War poems
/ page 200 of 504 /The Angel
© Virna Sheard
Down the white ward with slow, unswerving tread
He came ere break of day--
A cowl was drawn about his down-bent head,
His misty robes were grey.
The Judgement of Hercules
© William Shenstone
Wrapp'd in a pleased suspense, the youth survey'd
The various charms of each attractive maid:
Alternate each he view'd, and each admired,
And found, alternate, varying flames inspired:
Quick o'er their forms his eyes with pleasure ran,
When she, who first approach'd him, first began:-
Labor Is Prayer
© Dinah Maria Mulock Craik
LABORARE est orare:
We, black-visaged sons of toil,
From the coal-mine and the anvil
And the delving of the soil,--
Guns Of Peace
© Dinah Maria Mulock Craik
GHOSTS of dead soldiers in the battle slain,
Ghosts of dead heroes dying nobler far,
In the long patience of inglorious war,
Of famine, cold, heat, pestilence, and pain,--
The Bold Buccaneer
© John Le Gay Brereton
One very rough day on the Pride of the Fray
In the scuppers a poor little cabin-boy lay,
When the Bosun drew nigh with wrath in his eye
And gave him a kick to remember him by,
As he cried with a sneer: What good are you here?
Go home to your mammy, my bold buccaneer.
"Thus Saith The Lord, I Offer Thee Three Kings."
© Oliver Wendell Holmes
IN poisonous dens, where traitors hide
Like bats that fear the day,
While all the land our charters claim
Is sweating blood and breathing flame,
Dead to their country's woe and shame,
The recreants whisper STAY!
The Duellist - Book II
© Charles Churchill
Deep in the bosom of a wood,
Out of the road, a Temple stood:
Dedication From Moremi
© Wole Soyinka
Earth will not share the rafter's envy; dung floors
Break, not the gecko's slight skin, but its fall
Taste this soil for death and plumb her deep for life
A Boost For Modern Methods
© Edgar Albert Guest
In some respects the old days were perhaps ahead of these,
Before we got to wanting wealth and costly luxuries;
The Shepheardes Calender: December
© Edmund Spenser
I thee beseche (so be thou deigne to heare,
Rude ditties tund to shepheards Oaten reede,
Or if I euer sonet song so cleare,
As it with pleasaunce mought thy fancie feede)
Hearken awhile from thy greene cabinet,
The rurall song of carefull Colinet.
On Hearing The Princess Royal Sing
© Victor Marie Hugo
In thine abode so high
Where yet one scarce can breathe,
Dear child, most tenderly
A soft song thou dost wreathe.
Trysting Time
© Confucius
A pretty girl at time o' gloaming
Hath whispered me to go and meet her
Without the city gate.
I love her, but she tarries coming.
Shall I return, or stay and greet her?
I burn, and wait.
In Oblivion
© Peter McArthur
COME, friend, there's going to be a merry meeting
After the play. Our masks we'll throw aside,
Jeckoyva
© Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
They made the warrior's grave beside
The dashing of his native time:
The Worlds Exile
© Richard Monckton Milnes
Well, I will tell you, kind adviser,
Why thus I ever roam
In distant lands, nor wish to guide
My footsteps to the fair hill--side
Where stands my sacred home.
Song of the Torres Strait Islands
© Ernest Favenc
Bold Torres, the sailor, came and went,
with his swarthy, storm-worn band,
Eclogue
© John Crowe Ransom
JANE SNEED BEGAN IT: My poor John, alas,
Ten years ago, pretty it was in a ring
To run as boys and girls do in the grass
At that time leap and hollo and skip and sing
Came easily to pass.