Poems & Ballads (First Series)

Nay, but this god hath cause enow to smite; If he will slay me, baring breast and throat, I lean toward the stroke with silent mouth And a great heart. Come, take thy sword and...

Then I beheld, and lo on the other side My lady's likeness crowned and robed and dead. Sweet still, but now not red, Was the shut mouth whereby men lived and died. And sweet, bu...

My life is bitter with thy love; thine eyes Blind me, thy tresses burn me, thy sharp sighs Divide my flesh and spirit with soft sound, And my blood strengthens, and my veins abo...

Out of the golden remote wild west where the sea without shore is, Full of the sunset, and sad, if at all, with the fulness of joy, As a wind sets in with the autumn that blows...

Let this be said between us here, One love grows green when one turns grey; This year knows nothing of last year; To-morrow has no more to say To yesterday.

Princes, and ye whom pleasure quickeneth, Heed well this rhyme before your pleasure tire; For life is sweet, but after life is death. This is the end of every man's desire.

I will that if I say a heavy thing Your tongues forgive me; seeing ye know that spring Has flecks and fits of pain to keep her sweet, And walks somewhile with winter-bitten feet...

Lie closer, lean your face upon my side, Feel where the dew fell that has hardly dried, Hear how the blood beats that went nigh to swoon; The pleasure lives there when the sense...

Sleep, is it sleep perchance that covers Each face, as each face were his lover's? Farewell; as men that sleep fare well. The grave's mouth laughs unto derision Desire and dread...

Thou saidest: I am sick of love: Stay me with flagons, comfort me With apples for my pain thereof Till my hands gather in his tree That fruit wherein my lips would be.

You will agree with me that it is impossible for any man to undertake the task of commentary, however brief and succinct, on anything he has done or tried to do, without incurri...

It hath been seen and yet it shall be seen That out of tender mouths God's praise hath been Made perfect, and with wood and simple string He hath played music sweet as shawm-pla...

You would agree, if the point were worth discussion, that it might savour somewhat of pretention, if not of affectation, to be over particular in arrangement of poems according...

In yesterday's reach and to-morrow's, Out of sight though they lie of to-day, There have been and there yet shall be sorrows That smite not and bite not in play. The life and th...

Lo, sirs, this word is there said, That Urias the knight is dead Through some ill craft; by Poulis head, I doubt his blood hath made so red This bird that flew from the queen's...

Rest, and be glad of the gods; but I, How shall I praise them, or how take rest? There is not room under all the sky For me that know not of worst or best, Dream or desire of th...