Darkness by Lord Byron

When I have fears, by John Keats

When I have Fears That I May Cease to Be

By John Keats

(written in 1818, published posthumously in 1848)

When I have fears that I may cease to be 

Before my pen has gleaned my teeming brain, 

Before high-piled books, in charact’ry, 

Hold like rich garners the full ripened grain; 

When I behold, upon the night’s starred face, 

Huge cloudy symbols of a high romance, 

And think that I may never live to trace 

Their shadows with the magic hand of chance; 

And when I feel, fair creature of an hour, 

That I shall never look upon thee more, 

Never have relish in the faery power 

Of unreflecting love—then on the shore 

Of the wide world I stand alone, and think 

Till love and fame to nothingness do sink.

Poem: Metrical Feet - A lesson for a boy

Derwent Coleridge, the third child of Samuel, started learning ancient Greek before he was even seven years old. In 1807, Samuel sent his young son a letter in which he wrote: "I am greatly delighted that you are so desirous to go on with your Greek; and shall finish this letter with a short lesson of Greek"; about a month later, Samuel sent Derwent another letter in which he enclosed the poem "Metrical Feet – A Lesson for a Boy." Coleridge wrote the poem in order to help his son learn about some of the different types of "metrical feet" in ancient Greek poetry (which an also be found in English)

Metrical Feet: a lesson for a boy

By Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1806)

Trochee trips from long to short;
From long to long in solemn sort
Slow Spondee stalks, strong foot!, yet ill able
Ever to come up with Dactyl's trisyllable.
Iambics march from short to long.
With a leap and a bound the swift Anapests throng.
One syllable long, with one short at each side,
Amphibrachys hastes with a stately stride --
First and last being long, middle short, Amphimacer
Strikes his thundering hoofs like a proud high-bred Racer.

If Derwent be innocent, steady, and wise,
And delight in the things of earth, water, and skies;
Tender warmth at his heart, with these meters to show it,
WIth sound sense in his brains, may make Derwent a poet --
May crown him with fame, and must win him the love
Of his father on earth and his father above.
My dear, dear child!
Could you stand upon Skiddaw, you would not from its whole ridge
See a man who so loves you as your fond S.T. Coleridge.

Poetry: Metre and Rhyme

Graveyard Poetry

This poem is often associated with the earlier "graveyard school"of poetry, which revel at great length in death -'that dread moment'-and morbidity; creating an atmosphere of 'delightful gloom'.

Thomas Gray's "Elegy" is considerably different in emphasis, although suffused with a gently humanistic melancholy. It is, in some sense, a life-affirming reconsideration of rural values, although the ending is often read as involving the poet's suicide.

Carter, R. and McRae, J. (1998) The Routledge History of Literature in English: Britain and Ireland London: Routledge (p. 196)

Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard

By Thomas Gray

The curfew tolls the knell of parting day,
The lowing herd wind slowly o'er the lea,
The plowman homeward plods his weary way,
And leaves the world to darkness and to me.

Now fades the glimm'ring landscape on the sight,
And all the air a solemn stillness holds,
Save where the beetle wheels his droning flight,
And drowsy tinklings lull the distant folds;

Save that from yonder ivy-mantled tow'r
The moping owl does to the moon complain
Of such, as wand'ring near her secret bow'r,
Molest her ancient solitary reign.

Beneath those rugged elms, that yew-tree's shade,
Where heaves the turf in many a mould'ring heap,
Each in his narrow cell for ever laid,
The rude forefathers of the hamlet sleep.

The breezy call of incense-breathing Morn,
The swallow twitt'ring from the straw-built shed,
The cock's shrill clarion, or the echoing horn,
No more shall rouse them from their lowly bed.

For them no more the blazing hearth shall burn,
Or busy housewife ply her evening care:
No children run to lisp their sire's return,
Or climb his knees the envied kiss to share.

Oft did the harvest to their sickle yield,
Their furrow oft the stubborn glebe has broke;
How jocund did they drive their team afield!
How bow'd the woods beneath their sturdy stroke!

Let not Ambition mock their useful toil,
Their homely joys, and destiny obscure;
Nor Grandeur hear with a disdainful smile
The short and simple annals of the poor.

The boast of heraldry, the pomp of pow'r,
And all that beauty, all that wealth e'er gave,
Awaits alike th' inevitable hour.
The paths of glory lead but to the grave.

Nor you, ye proud, impute to these the fault,
If Mem'ry o'er their tomb no trophies raise,
Where thro' the long-drawn aisle and fretted vault
The pealing anthem swells the note of praise.

Can storied urn or animated bust
Back to its mansion call the fleeting breath?
Can Honour's voice provoke the silent dust,
Or Flatt'ry soothe the dull cold ear of Death?

Perhaps in this neglected spot is laid
Some heart once pregnant with celestial fire;
Hands, that the rod of empire might have sway'd,
Or wak'd to ecstasy the living lyre.

But Knowledge to their eyes her ample page
Rich with the spoils of time did ne'er unroll;
Chill Penury repress'd their noble rage,
And froze the genial current of the soul.

Full many a gem of purest ray serene,
The dark unfathom'd caves of ocean bear:
Full many a flow'r is born to blush unseen,
And waste its sweetness on the desert air.

Some village-Hampden, that with dauntless breast
The little tyrant of his fields withstood;
Some mute inglorious Milton here may rest,
Some Cromwell guiltless of his country's blood.

Th' applause of list'ning senates to command,
The threats of pain and ruin to despise,
To scatter plenty o'er a smiling land,
And read their hist'ry in a nation's eyes,

Their lot forbade: nor circumscrib'd alone
Their growing virtues, but their crimes confin'd;
Forbade to wade through slaughter to a throne,
And shut the gates of mercy on mankind,

The struggling pangs of conscious truth to hide,
To quench the blushes of ingenuous shame,
Or heap the shrine of Luxury and Pride
With incense kindled at the Muse's flame.

Far from the madding crowd's ignoble strife,
Their sober wishes never learn'd to stray;
Along the cool sequester'd vale of life
They kept the noiseless tenor of their way.

Yet ev'n these bones from insult to protect,
Some frail memorial still erected nigh,
With uncouth rhymes and shapeless sculpture deck'd,
Implores the passing tribute of a sigh.

Their name, their years, spelt by th' unletter'd muse,
The place of fame and elegy supply:
And many a holy text around she strews,
That teach the rustic moralist to die.

For who to dumb Forgetfulness a prey,
This pleasing anxious being e'er resign'd,
Left the warm precincts of the cheerful day,
Nor cast one longing, ling'ring look behind?

On some fond breast the parting soul relies,
Some pious drops the closing eye requires;
Ev'n from the tomb the voice of Nature cries,
Ev'n in our ashes live their wonted fires.

For thee, who mindful of th' unhonour'd Dead
Dost in these lines their artless tale relate;
If chance, by lonely contemplation led,
Some kindred spirit shall inquire thy fate,

Haply some hoary-headed swain may say,
"Oft have we seen him at the peep of dawn
Brushing with hasty steps the dews away
To meet the sun upon the upland lawn.

"There at the foot of yonder nodding beech
That wreathes its old fantastic roots so high,
His listless length at noontide would he stretch,
And pore upon the brook that babbles by.

"Hard by yon wood, now smiling as in scorn,
Mutt'ring his wayward fancies he would rove,
Now drooping, woeful wan, like one forlorn,
Or craz'd with care, or cross'd in hopeless love.

"One morn I miss'd him on the custom'd hill,
Along the heath and near his fav'rite tree;
Another came; nor yet beside the rill,
Nor up the lawn, nor at the wood was he;

"The next with dirges due in sad array
Slow thro' the church-way path we saw him borne.
Approach and read (for thou canst read) the lay,
Grav'd on the stone beneath yon aged thorn."

THE EPITAPH
Here rests his head upon the lap of Earth
A youth to Fortune and to Fame unknown.
Fair Science frown'd not on his humble birth,
And Melancholy mark'd him for her own.

Large was his bounty, and his soul sincere,
Heav'n did a recompense as largely send:
He gave to Mis'ry all he had, a tear,
He gain'd from Heav'n ('twas all he wish'd) a friend.

No farther seek his merits to disclose,
Or draw his frailties from their dread abode,
(There they alike in trembling hope repose)
The bosom of his Father and his God.

Poem: A Beautiful Young Nymph Going to Bed

Jonathan Swift composed this poem in 1731 and he subtitled it (ironically) “Written for the Honour of the Fair Sex,”. It reflects the persistent, unromantic, and satirical vision that marks the later years of Swift’s writing. This most unpoetic of poems presents the terrible process by means of which an eighteenth century London prostitute gets ready to go to sleep after her job—a process which involves her divesting herself of those various artifices she uses to disguise both her physical and moral corruption. The poet offers three different moments in Corinna's night: her preparations for bed (lines 1-38), her fitful dreams (lines 39-59), and her waking to personal disaster (lines 58-64).

The “I” of a first-person narrator (could it be Swift himself) intrudes at the end to provide moral commentary on the whole situation described (lines 65-74).

Poem: A Satirical Elegy on the Death of a Late Famous General

A satire is a genre which "can be described as the literary art of diminishing or derogating a subject by making it ridiculous and evoking toward it attitudes of amusement, contempt, scorn, or indignation". (Abrams: 2012)

A Satirical Elegy on the Death of a Late Famous General

By Jonathan Swift

(1722)

His Grace! impossible! what dead! 

Of old age too, and in his bed! 

And could that mighty warrior fall? 

And so inglorious, after all! 

Well, since he’s gone, no matter how, 

The last loud trump must wake him now: 

And, trust me, as the noise grows stronger, 

He’d wish to sleep a little longer. 

And could he be indeed so old 

As by the newspapers we’re told? 

Threescore, I think, is pretty high; 

’Twas time in conscience he should die 

This world he cumbered long enough; 

He burnt his candle to the snuff; 

And that’s the reason, some folks think, 

He left behind so great a stink. 

Behold his funeral appears, 

Nor widow’s sighs, nor orphan’s tears, 

Wont at such times each heart to pierce, 

Attend the progress of his hearse.

But what of that, his friends may say, 

He had those honours in his day. 

True to his profit and his pride, 

He made them weep before he died. 

Come hither, all ye empty things, 

Ye bubbles raised by breath of kings; 

Who float upon the tide of state, 

Come hither, and behold your fate. 

Let pride be taught by this rebuke, 

How very mean a thing’s a Duke; 

From all his ill-got honours flung, 

Turned to that dirt from whence he sprung.

Abrams, M. (2012) A Glossary of Literary terms. Boston: Wadsworth, Cengage learning.

Poem: The Two Trees by W. B. Yeats

William Butler Yeats

DN-0071801, Chicago Daily News negatives collection, Chicago History Museum
Retrieved from https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/william-butler-yeats

He was born in Dublin, Ireland, in 1865. He was the eldest child of John Butler Yeats and Susan Mary Pollexfen. Yeats spent his early years in London since his father was studying art, but he often returned to Dublin.

After returning to London in the late 1880s, Yeats met writers such as Oscar Wilde and George Bernard Shaw. He also became acquainted with Maud Gonne, a supporter of Irish independence. This revolutionary woman served as a muse for Yeats for years. He even proposed marriage to her several times, but she turned him down.

I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud by William Wordsworth

I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud

By 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
Out-did 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
Which is the bliss of solitude;
And then my heart with pleasure fills,
And dances with the daffodils.

The Chimney Sweeper by William Blake

The Chimney Sweeper
By William Blake

When my mother died I was very young,
And my father sold me while yet my tongue
Could scarcely cry " 'weep! 'weep! 'weep! 'weep!"
So your chimneys I sweep & in soot I sleep.

There's little Tom Dacre, who cried when his head
That curled like a lamb's back, was shaved, so I said,
"Hush, Tom! never mind it, for when your head's bare,
You know that the soot cannot spoil your white hair."

And so he was quiet, & that very night,
As Tom was a-sleeping he had such a sight!
That thousands of sweepers, Dick, Joe, Ned, & Jack,
Were all of them locked up in coffins of black;

And by came an Angel who had a bright key,
And he opened the coffins & set them all free;
Then down a green plain, leaping, laughing they run,
And wash in a river and shine in the Sun.

Then naked & white, all their bags left behind,
They rise upon clouds, and sport in the wind.
And the Angel told Tom, if he'd be a good boy,
He'd have God for his father & never want joy.

And so Tom awoke; and we rose in the dark
And got with our bags & our brushes to work.
Though the morning was cold, Tom was happy & warm;
So if all do their duty, they need not fear harm.

A lego stop-motion animation of William Blake's poem, "The Chimney Sweeper".

Composed Upon Westminster Bridge by William Wordsworth

Composed Upon Westminster Bridge
By William Wordsworth

Earth has not anything to show more fair:
Dull would he be of soul who could pass by
A sight so touching in its majesty:
This City now doth, like a garment, wear
The beauty of the morning; silent, bare,
Ships, towers, domes, theatres, and temples lie
Open unto the fields, and to the sky;
All bright and glittering in the smokeless air.
Never did sun more beautifully steep
In his first splendour, valley, rock, or hill;
Ne'er saw I, never felt, a calm so deep!
The river glideth at his own sweet will:
Dear God! the very houses seem asleep;
And all that mighty heart is lying still!

Darkness by Lord Byron

Metre: Poetry

Poem: Metrical Feet - A lesson for a boy

Derwent Coleridge, the third child of Samuel, started learning ancient Greek before he was even seven years old. In 1807, Samuel sent his young son a letter in which he wrote: "I am greatly delighted that you are so desirous to go on with your Greek; and shall finish this letter with a short lesson of Greek"; about a month later, Samuel sent Derwent another letter in which he enclosed the poem "Metrical Feet – A Lesson for a Boy." Coleridge wrote the poem in order to help his son learn about some of the different types of "metrical feet" in ancient Greek poetry (which an also be found in English)

Metrical Feet: a lesson for a boy

By Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1806)

Trochee trips from long to short;
From long to long in solemn sort
Slow Spondee stalks, strong foot!, yet ill able
Ever to come up with Dactyl's trisyllable.
Iambics march from short to long.
With a leap and a bound the swift Anapests throng.
One syllable long, with one short at each side,
Amphibrachys hastes with a stately stride --
First and last being long, middle short, Amphimacer
Strikes his thundering hoofs like a proud high-bred Racer.

If Derwent be innocent, steady, and wise,
And delight in the things of earth, water, and skies;
Tender warmth at his heart, with these meters to show it,
WIth sound sense in his brains, may make Derwent a poet --
May crown him with fame, and must win him the love
Of his father on earth and his father above.
My dear, dear child!
Could you stand upon Skiddaw, you would not from its whole ridge
See a man who so loves you as your fond S.T. Coleridge.

Poem: A Beautiful Young Nymph Going to Bed

Jonathan Swift composed this poem in 1731 and he subtitled it (ironically) “Written for the Honour of the Fair Sex,”. It reflects the persistent, unromantic, and satirical vision that marks the later years of Swift’s writing. This most unpoetic of poems presents the terrible process by means of which an eighteenth century London prostitute gets ready to go to sleep after her job—a process which involves her divesting herself of those various artifices she uses to disguise both her physical and moral corruption. The poet offers three different moments in Corinna's night: her preparations for bed (lines 1-38), her fitful dreams (lines 39-59), and her waking to personal disaster (lines 58-64).

The “I” of a first-person narrator (could it be Swift himself) intrudes at the end to provide moral commentary on the whole situation described (lines 65-74).

Poem: A Satirical Elegy on the Death of a Late Famous General

A satire is a genre which "can be described as the literary art of diminishing or derogating a subject by making it ridiculous and evoking toward it attitudes of amusement, contempt, scorn, or indignation". (Abrams: 2012)

A Satirical Elegy on the Death of a Late Famous General

By Jonathan Swift

(1722)

His Grace! impossible! what dead! 

Of old age too, and in his bed! 

And could that mighty warrior fall? 

And so inglorious, after all! 

Well, since he’s gone, no matter how, 

The last loud trump must wake him now: 

And, trust me, as the noise grows stronger, 

He’d wish to sleep a little longer. 

And could he be indeed so old 

As by the newspapers we’re told? 

Threescore, I think, is pretty high; 

’Twas time in conscience he should die 

This world he cumbered long enough; 

He burnt his candle to the snuff; 

And that’s the reason, some folks think, 

He left behind so great a stink. 

Behold his funeral appears, 

Nor widow’s sighs, nor orphan’s tears, 

Wont at such times each heart to pierce, 

Attend the progress of his hearse.

But what of that, his friends may say, 

He had those honours in his day. 

True to his profit and his pride, 

He made them weep before he died. 

Come hither, all ye empty things, 

Ye bubbles raised by breath of kings; 

Who float upon the tide of state, 

Come hither, and behold your fate. 

Let pride be taught by this rebuke, 

How very mean a thing’s a Duke; 

From all his ill-got honours flung, 

Turned to that dirt from whence he sprung.

Abrams, M. (2012) A Glossary of Literary terms. Boston: Wadsworth, Cengage learning.

Poem: The Two Trees by W. B. Yeats

William Butler Yeats

DN-0071801, Chicago Daily News negatives collection, Chicago History Museum
Retrieved from https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/william-butler-yeats

He was born in Dublin, Ireland, in 1865. He was the eldest child of John Butler Yeats and Susan Mary Pollexfen. Yeats spent his early years in London since his father was studying art, but he often returned to Dublin.

After returning to London in the late 1880s, Yeats met writers such as Oscar Wilde and George Bernard Shaw. He also became acquainted with Maud Gonne, a supporter of Irish independence. This revolutionary woman served as a muse for Yeats for years. He even proposed marriage to her several times, but she turned him down.

I Wondered Lonely as a Cloud

Composed upon Westminster Bridge

By William Wordsworth

Earth has not anything to show more fair:
Dull would he be of soul who could pass by
A sight so touching in its majesty:
This City now doth, like a garment, wear
The beauty of the morning; silent, bare,
Ships, towers, domes, theatres, and temples lie
Open unto the fields, and to the sky;
All bright and glittering in the smokeless air.
Never did sun more beautifully steep
In his first splendour, valley, rock, or hill;
Ne'er saw I, never felt, a calm so deep!
The river glideth at his own sweet will:
Dear God! the very houses seem asleep;


And all that mighty heart is lying still!

The Chimney Sweeper

By William Blake

When my mother died I was very young,
And my father sold me while yet my tongue
Could scarcely cry " 'weep! 'weep! 'weep! 'weep!"
So your chimneys I sweep & in soot I sleep.

There's little Tom Dacre, who cried when his head
That curled like a lamb's back, was shaved, so I said,
"Hush, Tom! never mind it, for when your head's bare,
You know that the soot cannot spoil your white hair."

And so he was quiet, & that very night,
As Tom was a-sleeping he had such a sight!
That thousands of sweepers, Dick, Joe, Ned, & Jack,
Were all of them locked up in coffins of black;

And by came an Angel who had a bright key,
And he opened the coffins & set them all free;
Then down a green plain, leaping, laughing they run,
And wash in a river and shine in the Sun.

Then naked & white, all their bags left behind,
They rise upon clouds, and sport in the wind.
And the Angel told Tom, if he'd be a good boy,
He'd have God for his father & never want joy.

And so Tom awoke; and we rose in the dark
And got with our bags & our brushes to work.
Though the morning was cold, Tom was happy & warm;
So if all do their duty, they need not fear harm.

A lego stop-motion animation of William Blake's poem, "The Chimney Sweeper".