Power poems
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To The Committee Of The Cayley Portrait Fund
© James Clerk Maxwell
O wretched race of men, to space confined!
What honour can ye pay to him, whose mind
To that which lies beyond hath penetrated?
The symbols he bath formed shall sound his praise,
And lead him on through unimagined ways
To conquests new, in worlds not yet created.
To A Young Lady, Who Was Fond Of Fortune-Telling
© Matthew Prior
You, Madam, may, with safety go
Decrees of destiny to know;
The Purple Cow Parodies
© Carolyn Wells
I never saw a Purple Cow,
I never hope to see one;
But I can tell you, anyhow,
I'd rather see than be one.
Damon vs. Pythias
© William Schwenck Gilbert
Two better friends you wouldn't pass
Throughout a summer's day,
Than DAMON and his PYTHIAS, -
Two merchant princes they.
The Divine Right Of Kings
© Edgar Allan Poe
The only king by right divine
Is Ellen King, and were she mine
I'd strive for liberty no more,
But hug the glorious chains I wore.
Sunny New South Wales
© Anonymous
We often hear men boast about the land which gave them birth,
And each one thinks his native land the fairest spot on earth;
The Flower.
© Robert Crawford
I.
The flower in its own scent breathes till it dies
As if the scent its very birth-breath were
(As love is life's) which, while it occupies
The Glowworm
© William Cowper
Beneath the hedge or near the stream,
A worm is known to stray,
That shows by night a lucid beam,
Which disappears by day.
Barbarians.
© Robert Crawford
As the crinoid star-fish to the sea-base
By his stem fixed draws bare subsistence in
His straitened sphere, as in the sunless ooze
He turns on his long jointed pedicle,
On Pressing Some Flowers
© Henry Timrod
So, they are dead! Love! when they passed
From thee to me, our fingers met;
O withered darlings of the May!
I feel those fairy fingers yet.
The Loves of the Angels
© Thomas Moore
Alas! that Passion should profane
Even then the morning of the earth!
That, sadder still, the fatal stain
Should fall on hearts of heavenly birth-
And that from Woman's love should fall
So dark a stain, most sad of all!
American Academy Centennial Celebration
© Oliver Wendell Holmes
SIRE, son, and grandson; so the century glides;
Three lives, three strides, three foot-prints in the sand;
Silent as midnight's falling meteor slides
Into the stillness of the far-off land;
How dim the space its little arc has spanned!
In Quest
© John Greenleaf Whittier
Have I not voyaged, friend beloved, with thee
On the great waters of the unsounded sea,
Columbus
© James Russell Lowell
One poor day!--
Remember whose and not how short it is!
It is God's day, it is Columbus's.
A lavish day! One day, with life and heart,
Is more than time enough to find a world.
Master And Servant
© Wilcox Ella Wheeler
The devil to Bacchus said, one day,
In a scowling, growling, petulant way,
To A Lady Who Spoke Slightingly Of Poets
© Washington Allston
Oh, censure not the Poet's art,
Nor think it chills the feeling heart
To love the gentle Muses.
Can that which in a stone or flower,
As if by transmigrating power,
His gen'rous soul infuses;
The Eighth Olympic Ode Of Pindar
© Henry James Pye
To Alcimedon, on his Olympic Victory; Timosthenes, on his Nemean Victory; and Melesias, their Preceptor. ARGUMENT. Though this is called an Olympic Ode, the Poet does not confine himself to Alcimedon, who won the Prize in those Games, but celebrates his Brother Timosthenes, for his success at Nemea, and Melesias, their Instructor. The Ode opens with an invocation to the place where the Games were held. Pindar then, after praising Timosthenes for his early victory in the Nemean Games, mentions Alcimedon, and extols him for his dexterity and strength, his beauty, and his country Ægina; which he celebrates for it's hospitality, and for it's being under the government of the Dorians after the death of Æacus; on whom he has a long digression, giving an account of his assisting the Gods in the building of Troy. Then returning to his subject, he mentions Melesias as skilled himself in the Athletic Exercises, and therefore proper to instruct others; and, enumerating his Triumphs, congratulates him on the success of his Pupil Alcimedon; which, he says, will not only give satisfaction to his living Relations, but will delight the Ghosts of those deceased. The Poet then concludes with a wish for the prosperity of him and his family.
STROPHE I.
Hymn To God's Power
© James Thomson
Hail! Power Divine, who by thy sole command,
From the dark empty space,
Made the broad sea and solid land
Smile with a heavenly grace.
Composed After A Journey Across The Hambleton Hills, Yorkshire
© William Wordsworth
DARK and more dark the shades of evening fell;
The wished-for point was reached--but at an hour
When little could be gained from that rich dower
Of prospect, whereof many thousands tell.
