Things more true and deep

Than we mortals dream,

Or how could thy notes flow in such a crystal stream?

We look before and after,

And pine for what is not:

Our sincerest laughter

With some pain is fraught;

Our sweetest songs are those that tell of saddest thought.

Yet, if we could scorn

Hate, and pride, and fear;

If we were things born

Not to shed a tear,

I know not how thy joy we ever should come near.

Better than all measures

Of delightful sound,
Better than all treasures

That in books are found,

Thy skill to poet were, thou scorner of the ground!

Teach me half the gladness

That thy brain must know,
Such harmonious madness

From my lips would flow,

The world should listen then, as I am listening now.

Percy Bysshe Shelley

THE THROSTLE

"Summer is coming, summer is coming,

I know it, I know it, I know it.

Light again, leaf again, life again, love again,"
Yes, my wild little Poet.

Sing the new year in under the blue.

Last year you sang it as gladly.

"New, new, new, new!" Is it then so new
That you should carol so madly?

"Love again, song again, nest again, young again,"

Never a prophet so crazy!

And hardly a daisy as yet, little friend,

See, there is hardly a daisy.

"Here again, here, here, here, happy year!"

O warble unchidden, unbidden!

Summer is coming, is coming, my dear,

And all the winters are hidden.

Alfred Tennyson

THE BROWN THRUSH

There's a merry brown thrush sitting up in the tree.
"He's singing to me! He's singing to me!"

And what does he say, little girl, little boy?
"Oh, the world's running over with joy!

Don't you hear? Don't you see?
Hush! Look! In my tree,

I'm as happy as happy can be!"

And the brown thrush keeps singing, “A nest do you see
And five eggs hid by me in the juniper tree?

Don't meddle! Don't touch! little girl, little boy,
Or the world will lose some of its joy!

Now I'm glad! Now I'm free!

And I always shall be,

If you never bring sorrow to me."

So the merry brown thrush sings away in the tree,

To you and to me, to you and to me;

And he sings all the day, little girl, little boy, "Oh, the world's running over with joy!

But long it won't be,

Don't you know? Don't you see?

Unless we're as good as can be."

Lucy Larcom

CHANTICLEER

Of all the birds from East to West
That tuneful are and dear,
I love that farmyard bird the best,
They call him Chanticleer.

Gold plume and copper plume,
Comb of scarlet gay;

'Tis he that scatters night and gloom,
And whistles back the day!

He is the sun's brave herald
That, ringing his blithe horn,
Calls round a world dew-pearled
The heavenly airs of morn.

O clear gold, shrill and bold!

He calls through creeping mist

The mountains from the night and cold
To rose and amethyst.

He sets the birds to singing,

And calls the flowers to rise;
The morning cometh, bringing
Sweet sleep to heavy eyes.

Gold plume and silver plume,
Comb of coral gay;

'Tis he packs off the night and gloom,

And summons home the day!

Black fear he sends it flying,

Black care he drives afar;
And creeping shadows sighing
Before the morning star.

The birds of all the forest

Have dear and pleasant cheer,

Red cock or black cock,

Gold cock or white,

The flower of all the feathered flock,

He whistles back the light!

Katharine Tynan

"A WET SHEET AND A FLOWING SEA"

A wet sheet and a flowing sea,

A wind that follows fast,

And fills the white and rustling sail,

And bends the gallant mast;

And bends the gallant mast, my boys,

While, like the eagle free,

Away the good ship flies, and leaves
Old England on the lee.

O for a soft and gentle wind!
I heard a fair one cry;

But give to me the snoring breeze
And white waves heaving high;

And white waves heaving high, my boys,
The good ship tight and free-
The world of waters is our home,
And merry men are we.

There's tempest in yon hornèd moon,
And lightning in yon cloud;
And hark the music, mariners!
The wind is piping loud;

The wind is piping loud, my boys,
The lightning flashes free-

While the hollow oak our palace is,

Our heritage the sea.

Allan Cunningham

THE SEA

The sea! the sea! the open sea!
The blue, the fresh, the ever free!
Without a mark, without a bound,

It runneth the earth's wide regions round;
It plays with the clouds; it mocks the skies;
Or like a cradled creature lies.

I'm on the sea! I'm on the sea!

I am where I would ever be;

With the blue above, and the blue below,
And silence wheresoe'er I go;

If a storm should come and awake the deep,
What matter? I shall ride and sleep.

I love, O, how I love to ride

On the fierce, foaming, bursting tide,
When every mad wave drowns the moon
Or whistles aloft his tempest tune,
And tells how goeth the world below,
And why the sou'west blasts do blow.

I never was on the dull, tame shore,
But I loved the great sea more and more,