Sonnet LXV. To Dr. Parry Of Bath
With some botanic drawings which had been made
some years.
IN happier hours, ere yet so keenly blew
Adversity's cold blight, and bitter storms,
Luxuriant Summer's evanescent forms,
And Spring's soft blooms with pencil light I drew:
But as the lovely family of flowers
Shrink from the bleakness of the Northern blast,
So fail from present care and sorrow past
The slight botanic pencil's mimic powers--
Nor will kind Fancy even by Memory's aid,
Her visionary garlands now entwine;
Yet while the wreaths of Hope and Pleasure fade,
Still is one flower of deathless blossom mine,
That dares the Lapse of Time, and Tempest rude,
The unfading Amaranth of Gratitude.
poem by Charlotte Smith
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Sonnet XXXVII.
The poet's fancy takes from Flora's realm
Her buds and leaves to dress fictitious powers,
With the green olive shades Minerva's helm,
And give to Beauty's queen, the queen of flowers.
But what gay blossoms of luxuriant spring,
With rose, mimosa, amaranth entwined,
Shall fabled Sylphs and fairy people bring,
As a just emblem of the lovely mind?
In vain the mimic pencil tries to blend
The glowing dyes that dress the flowery race,
Scented and colour'd by a hand divine!
Ah! not less vainly would the Muse pretend,
On her weak lyre, to sing the native grace
And native goodness of a soul like thine!
poem by Charlotte Smith
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Sonnet XXXVI.
SHOULD the lone wanderer, fainting on his way,
Rest for a moment of the sultry hours,
And though his path through thorns and roughness lay,
Pluck the wild rose, or woodbine's gadding flowers,
Weaving gay wreaths beneath some sheltering tree,
The sense of sorrow he awhile may lose;
So have I sought thy flowers, fair Poesy!
So charm'd my way with Friendship and the Muse.
But darker now grows life's unhappy day,
Dark with new clouds of evil yet to come,
Her pencil sickening Fancy throws away,
And weary Hope reclines upon the tomb;
And points my wishes to that tranquil shore,
Where the pale spectre Care pursues no more.
poem by Charlotte Smith
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Ode to Pencils
Pencil o pencil
What would i use to trace the stencil
Possibly crayon, marker, or a pen
Unfortunately they are back in the den
Could i use a pencil with color
They might be much taller
So thanks for the pencil to be born
It is easier to draw when there aren't torn
That is my ode
I hope you thought it flowed
poem by Kristi Miller
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Love Not
LOVE not, love not! ye hapless sons of clay!
Hope’s gayest wreaths are made of earthly flowers—
Things that are made to fade and fall away
Ere they have blossom’d for a few short hours.
Love not!
Love not! the thing ye love may change:
The rosy lip may cease to smile on you,
The kindly-beaming eye grow cold and strange,
The heart still warmly beat, yet not be true.
Love not!
Love not! the thing you love may die,
May perish from the gay and gladsome earth;
The silent stars, the blue and smiling sky,
Beam o’er its grave, as once upon its birth.
Love not!
Love not! oh warning vainly said
In present hours as in the years gone by;
Love flings a halo round the dear ones’ head,
Faultless, immortal, till they change or die,
Love not!
poem by Caroline Elizabeth Sarah Norton
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Sonnet II
Written at the close of Spring.
THE garlands fade that Spring so lately wove,
Each simple flower, which she had nursed in dew,
Anemonies, that spangled every grove,
The primrose wan, and hare-bell mildly blue.
No more shall violets linger in the dell,
Or purple orchis variegate the plain,
Till Spring again shall call forth every bell,
And dress with humid hands her wreaths again.-
Ah! poor humanity! so frail, so fair,
Are the fond visions of thy early day,
Till tyrant passion and corrosive care
Bid all thy fairy colours fade away!
Another May new buds and flowers shall bring;
Ah! why has happiness-no second spring?
poem by Charlotte Smith
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The Rose-Bush
There was a rose-bush in a garden growing,
Its tender leaves unfolding day by day;
The sun looked-on, and his down-going
Left it amid the starlit dusk of nights of May.
The dew-drop came and kissed it in the gloaming;
It gathered sweetness in the morning hours;
The bee beheld it as he went aroaming,
And thought, 'What honey will be hidden in its flowers!'
The light grew richer and the days grew long;
The May-time deepened into June;
The air was laden with the robin's song,
The light wind touched the leaves and set them atune.
And now a tiny bud appeared, and then another--
Bright promises of radiant flowers;
The breezes, whispering, told it to each other,
The rose-bush heard them in the gladsome hours.
New Hope awoke and thrilled in all it veins;
Life is so sweet that culminates in flowers!
It smiled and grew in misty summer rains,
And caught the freshness of the evening showers.
And oft the gardener came and stood beside;
He tended it alway with zealous care,
Watching lest any evil should betide,
Or blight creep o'er the leaves that grew so fair.
He crushed the buds and dropped them on the ground;
The rose-bush felt a chill in every vein;
It drooped, as if to hide each bitter wound--
This strange experience was its earliest thought of pain.
'Poor little plant,' the gardener thought,
Thou art too young, too young to know
That few buds unto flowers are brought,--
It is by pruning thou must grow.'
And still the summer smiled and shoned,
And other roses bloomed and died.
'Mine would more beauteously have blown,'
The little rose-bush sadly sighed.
Again the gardener sought his flowers,
Where he had watched his treasures blow:
The autumn blast has swept the bowers,
The winds and storms has laid them low!
Though sad of heart, the rose-bush still was green;
It lifted up its drooping head;
'The life that would have filled the buds may still be seen,
'Tis folded in its heart,' he said.
He stooped and took it from the ground
All trembling with its vague alarms,
And quick and tenderly he wrapped it round,
And kindly bore it in his arms.
And now where soft the sunshine flows,
Within a fair, immortal bower,
In all its fragrant beauty blooms the rose,
Its every bud grown into perfect flower.
poem by Anonymous Americas
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Apostrophe
TO AN OLD TREE.
WHERE thy broad branches brave the bitter North,
Like rugged, indigent, unheeded, worth,
Lo! Vegetation's guardian hands emboss
Each giant limb with fronds of studded moss,
That clothes the bark in many a fringed fold
Begemm'd with scarlet shields, and cups of gold,
Which, to the wildest winds their webs oppose,
And mock the arrowy sleet, or weltering snows.
--But to the warmer West the woodbine fair
With tassels that perfumed the summer air,
The mantling clematis, whose feathery bowers
Waved in festoons with nightshade's purple flowers,
The silver weed, whose corded fillets wove
Round thy pale rind, even as deceitful love
Of mercenary beauty would engage
The dotard fondness of decrepit age;
All these, that during summer's halcyon days
With their green canopies conceal'd thy sprays,
Are gone for ever; or disfigured, trail
Their sallow relicts in the autumnal gale;
Or o'er thy roots, in faded fragments toss'd,
But tell of happier hours, and sweetness lost!
--Thus in Fate's trying hour, when furious storms
Strip social life of Pleasure's fragile forms,
And awful Justice , as his rightful prey
Tears Luxury's silk, and jewel'd robe, away,
While reads Adversity her lesson stern,
And Fortune's minions tremble as they learn;
The crowds around her gilded car that hung,
Bent the lithe knee, and troul'd the honey'd tongue,
Desponding fall, or fly in pale despair;
And Scorn alone remembers that they were.
Not so Integrity ; unchanged he lives
In the rude armour conscious Honour gives,
And dares with hardy front the troubled sky,
In Honesty's uninjured panoply.
Ne'er on Prosperity's enfeebling bed
Or rosy pillows, he reposed his head,
But given to useful arts, his ardent mind
Has sought the general welfare of mankind;
To mitigate their ills his greatest bliss,
While studying them , has taught him what he is ;
He , when the human tempest rages worst,
And the earth shudders as the thunders burst,
Firm, as thy northern branch, is rooted fast,
And if he can't avert , endures the blast.
poem by Charlotte Smith
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Spring Tones
Spring tones are coming
From the inside blooming
Spring is here everywhere
In footsteps of New Year
Flower garden come - grow
Melt down coldness snow
With freedom for earth
In its new freshness birth
Spring's time blowing wind
Towards icily rescind
Of bleakness deep dim
In the blow sweepings grim
Where cold waves glide
In its striking bitter tide
Flowing on to dark destiny
Still inside you and me
Spring tone rise - the blue sky!
In feelings of light high
That comes through the rays
Of the new meeting days
Give seeds of its outcomes
In birth of new blooms
And every day to be new
When it comes here through
poem by Peter S. Quinn
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Health: A sojourner
One never contemplates mortality
Until our health begins to fade away.
In our youth we possessed vitality
Thought it would last forever and a day.
But comes a season our thoughts will languor
And dreams of immortality will wane
Like unto annual summer flowers
Whose spring advents we never see again.
Our health is such a very fragile thing
We often take for granted in our lives;
And like the blooming flowers in the spring
Their stay is brief until their time arrives
When all the lovely blooms begin ebbing
That’s not unlike the health we once possessed
A bitter pill to swallow nonetheless.
poem by Albert Ahearn
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Life Is Lovely All the Year
When the buds are blossoming,
Smiling welcome to the spring,
Lovers choose a wedding day -
Life is love in merry May!
Spring is green - Fal lal la!
Summer's rose - Fal lal la!
It is sad when Summer goes,
Fal la!
Autumn's gold - Fal lal la!
Winter's grey - Fal lal la!
Winter still is far away -
Fal la!
Leaves in Autumn fade and fall;
Winter is the end of all.
Spring and summer teem with glee:
Spring and summer, then, for me!
Fal la!
In the Spring-time seed is sown:
In the Summer grass is mown:
In the Autumn you may reap:
Winter is the time for sleep.
Spring is hope - Fal lal la!
Summer's joy - Fal lal la!
Spring and Summer never cloy,
Fal la!
Autumn, toil - Fal lal la!
Winter, rest - Fal lal la!
Winter, after all, is best -
Fal la!
Spring and summer pleasure you,
Autumn, ay, and winter, too -
Every season has its cheer;
Life is lovely all the year!
Fal la!
poem by William Schwenck Gilbert
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To A Friend,
WHO SENT ME FLOWERS, WHEN CONFINED BY
ILLNESS.
WHILE sickness still my step detains
From scenes where vernal pleasure reigns,
Where Spring has bath'd with dewy tear
The blossoms of the op'ning year;
To soothe confinement's languid hours,
You send a lavish gift of flowers,
Midst whose soft odours mem'ry roves
O'er all the images she loves.
Not long their sweetness shall prevail,
Their rosy tints shall soon be pale,
Yet fancy in their fading hues
No emblem of our friendship views;
Its firm fidelity shall last,
When all the flowers of spring are past;
And when life's summer shall be o'er,
That summer which returns no more,
Still friendship, with perennial bloom,
Shall soften half the winter's gloom!
poem by Helen Maria Williams
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Elegy (Tir'd with the busy crouds)
Tir'd with the busy crouds, that all the day
Impatient throng where Folly's altars flame,
My languid powers dissolve with quick decay,
Till genial Sleep repair the sinking frame.
Hail kind Reviver! that canst lull the cares,
And every weary sense compose to rest,
Lighten th' oppressive load which Anguish bears,
And warm with hope the cold desponding breast.
Touch'd by thy rod, from Power's majestic brow
Drops the gay plume; he pines a lowly clown;
And on the cold earth stretch'd the son of Woe
Quaffs Pleasure's draught, and wears a fancy'd crown.
When rous'd by thee, on boundless pinions born
Fancy to fairy scenes exults to rove,
Now scales the cliff gay-gleaming on the morn,
Now sad and silent treads the deepening grove;
Or skims the main, and listens to the storms,
Marks the long waves roll far remote away;
Or mingling with ten thousand glittering forms
Floats on the gale, and basks in purest day.
Haply, ere long, pierc'd by the howling blast
Through dark and pathless desarts I shall roam,
Plunge down th' unfathom'd deep, or shrink aghast
Where bursts the shrieking spectre from the tomb:
Perhaps loose Luxury's enchanting smile
Shall lure my steps to some romantic dale,
Where Mirth's light freaks th' unheeded hours beguile,
And airs of rapture warble in the gale.
Instructive emblem of this mortal state!
Where scenes as various every hour arise
In swift succession, which the hand of Fate
Presents, then snatches from our wondering eyes.
Be taught, vain man, how fleeting all thy joys,
Thy boasted grandeur, and thy glittering store;
Death comes, and all thy fancy'd bliss destroys,
Quick as a dream it fades, and is no more.
And, sons of Sorrow! though the threatening storm
Of angry Fortune overhang a while,
Let not her frowns your inward peace deform;
Soon happier days in happier climes shall smile.
Through earth's throng'd visions while we toss forlorn,
'Tis tumult all, and rage, and restless strife;
But these shall vanish like the dreams of morn,
When Death awakes us to immortal life.
poem by James Beattie
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Verses II
Supposed to have been written in the New Forest,
in early Spring.
AS in the woods, where leathery Lichen weaves
Its wint'ry web among the sallow leaves,
Which (through cold months in whirling eddies blown)
Decay beneath the branches once their own,
From the brown shelter of their foliage sear,
Spring the young blooms that lead the floral year:
When, waked by vernal suns, the Pilewort dares
Expand her spotted leaves, and shining stars
And (veins empurpling all her tassels pale)
Bends the soft Wind-flower in the tepid gale;
Uncultured bells of azure Jacynth's blow,
And the breeze-scenting Violet lurks below:
So views the wanderer, with delighted eyes,
Reviving hopes from black despondence rise,
When, blighted by adversity's chill breath,
Those hopes had felt a temporary death;
Then with gay heart he looks to future hours,
When love shall dress for him the summer bowers.
And, as delicious dreams enchant his mind,
Forgets his sorrows past, or gives them to the wind.
poem by Charlotte Smith
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Memory
Brightly the sun of summer shone,
Green fields and waving woods upon,
And soft winds wandered by;
Above, a sky of purest blue,
Around, bright flowers of loveliest hue,
Allured the gazer's eye.
But what were all these charms to me,
When one sweet breath of memory
Came gently wafting by?
I closed my eyes against the day,
And called my willing soul away,
From earth, and air, and sky;
That I might simply fancy there
One little flower - a primrose fair,
Just opening into sight;
As in the days of infancy,
An opening primrose seemed to me
A source of strange delight.
Sweet Memory! ever smile on me;
Nature's chief beauties spring from thee,
Oh, still thy tribute bring!
Still make the golden crocus shine
Among the flowers the most divine,
The glory of the spring.
Still in the wall-flower's fragrance dwell;
And hover round the slight blue bell,
My childhood's darling flower.
Smile on the little daisy still,
The buttercup's bright goblet fill
With all thy former power.
For ever hang thy dreamy spell
Round mountain star and heather bell,
And do not pass away
From sparkling frost, or wreathed snow,
And whisper when the wild winds blow,
Or rippling waters play.
Is childhood, then, so all divine?
Or Memory, is the glory thine,
That haloes thus the past?
Not all divine; its pangs of grief,
(Although, perchance, their stay be brief,)
Are bitter while they last.
Nor is the glory all thine own,
For on our earliest joys alone
That holy light is cast.
With such a ray, no spell of thine
Can make our later pleasures shine,
Though long ago they passed.
poem by Anne Brontë from Poems by Currer, Ellis, and Acton Bell (1846)
Submitted by Veronica Serbanoiu
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Pink Flower
Pink flower is beautiful
Always so much of anything
Playfully and never dull
As it is inside spring
Tenderly moments to bring on
To every summer night
Until its blossom is gone
With beautiful pinkish bright
Pink flower is like you
With all your loving touch
So much to make and do
If you are in love so much
Nothing is all like this
On to the blue light dark
With new spring dawn bliss
Shades of the petal spark
Fragrances in the air
Full of new summer high
Touching blossom everywhere
In the hours going by
Just like a love to come
When love touches heart
Flowering passion blossom
Now in these days will start
poem by Peter S. Quinn
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Pencil Rain
The possible dream
Finale of seem
The moment that some call eternal that some call insane
Now helmets on each head awaiting the first lead
The pageant is named the pencil rain
The infantry stands
And holds out its hands
The marshals binoculars focus and skyward they train
Theyre searching the yonder blue
They look out for number two
The heraldry of the pencil rain
And now hear the roar that none can ignore
The thunderous clatter of splintering wood and lives that are claimed
And none who have witnessed all
Can think of a nobler cause than perishing in the pencil rain
The pencil rain
The pencil rain
The pencil rain
song performed by by They Might Be Giants
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Fragrant Flower Vavroovahana patra
Virgins love flowers;
Garlands of flowers adorn with pleasure.
Garlands of flowers on curly crisp wavy long hair allure lover;
Lover enjoys peerless beauty with pleasure.
Wife looks beautiful adorned with garlands of flower;
Entices husband with profound pleasure.
Women adorned with garlands of jasmines cure men gaily;
Beholding the beauty men derive peace gleefully.
Flower is a gift of Almighty;
Beholding the beauty all enchant with gaiety.
Flowers in dense green forests are most beautiful;
Poet enjoys the beauty, mind is delightful.
poem by Vavroovahana Patra
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The Flower of Love
'Tis said the rose is Love's own flower,
Its blush so bright, its thorns so many;
And winter on its bloom has power,
But has not on its sweetness any.
For though young Love's ethereal rose
Will droop on Age's wintry bosom,
Yet still its faded leaves disclose
The fragrance of their earliest blossom.
But ah! the fragrance lingering there
Is like the sweets that mournful duty
Bestows with sadly-soothing care,
To deck the grave of bloom and beauty.
For when its leaves are shrunk and dry,
Its blush extinct, to kindle never,
That fragrance is but Memory's sigh,
That breathes of pleasures past for ever.
Why did not Love the amaranth choose,
That bears no thorns, and cannot perish ?
Alas! no sweets its flowers diffuse,
And only sweets Love's life can cherish.
But be the rose and amaranth twined,
And Love, their mingled powers assuming,
Shall round his brows a chaplet bind,
For ever sweet, for ever blooming.
poem by Thomas Love Peacock
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Tried and Tested
My pencil holds a multitude
of varied possiblities.
Which I accept with gratitude
I grasp the opportunities
To write my thoughts in black and white
on any subject that I choose.
Expressing sorrow or delight
enabling me to share my views
With other poets on the net.
Who also share their thoughts with me
although in fact we have not met.
The common bond is poetry.
I am old fashioned proud to use
The simplest of technology.
A pencil is the tool I choose
it helps my thoughts flow easily.
I don’t compose on my P.C.
Though I suppose I should learn to.
I’d rather scribble happily
in pencil as I usually do.
24/06/2009
http: //.blog.myspace.com/poeticpiers
poem by Ivor Or Ivor.e Hogg
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Song III: It Grew Up Without Heeding
Love is enough: it grew up without heeding
In the days when ye knew not its name nor its measure,
And its leaflets untrodden by the light feet of pleasure
Had no boast of the blossom, no sign of the seeding,
As the morning and evening passed over its treasure.
And what do ye say then?--That Spring long departed
Has brought forth no child to the softness and showers;
--That we slept and we dreamed through the Summer of flowers;
We dreamed of the Winter, and waking dead-hearted
Found Winter upon us and waste of dull hours.
Nay, Spring was o'er-happy and knew not the reason,
And Summer dreamed sadly, for she thought all was ended
In her fulness of wealth that might not be amended;
But this is the harvest and the garnering season,
And the leaf and the blossom in the ripe fruit are blended.
It sprang without sowing, it grew without heeding,
Ye knew not its name and ye knew not its measure,
Ye noted it not mid your hope and your pleasure;
There was pain in its blossom, despair in its seeding,
But daylong your bosom now nurseth its treasure.
poem by William Morris
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