To a poet's wife
She, who in lonely pride may wear
The laurel on her brow,
And sit beneath its chilling shade,
Is far less blest than thou.
A higher happiness is thine,
To hear the voice of Fame
Re-echo in her silver tones,
The one beloved name.
poem by Anne Lynch Botta from Poems (1848)
Submitted by Veronica Serbanoiu
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Related quotes
The False Laurel And The True
'What art thou, Presumptuous, who profanest
The wreath to mighty poets only due,
Even whilst like a forgotten moon thou wanest?
Touch not those leaves which for the eternal few
Who wander o'er the Paradise of fame,
In sacred dedication ever grew:
One of the crowd thou art without a name.'
'Ah, friend, 'tis the false laurel that I wear;
Bright though it seem, it is not the same
As that which bound Milton’s immortal hair;
Its dew is poison; and the hopes that quicken
Under its chilling shade, though seeming fair,
Are flowers which die almost before they sicken.'
poem by Percy Bysshe Shelley
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To-- Yet look on me
Yet look on me -- take not thine eyes away,
Which feed upon the love within mine own,
Which is indeed but the reflected ray
Of thine own beauty from my spirit thrown.
Yet speak to me -- thy voice is as the tone
Of my heart’s echo, and I think I hear
That thou yet lovest me; yet thou alone
Like one before a mirror, without care
Of aught but thine own features, imaged there;
And yet I wear out life in watching thee;
A toil so sweet at times, and thou indeed
Art kind when I am sick, and pity me.
poem by Percy Bysshe Shelley
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When Poor In All But Hope And Love
WHEN, poor in all but hope and love,
I clasped thee to my faithful heart;
For wealth and fame I vowed to rove,
That we might meet no more to part!
Years have gone by-long weary years
Of toil, to win thee comfort now-
Of ardent hopes-of sickening fears-
And wealth is mine-but where art thou?
Fame's dazzling dreams, for thy dear sake,
Rose brighter than before to me;
I clung to all I deemed could make
My burning heart more worthy thee.
Years have gone by-the laurel droops
In mockery o'er my joyless brow :
A conquered world before me stoops,
And Fame is mine-but where art thou?
In life's first hours, despised and lone,
I wandered through the busy crowd;
But now that life's best hopes are gone,
They greet with pride and murmurs loud.
Oh! for thy voice! thy happy voice,
To breathe its laughing welcome now;
Wealth, fame, and all that should rejoice,
To me are vain-for where art thou?
poem by Caroline Elizabeth Sarah Norton
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Xxx
I see thine image through my tears to-night,
And yet to-day I saw thee smiling. How
Refer the cause ?--Beloved, is it thou
Or I, who makes me sad ? The acolyte
Amid the chanted joy and thankful rite
May so fall flat, with pale insensate brow,
On the altar-stair. I hear thy voice and vow,
Perplexed, uncertain, since thou art out of sight,
As he, in his swooning ears, the choir's Amen.
Beloved, dost thou love ? or did I see all
The glory as I dreamed, and fainted when
Too vehement light dilated my ideal,
For my soul's eyes ? Will that light come again,
As now these tears come--falling hot and real ?
poem by Elizabeth Barrett Browning
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Sonnet 30 - I see thine image through my tears to-night
I see thine image through my tears to-night,
And yet to-day I saw thee smiling. How
Refer the cause?—Beloved, is it thou
Or I, who makes me sad? The acolyte
Amid the chanted joy and thankful rite
May so fall flat, with pale insensate brow,
On the altar-stair. I hear thy voice and vow,
Perplexed, uncertain, since thou art out of sight,
As he, in his swooning ears, the choir's Amen.
Beloved, dost thou love? or did I see all
The glory as I dreamed, and fainted when
Too vehement light dilated my ideal,
For my soul's eyes? Will that light come again,
As now these tears come—falling hot and real?
poem by Elizabeth Barrett Browning
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Sonnet XXX: I See Thine Image
I see thine image through my tears to-night,
And yet to-day I saw thee smiling. How
Refer the cause?--Beloved, is it thou
Or I, who makes me sad? The acolyte
Amid the chanted joy and thankful rite
May so fall flat, with pale insensate brow,
On the altar-stair. I hear thy voice and vow,
Perplexed, uncertain, since thou art out of sight,
As he, in his swooning ears, the choir's amen.
Beloved, dost thou love? or did I see all
The glory as I dreamed, and fainted when
Too vehement light dilated my ideal,
For my soul's eyes? Will that light come again,
As now these tears come--falling hot and real?
poem by Elizabeth Barrett Browning
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Sonnet XXX
I see thine image through my tears to-night,
And yet to-day I saw thee smiling. How
Refer the cause ?--Beloved, is it thou
Or I, who makes me sad ? The acolyte
Amid the chanted joy and thankful rite
May so fall flat, with pale insensate brow,
On the altar-stair. I hear thy voice and vow,
Perplexed, uncertain, since thou art out of sight,
As he, in his swooning ears, the choir's Amen.
Beloved, dost thou love ? or did I see all
The glory as I dreamed, and fainted when
Too vehement light dilated my ideal,
For my soul's eyes ? Will that light come again,
As now these tears come--falling hot and real ?
poem by Elizabeth Barrett Browning
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Thine Eyes I Wear
Hidden beneath your immense stare
Is thine soul exquisite, refined and rare
Fluid and chilly as a streaming river
Your look, your soul, makes mine shiver
Under thine eyes, thy raiment I wear
The look of love, thine ardent glare
Attractive to thee like the embers of fire
What is that thou sincerely admire?
Is it thine own eyes I wear?
Is it thine eyes that attract thy own stare?
When thou look I change into you
For in thine look, thy love I accrue
Always look at me with that beautiful glare
And thine look, thine eyes, I will proudly wear.
poem by Kevin Michael Murphy
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Address To Music
OH thou! whose soft, bewitching lyre,
Can lull the sting of pain to rest;
Oh thou! whose warbling notes inspire,
The pensive muse with visions blest;
Sweet music! let thy melting airs
Enhance my joys, and sooth my cares!
Is there enchantment in thy voice,
Thy dulcet harp, thy moving measure;
To bid the mournful mind rejoice,
To raise the fairy form of pleasure?
Yes, heav'nly maid! a charm is thine,
A magic art, a spell divine!
Sweet music! when thy notes we hear,
Some dear remembrance oft they bring,
Of friends belov'd, no longer near,
And days that flew on rapture's wing;
Hours of delight that long are past,
And dreams of joy, too bright to last!
And oft 'tis thine the soul to fire,
With glory's animating flame,
Bid valor's noble sons aspire
To win th' immortal wreath of fame
Thine too, the soft, expressive tones,
That pity, tender pity owns!
Oh harmony! celestial pow'r!
Thou syren of the melting soul!
In sorrow's reign, in pleasure's hour,
My heart shall own thy blest control;
And ever let thy moving airs,
Enhance my joys and sooth my cares!
poem by Felicia Dorothea Hemans
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Love's Nearness
I think of thee, when golden sunbeams shimmer
Across the sea;
And when the waves reflect the moon's pale glimmer,
I think of thee.
I see thy form, when down the distant highway
The dust-clouds rise;
In deepest night, above the mountain by-way,
I see thine eyes.
I hear thee when the ocean-tides returning
Loudly rejoice;
And on the lonely moor, in stillness yearning,
I hear thy voice.
I dwell with thee: though thou art far removed,
Yet art thou near.
The sun goes down, the stars shine out, ---
Beloved,
Ah, wert thou here!
poem by Henry Van Dyke
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To Mary
O Mary dear, that you were here
With your brown eyes bright and clear.
And your sweet voice, like a bird
Singing love to its lone mate
In the ivy bower disconsolate;
Voice the sweetest ever heard!
And your brow more...
Than the sky
Of this azure Italy.
Mary dear, come to me soon,
I am not well whilst thou art far;
As sunset to the sphered moon,
As twilight to the western star,
Thou, beloved, art to me.
O Mary dear, that you were here;
The Castle echo whispers 'Here!'
poem by Percy Bysshe Shelley
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The Rail Road
Thou great proclaimer to the outward eye
Of what the spirit too would seek to tell,
Onward thou go'st, appointed from on high
The other warnings of the Lord to swell;
Thou art the voice of one that through the world
Proclaims in startling tones, 'Prepare the way;'
The lofty mountain from its seat is hurled,
The flinty rocks thine onward march obey;
The valleys lifted from their lowly bed
O'ertop the hills that on them frowned before,
Thou passest where the living seldom tread,
Through forests dark, where tides beneath thee roar,
And bid'st man's dwelling from thy track remove,
And would with warning voice his crooked paths reprove.
poem by Jones Very
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Echo
Echo, echo...
We come, we go-woah
No I don't want to be just another
Echo, echo...
Everywhere I go
There's something I really need
Everyone I know
Is someone I want to be
Even though
I don't really know me
I better pick it up
Before I let it slip away
I better stick it out
Before I take another day
Into mouth
Everything I say fades out
Echo, echo...
We come, we go-woah
No I don't want to be just another
Echo, echo...
Can I open up your eyes?
Only when the clouds break?
Can I feel the light?
Even though the world shakes
Every night,
You're my quiet satellite
Can I hold you close?
Do her out of focus
And everything I know
I don't even know this
It all falls through
I'm here and I hear you
Echo, echo...
We come, we go-woah
No I don't want to be just another
Echo, echo...
Do you hear me?
Do you hear me?
Cause I need to, just to reach you
Do you hear me?
Coming clearly?
Am I hollow?
Just an echo
Echo, echo...
We come, we go-woah
No I don't want to be just another
Echo, echo...
Echo, echo...
We come, we go-woah
No I don't want to be just another
Echo, echo...
song performed by by Vertical Horizon
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Selene
My beloved, is it nothing
Though we meet not, neither can,
That I see thee, and thou me,
That we see, and see we see,
When I see I also feel thee;
Is it nothing, my beloved!
Thy luminous clear beauty
Brightens on me in my night,
I withdraw into my darkness
To allure thee into light.
About me and upon me I feel them pass and stay,
About me, deep into me, every lucid tender ray.
And thou, thou also feelest
When thou stealest
Shamefaced and half afraid
To the chamber of thy shade,
Thou in thy turn,
Thou too feelest
Something follow, something yearn,
A full orb blaze and burn.
My full orb upon thine,
As thine erst, gently smiling,
Softly wooing, sweetly wiling,
Gleamed on mine;
So mine on thine in turn
When thou feelest blaze and burn,
Is it nothing, my beloved?
My beloved, is it nothing
When I see thee and thou me,
When we each other see,
Is it nothing, my beloved?
Closer, closer come unto me.
Shall I see thee and no more?
I can see thee, is that all?
Let me also,
Let me feel thee,
Closer, closer, my beloved,
Come unto me, come to me, come
O cruel, cruel lot, still thou rollest, stayest not,
Lookest onward, look’st before,
Yet I follow, evermore.
Oh, cold and cruel fate, thou rollest on thy way,
Scarcely lookest, will not stay,
From thine alien way.
The inevitable motion
Bears me forth upon the line
Whose course I cannot see.
I must move as it conveys me
Evermore. It so must be.
O cold one, and I round thee
Revolve, round only thee,
Straining ever to be nearer
While thou evadest still;
Repellest still, O cold one,
Nay, but closer, closer, closer,
My beloved, come, come, come!
The inevitable motion
Carries both upon its line,
Also you as well as me.
What is best, and what is strongest,
We obey. It so must be.
Cruel, cruel, didst thou only
Feel as I feel evermore,
A force, though in, not of me,
Drawing inward, in, in, in.
Yea, thou shalt though, ere all endeth,
Thou shalt feel me closer, closer,
My beloved, close, close to thee,
Come to thee, come, come, come!
The inevitable motion
Bears us both upon its line
Together, you as me,
Together and asunder,
Evermore. It so must be.
poem by Arthur Hugh Clough
Submitted by Veronica Serbanoiu
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The Vigil
England! where the sacred flame
Burns before the inmost shrine,
Where the lips that love thy name
Consecrate their hopes and thine,
Where the banners of thy dead
Weave their shadows overhead,
Watch beside thine arms to-night,
Pray that God defend the Right.
Think that when to-morrow comes
War shall claim command of all,
Thou must hear the roll of drums,
Thou must hear the trumpet's call.
Now, before thy silence ruth,
Commune with the voice of truth;
England! on thy knees to-night
Pray that God defend the Right.
Single-hearted, unafraid,
Hither all thy heroes came,
On this altar's steps were laid
Gordon's life and Outram's fame.
England! if thy will be yet
By their great example set,
Here beside thine arms to-night
Pray that God defend the Right.
So shalt thou when morning comes
Rise to conquer or to fall,
Joyful hear the rolling drums,
Joyful tear the trumpets call,
Then let Memory tell thy heart:
'England! what thou wert, thou art!'
Gird thee with thine ancient might,
Forth! and God defend the Right!
poem by Sir Henry Newbolt
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The Chamois Hunter's Love
Thy heart is in the upper world, where fleet the chamois bounds;
Thy heart is where the mountain-fir shakes to the torrent-sounds;
And where the snow-peaks gleam like stars, through the stillness of the air,
And where the Lauwine's peal is heart - Hunter! thy heart is there!
I know thou lovest me well, dear friend! but better, better far,
Thou lovest that high and haughty life, with rocks and storms at war;
In the green sunny vales with me, thy spirit would but pine,
And yet I will be thine, my love! and yet I will be thine!
And I will not seek to woo thee down from those thy native heights,
With the sweet song, our land's own song, of pastoral delights;
For thou must live as eagles live, thy path is not as mine,
And yet I will be thine, my love! and yet I will be thine!
And I will leave my blessed home, my father's joyous hearth,
With all the voices meeting there in tenderness and mirth,
With all the kind and laughing eyes that in its firelight shine,
To sit forsaken in thy hut, yet know that thou art mine!
It is my youth, it is my bloom, it is my glad free heart,
That I cast away for thee - for thee, all reckless as thou art!
With tremblings and with vigils lone, I bind myself to dwell,
Yet, yet I would not change that lot, oh no! I love too well!
A mournful thing is love which grows to one so wild as thou,
With that bright restlessness of eye, that tameless fire of brow.
Mournful! - but dearer far I call its mingled fear and pride,
And the trouble of its happiness, than aught on earth beside.
To listen for thy step in vain, to start at every breath,
To watch through long long nights of storm, to sleep and dream of death,
To wake in doubt and loneliness - this doom I know is mine
And yet I will be thine, my love! and yet I will be thine!
That I may greet thee from thine Alps, when thence thou comest at last,
That I may hear thy thrilling voice tell o'er each danger past,
That I may kneel and pray for thee, and win thee aid divine -
For this I will be thine, my love! for this I will be thine!
poem by Felicia Dorothea Hemans
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Otho
I.
Thou wert not, Cassius, and thou couldst not be,
Last of the Romans, though thy memory claim
From Brutus his own glory--and on thee
Rests the full splendour of his sacred fame:
Nor he who dared make the foul tyrant quail
Amid his cowering senate with thy name,
Though thou and he were great--it will avail
To thine own fame that Otho’s should not fail.
II.
'Twill wrong thee not—thou wouldst, if thou couldst feel,
Abjure such envious fame--great Otho died
Like thee--he sanctified his country’s steel,
At once the tyrant and tyrannicide,
In his own blood—a deed it was to bring
Tears from all men—though full of gentle pride,
Such pride as from impetuous love may spring,
That will not be refused its offering.
poem by Percy Bysshe Shelley
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Fontana Di Trevi
Why do I sit within the spell
Of eyes like thine, who oft have known
What 'tis in Beauty's gaze to dwell,
And then-to feel alone:
Back be remitted to my cell,
Too lately near a throne?
What though the moon on Trevi's fount,
Whilst we together drink, doth shine,
Can it the rural miles remount,
Or I subtract from mine?
Whilst Time hath scarce begun to count
The pleasant paths of thine.
How vain to thus divide its wave!
It will not help to blend our own.
Thy voice is gay, but mine is grave,
As thine too will have grown
In days when nought is left thee save
A half-remembered tone.
The light that gilds my world no more,
But only now just breaks on thine;
Thy shadows stretch all bright before,
Behind in darkness mine.
Leave me my unillumined shore,
And in thy lustre shine!
Forth to thy Future, gifted child!
Oh, be it fair as thou!
As thy sweet tones and temper mild,
And cloudless as thy brow;
And thou wilt then be reconciled
That I am silent now!
poem by Alfred Austin
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To Summer
O thou who passest thro' our valleys in
Thy strength, curb thy fierce steeds, allay the heat
That flames from their large nostrils! thou, O Summer,
Oft pitched'st here thy goldent tent, and oft
Beneath our oaks hast slept, while we beheld
With joy thy ruddy limbs and flourishing hair.
Beneath our thickest shades we oft have heard
Thy voice, when noon upon his fervid car
Rode o'er the deep of heaven; beside our springs
Sit down, and in our mossy valleys, on
Some bank beside a river clear, throw thy
Silk draperies off, and rush into the stream:
Our valleys love the Summer in his pride.
Our bards are fam'd who strike the silver wire:
Our youth are bolder than the southern swains:
Our maidens fairer in the sprightly dance:
We lack not songs, nor instruments of joy,
Nor echoes sweet, nor waters clear as heaven,
Nor laurel wreaths against the sultry heat.
poem by William Blake
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Introductory Verses
OH! blest art thou, whose steps may rove
Through the green paths of vale and grove,
Or, leaving all their charms below,
Climb the wild mountain's airy brow;
And gaze afar o'er cultured plains,
And cities with their stately fanes,
And forests, that beneath thee lie,
And ocean mingling with the sky.
For man can show thee nought so fair,
As Nature's varied marvels there;
And if thy pure and artless breast
Can feel their grandeur, thou art blest!
For thee the stream in beauty flows,
For thee the gale of summer blows,
And, in deep glen and wood-walk free,
Voices of joy still breathe for thee.
But happier far, if then thy soul
Can soar to Him who made the whole,
If to thine eye the simplest flower
Portray His bounty and His power.
If, in whate'er is bright or grand,
Thy mind can trace His viewless hand,
If Nature's music bid thee raise
Thy song of gratitude and praise;
If heaven and earth, with beauty fraught,
Lead to His throne thy raptured thought,
If there thou lov'st His love to read,
Then, wanderer, thou art blest indeed.
poem by Felicia Dorothea Hemans
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