NATURE
POEMS
Nature
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
As a fond mother, when the
day is o'er,
Leads by the hand her little
child to bed,
Half willing, half reluctant
to be led,
And leave his broken playthings
on the floor,
Still gazing at them through
the open door,
Nor wholly reassured and comforted
By promises of others in their
stead,
Which, though more splendid,
may not please him more;
So Nature deals with us, and
takes away
Our playthings one by one,
and by the hand
Leads us to rest so gently,
that we go
Scarce knowing if we wish
to go or stay,
Being too full of sleep to
understand
How far the unknown transcends
the what we know.
Stopping by Woods on a
Snowy Evening
Robert Frost
Whose
woods these are I think I
know.
His house is in the village
though;
He will not see me stopping
here
To watch his woods fill up
with snow.
My
little horse must think it
queer
To stop without a farmhouse
near
Between the woods and frozen
lake
The darkest evening of the
year.
He
gives his harness bells a
shake
To ask if there is some mistake.
The only other sound's the
sweep
Of easy wind and downy flake.
The
woods are lovely, dark and
deep.
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep.
I Wandered Lonely as a
Cloud
William Wordsworth
I
wandered lonely as a cloud
That floats on high o'er vales
and hills,
When all at once I saw a crowd,
A host, of golden daffodils;
Beside the lake, beneath the
trees,
Fluttering and dancing in
the breeze.
Continuous
as the stars that shine
And twinkle on the Milky Way,
They stretched in never-ending
line
Along the margin of a bay:
Ten thousand saw I at a glance,
Tossing their heads in sprightly
dance.
The
waves beside them danced;
but they
Outdid the sparkling waves
in glee;
A poet could not but be gay,
In such a jocund company;
I gazed-and gazed-but little
thought
What wealth the show to me
had brought:
For
oft, when on my couch I lie
In vacant or in pensive mood,
They flash upon that inward
eye
When is the bliss of solitude;
And then my heart with pleasure
fills,
And dances with the daffodils.
Fall, Leaves, Fall
Emily Bronte
Fall,
leaves, fall; die, flowers,
away;
Lengthen night and shorten
day;
Every leaf speaks bliss to
me,
Fluttering from the autumn
tree.
I shall smile when wreaths
of snow
Blossom where the rose should
grow;
I shall sing when night's
decay
Ushers in a drearier day.
On the Grasshopper and
the Cricket
John Keats
The
poetry of earth is never dead:
When all the birds are faint
with the hot sun,
And hide in cooling trees,
a voice will run
From hedge to hedge about
the new-mown mead;
That is the grasshopper's-he
takes the lead
In summer luxury,--he has
never done
With his delights, for when
tired out with fun
He rests at ease beneath some
pleasant weed.
The poetry of earth is ceasing
never:
On a lone winter evening,
when the frost
Has wrought a silence, from
the stove there shrills
The cricket's song, in warmth
increasing ever,
And seems to one, in drowsiness
half-lost,
The grasshopper's among some
grassy hills
Loveliest of Trees
A.E. Housman
Loveliest
of trees, the cherry now
Is hung with bloom along the
bough,
And stands about the woodland
ride
Wearing white for Eastertide.
Now,
of my threescore years and
ten,
Twenty will not come again,
And take from seventy springs
a score,
It only leaves me fifty more.
And
since to look at things in
bloom
Fifty springs are little room,
About the woodlands I will
go
To see the cherry hung with
snow.
Sonnets from the Portuguese
Elizabeth Barrett Browning
How
do I love thee? Let me count
the ways.
I love thee to the depth and
breadth and height
My soul can reach, when feeling
out of sight
For the ends of Being and
ideal Grace.
I love thee to the level of
every day's
Most quiet need, by sun and
candle-light.
I love thee freely, as men
strive for right;
I love thee purely, as they
turn from praise.
I love thee with the passion
put to use
In my old griefs, and with
my childhood's faith.
I love thee with a love I
seemed to lose
With my lost saints-I love
thee with the breath,
Smiles, tears, of all my life!-and
if God choose,
I shall love thee better after
death.
When I Heard the Learn'd
Astronomer
Walt Whitman
When
I heard the learn'd astronomer,
When the proofs, the figures,
were ranged in
columns before me,
When I was shown the charts
and diagrams,
to add, divide, and measure
them,
When I sitting heard the astronomer
where
he lectured with much applause
in the
lecture-room,
How soon unaccountable I became
tired and
sick,
Till rising and gliding out
I wander'd off by
myself,
In the mystical moist night-air,
and from time
to time,
Look'd up in perfect silence
at the stars.
Fog
Carl Sandburg
The
fog comes on little cat feet.
It sits looking over harbor
and city,
On silent haunches and then
moves on.
A Bird Came Down the Walk
Emily Dickinson
A
Bird came down the Walk-
He did not know I saw-
He big an Angleworm in halves
And ate the fellow, raw,
And
then he drank a Dew
From a convenient Grass-
And then hopped sidewise to
the Wall
To let a Beetle pass-
He
glanced with rapid eyes
That hurried all around-
They looked like frightened
Beads,
I thought-
He stirred his Velvet Head
Like
one in danger, Cautious,
I offered him a Crumb
And he unrolled his feathers
And rowed him softer home-
Than
Oars divide the Ocean,
Too silver for a seam-
Or Butterflies, off Banks
of Noon
Leap, plashless as they swim.
The Fly
William Oldys
Busy,
curious, thirsty fly,
Gently drink, and drink as
I;
Freely welcome to my cup,
Could'st thou sip, and sip
it up;
Make the most of life you
may,
Life is short and wears away.
Just
alike, both mine and thine,
Hasten quick to their decline;
Thine's a summer, mine's no
more,
Though repeated to threescore;
Threescore summers when they're
gone,
Will appear as short as one.
The Tide Rises, the Tide
Falls
Henry
Wadsworth Longfellow
The tide rises, the tide falls,
The twilight darkens, the
curlew calls;
Along the sea-sands damp and
brown
The traveller hastens toward
the town,
And the ride rises, the tide
falls.
Darkness
settles on roofs and walls,
But the sea, the sea in the
darkness calls:
The little waves, with their
soft, white hands,
Efface the footprints in the
sands,
And the tide rises, the tide
falls.
The
morning breaks; the steeds
in their stalls
Stamp and neigh, as the hostler
calls;
The day returns, but nevermore
Returns the traveller to the
shore.
And the tide rises, the tide
falls.
Memory
Thomas Bailey Aldrich
My
mind lets go a thousand things,
Like dates of wars and deaths
of kings,
And yet recalls the very hour
-
'Twas noon by yonder village
tower,
And on the last blue moon
in May -
The wind came briskly up this
way,
Crisping the brook beside
the road;
Then, pausing here, set down
its load
Of pine-scents, and shook
listlessly
Two petals from that wild-rose
tree.
The Ages of Man
Anonymous
At ten, a child; at twenty,
wild;
At thirty, tame if ever;
At forty, wise; at fifty,
rich;
At sixty, good or never.
Weathers
Thomas Hardy
This
is the weather the cuckoo
likes, And so do I;
When showers beturnble the
chestnut spikes, And nestlings
fly:
And the little brown nightingale
bills his best,
And they sit outside at "The
Travellers' Rest,
And maids come forth sprig-muslin
drest,
And citizens dream of the
south and west, And so do
I.
This
is the weather the shepherd
shuns, And so do I;
When beeches drip in browns
and duns, and thresh, and
ply;
And hill-hid tides throb,
throe on throe,
And meadow rivulets overflow,
And drops on gate-bars bang
in a row,
And rooks in families homeward
go, And so do I.
Sailing
on the Deep, Blue Sky
Paul Betz (Reader's Contest
Entry)
The
sky is as a vast blue sea.
White clouds roll forth as
waves.
The moon it shines for all
to see,
As lighthouses beam rays.
The
planes become ships of the
sky.
Swift breeze becomes the mist.
A bird floats through the
clouds on high,
Like nothing else exists.
Both
oceans hold their jewels grand,
Like treasure chests and stars.
They both contain uncharted
land,
The unknown isle and Mars.
Cuckoo
Anonymous
Cuckoo,
Cuckoo,
What do you do?
In April
I open my bill.
In May
I sing night and day.
In June
I change my tune.
In July
Away I fly.
In August,
Go I must.
Hummingbird
Emily Dickinson
A
Route of Evanescence
With a revolving Wheel -
A Resonance of Emerald -
A Rush of Cochineal -
And every Blossom on The Bush
Adjusts its tumbled Head -
The mail from Tunis, probably,
An easy Morning's Ride -
Pied Beauty
Gerard Manley Hopkins
Glory
be to God for dappled things-
For skies of couple-color
as a brinded cow;
For rose-moles all in stipple
upon trout that swim;
Fresh-firecoal chestnut-falls;
finches' wings;
Landscape plotted and pieced-fold,
fallow, and plow;
And all trades, their gear
and tackle and trim.
All
things counter, original,
spare, strange;
Whatever is fickle, freckled
(who knows how?)
With swift, slow; sweet, sour;
adazzle, dim;
He fathers-forth whose beauty
is past change:
Praise Him.
The Year's at the Spring
Robert Browning
The
year's at the spring
And the day's at the morn;
Morning's at seven;
The hillside's dew-pearled;
The lark's on the wing;
The snail's on the thorn:
God's in his heaven-
All's right with the world
To Daffodils
Robert Herrick
Fair
Daffodils, we weep to see
You haste away so soon:
As yet the early-rising sun
Has not attained his noon.
Stay, stay,
Until
the hasting day has run
But to the evensong;
And, having prayed together,
we
Will go with you along.
We have short time to stay
as you;
We
have as short a spring;
As quick a growth to meet
decay,
As you or anything.
We die.
As your hours do, and dry
Away
Like to the summer's rain;
Or as the pearls of morning's
dew,
Ne'er to be found again.
A Charleston Garden
Henry Bellaman
I
love old gardens best -
tired old gardens
that rest in the sun.
There the rusty tamarisk
And knotted fig trees
lean on the wall,
and paper-whites break rank
to wander carelessly
among tall grasses.
The yellow roses
slip from the trellis,
and the wistaria goes adventruing
to the neighboring trees.
The
forgotten comfort
of the wilderness comes again.
The legend of the twisted
walks
is broken,
and the marble seats are green
like woodland banks.
'Tis the Last Rose of Summer
Thomas Moore
'Tis
the last rose of Summer,
Left blooming alone;
All her lovely companions
Are faded and gone;
No flower of her kindred,
No rosebud is nigh,
To reflect back her blushes,
Or give sigh for sigh!
I'll
not leave thee, thou lone
one,
To pine on the stem;
Since the lovely are sleeping,
Go sleep thou with them.
Thus kindly I scatter
Thy leaves o'er the bed
Where thy mates of the garden
Lie scentless and dead.
So
soon may I follow,
When friendships decay,
And from Love's shining circle
The gems drop away!
When true hearts lie withered,
And fond ones are flown,
Oh I who would inhabit
This bleak world alone?
September
Helen Hunt Jackson
The
golden rod is yellow;
The corn is turning brown;
The trees in apple orchards
With fruit are bending down.
The
gentian's bluest fringes
Are curling in the sun;
In dusty pods in the mildweed
Its hidden silk has spun.
The
sedges flaunt their harvest,
In every meadow nook
And asters by the brook-side
Make asters in the brook,
From
dewy lanes at morning
The grapes' sweet odors rise;
At noon the roads all flutter
With yellow butterflies.
By
these lovely tokens
September days are here,
With summer's best of weather,
And autumn's best of cheer.
But
none of all this beauty
Which floods the earth and
air
Is unto me the secret
Which makes September fair.
'Tis
a thing which I remember;
To name it thrills me yet:
One day of one September
I never can forget.
October's Party
George Cooper
October
gave a party;
The leaves by hundreds came-
The Chestnuts, Oaks, and Maples,
And leaves of every name.
The Sunshine spread a carpet,
And everything was grand,
Miss Weather led the dancing,
Professor Wind the band.
The
Chestnuts came in yellow,
The Oaks in crimson dressed;
The lovely Misses Maple
In scarlet looked their best;
All balanced to their partners,
And gaily fluttered by;
The sight was like a rainbow
New fallen from the sky.
Then,
in the rustic hollow,
At hide-and-seek they played,
The party closed at sundown,
And everybody stayed.
Professor Wind played louder;
They flew along the ground;
And then the party ended
In jolly "hands around."
My November Guest
Robert Frost
My
Sorrow, when she's here with
me,
Thinks these dark days of
autumn rain
Are beautiful as days can
be;
She loves the bare, the withered
tree;
She walks the sodden pasture
lane.
Her
pleasure will not let me stay.
She talks and I am fain to
list:
She's glad the birds are gone
away,
She's glad her simple worsted
grey
Is silver now with clinging
mist.
The
desolate, deserted trees,
The faded earth, the heavy
sky,
The beauties she so truly
sees,
She thinks I have no eye for
these,
And vexes me for reason why.
Not
yesterday I learned to know
The love of bare November
days
Before the coming of the snow,
But it were vain to tell her
so,
And they are better for her
praise.
I Heard a Bird Sing
Oliver Herford
I
heard a bird sing
In the night of December
A magical thing
And sweet to remember.
"We
are nearer to Spring
Than we were in September,"
I heard a bird sing
In the dark of December.
Snowflakes
John Greenleaf Whittier
Out
of the bosom of the air,
Out of the cloud-folds of
her garments shaken,
Over the woodlands brown and
bare,
Over the harvest-fields forsaken,
Silent, and soft, and slow
Descends the snow.
Even
as our cloudy fancies take
Suddenly shape in some divine
expression,
Even as the troubled heart
doth make
In the white countenance confession,
The troubled sky reveals
The grief it feels.
This
is the poem of the air,
Slowly in silent syllables
recorded;
This is the secret of despair,
Long in its cloudy bosom hoarded,
Now whispered and revealed
To wood and field.
The Snowstorm
Ralph Waldo Emerson
Announced
by all the trumpets of the
sky,
Arrives the snow, and, driving
o'er the fields,
Seems nowhere to alight: the
whited air
Hides hills and woods, the
river, and the heaven,
And veils the farm-house at
the garden's end.
The sled and traveller stopped,
the courier's feet
Delayed, all friends shut
out, the housemates sit
Around the radiant fireplace,
enclosed
In a tumultuous privacy of
storm.
Come
see the north wind's masonry.
Out of an unseen quarry evermore
Furnished with tile, the fierce
artificer
Curves his white bastions
with projected roof
Round every windward stake,
or tree, or door.
Speeding, the myriad-handed,
his wild work
So fanciful, so savage, nought
cares he
For number or proportion.
Mockingly,
On coop or kennel he hangs
Parian wreaths;
A swan-like form invests the
hidden thorn;
Fills up the farmer's lane
from wall to wall,
Maugre
the farmer's sighs; and at
the gate
A tapering turret overtops
the work.
And when his hours are numbered,
and the world
Is all his own, retiring,
as he were not,
Leaves, when the sun appears,
astonished Art
To mimic in slow structures,
stone by stone,
Built in an age, the mad wind's
night-work,
The frolic architecture of
the snow