Poor little heart!
Did they forget thee?
Then dinna care! Then dinna care!

Proud little heart!
Did they forsake thee?
Be debonair! Be debonair!

Frail little heart!
I would not break thee:
Could’st credit me? Could’st credit me?

Gay little heart!
Like morning glory
Thou’ll wilted be; thou’ll wilted be!

– Poor little heart! by Emily Dickinson

The two old, simple problems ever intertwined,
Close home, elusive, present, baffled, grappled.
By each successive age insoluble, pass’d on,
To ours to-day–and we pass on the same.

– Life and Death by Walt Whitman

‘And ask ye why these sad tears stream?’

‘Te somnia nostra reducunt.’
OVID.

And ask ye why these sad tears stream?
; ;Why these wan eyes are dim with weeping?
I had a dream–a lovely dream,
; ;Of her that in the grave is sleeping.

I saw her as ’twas yesterday,
; ;The bloom upon her cheek still glowing;
And round her play’d a golden ray,
; ;And on her brows were gay flowers blowing.

With angel-hand she swept a lyre,
; ;A garland red with roses bound it;
Its strings were wreath’d with lambent fire
; ;And amaranth was woven round it.

I saw her mid the realms of light,
; ;In everlasting radiance gleaming;
Co-equal with the seraphs bright,
; ;Mid thousand thousand angels beaming.

I strove to reach her, when, behold,
; ;Those fairy forms of bliss Elysian,
And all that rich scene wrapt in gold,
; ;Faded in air–a lovely vision!

And I awoke, but oh! to me
; ;That waking hour was doubly weary;
And yet I could not envy thee,
; ;Although so blest, and I so dreary.

– ‘And ask ye why these sad tears stream?’ by Lord Alfred Tennyson

I should not dare to leave my friend,
Because — because if he should die
While I was gone, and I — too late –
Should reach the heart that wanted me;

If I should disappoint the eyes
That hunted, hunted so, to see,
And could not bear to shut until
They noticed me — they noticed me;

If I should stab the patient faith
So sure I ‘d come — so sure I ‘d come,
It listening, listening, went to sleep
Telling my tardy name, –

My heart would wish it broke before,
Since breaking then, since breaking then,
Were useless as next morning’s sun,
Where midnight frosts had lain!

– TILL THE END by Emily Dickinson

YOU waves, though you dance by my feet like children at play,
Though you glow and you glance, though you purr and you dart;
In the Junes that were warmer than these are, the waves were more gay,
When I was a boy with never a crack in my heart.
The herring are not in the tides as they were of old;
My sorrow! for many a creak gave the creel in the-cart
That carried the take to Sligo town to be sold,
When I was a boy with never a crack in my heart.
And ah, you proud maiden, you are not so fair when his oar
Is heard on the water, as they were, the proud and apart,
Who paced in the eve by the nets on the pebbly shore,
When I was a boy with never a crack in my heart.

– The Meditation Of The Old Fisherman by William Butler Yeats

Let laureates sing with rapturous swing
Of the wonder and glory of work;
Let pulpiteers preach and with passion impeach
The indolent wretches who shirk.
No doubt they are right: in the stress of the fight
It’s the slackers who go to the wall;
So though it’s my shame I perversely proclaim
It’s fine to do nothing at all.

It’s fine to recline on the flat of one’s spine,
With never a thought in one’s head:
It’s lovely to le staring up at the sky
When others are earning their bread.
It’s great to feel one with the soil and the sun,
Drowned deep in the grasses so tall;
Oh it’s noble to sweat, pounds and dollars to get,
But – it’s grand to do nothing at all.

So sing to the praise of the fellows who laze
Instead of lambasting the soil;
The vagabonds gay who lounge by the way,
Conscientious objectors to toil.
But lest you should think, by this spatter of ink,
The Muses still hold me in thrall,
I’ll round out my rhyme, and (until the next time)
Work like hell – doing nothing at all.

– Laziness by Robert Service

BID a strong ghost stand at the head
That my Michael may sleep sound,
Nor cry, nor turn in the bed
Till his morning meal come round;
And may departing twilight keep
All dread afar till morning’s back.
That his mother may not lack
Her fill of sleep.
Bid the ghost have sword in fist:
Some there are, for I avow
Such devilish things exist,
Who have planned his murder, for they know
Of some most haughty deed or thought
That waits upon his future days,
And would through hatred of the bays
Bring that to nought.
Though You can fashion everything
From nothing every day, and teach
The morning stats to sing,
You have lacked articulate speech
To tell Your simplest want, and known,
Wailing upon a woman’s knee,
All of that worst ignominy
Of flesh and bone;
And when through all the town there ran
The servants of Your enemy,
A woman and a man,
Unless the Holy Writings lie,
Hurried through the smooth and rough
And through the fertile and waste,
protecting, till the danger past,
With human love.

– A Prayer For My Son by William Butler Yeats

NAPOLEON shifted,
Restless in the old sarcophagus
And murmured to a watchguard:
Who goes there?
Twenty-one million men,
Soldiers, armies, guns,
Twenty-one million
Afoot, horseback,
In the air,
Under the sea.
And Napoleon turned to his sleep:
It is not my world answering;
It is some dreamer who knows not
The world I marched in
From Calais to Moscow.
And he slept on
In the old sarcophagus
While the aeroplanes
Droned their motors
Between Napoleon’s mausoleum
And the cool night stars.

– STATISTICS by Carl Sandburg

THERE was a man whom Sorrow named his Friend,
And he, of his high comrade Sorrow dreaming,
Went walking with slow steps along the gleaming
And humming Sands, where windy surges wend:
And he called loudly to the stars to bend
From their pale thrones and comfort him, but they
Among themselves laugh on and sing alway:
And then the man whom Sorrow named his friend
Cried out, Dim sea, hear my most piteous story.!
The sea Swept on and cried her old cry still,
Rolling along in dreams from hill to hill.
He fled the persecution of her glory
And, in a far-off, gentle valley stopping,
Cried all his story to the dewdrops glistening.
But naught they heard, for they are always listening,
The dewdrops, for the sound of their own dropping.
And then the man whom Sorrow named his friend
Sought once again the shore, and found a shell,
And thought, I will my heavy story tell
Till my own words, re-echoing, shall send
Their sadness through a hollow, pearly heart;
And my own talc again for me shall sing,
And my own whispering words be comforting,
And lo! my ancient burden may depart.
Then he sang softly nigh the pearly rim;
But the sad dweller by the sea-ways lone
Changed all he sang to inarticulate moan
Among her wildering whirls, forgetting him.

– The Sad Shepherd by William Butler Yeats

Of all the meals that glad my day
My morning one’s the best;
Purveyed me on a silver tray,
Immaculately dressed.
I rouse me when the dawn is bright;
I leap into the sea,
Returning with a rare delight
To honey, toast and tea.

My appetite was razor edged
When I was in my prime;
To eggs and bacon I was pledged . . .
Ala! the March of Time;
For now a genial old gent
With journal on my knee,
I sip and take with vast content
My honey, toast and tea.

So set me up for my delight
The harvest of the bee;
Brown, crispy toast with butter bright,
Ceylon – two cups or three.
Let others lunch or dinner praise,
But I regale with glee,
As I regard with grateful gaze
Just honey, toast and tea.

– Breakfast by Robert Service