged. The Northern and Western Europeans, struck with the splendor of Constantinople, and the superior elegance of the Saracens.Origin of Romance. The remains of Science confined to the monasteries, and in an unknown language.Hence the distinction of learning.Discovery of the Roman Jurisprudence, and it's effects.Classic writers begin to be admiredArts revive in Italy.Greek learning introduced there, on the taking of Constantinople by the Turks.That event lamented.Learning encouraged by Leo X.Invention of Printing.The Reformation.It's effects, even on those countries that retained their old Religion. It's establishment in Britain.Age of Elizabeth. Arts and Literature flourish.Spenser.Shakespear. Milton.Dryden.The Progress of the Arts checked by the Civil War.Patronized in France. Age of Lewis XIV.Taste hurt in England during the profligate reign of Charles II.Short and turbulent reign of his Successor.King William no encourager of the Arts.Age of Queen Anne.Manners.Science and Literature flourish.Neglected by the first Princes of the House of Brunswick.Patronage of Arts by his present Majesty.Poetry not encouraged.Address to the King.General view of the present state of Refinement. Among the European Nations.France. Britain.Italy.Spain.Holland and Germany. Increasing Influence of French manners. Russia.Greece.Asia.China.Africa. America.Newly discovered islands.European Colonies.