The Penguin Book of English Verse

by Paul Keegan

  Agreed it would not do at all;

  And so, – I’m sorry for my brother! –

  It’s settled that we’re not to call.

  And there’s an Author, full of knowledge;

  And there’s a Captain on half-pay;

  And there’s a Baronet from college,

  Who keeps a boy, and rides a bay;

  And sweet Sir Marcus from the Shannon,

  Fine specimen of brogue and bone;

  And Doctor Calipee, the canon,

  Who weighs, I fancy, twenty stone:

  A maiden Lady is adorning

  The faded front of Lily Hall: –

  Upon my word, the first fine morning,

  We’ll make a round, my dear, and call.

  Alas! disturb not, maid and matron,

  The swallow in my humble thatch;

  Your son may find a better patron,

  Your niece may meet a richer match:

  I can’t afford to give a dinner,

  I never was on Almack’s list;

  And since I seldom rise a winner,

  I never like to play at whist:

  Unknown to me the stocks are falling;

  Unwatched by me the glass may fall;

  Let all the world pursue its calling, –

  I’m not at home if people call.

  GEORGE GORDON, LORD BYRON 1830

  So, we’ll go no more a roving

  So late into the night,

  Though the heart be still as loving,

  And the moon be still as bright.

  For the sword outwears its sheath,

  And the soul wears out the breast,

  And the heart must pause to breathe,

  And love itself have rest.

  Though the night was made for loving,

  And the day returns too soon,

  Yet we’ll go no more a roving

  By the light of the moon.

  (written 1817)

  1831WALTER SAVAGE LANDOR

  Past ruin’d Ilion Helen lives,

  Alcestis rises from the shades;

  Verse calls them forth; ’tis verse that gives

  Immortal youth to mortal maids.

  Soon shall Oblivion’s deepening veil

  Hide all the peopled hills you see,

  The gay, the proud, while lovers hail

  These many summers you and me.

  WALTER SAVAGE LANDOR Dirce

  Stand close around, ye Stygian set,

  With Dirce in one boat conveyed!

  Or Charon, seeing, may forget

  That he is old and she a shade.

  WALTER SAVAGE LANDOR On Seeing a Hair of Lucrezia Borgia

  Borgia, thou once wert almost too august,

  And high for adoration; – now thou’rt dust!

  All that remains of thee these plaits infold –

  Calm hair, meand’ring with pellucid gold!

  1832GEORGE GORDON, LORD BYRON Lines on Hearing That Lady Byron was Ill

  And thou wert sad – yet I was not with thee;

  And thou wert sick, and yet I was not near;

  Methought that joy and health alone could be

  Where I was not – and pain and sorrow here!

  And is it thus? – it is as I foretold,

  And shall be more so; for the mind recoils

  Upon itself, and the wreck’d heart lies cold,

  While heaviness collects the shatter’d spoils.

  It is not in the storm nor in the strife

  We feel benumb’d, and wish to be no more,

  But in the after-silence on the shore,

  When all is lost, except a little life.

  I am too well avenged! – but ’twas my right;

  Whate’er my sins might be, thou wert not sent

  To be the Nemesis who should requite –

  Nor did Heaven choose so near an instrument.

  Mercy is for the merciful! – if thou

  Hast been of such, ’twill be accorded now.

  Thy nights are banish’d from the realms of sleep! –

  Yes! they may flatter thee, but thou shalt feel

  A hollow agony which will not heal,

  For thou art pillow’d on a curse too deep;

  Thou hast sown in my sorrow, and must reap

  The bitter harvest in a woe as real!

  I have had many foes, but none like thee;

  For ’gainst the rest myself I could defend,

  And be avenged, or turn them into friend;

  But thou in safe implacability

  Hadst nought to dread – in thy own weakness shielded,

  And in my love, which hath but too much yielded,

  And spared, for thy sake, some I should not spare –

  And thus upon the World’s trust in thy truth –

  And the wild fame of my ungovern’d youth –

  On things that were not, and on things that are –

  Even upon such a basis hast thou built

  A monument, whose cement hath been guilt!

  The moral Clytemnestra of thy lord,

  And hew’d down, with an unsuspected sword,

  Fame, peace, and hope – and all the better life

  Which, but for this cold treason of thy heart,

  Might still have risen from out the grave of strife,

  And found a nobler duty than to part.

  But of thy virtues didst thou make a vice,

  Trafficking with them in a purpose cold,

  For present anger, and for future gold –

  And buying other’s grief at any price.

  And thus once enter’d into crooked ways,

  The early Truth, which was thy proper praise,

  Did not still walk beside thee – but at times,

  And with a breast unknowing its own crimes,

  Deceit, averments incompatible,

  Equivocations, and the thoughts which dwell

  In Janus-spirits – the significant eye

  Which learns to lie with silence – the pretext

  Of Prudence, with advantages annex’d –

  The acquiescence in all things which tend,

  No matter how, to the desired end –

  All found a place in thy philosophy.

  The means were worthy, and the end is won –

  I would not do by thee as thou hast done!

  (written 1816)

  1833HARTLEY COLERIDGE

  Long time a child, and still a child, when years

  Had painted manhood on my cheek, was I;

  For yet I lived like one not born to die;

  A thriftless prodigal of smiles and tears,

  No hope I needed, and I knew no fears.

  But sleep, though sweet, is only sleep, and waking,

  I waked to sleep no more, at once o’ertaking

  The vanguard of my age, with all arrears

  Of duty on my back. Nor child, nor man,

  Nor youth, nor sage, I find my head is grey,

  For I have lost the race I never ran,

  A rathe December blights my lagging May;

  And still I am a child, tho’ I be old,

  Time is my debtor for my years untold.

  1834SAMUEL TAYLOR COLERIDGE The Knight’s Tomb

  Where is the grave of Sir Arthur O’Kellyn?

  Where may the grave of that good man be? –

  By the side of a spring, on the breast of Helvellyn,

  Under the twigs of a young birch tree!

  The oak that in summer was sweet to hear,

  And rustled its leaves in the fall of the year,

  And whistled and roared in the winter alone,

  Is gone, – and the birch in its stead is grown. –

  The Knight’s bones are dust,

  And his good sword rust; –

  His soul is with the saints, I trust.

  (written 1802)

  JOHN CLARE The Nightingales Nest 1835

  Up this green woodland ride lets softly rove

  And list th
e nightingale – she dwelleth here

  Hush let the wood gate softly clap – for fear

  The noise may drive her from her home of love

  For here Ive heard her many a merry year

  At morn and eve nay all the live long day

  As though she lived on song – this very spot

  Just where that old mans beard all wildly trails

  Rude arbours oer the road and stops the way

  And where that child its blue bell flowers hath got

  Laughing and creeping through the mossy rails

  There have I hunted like a very boy

  Creeping on hands and knees through matted thorns

  To find her nest and see her feed her young

  And vainly did I many hours employ

  All seemed as hidden as a thought unborn

  And where these crimping fern leaves ramp among

  The hazels under boughs – Ive nestled down

  And watched her while she sung – and her renown

  Hath made me marvel that so famed a bird

  Should have no better dress than russet brown

  Her wings would tremble in her extacy

  And feathers stand on end as twere with joy

  And mouth wide open to release her heart

  Of its out sobbing songs – the happiest part

  Of summers fame she shared – for so to me

  Did happy fancys shapen her employ

  But if I touched a bush or scarcely stirred

  All in a moment stopt – I watched in vain

  The timid bird had left the hazel bush

  And at a distance hid to sing again

  Lost in a wilderness of listening leaves

  Rich extacy would pour its luscious stain

  Till envy spurred the emulating thrush

  To start less wild and scarce inferior songs

  For cares with him for half the year remain

  To damp the ardour of his speckled breast

  While nightingales to summers life belongs

  And naked trees and winters nipping wrongs

  Are strangers to her music and her rest

  Her joys are evergreen her world is wide

  – Hark there she is as usual lets be hush

  For in this black thorn clump if rightly guest

  Her curious house is hidden – part aside

  These hazle branches in a gentle way

  And stoop right cautious neath the rustling boughs

  For we will have another search to day

  And hunt this fern strown thorn clump round and round

  And where this seeded wood grass idly bows

  We’ll wade right through – it is a likely nook

  In such like spots and often on the ground

  Theyll build where rude boys never think to look

  Aye as I live her secret nest is here

  Upon this white thorn stulp – Ive searched about

  For hours in vain – there put that bramble bye

  Nay trample on its branshes and get near

  How subtle is the bird she started out

  And raised a plaintive note of danger nigh

  Ere we were past the brambles and now near

  Her nest she sudden stops – as choaking fear

  That might betray her home so even now

  Well leave it as we found it – safetys guard

  Of pathless solitude shall keep it still

  See there shes sitting on the old oak bough

  Mute in her fears our presence doth retard

  Her joys and doubt turns all her rapture chill

  Sing on sweet bird may no worse hap befall

  Thy visions then the fear that now decieves

  We will not plunder music of its dower

  Nor turn this spot of happiness to thrall

  For melody seems hid in every flower

  That blossoms near thy home – these harebells all

  Seems bowing with the beautiful in song

  And gaping cuckoo with its spotted leaves

  Seems blushing of the singing it has heard

  How curious is the nest no other bird

  Uses such loose materials or weaves

  Their dwellings in such spots – dead oaken leaves

  Are placed without and velvet moss within

  And little scraps of grass – and scant and spare

  Of what seems scarce materials down and hair

  For from mans haunts she seemeth nought to win

  Yet nature is the builder and contrives

  Homes for her childerns comfort even here

  Where solitudes deciples spend their lives

  Unseen save when a wanderer passes near

  That loves such pleasant places – deep adown

  The nest is made an hermits mossy cell

  Snug lie her curious eggs in number five

  Of deadend green or rather olive brown

  And the old prickly thorn bush guards them well

  And here well leave them still unknown to wrong

  As the old woodlands legacy of song

  JOHN CLARE The Sky Lark

  The rolls and harrows lie at rest beside

  The battered road and spreading far and wide

  Above the russet clods the corn is seen

  Sprouting its spirey points of tender green

  Where squats the hare to terrors wide awake

  Like some brown clod the harrows failed to break

  While neath the warm hedge boys stray far from home

  To crop the early blossoms as they come

  Where buttercups will make them eager run

  Opening their golden caskets to the sun

  To see who shall be first to pluck the prize

  And from their hurry up the skylark flies

  And oer her half formed nest with happy wings

  Winnows the air – till in the clouds she sings

  Then hangs a dust spot in the sunny skies

  And drops and drops till in her nest she lies

  Where boys unheeding past – neer dreaming then

  That birds which flew so high – would drop agen

  To nests upon the ground where any thing

  May come at to destroy had they the wing

  Like such a bird themselves would be too proud

  And build on nothing but a passing cloud

  As free from danger as the heavens are free

  From pain and toil – there would they build and be

  And sail about the world to scenes unheard

  Of and unseen – O where they but a bird

  So think they while they listen to its song