 Do we begin, or do we make an end, When you and I part who have had fair day? If we begin, then I am glad of it, As a man kindling a wrought silver lamp, And casting perfumes in it might be glad, And if we make an end, I am glad too, As a man might be laying down his book, And knowing a fair tale has been well told. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain, Supposing we had gone down, by Gerald Crowe, Read for LibriVox.org by Adrian Stevens. Supposing we had gone down into the dark, Under the fascinating swirl of waves, Would you have given it me to clasp you round, Before the seagulls came to kiss your eyes, And came long-fingered crabs to feast with you, And was no further talk of our desire, Except the tide had made it musical, Bone upon bone of us a little while. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. The Dance of the Blood-Red Sun by Eric Dickinson. Read for LibriVox.org by Carmen Fulmer. The Dance of the Blood-Red Sun. And when the sun sank down toward the temple hill, When day's last breath was blown, And Saqqala's note was still, Twas then Demeter's daughter, To the stream by the hill would run, To bend and kiss the grasses, And dance to a blood-red sun. While Khashogh's homeward wing, Pan hear some footsteps pass, As some first breath of spring Go sweeping o'er the grass. So slight, so swift they pass, And as the feet speed by, A whisper shakes the trees. They nudge them for a lie And dream that no one sees. A tremor shakes the grasses, To some young hero passes. But on Demeter's daughter, To the stream by the hill has run, Has bent and kissed the grasses, And danced to a blood-red sun. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. A calendar by Esther Lillian Duff. Read for LibriVox.org by Adrian Stevens. I made a calendar of saints To name upon my rosary, And daily I entreat their aid for thee. To guard thee during sleep I name St. Veep. St. Prisa has thy wardrobe in her care, And Blythe St. Hugh the dressing of thy hair. St. Maddox aids the toilet of my fair. When thou betimes to household tasks Repair, St. Sylvester is there, St. Chad inspects the linen and the lace, Each polished spoon reflects the shining face Of St. Remidius, minister of grace, And all the meal presides St. Boniface. To keep thy missile, Tempting thee to read I name St. Bede, And later, when thy French shall visit thee, Ensuring that the talk be Blythe and free, I seek betimes the bland St. Alphage, Whilst thy pen, lest happily thou shouldst need it, Attends and dusted it. And when the little mask of day is over, Gentle St. Damian of Villanova takes charge Of thee, and all that thou shalt know Of this hour's passing is that thou wilt grow Dreamily willing for the night, And so turning a bead in prayer to deft St. Probein For thine unrobing To guard thee during sleep I name St. Veep. I marked how black they were in strange, The oxen that bore your body to a resting place, Where, when the work was done, We stood bare-headed for a little space. I marked how light you were to lower down, And wondered if you knew that I was there, And railing in the place, Remembered that you could not greatly care. So you were dead because we buried you, And oxen drew you to a resting place. You must be dead, for as we buried you I trod the heaped-up earth about your face. This recording is in the public domain. Lad's Love and Lavender by Esther Lillian Doth Read for Libri Vox by Julian Pratley Lad's Love and Lavender, Rosemary and Rue I picked them in a posie, and I offered them to you. It was only Lad's Love, but surely it was true, Only Wild Grey Lavender, but fragrant as it grew. I plucked the sprig of Rosemary for memory of you, And was it to complete the tale I tidied up with Rue? Lad's Love and Lavender, Rosemary and Rue I picked them in a posie, and I offered it to you. End of Poem This recording is in the public domain. Years longer than years go by in bleak enduring. We bustle over humdrum, toil at some littleness, When, suddenly, a flame leaps up within us. As things sense new are whirled away, Expunged, and sight itself is blinded by the dazzle, The blaze of glory. Briefly then we live till the dropped curtain. May you have hours where I have had but moments. End of Poem This recording is in the public domain. The Crowd by T. W. Earp Read for Libby Rocks.org by Algypug. Here are many different people all roaring with one voice. Beware, go not too near, For you will lose your voice and roar with them. End of Poem This recording is in the public domain. End of Poem This recording is in the public domain. We come so much a part of you, Alas, and the worst part, That you go down the street and hear men's praises with calm indifference, While I, who follow, smile, and am filled with pride. End of Poem This recording is in the public domain. Nauts, you said, and I said, Nauts, oh yes, of course, but there are other places. And then I was silent, quickly, for I remembered certain fields where I played when I was a child, With a November sunset over them. End of Poem This recording is in the public domain. Cranes by T. W. Earp Read for Libby Rocks.org by Algypug. All day they have been busy about man's work, Swinging great hods of bricks with eager wear, But now they, too, endure the desires That lurk haunting the hours of night. They do not stir, Erect, they suffer metallic agony, Struck to a frozen gesture, Catch a claw twitched up at heaven. All night long they see Star upon star, And these they hunger for. Emotionless, thrilled with longing, They've only tried to pluck a golden blossom down from the sky. End of Poem This recording is in the public domain. Departure by T. W. Earp Read for Libby Rocks.org by Algypug. I have been reading books for about twenty years, I have laughed with other men's laughter, Wept with their tears. Life has been a cliche all these years, I would find a gesture of my own. End of Poem This recording is in the public domain. Six Poems Written in Foreign Countries by Godfrey Alton Read for Libby Rocks.org by Adrien Stevens One In quetta lamps are lighted, And like a sound in dreams, The bugle calls at evening Across the seven streams, How sweet and faint it seems. O here I am a soldier, And here my heart must stay Till twilight's in the barracks, And with the end of day My heart is fair away. For Hanna Pass is rocky, And high is Murda Hill, But O for June in Hampshire, And the fields my people till, My heart is crying still. The honeysuckle hedges, Where they will be dusty white, Where grass mows go singing, Along the golden light, Down smooth fields out of sight. Surely on some long evening, When rooks call down the lane, And on the fields at twilight Or softly falls the rain, We shall come home again. When faint far cries of sunset Are in the lime trees cool, And by the ancient spinny Up from the hidden pool The boys troop back to school. For Hanna Pass is rocky, And high is Murda Hill, But O of June in England, And the fields our people till, Our hearts are dreaming still. Quetta 1915 2. What of the woods on summer evenings wide We have looked down upon from Broadmoor Hill, And our dear pool beyond the barkam ride Is this a sunlit and a silent still? The summer evenings are as lingering still Along the alzmore heather golden cool, And where the dogs swam out by barkam hill No shadow falls on the unruffled pool. Do you climb up by Sandhurst wood alone To watch the moon rise over Eversley, And where far up the glimmering pines Make moan look down the valley, And remember me? Dream not of our old summers Where the rain falls whispering Towards the ancient Rhine. And forget, though never now again Shall we together thread the lands of pine, Yet happier boys hour long Shall loiter still Along the alzmore heather golden cool, And where our dogs swam out by barkam hill No shadow falls on the unruffled pool. Mediterranean Sea 1914 3. In a garden where bees murmured A droning, sunny dream, First heard I that old story Thy story polypheme, And half my heart enraptured Held present peace for naught, Weaving the long adventure Along the looms of thought. Yet to the tail had entered The scent of lilac trees, And down that ancient garden The dreamlike sound of bees, Back to a tune more subtle Beneath his warrior Greek, The tune of endless summers I heard Odysseus speak. This evening sailing eastward That blue rejoicing stream, I found Thy fabled island, Thy island polypheme, And half my heart enraptured Holds all but strife for naught, Weaving a new adventure Along the looms of thought. Yet though I hear adventure Singing so clear and low, My heart is drugged with memory Of summers long ago, And from the past there riseeth The scent of lilac trees, The sleepy ancient garden The dreamlike sound of bees. Mediterranean Sea 1914 4. Above the hot white high road, The cold in woods below, The sunny road to Sandhurst I knew so long ago, Deep down hot, Through the pine stems, In that deep shadowy wood, Show sunlight on the heather Where you and Douglas stood, And faint from over Bracknell, And Alsmore's leaf strewn dowels Across the silent pine-woods, There comes a sound of bells. Still lies that narrow clearing, Sunlit and sweet with bees, And still keep watch around it Unchanging silent trees. The hot bee-haunted heather Still from the highway shows, But now along that heathland No sun-drowsed wanderer goes, Only from over Bracknell And Alsmore's leaf strewn dowels Across the silent pine-woods There comes a sound of bells. Quetta 1915 5. The last bell rings, The summer term is dying, The chapel lights gleam out along the court, And frankly the organ sounds For old years sighing That pass more swift than thought. And then the undersound, The welcome thunder Of thronging boys beneath the ancient gate, Gay and well-loved, As any guest, I wonder, When comes the unquestioned fate? At this last hour, Before the huge-awaking Air All the fruit of love and peace be shed, Behold your comrades for the great leaf-taking Throng up from the summer's dead. They too have knelt, Sun flushed from July-weather, Down these long-lamplet aisles In evenings past, And in old years were gathered here together To say farewell at last. Ah! many of this much wept for phantom-number Whose delicate youth made dear our summer-land Fell in far wars, And now forgotten slumber In sinned or malacand. The organ fills with thankfulness and sorrow, Merma the tranquil prayers, O happy place, How many here shall sleep with these tomorrow, That were thy earlier race? Ah! mighty throng of score-boys, Proud and slender, Not here again shall you your vespers tell, The last hour ends, kneel down, give thanks, And render to your dear youth farewell. Quetta 1915 6 Still through the woods of childhood, With autumn one by one, The golden leaves go fluttering Down shafts of woodland sun, The long path through the heather Still finds the hidden pool, Where far through dell and spinny The last bell sounds from school. O, far across the meadows, By Lonehill copses tall, Where through sun-checkered silence All day the oak-leaves fall, By slanting windless beech-woods, Leafs strewn in valleys deep, Where lulled by hidden ring-doves The sun-drowsed copses sleep. Faintly, the far bell murmurs, At whose insistent call Across her starlit courtyards How loud the footsteps fall, I see the lighted windows, I hear the voices hum, The great bell calls, Come quickly, but I, I do not come. Six thousand miles to eastward My bones are buried deep, The bell rings on forever, They stir not in their sleep, Yet through the huge dim woodlands, Age-long by childhood's ways, My happy spirit wanders, Dreaming of olden days. Kazma Tangi, Balukistan, 1915 End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. A girl's song by H.R. Freston, read for Libri Vox by Julian Pratley. He would make me idle as the droning bees In some aged pinewood, sad at set of sun. You would make me splendid as the plunging seas, When at call of mourning the great tides sure would run. He would make me sigh for langua and repose, Frail as some tall lily bruised by human hands. You would make me blush for joy like a laughing rose, Worked to sudden splendour on sun-warmed lands. Beauty lies in sorrow, lovely as the snow, Lying on a ruined town, that once was blithe and gay. Beauty wakes in gladness, like a dream of long ago, Waking into music at opening of the day. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. Sometimes I wonder by H.R. Freston, read for Libri Vox.org by Nima. Sometimes I wonder if you know how, When we meet in rotor lane, my heart leaps up and trembles so. I think it narrow will quiet again. Sometimes I wonder if you know. Sometimes I wonder if you guess, Behind each careless word of mine, There lurks a passionate caress, Although I make no outward sign. Sometimes I wonder if you guess. Always I find you calm and yet so strange your eyes, So strange your smile. Sometimes I think they hold regret, Who wished for something all the while. Always I find you calm and yet. Sometimes I think you understand that, When the magic hour draws near. Suddenly I shall seize your hand, And kiss your lips and call you dear. Sometimes I think you understand. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. Lament by Russell Green, read for Libri Vox by Julian Pratley. Oh, would that beauty clothed no living thing? It is a curse that ever it should cling To that which lies within the doom of death. Why are you not a ring of tawny gold? Why are you not a sapphire I might hold, Rather than warm of blood and warm of breath? For then love would not crave for love's return. No more the need laboriously to learn The baffling byways of a silent heart. No more a pilgrim of the endless quest, When in my hand the quiet gem should rest In mute fulfillment of a mute desire. No more the unattainable, The goal unreached by all the travelings of the soul, The distant tremors of a fading fire. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. Awakening of the Baki by Naomi M. Haldane, read for Libri Vox by Julian Pratley. We were asleep in sleepy fields, In summer-centred fields of hay, Or where that heavy oak copse Shields pale bracken from the light of day. We were asleep and dreaming endlessly, No breath of May or June us from our dreams could sever. Dreams like long furrows in a crested sea, We were asleep but now are awake forever. And as we woke we saw the stars stream overhead across the night, Till all the east was streaked with bars Of swiftly growing milky light. And when the dawn had swept across the sky, Ah, past all hoping and past all endeavor, We felt new life at every pulse beat cry. We were asleep but now are awake forever. So it was no wise strange to see When we leapt up the dappled skin, The thirst as twining wondrously, The wine we steeped our faces in. We felt the bull's breath burning on our brows, The branding god-mark that will leave us never. Strong in the wisdom which that touch endows, We were asleep but now are awake forever. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. From the Youth of All Nations by H. C. Harwood, Read for LibriVox.org by Larry Wilson. Think not, my elders, to rejoice When from the nation's wreck we wise, With a new thunder in our voice And a new lightning in our eyes. You called with patriotic sneers And drums and sentimental songs. We came from out the vernal years Thus bloodily to right your wrongs. The sins of many centuries Sealed by your indolence and fright Have earned us these our agonies, The thunderous appalling night, When from the lurid darkness Came the pains of poison and of shell, The broken heart, the world's ill fame, The lonely arrogance of hell. Fate liars from a game afar Your wrangles and your patronage, Come drifting to the work of war Which you have made our heritage. O China's not. Not ours the crime. O praise us not. It is not one, The fight which we shall make sublime Beneath an unaccustomed sun. The simple world of childhood Fades beyond the sticks that all have passed. This is a novel land of shades Where in no ancient glories last. A land of desolation Blurred by mists of penitence and woe, Where every hope must be deferred And every river backward flow. Not on this gray and ruined plain Shall we obediently call your cities To rebuild again For their inevitable fall. We kneel at no ancestral shrine. With admirable blasphemy we desecrate The old divine and dream a new eternity. Destroy the history of men, The weary cycle of decay. We shall not pass that way again. We tread in you untrodden way. Though scattered wider yet, Our youth on every sea and continent, There shall come bitter with the truth A fraction of the suns you sent. When slowly with averted head, Some darkly, some with halting feet, And bowed with mourning for the dead, We walk the cheering, fluttering street. A music terrible austere Shall rise from our returning ranks To change your merriment to fear And slay upon your lips your thanks. And on the brooding weary brows Of stronger suns, Close enemies are writ The ruin of your house, As swift usurping dynasties. In the poem, this recording is in the public domain. The Prayer of the Virgin Mary by H. C. Harwood Bread for LibriVox.org Give me the strength for one more day To do the ordinary thing, To scrub and cook and watch and pray, And tranquilly at night To sing a lullaby to Jim and John, And memories to the boy who's gone. You know the wars and argument Brought on the world by feckless men. Preserve our home from discontent, Bring back my eldest boy again, And let us live among the strife And orderly and simple life. And when we go, as go we must, My man and I, to burying place, Still let our children put their trust in you And your unbounded grace, And merry well, and live at ease, And take strong babies on their knees. End of Poem. This recording is in the public domain. Home Sickness from the Town by A. L. Huxley Read for LibriVox.org by L. L. Wilson Fru, fruity, and faint of patchouli smells, And a bio-virgins talking keats, And the arch window in accordion pleats Artfully fringing with the tales she tells The giggling prurient. Life nauseous! Let the whole crowd be sent To the chosen limboes and appropriate hells Reserved in memories black as stagnancy. Back, back, no social contract, From the teats of our old wolfish Mother-nature drink, Sweet, unrestrained, and lust and savagery. Feel goat hair growing thick and redolent On loin and thigh. Look back and mark the cloven hoof marks Of the track. You leave, then forward eyes again. No wink, less for an instant, You should miss the sight of Mooney Floating flanks and haunches white, Flashed by your fleeting nymph girl through the leaves. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. Peace by Leslie Phillips Jones Read for LibriVox.org by Sarah Brown, S. Exjunction, Vermont A cool, calm night and a glowing fire Then the stately toll of a chime Mids the stillness of thoughts Seen through the haze of time Lingering vaguely the while A soft, dull light And a tall, grand spire Bold, black against the dusky sky An echo fading in space And the rising wind sigh Crooning, lulling, then sleep. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. For a folk song by R. S. Lambert Read for LibriVox.org O London, O London, I've heard of thee and thine How wide and full the highways With shops so wondrous fine So brightly do they glimmer A man abroad by night Would say the stars in heaven Came down to give them light And there be mighty buildings That cast their shadow far And strange, unceasing noises Such as in cities are O London, O London, Mother of us thou art Who callest to thy children And takest them to heart Where shall a man be resting And his body there found Be it far he sleeps His soul is still on London ground O London, O London, I must a journey go And parting is a sorrow Surely a bitter woe Then shall we but forget thee And wander feeplessly God put his curse upon us To dwell in the country And of poem This recording is in the public domain Wartime by R. S. Lambert Read for LibriVox.org by Nima Drums go forth to the marching And many battalions of fighters And the dark ships Lie upon the sea waiting And the sound of the great guns Is driven across the slanting sky But my heart has not gone with them My soul hath folded her wings In a great silence And hath saw her shame Amidst the much shouting Far away my soul hath flown Searching, searching for forgotten peace She, the clear-eyed one The dove of the deathless gods She hath departed away from us And we are given over to darkness and hatred I will go far awondering Looking for my lost love For all the light of the heavens Is fading About the faintness of her footstep And a poem This recording is in the public domain Domino Mayo by Agnes E. Murray Read for LibriVox.org by Larry Wilson I wait at the cottage door Looking out on the dusty highway Long, long have I waited From the first red flush of the morning When the fragrance of all the world Drifted out on the vagrant winds The men in the horned oxen Passed by to the burnished wheat fields Bright blue shirts on their backs And gleaming sighs on their shoulders And behind them the women and girls Clothed in crimson and russet Fresh from the deep night slumber With laughter beneath their lashes I hear the songs in the cornfields The ripple of laughter ringing along The deserted highway The sun is rising at noonday And the sound of the reapers is still Everywhere men are sleeping Seeking the shade of the branches In the tints Irresistible heat The dust lies white on the highway Unsteered by the foot of the traveller I wait and the shadows grow longer Light breaths stir in the branches And soon they are driving their oxen With jingling bells on the harness The young men and maidens come laughing With red corn sheaves on their shoulders They turn and stare as they pass me Wondering ask one another Who is it whence come see this stranger Whom all day long she awaiteth And then pass on to their homesteads The shadows lie black and the cornfields Blood red gleam in the sunset Now a pale star has kindled a torch in the west Another and after another come out Till the pale flush sky is a glitter With myriad on myriad of torches I wait and shall wait till the time come When he my master shall find me I feel not my limbs beneath me They are numb with the long, long vigil The sunlight is left in the darkness But the earth is crowned with starlight I strain my ears through the stillness The stillness that hangs like a shadow And holds the breath of the world Deep breaths of fragrance unfold me The fragrance of burgeoning blossoms Of rose and of jasmine And myrtle and the deep purple flower of slumber Moths flit white in the blackness Brushing my face in their passing An owl hoot slow in the distance A nightjar cloaks by the river I strain my ears through the darkness For the sound of passing footsteps I hear a step in the distance A swift light tread of my loved one And my deep heart beats and trembles Like the wings of a bird in flight He will come with his young lithe limbs Supple and bright as the panthers He will come with his glorious face Like lightning across the clouds And eyes like the deep night sky Where clustering stars are the thickest That I bow and tremble before For they are the shrine of my worship Lips that are fiery wine Lips that scorch and subdue I have woven the web of my life In the loom of my love for thee Lowly perchance the web But glorious thrice was the bloom All that was fairest and fiercest I wove And the threads were resplendent I caught the light of the stars In the flash of the sun on the wavetops The songs of an hundred birds And the breath of the wind at midnight All the color and sound and scent Of the world have I gathered And wrought in a shining web Beloved my master for thee The steps come near on the highway Or let them pause for a moment There is your hand made waiting Year upon year she has waited Fool, thrice in your dreaming The footsteps have passed without pausing I saw his face in the darkness But I could not move my lips to cry Allowed on his name For my soul was dumb in its longing His face was glorious Heedless and proud And he wrecked not his lover Stood waiting He passed in the darkness His footsteps were lost in stillness And now, though I wait for a lifetime He will not pass again I stretch my arms through the darkness Vainly, vainly in longing Oh, thou my dearly beloved Will thou not hear, though unuttered, The wail of my cry for thee The cry for a great prize lost End of poem This recording is in the public domain The Prince of Ormuz Sings to Badora By Robert Nichols Red for Libbervox.org When she kisses me with her lips I become a rock That giant, that fabulous bird And over the desert vast Yellow and dumb by wheel And my jubilant screaming is heard A voice, an echo, high up and glad Over the domes and green pools of Baghdad But when she kisses me with her eyes My heart melts in me She is my sun, she strokes my snow I am loosed, I arise A brook of water I run, I run Crystal water, sunny and sweet Laughing and weeping To fawn at her feet End of poem This recording is in the public domain Midday by Robert Nichols Red for Libbervox.org By Nima The earth is still Only the white sun climbs Through the green silence of the branching limes Whose linked flowers hanging from the still tree top Distill their soundless syrup Drop by drop While twix the starry bracket of their lips The black bee drowsing floats And drowsing sips The flimsy leaves hang on the bright blue air Calm, suspended Deep peace is everywhere Filled with a murmurous rumor of high noon Earth seems with open eyes to sink and swoon In the sky, peace Where nothing moves Save the sun that smiles and loves Aquivering pieces on the grass Through the noon-blown butterflies pass White and hot, blue only to wear They can float flat in dream on the soft air Trees are asleep, beautiful, slumberous trees Stirred only by the passion of the breeze That like a warm wave welling over rocks Lifts and loosens the mass of drowsing locks Earth too, under the profound grass, sleeps and sleeps And softly heaves their slumberous mass The earth sleeps, sleeps the newly buried clay Or doth divinity Trouble it to live away No voice uplifts from under the wrapped crust The dust cries to the unregarding dust Over the hill the stopped notes of twin reeds Speak like drops from an old wound that bleeds A yokel's pipe, an ancient pastoral sings Above the innumerable murmur of hid wings I hear the cadence, sour-phone sweet The oldest birthing of the earth repeat All love, all passion, all strife, all delight Are but the dreams that haunt earth's vision tonight In her eternal consciousness the stir Of Judas or Jesus is no more to her than you or I Being all part of dreams, the shadowy shadow Of a thing that seems The images, the lone pipe player sees Sitting and playing to the lone noon breeze One note, one life, they sleep Soon, we as these end a poem This recording is in the public domain The Tower by Robert Nichols Read for LibriVox.org by Larry Wilson It was deep night in over Jerusalem's pale roofs The moon floated, drifting through high vaporous roofs The moonlight crept and glistened silent, solemn, sweet Over dome and column, down empty listening street In the closed scented gardens the rose loosed from the stem For white showering petals None regarded them, the starry thicket Breed odors to the sentinel palm Silence possessed the city like a soul possessed by calm Thought a spark in the warn under the giant night Save where in the turrets lantern beamed a grave, still light There in an upper chamber a gold-eyed lamp was lit Marvelous lamp in darkness informing, redeeming it For set in that tiny lantern Jesus, the blessed and doomed Spoke to the lone apostles as light to men entombed And spitting his hands in blessing as one soon to be dead He put soft enchantment into spare wine and bread The hearts of the disciples were broken and full of tears Because their Lord the Spearless was hedged about with spears And in his face the sickness of departure had spread a gloom At leaving his young friends friendless They could not forget the tomb He smiled subduedly telling in tones soft his voice of the dove The endlessness of sorrow, the eternal solace of love And lifting the earthy tokens wine and sorrowful bread He bade them sup and remember one who lived and was dead And they could not restrain their weeping But one rose to depart having weakness and hate of weakness Raging within his heart and bowed to the rogue assembly Whose eyes gleamed wet in the light Judas arose and departed night went out to the night Then Jesus lifted his voice like a fountain in an ocean of tears And comforted his disciples and calmed and allayed their fears Judas wound down the turret creeping from floor to floor And would fly but one leaning, weeping, barred him beside the door And he knew her by her ruddy garment and two yet watching men Mary of seven sorrows, Mary Magdalene And he was frightened at her She sighed, I dreamed him dead and that was I who sold him by sin Then Judas fled out into the night The moon had begun to set, a drear small wind went sifting setting the dust afret Into the heart of the city Judas ran on and prayed To stern Jehovah lest his deed make him afraid But in the spirey turret, hanging as if on air, the disciples sat unspeaking A maze and peace were there, for his voice, more lovely than song of all earthly birds, In accents humble and happy, spoke slow, consoling words Then Jesus discoursed and was silent, sitting upright And soon passed the window behind him slanted the setting moon And rising for Olivet, all stared betwixt love and dread, Seeing the moon a ruddy halo behind his head End of poem This recording is in the public domain Franklin Kane, by Elizabeth Rendle Read for Librebox.org by Kathleen Silk I had for you, Madonna, you shook your small dear head Silk I have and silk enough, a store of it, you said Content I laid the web away, you lacked some cotton thread A cup I filled for you, Madonna, but other hands than mine More meat had given you to know the magic of the vine I poured within my empty cup fresh water for the wine A song I made for you, Madonna, it was my very best But your heart had heard the melody that will not let us rest Yet her lips had need of laughter, so I sang it as a jest Love I had for you, Madonna, because I looked on you But long ago your love was gone to pay its happy due Love you had, and love enough, and yet your friends were few My days are sweet, Madonna, sweet to their farthest end You, rich beyond all telling, had need that I should send Cotton thread in clear clean water and adjusting and a friend End of poem, this recording is in the public domain A Valid of Doom by Elizabeth Rendell Read for Librebox.org by Kathleen Ladies, pretty ladies, what do you lack? Ladies, pretty ladies, choose from my pack All the way to heaven and all the way to hell I went to fetch the fairings I have to sell If you've been to heaven, if you've been to hell I will pay a pretty price for a thing that you can tell How does my true love and how fares the foe Who slew him on a winter's night, very long ago I went the road to heaven, it is a weary way I pass the open gate of hell, you may reach it in a day Of all the many folk I saw, how should I know Which was your true love and which was your foe My love is a gallant, blue-eyed and debonair A thousand, thousand, such as he you may meet with anywhere He bears upon his breast the marks of wounds and kisses seven I saw not any man like this in all the courts of heaven My foe is a dour man and his hand is bitten through A little sign of love I gave for the deed he willed to do Lady, pretty lady, to his other news you lack This faring only, peddler, will I have from out your pack O lady, there in heaven I saw the blessed Stand, appraising God, and one there was who had a bitten hand And one among the damned I saw, who know not any rest Marks of wounds and kisses seven were burning on his breast Go, go again, good peddler, and bring me word again Why he I hate is doomed to bliss and he I love to pain Go cry my name in heaven, inhale my name declare That I may know before I go what was answered there Lady, pretty lady, what do you lack? Lady, pretty lady, choose from my pack I've been again to heaven, I've been again to hell Here are news that you may choose from those I have to sell Oh, what said my lover and what said my foe? Tell me, trusty peddler, that I may know I'll take the road to heaven or go my way to hell Give me news that I may choose and I will pay you well I cried your name before the damned And he who was your friend A curse upon the silly fool who brought me to my end I cry your name before the saints And he who was your foe caught me with his bitten hand And would not let me go He held me long in my despite Conjuring me by God and hope of heaven To come again back by the path I trod And swear your false fair lover had been forever true And he or foe was damned in hell for the deed he dared to do I'll climb the road to heaven and kiss the wounded hand of him Who is a lover true and he will understand Then I will take my way to hell unto my lover foe False or true I love him and God will let me go Ladies, pretty ladies, what do you lack? Ladies, pretty ladies, choose from my pack All the way to heaven and all the way to hell I went to fetch these pretty fairings I have to sell End of poem, this recording is in the public domain The Return by Elizabeth Rendell Read for Labourvox.org by Kathleen Last night my virgin spirit sinned It fled along the ways of wind nakedly I To seek your breast Knowing what chanced I would not tell It crept air moon rise back to hell A little sobbing and distress End of poem, this recording is in the public domain Night by L. Rice Oxley Read for Librevox.org by Carmen Fulmer West Virginia February 29, 2020 Night and now dark sleep has climbed the highest hill And no last sunlight keeps awake the day One after one the stars rise up until they gather to night's surface And the bay of heaven is sparkling with their thousand lights Such silence and such stillness that afar You seem to hear as ever on such nights The flickering of every burning star Oh, what fair compass this the course to mark Of wanderers in the night For strange it seems, though all is light in heaven The earth is dark till stately through the trees The chast moon gleams round in the silver Fairest of her moods like Diane Hunting in her native woods End of poem, this recording is in the public domain Petro Night and a Road by L. Rice Oxley Read for Librevox.org by Carmen Fulmer West Virginia Petro Night and a Road Swift life and light on a desolate road When the night is still deep with its fullness of stars And there goes from the lamp set before the command Let there be light And a white patch of road swiftly flees onward Oh, who hath not felt it? Greatly exulting that divine motion, the glory of speed Who hath not felt it but feels that his heart is one with the engines Brace to endeavor strong for a trial of swiftness and strength And fired with a joy and a zeal to be onward Swift life and light in the deadness and darkness of the deep of night In the silence of sleep, the strong delight of the rapid beat Urging the wheels to follow the fleet white beam on the road Swift life and light and a wind that is hurling itself through the night With a scream past our ears With a frantic might like a wretch distraught Mad in the dark and fleeing the thought of fiends on the road Swift life and light in the heavens above us Where worlds are burning with fire and speed But fair as the stars, we with our lamp With quick pulsing spark and shake of engine Speed on the road, shoot meteoric, adventuresome, glorious Too soon our lamp's light is merged in a lit street Losing its potency and the wheels once so fleet Slow down and the engine stops And sudden the stillness aches till the ears grow used to the silence And I thank you now for the joy of that journeying For the sense of man's vigor For the knowledge that beauty hates not machinery neither modernity For the exaltation of life and light On the free dark road End of poem This recording is in the public domain An old rhyme re-sung by Dorothy H. Rowe Read for LibriVox.org by Larry Wilson Here comes an old soldier Down the dusty highway trooping with the stars Comes old year, a soldier returning from the wars Out at elbow, down at heel, shuffling in his shoe With a knapsack full of lutein, of summertime free-booting Threadbear at the corners where the sunshine filters through Who beheld the youth of him how he marched away Confident, resplendent in the morning of a day Heels of air and heart of grace bragging of the spring With the trumpets of the fourth wind, the near wind, the north wind And half the world as mad as marched to hear his trumpeting Where's the marshal pageantry that used to flout the sky Flung to sport by every air that blows the leaves awry While the old year limps along whistling out of tune And gorgeous in his old rags, red rags, gold rags Flounce the todry tatters of the glory that was June End of poem This recording is in the public domain Lay by Dorothy L. Sayers Read for LibriVox.org by Linda Elson Phytac, Los Angeles Qu'ils font dix-huit Aucune fois de dix qu'ils font vingt Aucune fois de douze Qu'ils font vingt-cinq De verre entier ou de verre coupé Et qu'on vient que la taille de chacune couple A deux paragraphs Soit d'une rime toute, différente, l'une à l'autre Excepté tant seulement que la dernière couple Des douze Qu'ils font vingt-cinq Et qu'il y ait et doit être conclusion de lait Soit de pareil rime et d'autant de verre Sans redite comme la première couple Eustache des champs, l'art de dictier One Mamas, let love go by with his crown upon his head Beaten royally of gold, heavy, and red Your tinsel garments fly to the trip of a lightsome tread The gusty gale has fled, and your garlands are blown awry Sniggering, whisperingly, what was that thing you said? Poor old love, oh eye, put him away to bed With his wearisome song and sigh, with a ragtime tune instead But yours is already dead, and his can never die Two Oxford, suffer it once again that another should do thee wrong I also, eye above all, should set thee into a song Eye that am twice thy child have known thee Worship thee, loved thee, cried thy name allowed to the silence And could not be satisfied For my hands were stretched to clutch thee Draw thee up to my side, and my heart has leaped And my breath has failed to hear the tongue of Tom Tole in the dark And straight, unpanopled, my soul has almost died Bear with me as thou hast borne with all thy passionate throng Of lovers, the fools of love, for the great flood Sweeps along from the hills into the sea And all their boats go down with the tide And thou shalt stand unmoved When the wreck of the world beside When the loveless cities of greed slip down In their ruined pride and crumble into the gulf of time Thou shalt be strong With thebes and Arn and Memphis Where the deathless gods abide, a city sanctified 3. If I shall sing of thee an antique rhyme Stately and cold as moons that near eclipse And intricate as bells wrung down in time It is to keep the madness from my lips Whereby the lovers tongue stumbles and trips Uttering foolishness, and thy sublime white brow Is marred with mockery Garlands to whips, sceptres to reeds Are turned and worshiped to a crime Think, magic city, that as each dear chime Thrills the mute friendless night Or stealthily drips through all the noise Of noon from prime to prime Continually some new soul comes to grips With thee and all the power of thee He slips to seaward, weighs out anchor From the slime, following the wake Of countless golden ships thy figure at the prow To some far western climb 4. Thou art so magical, thou makest me afraid Lest some great bolt of desolation fall And thou in dust be laid with Babylon and Nineveh the Tall Awesome enchanted lake will cover the all And through quadrangle cloister colonnade Four coloured fishes swim and faint and small Up through the waves at midnight The bells of Maudlin call Through midnight water's mighty tome will call Or when perchance the pole of some nocturnal shade Unstarred, more dewy dark than usual Lifts upon hill and glade I fear lest sunrise strike upon nor wall No winding street nor ghost white pinnacle Only on level woodlands lonely made of thee as once By art's incredible The holy castle vanished behind Ser Percival At morning light was not for Percival 5. Once Nymew the lady of the lake wound aged Merlin in the coils of sleep And cast the silence of the luminous deep Green forest all about him there to take his rest forever No alarm might shake the stillness No wild creature snuff or peep on him No knight arouse him with the leap of his tall war horse Plunging through the break And that enchantress Venus For the sake of young Pygmalion Weary to see him creep Kissing his idols senseless foot and weep Smote life into the stone And so did Slake his thirst of love And thou the willow's quake by the clear share Thick clustered dewdrops steep The heads of mossy gargoyle beasts That keep their wide shy smile And dewy dream or wake 6. Only one painter could have painted thee Still mother with the unimpassioned eyes Dark with the mystery of many centuries Couldst thou have walked in a woman's guise Under the blue exulting skies of Italy In the great sunrise All things that were and now are and shall be Grave and upon thy heart have made thee wise To smile inscrutably All aid thou couldst despise Of reeds and fanciful sultries Strange face of kindness and cruelties Immutably without surprise 7. Thy name is as the scent of things departed Of myrrh and unremembered frankincense Stored in the niches of dim chapels dense With hidden tales of penitence With wreathed prayer and desperate vows red-hearted Whose ancient eloquence knocks on the doors of scents When in thy haunted shrines I kneel without defence Like one that sails on ice-dark waters Chartered by wrinkled mariners at dear expense Who trims the sails with careful diligence And though the pole-star burn intense Shudders to know how many ships thus started Feeling the wrath commence of old experience And drowned green ghosts that crawl From unsuspected dens 8. How shall I let thee go? For thou didst ring all myself from me I would not withhold one citadel but gave thee everything Perhaps a better wisdom had controlled the gift Had kept some solitary string thou could not shake Some secret still untold So that thou hadst not left me unconsoled at thy departure All this sorrowing would not be mine to-day Had I been strong of old But now, too late, the fleeing shadows bring The unsheathed swords of mourning sharp and cold Thou breakest from me, I am weakening Last night whilst thou so mighty I behold glimmering betwixt the feathers of thy wing Westward the stars, eastward the sunrise gold O stay, my hands about thy feet are bold Curse me, O bless, thou godlike deadly thing By the Lord's living face I will not lose my hold 9. The moonlight over Radliff Square Small sunset spires that drows and dream Thin bells that ring to evening prayer Red willow roots along the stream And perilous grey streets that team With light feet wandering unaware And winter nights with lamps a gleam Globet golden in the violet air Odd nightmare carven things that stare Spell stricken in a voiceless scream The warn steps of an ancient stare With oak and balustrade and beam Such things are way-tier than they seem These marks, my branded soul must bear Pledges that time cannot redeem And yet god knows if I shall care 10. Isoat Day follows day with weary feet The bitter spray flies fitfully over the waterway The gulls harsh crying is cruel as death O, far away are the years when we made holiday My hair and beard show very grey In the bed where I am lying All the wonderful songs of May round it madrigal Viralé, I cannot remember them now to play For yesterday night I was trying to bring them back But the harp strings fray And I only know that the songs were gay Thus and thus did Sir Tristram say In the hour that he was dying 11. They say the waters cannot drown love I believe it, set this down That I believed and uttered thus Whatever things the years discrown Somehow, love, I would have it known My youth was not ungenerous And I could kneel to kiss thy gown As every honest lover does For when beneath the winters frown Forth to the forest goes the clown Whistling when winds are blustrous To gather kindling for the town And there on his faggots sear and brown A few dry leaves hung dolerous In witness of the spring's renown And it is even so with us 12. I, even I, have loved in joy and dread Now my spinning wheel I ply like the peasant girl that wed With a king, they say, and try with hands and heart of lead To spin out a golden thread From the dusty straws and dry I will not weep nor cry for work unperfected Still laboring faithfully I have no tears to shed For love goes harping high And is, remember it, mummers When you are sped with all the lips that lie End of poem This recording is in the public domain Sisters by Eric Earnshaw Smith Read for Libri Vox by Julian Pratley You had not heard the clang of life, it seems, In those dim shadows of backwater days Save in the weary barrenness of dreams A vision of burning heights and dancing waves And so one day you dared And down the stair crept trembling Through the door into the street And o'ed to find your little soul laid bare And cast it thrilling at the city's feet So you have loved and you have lived, it seems, And they are silent now, forgotten days Save in the agony of sleepless dreams Forgotten heights, how cold and shadowy ways But in the grave I think you smile To hear your myriad sisters pass Their hungry eyes dark with the torment Of a restless fear Long-buried hopes and one-faced memories Death holds you in his arms Your bitter quest has given you sleep at last You could but die These are your sisters envying your rest And one by one they join you where you lie End of poem This recording is in the public domain God Stem by Eric Earnshaw Smith Read for Libri Vox.org by Nima April sent foolish blood about our hearts Waking old madness We had planned high tea under the sun at God's door It would be like an old April And so we played our parts There was a froth of Hawthorne And you said how love was very son of truth forgotten Undying, unchangeable And I'd forgotten all save the pulses drawing in my head Twilight comes cool in April You were thinking not yet the end Not yet the end I thought, dear fools Since when have we two grown so old That we are blind how love has fallen to naught And there's but lust in kisses We went on drinking while the stream laughed and chattered And tea was cold End of poem This recording is in the public domain Songs on the Downs by G.B. Smith Read for Libri Vox.org by Devorah Allen One This is the road the Romans made This track half lost in the green hills Or fading in a forest glade mid-violets and daffodils The years have fallen like dead leaves Unwept uncounted and unstayed Such as the autumn tempest thieves Since first this road the Romans made Two A miser lives within this house His patron saints the gnawing mouse And there's no peace upon his brows A many ancient trees and thin Do fold the place their shade within And moan as for remembered sin End of poem This recording is in the public domain Narcisse Malameleon by Hassan Shahid Surawadi Read for Libri Vox by Julian Pratley Your eyes to me are moonlit seas Where rove my seagull dreams like soles Where coral roses keep their trists With large translucent beads Where seaweeds kept in amber bowls Whisper like eager girls Where leaves of lily pearls Wander amongst cold-gleaming eyes And where the dream and transit skies Tremble grape-colored starlight kissed But in your inmost eye I see a boy A wondrous fair-limbed flower-bodied boy Gazing into an amethyst End of poem This recording is in the public domain Shinwazuri Samaynesk by Hassan Shahid Surawadi Read for Libri Vox by Julian Pratley The spring is calm, beloved We shall float white lotus lamps Upon the shimmering stream And watch the sunset's passion waste and fade An amber dream I'll weave the jasmine garlands for thy throat And mesh bold poppies in thy stormy hair And heap thy lap with tender blossoms Snowed by the tall pair But oh, tonight, beloved, play thy lute And lean thy cheek to mine and softly sing A fragile princess in her springtime dead And a lone king Love through thy finger lattices I see full of desire thy passionate longing eyes And lo, the moon, like an impetuous flower, bursts in the skies End of poem This recording is in the public domain Epitaph by E. Graham Sutton Read for LibriVox.org Here lies a fool for whom no tears are shed Here lies a fool one woman would have wed My glory and my shame go hand and hand So shall my soul in hell be comforted End of poem This recording is in the public domain Goblin Feet by J. R. R. Tolkien Read for LibriVox.org by Devorah Allen I am off down the road where the fairy lanterns glowed And the little pretty flitter mice are flying A slender band of gray it runs creepily away And the hedges and the grasses are assaying The air is full of wings and of blundering beetle things That warn you with their whirring and their humming Oh, I hear the tiny horns of enchanted leprechauns And the padded feet of many gnomes are coming Oh, the lights, oh, the gleams, oh, the little tinkly sounds Oh, the rustle of their noiseless little robes Oh, the echo of their feet, of their little happy feet Oh, their swinging lamps and little starlit globes I must follow in their train down the crooked fairy lane Where the cony rabbits long ago have gone And where silverly they sing in a moving moonlit ring All a twinkle with the jewels they have on They are fading round the turn where the glow worms palely burn And the echo of their padding feet is dying Oh, it's knocking at my heart, let me go, oh, let me start For the little magic hours are all flying Oh, the warmth, oh, the hum, oh, the colors in the dark Oh, the gauzy wings of golden honeyflies Oh, the music of their feet, of their dancing goblin feet Oh, the magic, oh, the sorrow when it dies End of poem This recording is in the public domain The Lover Made Light by Circumstance By Sherard Vines Red for LibriVox.org By Nima Who may have seen the trees grow tall Or watched what gate imperial the lord the sun from hour to hour From throne to throne by his blue hall makes And have known his stride gets slower Such might a patient lover be whose love runs deeper than the sea But I, how can I contemplate patiently With good will to wait, some slow maturing of desire Love meets me suddenly and straight scarce knowing All my bones run fire Fire blooms within me and without Tomorrow I am sent about I take tomorrow's crooked road My heart to wound, my fate agode Who may not sleep more nights than one To build foundations deep and broad And do as true lovers have done And give my handy craft my love Nor may love's habit find a groove On whom the dust falls white Because a day's march carries whence he was More happy than to hope his day Will bud in blossom arid paths And God's hands hurry him away Men may call light lover nor see Fit ground for his apology And a poem this recording is in the public domain Modern Beauty by Shahrad Vines Red for LibriVox.org by Nemo The month of May is over The green is crushed with red But God has raised the clover To hide his quiet dead Look not upon these temples Of cloud hewed by the wind Rather these weary wagons And dust flung up behind Our windows gape with blackness Our linen sheets are soiled All sorry are our women For each of them is spoiled Rather the broken body than body full of light Rather the skeleton of a house Or none lie down at night End of poem This recording is in the public domain Untiring of a certain subject By Shahrad Vines Red for LibriVox.org by Nemo Damn sex Let us drink of this raw purple wine If it blisters your throat That is no fault of mine We'll talk of all good things that met us together From the shape of a spire To our good sailing weather Let's wrangle no more about women and man While breads on the table and wines in the can The sun to southwest And a wind coming over Sweet seasoned with quicksets and beans and red plover Rare towns we may mention The little and old With pavements of cobble In keepers of gold Where, turning the corner by jubilee clock We ran into dusk in a comely blue frock Of the slant of the west with its head in a cloud And streams fed by sea wind Brown, lusty and loud Of the road by the cliff and the road down the comb The high road abroad and the level road home Why, here's to them all And of each road a story The halt and the meeting and end of day glory When it eaves in a garden some cottage beside Our pipe fire glowed up and their heaven fire died Here's days full of work seven times worth the doing Plain food for plain men and for strong men strong brewing Here's all that does good to our sinew in metal And for God's sake leave sex to some others to settle End of poem This recording is in the public domain To master Robert Herrick upon his death By HT Wade Jerry Read for LibriVox by Julian Pratley Sweet Robin Herrick, friend who death himself Could fend with song until the end When death, poor Dunderhead, grew tired of play And said you must be off to bed So sent you to your sleep, so deep, so endless deep Why, if a child will weep, who's kissed and sent away Yet night itself half play, and promise of next day What good night's yours alone to depths of silence gone And heard and seen of none End of poem This recording is in the public domain The grass is cold and wet, the dew is set By HT Wade Gary Read for LibriVox.org by Sarah Brown S Extension Vermont The grass is cold and wet, the dew is set Where we together lie But love will keep us warm, will take no harm Beloved you and I The moon shall shine slant-wise upon my eyes While it shines full on yours And I shall see them clear, which are more dear Than all that night obscures Put out your hand and see how cold they be The dew drops on the ground Drenching the grass, breathe full, how sweet and cool The vasty night around End of poem This recording is in the public domain Hark! How the birds do sing it evening By HT Wade Gary Read for LibriVox.org by Neema Hark! How the birds do sing it evening This doth the air possess Oh! This the quiet air doth wash from care Doth fill with loveliness To me now better this than any kiss Than any lovid voice Better than any speech when each with each Sweet lovers do rejoice Better to stand and see how goldenly All light and sound do end O love, what hast thou done beneath the sun? What have we done, sweet friend? End of poem This recording is in the public domain End of Oxford Poetry, 1915 Edited by GDHC and TWE