 Annabelle Lee, by Edgar Allen Poe Red for LibriVox.org by Stephen Phillips from Greenwell Springs, Louisiana It was many and many a year ago, in a kingdom by the sea, that a maiden there lived whom you may know by the name of Annabelle Lee. And this maiden she lived with no other thought than to love and be loved by me. I was a child and she was a child and this kingdom by the sea. But we loved with a love that was more than love, I and my Annabelle Lee, with a love that the winged seraphs of heaven coveted her and me. And this was the reason, that long ago in this kingdom by the sea, a wind blew out of a cloud, chilling my beautiful Annabelle Lee. So that her high-born kinsman came and bore her away from me, to shut her up in a sepulchre in this kingdom by the sea. The angels, not half so happy in heaven, went envying her in me. Yes, that was the reason, as all men know, in this kingdom by the sea, that the wind came out of the cloud by night, chilling and killing my Annabelle Lee. But our love, it was stronger by far than the love of those who were older than we, of many far wiser than we, and neither the angels in heaven above nor the demons down under the sea, can ever dissever my soul from the soul of the beautiful Annabelle Lee. For the moon never beams without bringing me dreams of the beautiful Annabelle Lee, and the stars never rise but I see the bright eyes of the beautiful Annabelle Lee. And so, all the night-tide, I lie down by the side of my darling, my darling, my life in my bride, in her sepulchre there by the sea, in her tomb by the side of the sea. Don't you see, by Catherine Lee Bates. Recorded for LibriVox by BJ, August 2009. The day was hotter than words can tell. So hot the jellyfish wouldn't gel. The halibut went all to butter, and the catfish had only forced to utter. A faint seam you, I, though some have doubted. The carp he capered, and the horn pout pouted. The sardonic sardine had his sly heart's wish when the angel fish fought with the paradise fish. Twas a sight gave the blue fish the blues to see, but the seal concealed a wicked glee. The day it went from bad to worse till the pickerel picked the purse-crabs purse. And the crab-filled crabbiter yet no doubt, because the oyster wouldn't shell out. The sculpton would sculpt but hadn't a model, and the coddlefish begged for something to coddle. But to boat the dolphin refused its doll till the whale was obliged to whale them all. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. Epitaph for himself by Benjamin Franklin. Read for LibriVox.org by David Lawrence. The body of Benjamin Franklin, like the cover of an old book. Its contents torn out, and stripped of its lettering and gilding, lies here food for worms. Yet the work itself shall not be lost, for it will, as he believed, appear once more in a new and more beautiful edition, corrected and amended by the author. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. The Flowers by Aldous Huxley. Read for LibriVox by Avahee. Day after day, at spring's return, I watch my flowers, how they burn their lives away. The candle crocus and deffodil gold, drink fire of the sunshine, quickly cold. And the proud tulip, how red he glows, is quenched ear summer, can kindle the rose. So as the innermost core of a sinking flame, deep in the leaves, the violets smolder to the dust whence they came. Day after day, at spring's return, I watch my flowers, how they burn their lives away. Day after day. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. Fog by Carl Sandberg. Read for LibriVox.org by Semantic and Wands. The fog comes on little cat's feet. It sits looking over hopper and city on silent haunches, and then moves on. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. The Great Lover by Rupert Brooke. This is a LibriVox recording. The LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. Reading by Bologna Times. I have been so great a lover, filled my days, so proudly with the splendor of love's praise, the pain, the calm, and the astonishment, desire, illimitable, and still content, and all dear name's menus to cheat despair, for the perplexed and viewless streams that bear our hearts at random down the dark of life. Now ere the unthinking silence on that strife stills down, I would cheat drowsy death so far, my night shall be remembered for a star that outshone all the sons of all men's days. Shall I not crown them with immortal prayers whom I have loved, who have given me, dared with me, high secrets, and in darkness knelt to see, the inerrable Godhead of delight? Love is a flame, we have beaken the world's night, a city, and we have built it, these and I, an emperor, we have taught the world to die. So for their sex I loved ere I go hence, and the high cause of love's magnificence, and to keep loyalties young, I'll write those names golden for ever, eagles crying flames, and set them as a banner that men may know, to dare the generations burn and blow out on, the wind of time shining and streaming. These I have loved, white plates and cups, clean gleaming, ringed with blue lines and feathery fairy dust, wet roofs beneath the lamplight, the strong crust of friendly bread, and many tasting food, rainbows and the blue bitter smoke of wood, and radiant raindrops couching in cool flowers, and flowers themselves that sway through sunny hours, dreaming of moths that drink them under the moon, then the cool kindness of sheets that soon smooth through the way trouble, and the rough male kiss of blankets, grainy wood, live hair that is shining and free, blue massing clouds, the keen, unpassioned beauty of a great machine, the venison of hot water, furs to touch, the good smell of old clothes, and other such, the comfortable smell of friendly fingers, hair's fragrance, and the musty rick that lingers about dead leaves and last year's ferns, dear names and thousand others throng to me. Royal flames, sweet waters dimpling laugh from tap or spring, holes in the ground and voices that do sing, voices in laughter, too, and body's pain soon turn to peace, and the deep panting train, firm sands, the little dulling edge of foam that browns and dwindles as the wave goes home, and washing stones, gay for an hour, the cold graveness of iron, moist black earthen mould, sleep and high places, footprints in the dew, and oaks, and brown horse chestnuts glossy new, and new peeled sticks and shining pools on grass. All these have been my loves, and these shall pass. Whatever passes not in the great hour, nor all my passion, all my prayers, have power to hold them with me through the gate of death. They'll play deserter, turn with the trader-breath, break the high bond we made, and sell love's trust and sacramentate covenant to the dust. Oh, never a doubt, but somewhere I shall wake, and give what's left of love again, and make new friends, now strangers. But the best I've known stays here, and changes, breaks, grows old, is blown about the winds of the world, and fades from brains of living men, and dies. Nothing remains. Oh, dear my loves, oh faithless, once again, this one last gift I give, that after men shall know, and later lovers, far removed, praise you. All these were lovely, say, he loved. End of poem. The happiest day, the happiest hour, my seared and blighted heart hath known. The highest hope of pride and power I feel hath flown. Of power, said I, yes, such I wean, that they have vanished long alas. The visions of my youth have been, but let them pass. And pride, what have I now with thee? Another brow may even inherit the venom thou hast poured on me. Be still, my spirit. The happiest day, the happiest hour, mine eyes shall see, have ever seen. The brightest glance of pride and power I feel hath been. But were that hope of pride and power now offered with the pain, even then, I felt that brightest hour I would not live again. For on its wings was dark alloy, and as it fluttered, fell in essence powerful to destroy a soul that knew it well. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. Him to Love by LaCelle's Abercrombie. Read for LibriVox.org by Ruth Golding. We are thine, O love, being in thee and made of thee, as thou love were the deep thought, and we the speech of the thought. Yea, spoken are we, thy fires of thought outspoken. But burned not through us thy imagining like fierce mood in a song court, we were as clamoured words a fool may fling, loose words of meaning broken. For what more like the brainless speech of a fool, the lives travelling dark fears, and as a boy throws pebbles in a pool thrown down abysmal places. Hazardous are the stars, yet is our birth and our journeying time theirs. As words of air life makes of starry earth sweet, soul-delighted faces. As voices are we in the worldly wind. The great wind of the world's fate is turned as air to a shape and sound to mind and marvellous desires. But not in the world as voices storm-shattered, not borne down by the wind's weight. The rushing time rings with our splendid word like darkness filled with fires. For love doth use us for a sound of song, and love's meaning our life wields, making our souls like syllables to throng his tunes of exultation, down the blind speed of a fatal world we fly, as rain blown along earth's fields. Yet are we God-desiring liturgy, some joys of adoration. Yea, made of chants and all a labouring strife, we go charged with a strong flame. For as a language love hath seized on life his burning heart to story. Yea, love, we are thine, the liturgy of thee. Thy thoughts golden and glad name, the mortal conscience of immortal glee, love's zeal in love's own glory. End of Poem. This recording is in the public domain. Long John Brown and Little Mary Bell By William Blake Read for LibriVox.org by Ian Meyer Little Mary Bell had a fairy in a nut. Long John Brown had a devil in his gut. Long John Brown loved Little Mary Bell, and the fairy drew the devil into the nut shell. Her fairy skipped out, and her fairy skipped in. He laughed at the devil, saying, Love is the sin. The devil he raged, and the devil he was wroth, and the devil entered into the young man's broth. He was soon in the gut of the loving young swaying, for a John Eaton drank to drive away loves pain. But all he could do, he grew thinner and thinner, though he Eaton drank as much as ten men for his dinner. Some said he had a wolf in his stomach day and night, some said he had the devil, and they guessed right. The fairy skipped about in his glory joy and pride, and he laughed at the devil till poor John Brown died. Then the fairy skipped out of the old nut shell, and woe and a lack for pretty Mary Bell, for the devil crept in when the fairy skipped out, and there goes Miss Bell with the fusty old nut. End of Poem. This recording is in the public domain. Music an Ode by Algernon Charles Swinburne Read for LibriVox.org by Martin Geeson in Hazelmere Surrey. Was it light that spake from the darkness, or music that shone from the word when the night was in kindled with sound of the sun or the first-born bird? Souls enthralled and entrammeled in bondage of seasons that fall and rise, bound fast round with fetters of flesh and blinded with light that dies, lived not surely till music spake, and the spirit of life was heard. Music, sister of sunrise and herald of life to be, smiled as dawn on the spirit of man, and the thrall was free. Slave of nature and surf of time, the bondmen of life and death, dumb with passionless patience that breathed but forlorn and reluctant breath, heard, beheld, and his soul made answer and communed aloud with the sea. Morning spake, and he heard, and the passionate silent noon kept for him not silence, and soft from the mounting moon fell the sound of her splendour, heard as dawns in the breathless night, not of men, but of birds, whose note bade man's soul quicken and leap to light, and the song of it spake, and the light and the darkness of earth, whereas chords in tune. Out of poem. This recording is in the public domain. My aunt, my poor diluted aunt, her hair is almost grey. Why will she train that winter curl in such a spring-like way? How can she lay her glasses down and say she reads as well, when through a double convex lens she just makes out to spell? Her father, grandpa, forgive this airing lip its smiles, vowed she would make the finest girl within a hundred miles. He sent her to a stylish school, twas in her thirteenth June, and with her, as the rules required, two towels and a spoon. They braced my aunt against a board, to make her straight and tall. They laced her up, they starved her down, to make her light and small. They pinched her feet, they singed her hair, they screwed it up with pins. O never mortal suffered more impenance for her sins. So when my precious aunt was done, my grand sire brought her back, by daylight lest some rabid youth might follow on the track. Ah! said my grand sire, as he took some powder in his pan. What could this lovely creature do against a desperate man? Alas! nor chariot, nor barouche, nor bandit cavalcade, tore from the trembling father's arms his all-accomplish made. For her how happy had it been, and heaven had spared to me to see one's sad, un-gathered rose on my ancestral tree. And of poem. This recording is in the public domain. Nothing to Wear by William Allen Butler Read for LibriVox.org by Ruth Golding Miss Flora Mephlimsy of Madison Square has made three separate journeys to Paris, and her father assures me, each time she was there, that she and her friend Mrs. Harris, not the lady whose name is so famous in history, but plain Mrs. H. without romance or mystery, spent six consecutive weeks without stopping, in one continuous round of shopping. Shopping alone and shopping together, at all hours of the day, and in all sorts of weather, for all manner of things, that a woman can put on the crown of her head, or the sole of her foot, or wrap round her shoulders, or fit round her waist, or that can be sewed on, or pinned on, or laced, or tied on with a string, or stitched on with a bow, in front or behind, above or below. For bonnets, mantillas, capes, collars, and shawls, dresses for breakfasts, and dinners, and balls, dresses to sit in, and stand in, and walk in, dresses to dance in, and flirt in, and talk in, dresses in which to do nothing at all, dresses for winter, spring, summer, and fall, all of them different in colour and shape, silk, muslin, and lace, velvet, satin, and crepe, brocade, and broadcloth, and other material quite as expensive, and much more ethereal. In short, for all things that could ever be thought of, or Milena Maudith's stored tradesmen be bought of, from ten thousand franc robes to twenty sous frills, in all quarters of Paris, and to every store, while Mephrymse and Vain stormed, scalded, and swore, they footed the streets, and he footed the bills. The last trip, their goods shipped by the steamer Argo, formed, Mephrymse declares, the bulk of her cargo, not to mention a quantity kept from the rest, sufficient to fill the largest sized chest, which did not appear on the ship's manifest, but for which the ladies themselves manifested such particular interest, that they invested their own proper persons in layers and rows of muslins in broideries, worked under clothes, gloves, handkerchiefs, scarves, and such trifles as those, then wrapped in great shawls like Circassian beauties, gave goodbye to the ship, and go by to the duties. Her relations at home all marvelled, no doubt, Miss Flora had grown so enormously stout for an actual bell and a possible bride, but the miracle ceased when she turned inside out, and the juice came to light and the dry goods besides, which, in spite of collector and custom-house sentry, had entered the port without any entry. And yet those scarce three months have passed since the day this merchandise went on twelve carts, up Broadway. This same Miss Mephrymse of Madison Square, the last time we met, was in utter despair, because she had nothing whatever to wear. Nothing to wear! Now, as this is a true ditty, I do not assert this you know is between us, that she is in a state of absolute nudity, like Powers Greek slave or the Medici Venus, but I do mean to say I have heard her declare when at the same moment she had on a dress which cost five hundred dollars and not a cent less, and jewellery worth ten times more, I should guess, that she had not a thing in the wide world to wear. I should mention, just here, that out of Miss Flora's two hundred and fifty or sixty adoras, I had just been selected, as he who should throw all the rest in the shade by the gracious bestowal on myself after twenty or thirty rejections of those fossil remains which she called her affections, and that rather decayed but well-known work of art which Miss Flora persisted in styling her heart. So we were engaged, our troughs had been plighted, not by Moonbeam or Starbeam, by Fountain or Grove, but in a front parlor most brilliantly lighted beneath the gas fixtures we whispered our love. Without any romance or raptures or sighs, without any tears in Miss Flora's blue eyes or blushes or transports or such silly actions, it was one of the quietest business transactions, with a very small sprinkling of sentiment, if any, and a very large diamond imported by Tiffany. On her virginal lips, while I printed a kiss, she exclaimed as a sort of parenthesis, and by way of putting me quite at my ease, you know I'm to polk her as much as I please, and flirt when I like, now stop, don't you speak, and you must not come here more than twice in the week, or talk to me either at party or ball, but always be ready to come when I call, so don't prose to me about duty and stuff, if we don't break this off there will be time enough for that sort of thing, but the bargain must be that as long as I choose I am perfectly free, for this is a kind of engagement you see which is binding on you, but not binding on me. Well having thus wooed Miss Mephlimsy and gained her, with the silks, crinolines, and hoops that contained her, I had, as I thought, a contingent remainder at least in the property, and the best right to appear as its escort by day and by night. And it being the week of the stuck-ups grand ball, their cards had been out a fortnight or so, and set all the avenue on the tip-toe, I considered it only my duty to call and see if Miss Flora intended to go. I found her, as ladies are apt to be found, when the time intervening between the first sound of the bell and the visitor's entry is shorter than usual, I found, I won't say, I caught her, intent on the pier-glass, undoubtedly meaning to see if perhaps it didn't need cleaning. She turned as I entered, why, Harry, you sinner, I thought that you went to the flashes to dinner. So I did, I replied, the dinner is swallowed and digested, I trust, but is now nine and more, so being relieved from that duty, I followed inclination which led me, you see, to your door. And now will your ladyship so condescend as just to inform me if you intend your beauty and graces and presents to lend, all of which, when I own, I hope no one will borrow, to the stuck-ups whose party you know is to-morrow. The fair Flora looked up with a pitiful air, and answered quite promptly, why, Harry, will share. I should like above all things to go with you there, but really and truly, I've nothing to wear. Nothing to wear, go just as you are, wear the dress you have on, and you'll be by far I engage, the most bright and particular star on the stuck-up horizon. I stopped, for her eye, notwithstanding this delicate onset of flattery, opened on me at once the most terrible battery of scorn and amazement. She made no reply, but gave a slight turn to the end of her nose that pure Grecian feature, as much as to say, how absurd that any sane man should suppose that a lady would go to a ball in the clothes, no matter how fine, that she wears every day. So I ventured again, wear your crimson brocade, second turn up of nose, that's too dark by a shade, your blue silk, that's too heavy, your pink, that's too light. Wear tulle over satin, I can't endure white. Your rose-coloured, then, the best of the batch, I haven't a thread of pointless to match. Your brown noir honteak, yes, and look like a quaker. The pearl-coloured, I would, but that plaguey dress-maker has had it a week. Then that exquisite lilac, in which you would melt the heart of a shyluck. Here the nose took again the same elevation. I wouldn't wear that for the whole of creation. Why not? It's my fancy there's nothing could strike it as more comile-full. Yes, but, dear me, that lean, Sophronia-stuck-up has got one just like it, and I won't appear dressed like a chit of sixteen. Then that splendid purple, the sweet mazerine, that superb poindegui, that imperial green, that zephyr-like tarlaton, that rich grenadine, not one of all which is fit to be seen, said the lady, becoming excited and flushed. Then where, I exclaimed, in a tone which quite crushed opposition, that gorgeous toilette which you sported in Paris last spring, at the grand presentation, when you quite turned the head of the head of the nation, and by all the grand court were so very much courted. The end of the nose was poor tentacly tipped up, and both the bright eyes shot forth indignation, as she burst upon me with the fierce exclamation, I have worn it three times at the least calculation, and that and most of my dresses are ripped up. Where I ripped out something, perhaps rather rash, quite innocent though, but to use an expression more striking than classic, it settled my hash, and proved very soon the last act of our session. "'Fiddlesticks, is it, sir? I wonder this ceiling doesn't fall down and crush you. You men have no feeling. You selfish, unnaturally liberal creatures, who set yourself up as patterns and preachers, your silly pretence, why, what a mere guess it is! Pray, what do you know of a woman's necessities? I have told you and shown you I've nothing to wear. And it's perfectly plain, you not only don't care, but you do not believe me.' Here the nose went still higher. "'I suppose if you dared, you would call me a liar. Our engagement has ended, sir, yes, on the spot. You're a brute and a monster. And I don't know what.'" I mildly suggested the words hot and taut, pickpocket and cannibal, tartar and thief, as gentle expletives which might give relief. But this only proved as a spark to the powder, and the storm I had raised came faster and louder. It blew and it rained, thundered, lightened and hailed, interjections, verbs, pronouns, formal language quite failed to express the abusive, and then its arrears were brought up all at once by a torrent of tears. And my last faint despairing attempt at an observation was lost in a tempest of sobs. Well, I felt for the lady and felt for my hat too, improvised on the crown of the latter a tattoo, in lieu of expressing the feelings which lay quite too deep for words, as Wordsworth would say. Then without going through the form of a bow, found myself in the entry, I hardly know how, on doorstep and sidewalk, past lamppost and square, at home and upstairs in my own easy chair. Poked my feet into slippers, my fire into blaze, and said to myself, as I lit my cigar, supposing a man had the wealth of the czar of the rushers to boot for the rest of his days, on the whole do you think he would have much to spare if he married a woman with nothing to wear? Since that night taking pains that it should not be brooted abroad in society, I've instituted a course of inquiry, extensive and thorough, on this vital subject, and find to my horror that the fair flora's case is by no means surprising, but that there exists the greatest distress in our female community, solely arising from this unsupplied destitution of dress, whose unfortunate victims are filling the air with the pitiful wail of nothing to wear. Researchers in some of the upper ten districts reveal the most painful and startling statistics, of which let me mention only a few. In one single house on the Fifth Avenue, three young ladies were found all below twenty-two, who have been three whole weeks without anything new in the way of flaunt silks, and thus left in the lurch are unable to go to ball-concert or church. In another large mansion near the same place was found a deplorable heart-rending case of entire destitution of Brussels Point Lace. In a neighbouring block there was found in three calls total want, long continued, of camel's hair shawls, and a suffering family whose case exhibits the most pressing need of real ermine tippets. One deserving young lady, almost unable to survive for the want of a new Russian sable, another whose tortures have been most terrific ever since the sad loss of the steamer Pacific, in which were engulfed, not friend or relation, for whose fates she perhaps might have found consolation, or borne it at least with serene resignation, but the choicest assortment of French sleeds and collars ever sent out from Paris were thousands of dollars. And all is to style most rochercher and rare, the want of which leaves her with nothing to wear, and renders her life so drear and disceptic that she's quite a recluse, and almost a skeptic, for she touchingly says that this sort of grief cannot find in religion the slightest relief, and philosophy has not a maxim to spare for the victims of such overwhelming despair. But the saddest by far of all these sad features is the cruelty practised upon the poor creatures by husbands and fathers, real blue-beards and diamonds, who resist the most touching appeals made for diamonds by their wives and their daughters, and leave them for days unsupplied with new jewellery, fans or bouquets, even laugh at their miseries whenever they have a chance, and deride their demands as useless extravagance. One case of a bride was brought to my view too sad for belief, but alas it was too true, whose husband refused, as savage as Charon, to permit her to take more than ten trunks to Charon. The consequence was that when she got there, at the end of three weeks, she had nothing to wear, and when she proposed to finish the season at Newport, the monster refused out and out for his infamous conduct, alleging no reason except that the waters were good for his gout. Such treatment as this was too shocking, of course, and proceedings are now going on for divorce. But why harrow the feelings by lifting the curtain from these scenes of woe? Enough, it is certain, has here been disclosed, to stir up the pity of every benevolent heart in the city, and spur up humanity into a canter to rush and relieve these sad cases in stanta. Won't somebody, moved by this touching description, come forward to-morrow and head a subscription? Won't some kind philanthropist, seeing that aid is so needed at once by these indigent ladies, take charge of the matter? Or won't Peter Cooper, the cornerstone lay, of some new splendid superstructure like that which today links his name in the union unending of honour and fame, and found a new charity just for the care of these unhappy women with nothing to wear? Which in view of the cash which would daily be claimed, the laying-out hospital well might be named. Won't Stuart, or some of our dry-goods importers, take a contract for clothing our wives and our daughters? Or to furnish the cash to supply these distresses, and life's pathway strew with shawls, collars and dresses, ere the want of them makes it much rougher and thawneer, won't some one discover a new California? Oh, ladies, dear ladies, the next sunny day, please chundle your hoops just out of Broadway, from its swirl and its bustle, its fashion and pride, and the temples of trade which tower on each side, to the alleys and lanes, where misfortune and guilt their children have gathered, their city have built, where hunger and vice, like twin beasts of prey, have hunted their victims to gloom and despair. Raise the rich dainty dress and the fine broided skirt. Pick your delicate way through the dampness and dirt. Flip through the dark dens. Climb the rickety stair to the garret, where wretches, the young and the old, half-starved and half-naked, lie crouched from the cold. See those skeleton limbs, those frost-bitten feet, all bleeding and bruised by the stones of the street. Hear the sharp cry of childhood. The deep groans that swell from the poor dying creature who rides on the floor. Hear the curses that sound like the echoes of hell, as you sicken and shudder and fly from the door, then home to your wardrobes, and say, if you dare, spoiled children of fashion, you've nothing to wear. And oh, if perchance there should be a sphere, where all is made right, which so puzzles us here, where the glare and the glitter and tinsel of time fade and die in the light of that region sublime, where the soul, disenchanted of flesh and of sense, unscreened by its trappings and shows and pretence, must be clothed for the life and the service above, with purity, truth, faith, meekness, and love. Oh, daughters of earth, foolish virgins, beware, lest in that upper realm you have nothing to wear. Oh, heart, heart, heart, oh, the bleeding drops of red, where on the deck my captain lies, fallen, cold, and dead. Oh, captain, my captain, rise up and hear the bells, rise up. For you the flag is flung, for you the bugle trills, for you vocades and riman reese, for you the shores are crowding, for you they call the swaying mass their eager faces turning. Hear, captain, dear father, this arm beneath your head. It is some dream that on the deck you fallen, cold, and dead. My captain does not answer, his lips are pale and still. My father does not fill my arm, he has no pulse nor will. The ship is anchored safe and sound, its voyage closed and done. From fearful trip the victorship comes in with object one. Exalto shores and ring-o bells, but I with mournful tread, walk the deck my captain lies, fallen, cold, and dead. This recording is in public domain. Ozymandias by Percy Bish Shelley. Read for LibriVox.org by Rick Allison. I met a traveler from an antique land who said, Two vast and trunkless legs of stone stand in the desert. Near them, on the sand, half sunk, a shattered visage lies, Whose frown and wrinkled lip and sneer of cold command Tell that its sculptor well those passions read, which yet survive, Stamped on these lifeless things, the hand that mocked them, And the heart that fed. And on the pedestal these words appear, My name is Ozymandias, King of kings, look on my works ye mighty and despair. King beside remains. Round the decay of that colossal wreck, Boundless and bare, The lone and level sands stretch far away. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. Piano by D. H. Lawrence. Read for LibriVox.org by Martin Geeson. In Hazelmayer Surrey. Softly in the dusk a woman is singing to me, Taking me back down the vista of years till I see a child sitting under the piano in the boom of the tingling strings, And pressing the small poised feet of a mother who smiles as she sings. In spite of myself, the insidious mastery of song betrays me back, Till the heart of me weeps to belong to the old Sunday evenings at home, With winter outside and hymns in the cosy parlor, The tinkling piano our guide. So now it is vain for the singer to burst into clamour with the great black piano appassionato. The glamour of childhood days is upon me. My manhood is cast down in the flood of remembrance. I weep like a child for the past. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. A Smack in School by William Pitt Palmer. A District School not far away, mid Berkshire's Hills, one winter's day was humming with its wanted noise of three-score mingled girls and boys, some few upon their tasks intent, but more on furtive mischief bent. The while the master's downward look was fastened on a copy-book when suddenly, behind his back, rose sharp and clear a rousing smack. This tour of battery of bliss led off in one tremendous kiss. What's that? The startled master cries. That, thur, a little imp replies, What's William Wylth, if you please, a thawing kiss through than a peat? With frown to make a statue thrill, the master thundered, Hither, will! Like wretch or taken in his track with stolen chattels on his back, will hung his head in fear and shame, and to the awful presence came a great green bashful simpleton, the butt of all good-natured fun. With smile suppressed, and birch upraised, the thunderer faltered, I am amazed that you, my biggest pupil, should be guilty of an ax so rude, before the whole set schooled a boot, what evil genius puts you to it. Was she herself, sir? sobbed the lad. I did not mean to be so bad, but when Susanna shook her curls and whispered, I was afraid of girls, and dursting kiss a baby's doll, I couldn't stand it, sir, at all, but up and kissed her on the spot. I know, poo-hoo, I ought to not, but somehow, from her looks, poo-hoo, I thought she kind of wished me to. This recording is in the public domain. The Smile by William Blake. This is a Lieberbach recording by Ian Meyer. There is a smile of love, and there is a smile of deceit, and there is a smile of smiles in which these two smiles meet, and there is a frown of hate, and there is a frown of disdain, and there is a frown of frowns which you strive to forget in vain. For it sticks in the heart's deep core, and it sticks in the deep back bone, and no smile that was ever smiled but only one smile alone, that betwixt the cradle engraved it only once smiled can be, but when it once is smiled, there's an end to all misery. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. Song by John Dunn. Read for Lieberbachs.org by Sean Craig Smith. Go and catch a falling star. Get with child a mandrake root. Tell me where all past years are. Or who cleft the devil's foot. Teach me to hear mermaids singing. Or to keep off envy's stinging. And find what wind serves to advance an honest mind. If thou beest born to strange sights. It is invisible to see. Ride ten thousand days and nights till age snow-white hairs on thee. Thou, when thou returnst wilt tell me all strange wonders that befell thee. And swear nowhere lives a woman true and fair. If thou findst one, let me know. Such a pilgrimage were sweet. Do not. I would not go, though at next door we might meet, though she were true when you met her. And last till you write your letter. Yet she will be false ere I come to two or three. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. Speak of the North, a lonely moor by Charlotte Bonte. Read for LibriVox.org by Hilary Willis. Speak of the North, a lonely moor, silent and dark and trackless swells, the waves of some wild streamlet pour hurriedly through its farny dales. Profoundly still the twilight air, lifeless the landscape, so we deem, to like a phantom gliding near, a stag bends down to drink the stream, and far away a mountain zone, a cold white waste of snow-drift slides, and one star large and soft and lone silently lights the unclouded skies. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. The Talented Man by Winthrop McWhorth Prayed. Read for LibriVox.org by Patty Cunningham. Dear Alice, you'll laugh when you know it. Last week at the Duchess's ball, I danced with a clever new poet. You've heard of him, Tully St. Paul. Miss John Quill was perfectly frantic. I wish you had seen Lady Anne. It really was very romantic. He is such a talented man. He came up from Brazzanose College, just caught, as they call it, this spring, and his head-love is stuffed full of knowledge of every conceivable thing, of science and logic, he chatters, as fine and as fast as he can. Though I am no judge of such matters, I'm sure he's a talented man. His stories and jests are delightful. Not stories or jests dear for you. The jests are exceedingly spiteful. The story's not always quite true. Perhaps to be kind and voracious may do pretty well at Lausanne, but it would never answer good gracious, she knew, in a talented man. He sneers how my Alice would scold him, at the bliss of a sigh or a tear. He laughed, only think, when I told him, how he cried or travailion last year. I vow I was quite in a passion. I broke all the sticks of my fan. But sentiment's quite out of fashion, it seems, in a talented man. Lady Bab, who is terribly moral, has told me that Tully is vain, and apt, which is silly, to quarrel, and fond, which is sad, of champagne. I listened and doubted, dear Alice, for I saw, when my lady began, it was only the Dowager's malice, she does hate a talented man. He's hideous, I own it, but fame-love is all that these eyes can adore. He's lame, but Lord Byron was lame-love, and dumpy, but so is Tom more. In his voice, such a voice, my sweet creature, it's like your Aunt Lucy's toucan. But oh, what's a tone or a feature, when once one's a talented man? My mother, you know, all this season, has talked of Sir Geoffrey's estate. And truly, to do the full reason, he has been less horrid of late. But today, when we drive in the carriage, I'll tell her to lay down her plan. If ever I venture on marriage, it must be a talented man. P.S. I have found on reflection, one fault in my friend, Entrez-New. Without it he'd be just perfection, or fellow he has not a sue. And so, when he comes in September, to shoot with my uncle, Sir Dan, I've promised Mama to remember, he's only a talented man. This recording is in the Public Domain. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the Public Domain. For more information, or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. A tragic story, by William M. P. Sleckery, read by Marilyn Suckler at Bala. They lived a sage in days of yore, and he a handsome piteur-war, but one did much, and so did more, because it hung behind him. He news'd upon this curious case, and swore he'd changed the pigtail's place, and have it hanging at his face, but dangling there behind him, said he, the mystery I've found, I hope turned me round. He turned him round, but still it hung behind him. Then round, and round, and out and in, all day the puzzled sage did spin. In vain, it matted not a pin, the pigtail hung behind him, and right, and left, and round about, and up and down, and in and out he turned, but still the pigtail stout hung steadily behind him. And though his efforts never slack, and though he twist, and twirl, and tack, alas, still faithful to his back the pigtail hangs behind him. And of poem. This recording is in the public domain. When Love Went by Susan Coolidge What whispered love the day he fled, ah, this was what love whispered. You sought to hold me with a chain. I fly to prove such holding vein. You bound me burdens, and I bore. The burdens hard, the burdens sore. I bore them all unmermering. For love can bear a harder thing. You taxed me often, teased me, wept. I only smiled, and still I kept. Through storm, and sun, and night, and day, my joyous fueless faithful way. But dear, once dearest, you and I, this day have parted company. Love must be free to give, defer, himself alone his ominer. As free I freely poured my all, enslaved I spurned, renounced my thrall. Its wages and its bitter bread. Thus whispered love the day he fled.