 ATOM'S CURSE by W. B. Yeats Red for LibriVox.org by Phil Shempf We sat together at one summer's end, that beautiful mild woman, your close friend, and you and I, and talked of poetry. I said, a line will take us hours maybe, yet if it does not seem a moment's thought, our stitching in unstitching has been not. Better go down upon your morrow bones and scrub a kitchen pavement, or break stones like an old popper in all kinds of weather. For to articulate sweet sounds together is to work harder than all these, and yet be thought an idler by the noisy set of bankers, schoolmasters, and clergymen, the martyrs called the world. That woman then murmured with her young voice, for whose mild sake there's many a one shall find out all heartache, in finding that it's young and mild and low. There is one thing that all we women know, although we never heard of it at school, that we must labor to be beautiful. I said, it is certain there is no fine thing since Adam's fall, but needs much laboring. There have been lovers who thought love should be so much compounded of high courtesy that they would sigh in, quote, with learned looks precedents out of beautiful old books, yet now it seems an idle trade enough. We sat grown quiet at the name of love. We saw the last embers of daylight die, and in the trembling blue-green of the sky, a moon, worn as if it had been a shell, washed by time's waters as they rose and fell about the stars, and broke in days and years. I had a thought for no one's but your ears, that you were beautiful, and that I strove to love you in the old highway of love, that it had all seemed happy, and yet we'd grown as weary-hearted as that hollow moon. End of poem, this recording is in the public domain. THE HALFSTRIP TREES Struck by a wind together, bending all, the leaves fluttered dryly and refused to let go, or driven like hail stream bitterly out to one side and fall, where the solvious, hard carmine, like no leaf that ever was, edged the bare garden. End of poem, this recording is in the public domain. AT CAPE SHANK By James Lister Cuthbertson RedForLibbyBox.org By Algie Pug Down to the lighthouse pillar the rolling woodland comes, gay with the gold of she-oaks, and the green of the stunted gums, with a silver-grey of honeysuckle, with a wasted bracken red, with a tuft of softest emerald, and a cloud-flecked sky o'erhead. We climbed, by ridge and boulder, umber and yellow scarred, out to the utmost precipice, to the point that was ocean-barred, till we looked below on the fastness of the breeding eagles' nest, and Cape Woolermy opened eastward, and the Ottway, on the west. Over the mirror of azure, the purple shadows crept, league upon league of rollers, landward, evermore swept, and burst upon gleaming vassal, and foamed in cranny and crack, and mounted in sheets of silver and hurried, reluctant back. In the sea so calm out yonder, wherever we turned our eyes, like the blast of an angel's trumpet rang out to the earth and skies, till the reefs and the rocky ramparts throbbed to the giant fray, and the gullies and jutting headlands were bathed in a misty spray. O sweet in the distant ranges to the ear of inland men is the ripple of falling water in sassoprous-haunted glen, the stir in the ripening cornfield that gently rustles and swells, the wind in the wattle sighing, the tinkle of cattle-bells. But best is the voice of ocean that strikes to the heart and brain, that lulls with its passionate music, trouble and grief and pain, that murmurs the requiem sweetest for those who have loved and lost, and thunders a jubilant anthem to Braveheart's tempest toast, that takes to its boundless bosom the burden of all our care, that whispers of sorrow vanquished of hours that may yet be fair, that tells of a harbour of refuge beyond life's stormy straits, of an infinite peace that gladdens, of an infinite love that waits. End of poem, this recording is in the public domain. At the Closed Gate of Justice by James D. Carruthers Read for Librebox.org by Mike Overby, Midland, Washington To be a negro in a day like this demands forgiveness, bruised with blow-on-blow, betrayed, like him whose woe-dimmed eyes give bliss, still must one succour those who brought one low. To be a negro in a day like this, to be a negro in a day like this, demands rare patience, patience that can wait in utter darkness, tis the path to miss, and knock unheated at an iron gate, to be a negro in a day like this. To be a negro in a day like this demands strange loyalty. We serve a flag, which is to us white freedom's emphasis, ah, one must love when truth and justice lag, to be a negro in a day like this. To be a negro in a day like this, alas, Lord God, what evil have we done, still shines the gate all golden amethyst, but I pass by the glorious goal on one, merely a negro in a day like this. BROKEN DREAMS by W. B. Yates Red for LibriVox.org by Peter Tonglinson There is grey in your hair, young men no longer suddenly catch their breath when you are passing, but maybe some old gaffer mutters a blessing because it was your prayer recovered him upon the bed of death, for your soul's sake, that all hearts ache have known, and given to others all hearts ache, from meager girlhoods putting on burdensome beauty, for your soul's sake heaven has put away the stroke of her doom. So great a portion in that peace you make by merely walking in a room. Your beauty can but leave among us vague memories, nothing but memories. A young man, when the old men are done talking, will say to an old man, tell me of that lady the poet's stubborn with his passion sang us when age might well have chilled his blood. Vague memories, nothing but memories, but in the grave all shall be renewed, the certainty that I shall see that lady leaning or standing or walking in the first loveliness of womanhood, when with the fervour of my useful eyes has set me muttering like a fool. You are more beautiful than any one, and yet your body has a flaw, your small hands were not beautiful, and I am afraid that you will run and paddle to the wrist in that mysterious always brimming lake, where those that have obeyed the holy law paddle and are perfect. Things unchanged the hands that I have kissed for old sakes' sake. The last stroke of midnight dies, all day in the one chair from dream to dream and rhyme to rhyme I have ranged in rambling talk with an image of air. Vague memories, nothing but memories. End of poem, this recording is in the public domain. Butterfly Laughter by Catherine Mansfield, read for LibriVox.org by Colleen McMahon. In the middle of our partage-plates there was a blue butterfly painted, and each morning we tried who should reach the butterfly first. Then the grandmother said, Do not eat the poor butterfly. That made us laugh. Always she said it, and always it started us laughing. It seemed such a sweet little joke. I was certain that one fine morning the butterfly would fly out of the plates, laughing the teeniest laugh in the world, and perch on the grandmother's lap. End of poem, this recording is in the public domain. The Candle by Catherine Mansfield, read for LibriVox.org by Colleen McMahon. By my bed, on a little round table, the grandmother placed a candle. She gave me three kisses, telling me they were three dreams, and tucked me in just where I loved being tucked. Then she went out of the room and the door was shut. I lay still, waiting for my three dreams to talk, but they were silent. Suddenly I remembered giving her three kisses back. Perhaps by mistake I had given my three little dreams. I sat up in bed. The room grew big, oh, bigger, far than a church. The wardrobe quite by itself as big as a house. And the jug on the washstand smiled at me. It was not a friendly smile. I looked at the basket chair where my clothes lay folded. The chair gave a creak as though it were listening for something. Perhaps it was coming alive and going to dress in my clothes. But the awful thing was the window. I could not think what was outside. No tree to be seen, I was sure. No nice little plant or friendly pebbly path. Why did she pull the blind down every night? It was better to know. I crunched my teeth and crept out of bed. I peeped through a slit of the blind. There was nothing at all to be seen but hundreds of friendly candles all over the sky. And remembrance of frightened children. I went back to bed. The three dreams started singing a little song. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. A Christmas Sunbeam by Annie McQueen. Read for LibriVox.org. Gathering Christmas mistletoe to deck the cottage walls, herself the sweetest flower-red on which the sunlight falls. Calmly seated on a snow-bank, all unmindful of the cold. Clasping tight the treasured bunchies that the little fingers hold. Surely now the lowly cottage has no need of other grace to charm the joyous Christmas morning than her pretty smiling face. Christmas joy must surely linger where her footsteps lightly go. Loving hearts that know her surely, Christmas joy and gladness know. Like a merry Sunbeam straying from the sky at break of day, choosing with a wayward spirit on the pleasant earth to stay. So these little maiden-wanders round about with sweet intent comes today a happy Sunbeam, Christmas Sunbeam, heaven sent. Wishing all the world a welcome from her little loving heart, in her share of Christmas bounty, wishing all could have a part. And throughout the hills and valleys where the Sunbeams brightly gleam, not one sweeter, fairer, brighter than this little Christmas beam. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. The Cleric of the Weather by T. W. H. Crossland Read for LibriVox.org by Bruce Kachok. Monday, Thursday, 1900. My dear Cleric of the Weather. Next week, as you know, will be a holiday week. We are all going to the spas, or to Paris, or to Wembley. Each man according to his taste, which is to say, each man according to his wife's taste, and the numerical extent of his family. Wherefore, sweet cause, excuse this little term of endearment, it is well-meant. Wherefore, sweet cause, I venture to approach you with a pleasant ode, hoping this means to propitiate you, to put you in a good humour with yourself and mankind, as it were, and to extract from you sundry favours. I think I may venture to remark, dear sir, that, taking you in the lump, you are a person of infinite variety, an out-and-out enemy of that unholy thing, monotony, a sort of meteorological quick-change artist. Indeed, it has been asserted by a certain jocose-american that from your British office you never issue any real weather at all, contenting yourself rather with the brisk dissemination of samples. But that is neither here nor there. Sir, and it pleases you, what we want for next week is sunshine in solid chunks, sunshine beneath which old and young may desport themselves merrily, and as new-yeamed lambs, and without fear of spoiling their gay apparel. We also want specially fine mornings, for it is an awful job getting the twins to the station when it rains. We also want mild and fairly starlit evenings, in order that the adolescent among us may do a little useful spring courting, and suffering thereafter from cold in the head. And, lastly, we do not want anything in the way of rain, hail, snow, fog, mugginess, blackness, frowning, obnoxious winds, thunder, lightning, or kindred phenomena. Of course I am well aware that the worshipful company of umbrella-makers and Macintosh manufacturers are even at this present hour, really importuning you to make it rain like billy-o. But, my good, dear, kind, honest, clerk of the weather, you may take it from me that the company referred to do not in any way represent public feeling in this country. Far from it, sir. On the contrary, sir. Quite otherwise. And lest you should run away with an idea that in imploring you to do your best for my excellent friends, the British public, I am merely thinking about myself. Let me assure you, dear sir, that next week I do not propose to leave the precincts of my own leasehold miswitch, on the third floor of which I have a snug foreposter bed, also a large supply of improving literature, and several pounds of tobacco. With these and an occasional biscuit and a little wine for the stomach's sake, I shall be quite happy, even though it rain pitchforks and thunder to the tune of green sleeves. For all that, please do be kind to the British public. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. CONTENTMENT IN NATURE by John Kendrick Bangs I would not change my joys for those of emperors and kings. What has my gentle friend the Rose told them, if ought do you suppose, the Rose that tells me things? What secrets have they had with trees? What romps with grassy spears? What know they of the mysteries of butterflies and honeybees, who whisper in my ears? What says the sunbeam unto them? What tales have brooklets told? Is there within there died em a single rival to the gem, the dewy daisies hold? What sympathy have they with birds whose songs are songs of mine? Do they air here as though in words twas list the message of the herds of grazing lowing kind? Ah, no. Give me no lofty throne, but just what nature heals. Let me but wander on alone if need be, so that all my own are woods and dales and fields. THE DEATH OF THE OLD YEAR by Alfred Lord Tennyson Read for LibriVox.org by Phil Shamp Full need deep lies the winter snow, and the winter winds are wearily sighing. Told ye the church bell sad and slow, and tread softly and speak low, for the old year lies a dying. Old year, you must not die. You came to us so readily. You lived with us so steadily, old year, you shall not die. He lyeth still. He doth not move. He will not see the dawn of day. He hath no other life above. He gave me a friend, and a true, true love. And the new year will take him away. Old year, you must not go. So long as you have been with us. Such joy you have seen with us. Old year, you shall not go. He frothed his bumpers to the brim. A jollier year we shall not see. But though his eyes are waxing dim, and though his foes speak ill of him, he was a friend to me. Old year, you shall not die. We did so laugh and cry with you. I've half a mind to die with you, old year, if you must die. He was full of joke and jest, but all his merry quips are o'er. To see him die across the waste his son and heir doth ride post-haste. But he'll be dead before, every one for his own. The night is starry and cold, my friend, and the new year blith and bold, my friend, comes up to take his own. How hard he breathes. Over the snow I heard just now the crowing cock. The shadows flicker to and fro. The cricket chirps. The light burns low. Tears nearly twelve o'clock. Shake hands before you die, old year, we'll dearly rue for you. What is it we can do for you? Speak out before you die. His face is growing sharp and thin. Alack, our friend is gone. Close up his eyes, tie up his chin, step from the corpse, and let him in that standeth there alone, and waiteth at the door. There's a new foot on the floor, my friend. A new face at the door, my friend. A new face at the door. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. December by Christopher Pierce Cranch, read for LibriVox.org by Thomas Peter. No more the scarlet maples flash and burn their beacon fires from hilltop and from plain. The meadow grasses and the woodland fern in the bleak woods lie withered once again. The trees stand bare and bare each stony scar upon the cliffs. Half frozen glide the rills. The steel blue river like a scimitar lies cold and curved between the dusky hills. Over the upland farm I take my walk and miss the flaunting flocks of goldenrod. Each autumn flower, a dry and leafless stalk, each mossy field, a track, a frozen sod. I hear no more the robin's summer song through the grey network of the wintry woods. Only the calling crows at all day long clamour about the windy solitudes. Like agate stones upon earth's frozen breast, the little pools of ice lie round and still, while sullen clouds shut downward east and west, and marble ridges stretched from hill to hill. Come once again, O southern wind, once more come with thy wet wings flapping at my pain, hear snowdrifts pile their mounds about my door, one parting dream of summer bring again. Ah, no, I hear the windows rattle fast. I see the first flakes of the gathering snow that dance and whirl before the northern blast. No counterman the march of days can know. December drops no weak, relenting tear by our fawn summer sympathies ensnared, nor from the perfect circle of the year can even winter's crystal gems be spared. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. A denial by Elizabeth Barrett Browning, read for LibriVox.org by Newgate novelist. We have met late. It is too late to meet, no friend, not more than friend. Death's forecome shroud is tangled round my feet, and if I step or stir, I touch the end. In this last jeopardy can I approach thee, I, who cannot move? How shall I answer thy request for love? Look in my face and see. I love thee not, I dare not love thee. Go in silence, drop my hand. If thou seek roses, seek them where they blow in garden alleys, not in desert sand. Can life and death agree that thou shouldst stoop thy song to my complaint? I cannot love thee. If the word is faint, look in my face and see. I might have loved thee in some former days. Oh, then, my spirits had leaped as now they sink at hearing thy love praise. Before these faded cheeks were overwept, had this been asked of me, to love thee with my whole strong heart and head, I should have said still. Yes, but smiled and said, look in my face and see, but now. God sees me, God who took my heart and round it in life's surge. In all your wide warm earth I have no part. A light song overcomes me like a dirge. Could love's great harmony the saints keep step to when their bonds are loose, not weigh me down? Am I a wife to choose? Look in my face and see. While I behold as plain as one who dreams, some woman of full worth, whose voice has cadenced as a silver stream, shall prove the fountain soul which sends it forth, one younger, more thought free and fair and gay than I, thou must forget, with brighter eyes than these, which are not wet. Look in my face and see. So farewell, thou whom I have known too late, to let thee come so near. Be counted happy, well men call thee great, and one beloved woman feels thee dear, not I, that cannot be. I am lost, I am changed, I must go farther, where the change shall make me worse, and no one dare look in my face and see. Meantime I bless thee, by these thoughts of mine, I bless thee from all such, I bless thy lamp to oil, thy cup to wine, thy hearth to joy, thy hand to an equal touch of loyal trough. For me, I love thee not, I love thee not away. Here's no more courage in my soul to say, look in my face and see. End of poem, this recording is in the public domain. Dungbell by Walter Crane, read for libravox.org by Emma Rose. Ding dongbell, pussy's in the well, who put her in Little Tommy Green, who pulled her out Little Tommy Trout, what a naughty boy was that, let's do some poor pussy cat. End of poem, this recording is in the public domain. A dream of death by W. B. Yates, read for libravox.org by Chad Horner from Liverpool. I dreamed that one had died in a strange place, near no accustomed hand, and they had nailed the boards above her face, the peasants of that land, wandering to lay her in that solitude and raised above her mind, a cross they had made out of two bits of wood and planted cypress round, and left her to the indifferent stars above until I carved these words. She was more beautiful than my first love, but now lies underboards. End of poem, this recording is in the public domain. To us, too salty this and too sweet that, you've had this twice since Sunday, you always have what others like, you might please me just one day, and so it went till Pa would say, it was meant you could not doubt it, just eat what's set before you and say nothing tall about it. Now we are grown and seems to me too often we're inclined to criticize the things fate gives and think this life aggrined. Some things may not just suit our taste, some mean be quite unpleasant, some one may get the bigger share and failure seem air-present, but then let's think of Pa's advice. It's sound, pray, never doubt it, just eat what's set before you and say nothing tall about it. Life's road is rough, but what of that? The man who growls for swear, will top the hills ahead the crowd, all smiles with breath to spare, and so it goes this wide world o'er, tis true for saint and sinner. The man who silently will dig will always prove the winner. That's why I say take Pa's advice, try once, and you'll not doubt it, just eat what's set before you and say nothing tall about it. And a poem. This recording is in the public domain. The Edition De Luxe by John Kendrick Bangs read for LibriVox.org by Larry Wilson. How very close to truth these bookish men can be, when their catalogues they pin. The words descriptive of the wares they hold to tempt the bookman with his purse of gold. For instance they have Dryden, splendid set, which some poor white would part with wealth to get. Tis richly bound, its edges gilded, but hard fate, as Dryden well observes uncut, for who these days would think to buy the screed of dull old dusty Dryden just to read. In faith, if his editions had been kept amongst the rarities, he'd never have crept. And then those pompous overwhelming tomes you find so often in overwhelming homes, no substance on a waterman's surface placed, in polished leather and in tooling cased. The gilded edges dazzling to the eye, and flaunting all their charms so wantonly. These bookmen, when they catalog their books, call them in truth Edicione de Luxe. That's all they have, most of them just plain shape with less pure wine than any unripe grape. But tomes that travel on their looks, indeed, are only good for those who do not read, and like most people clad in garments grand, seem rather heavy for the average hand. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. Fear Not. By Frank R. Hine. Read for LibriVox.org by Bruce Kachok. Why will so many people now give way to frenzied fear? Why will they act as though they thought? Swift death were lurking near. Enough disease now stalks abroad, and death rides on the air. Tis not the time for craven acts, but courage everywhere. I wonder if they stop to think, how soon the ward be won, if sons of theirs showed half the fear that they of late have done. And why fear death, eternal life? I would not be the one to strive to stay on this poor earth with sacred tasks undone. So why not cherk up just a bit and say goodbye to fear? The world now needs much cheering up. Pray help supply the cheer. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. Frightened by Helen Leah Reed. Read for LibriVox.org by Kudrno. Today I had the awfulest time. Dear mother, in the wood, that hill out there we were to climb, and we'd been very good. But nurse was walking up the hill, when little Anne and I, we had to stop and stand quite still, and Anne began to cry. For something moved behind the trees, we felt so all alone, said either Anne, stop crying, please. I'll hit it with a stone. Cry then, oh listen, hear it growl, said I. I'm not afraid of bears or lions. Now don't scroll, you look so cross, she said. So then I had to smile and smile, where Anne was crying all the while, and if he didn't hear a bear, I am sure, dear mother, one was there. Boys always must take care of girls. You see, you've told me so. That's why I tried to pet Anne's girls, and walked with her real slow. But when we heard nurse calling out, come children, come along. Come nurse, you should have heard me shout. Anne says my voice is strong. From Anne, I cried, I'm almost five, and I'll kill any bear alive. And if we didn't see a bear, I truly think that one was there. How glad I was when nurse turned round, for everything seemed queer. The trees looked strange, and then that sound we didn't like to hear. Nurse laughed when we had told her all about the bear we saw. I came as quick as I heard you go, and it's against the law, for bears to live where people stay. They are 500 miles away. But if we didn't meet a bear, I am sure that almost one was there. And the poem, this recording is in the public domain. Frost at Midnight by Samuel Taylor Coleridge, read from LibriVox.org by Peter Tomlinson. The frost performed its secret ministry, unhelped by unwind. The Owlet's cry came loud, and hark, again, loud as before. The inmates of my cottage, all at rest, have left me to that solitude, which suits abstruse amusings, say that at my side my cradled infant slumbers peacefully. Tis calm indeed, so calm that it disturbs and vexes meditation with its strange and extreme silentness. See hill and wood, this populous village, see and hill and wood, with all the numberless goings on of life, inaudible as dreams. The thin blue flame lies on my low burnt fire, and quivers not. Only that film, which fluttered on the grate, still flutters there. The soul, unquiet thing. Methinks its motion in this hush of nature, gives it dim sympathies with me, who live, making it a compagnionable form, whose puny flaps and freaks the idling spirit by its own moods interprets. Everywhere echo or mirror, seeking of itself, and makes a toy of thought. But oh, how oft, how oft at school, with most believing mind, presageful have I gazed upon the bars, to watch that fluttering stranger, and as oft with unclosed lids, already had I dreamt of my sweet birthplace. And the old church tower, whose bells, the poor man's only music, rang from morn to evening, all the hot fair day, so sweetly that they stirred and haunted me with a wild pleasure, falling on my ear, most like articulate sounds of things to come. So gazed I, till the soothing things I dreamt, loved me to sleep, and sleep prolonged my dreams. And so I brooded all the following morn, awed by the stern preceptor's face, mine I fixed with mixed study on my swimming book. Saved if the door half opened, and I snatched a hasty glance, and still my heart leapt up, for still I hoped to see the stranger's face, townsman or aunt or sister more beloved. My playmate, when we both were closed alike. Dear babe, that sleep is crazed by my side, whose gentle breathings, heard in this deep calm, fill up the interspersed vacancies, and momentary pauses of the thought. My babe, so beautiful, it thrills my heart with tender gladness, thus to look at thee, and think that thou shalt learn far other law, and in far other scenes. For I was reared in the great city, pent mid-cloist as dim, and saw not lovely but the sky and stars. But thou, my babe, shall wander like a breeze by lakes and sandy shores, beneath the clouds which image in their volks both lakes and shores and mountain crags. So shalt thou see and hear the lovely shapes and sounds intelligible of that eternal language, which thy God utters, who from eternity does teach himself in all, and all things in himself. Great universal teacher, he shall mould thy spirit, and by giving make it ask. Therefore all seasons shall be sweet to thee, whether summer clothes the general earth with greenness, or the red dress fit and sing betwixt the tufts of snow on the bare branch of mossy apple tree, while the nigh that smokes in the sun-thaw, whether the eave drops fall heard only in the trances of the blasts, or if the secret ministry of frost shall hang them up in silent icicles, quietly shining to the quiet moon. End of poem. The Haunted Tram by P. G. Woodhouse. Read for LibriVox.org by Dale Groothman. Ghosts of the Tower, the Grange, the Court. Ghosts of the Castle Keep. Ghosts of the Finneking Highlife Sort are growing a trifle cheap. But there is a spook of another stamp. No thin theatrical sham, but a specter who fears not dirt nor damp. He rides on the London Tram. By a curious glance of a mortal eye, he is not seen. He's heard. His steps go a creeping, creeping by. He speaks but a single word. You may hear his feet. You may hear them playing. For it's odd in a ghost they crunch. You may hear the horror of his rattling chain, and the tinging of his ringing punch. The gathering shadows of the night fall fast. The lamps in the street are lit. To the roof have the airy footsteps passed, where the outside passengers sit. To the passenger side has the specter paced, for a moment he halts, they say. Then a ring from the punch, at an unseen waist, and footsteps pass away. That is the tale of the haunted car, and if on that car you ride, you won't, believe me, have journeyed far, ere the specter seeks your side. I, all unseen, by your seat, he'll stand, and, unless it's a wig, your hair will rise at the touch of his icy hand, and the sound of his whispered, fair? At the end of the trip, when you're getting down, and you'll probably simply fly. Just give the conductor half a crown. Ask who is the ghost, and why, and the man will explain with bated breath, and point you a moral thus. Ease a poor young bloke what was crushed to death, by people as fought as they didn't ought, for seats on a crowded bus, and of poem. This recording is in the public domain. How Doth the Little, by Lewis Carroll. Read for LibriVox.org by Dale Grossman. How Doth the Little Crocodile Improves His Shining Tail. And pour the waters of the Nile on every golden scale. How cheerful he seems to grin. How neatly spreads his claws. And welcomes little fishes in, with gently smiling jaws. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. Initiation by Rainer Maria Rilke. Read for LibriVox.org by Phil Shempf. Whosoever thou art, out in the evening-roam, out from thy room, thou knowest in every part, and far in the dim distance leave thy home. Whosoever thou art, lift thine eyes which lingering see the shadows on the foot-worn threshold fall. Lift thine eyes slowly to the great dark tree that stands against heaven, solitary, tall, and thou hast visioned life. Its meanings rise like words that in silence clearer grow as they unfold before thy will to know, gently withdraw thine eyes. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. I Travelled Among Unknown Men by William Wordsworth. Read for LibriVox.org by Paul Bryan Stewart. I travelled among unknown men in lands beyond the sea. Nor England did I know till then what love I bore to thee. Tis past that melancholy dream, nor will I quit thy shore a second time, for still I seem to love thee more and more. Among the mountains did I feel the joy of my desire, and she I cherished turned her wheel beside an English fire. Thy morning showed, thy night's concealed, the bowers where Lucy played. And thine, too, is the last greenfield that Lucy's eye surveyed. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. Jabberwocky by Lewis Carroll. Read for LibriVox.org by Dale Grossman. Twas Brillig, and the slivy toes did guire and gimble in the wabe. All mimsy were the borough groves, and the mome wraths outgrabe. Beware the jabberwock, my son, the jaws that bite, the claws that catch. Beware the jub-jub bird and shun, the frummiest banter snatch. He took his vorpal sword in hand. Long time the mangsome foe he sought. So rested he by the tum-tum tree, and stood a while in thought. And as in Uffish thought he stood, the jabberwock with eyes of flame came whiffling through the tellgy wood, and burbled as it came. One, two, one, two, and through, and through. The vorpal blade went snickersnack. He left it dead, and with his head he went glumping back. And has thou slain the jabberwock? Come to my arms, my beamish boy. O frapturous day, caloo, calay, he chortled in his joy. Twas brillig, and the slithy toves did guire and gimble in the wabe. All mimsy were the borough groves, and the mome wraths outgrabe. And of poem. This reading is in the public domain. January By William Carlos Williams Read for LibriVox.org By Winston Tharp Again I reply to the triple winds running chromatic fifths of derision outside my window. Play louder. You will not succeed. I am bound more to my sentences the more you batter at me to follow you. And the wind, as before, fingers perfectly its derisive music. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. Read for LibriVox.org by Chad Horner from Balli Clare, Coney Hunter and Robin Ireland, situated in the north-east of the island of Ireland. Can ought compared with wedlock be for yes, but he who made the heart to use the push of its joy. What he has joined to let no man put apart, sweet order has its drop of bliss, graced with the pearl of God's consent. Ten times delightful in that is considerate and innocent. In vain disorder grasps the cup. The pleasure's not enjoyed but split, and if he stoops to lick it up, it only tastes of earth and guilt. His sorry rapture's rest destroys. To live like comets, they must roam on settled poles, turn solid joys, and sun-like pleasures shine at home. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. Look not to the west by Cale Young Rice, read for LibriVox.org by Kevin Huss. Look not to the west where the sun is dying on fields of darkening clouds. Look not to the west where the wild birds nest and the winds are high to sweep away sleep from the forest and tatter the shrouds of sable silence flipped by the firefly's hoarse dance. Look not to the west, tis best for the heart to hear not the chance of evening over the day's long death. Look not to the west when the sun is dying, the sun that rose with song. Look not to the west where the closed quest of thy soul seems lime, where every sorrow that ever was wedded with wrong and human breast, from the sea of its radiance never fades. Look not to the west, tis best for the heart to see not the shades that rise, the wrecks of a ruined past. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. The Mental Traveler by William Blake, read for LibriVox.org by Sonia. The Mental Traveler. I traveled through a land of men, a land of men and women too, and heard and saw such dreadful things, as cold earth wanderers never knew. For there the babe is born in joy, that was begotten in dire woe, just as we reap in joy the fruit, which we in bitter tears did sow. And if the babe is born a boy, he is given to a woman old, who nails him down upon a rock, catches his shrieks in cups of gold. She binds iron thorns round his head, she pierces both his hands and feet, she cuts his heart out at his side, to make it feel both cold and heat. Her fingers number every nerve, just as a miser counts his gold, she lives upon his shrieks and cries, and she grows young, as he grows old. Till he becomes the bleeding youth, and she becomes the virgin bright, then he rents up his manacles, and binds her down for his delight. He plants himself in all her nerves, just as a husband man his mould, and she becomes his dwelling place, and garden fruitful seventy fold. An aged shadow soon he fades, wandering round an earthly cot, fulfilled all with gems and gold, which he by industry had got. And these are the gems of the human soul, the rubies and pearls of a lovesick eye, the countless gold of the aching heart, the martyrs grown, and the lovers sigh. They are his meat, they are his drink, he feeds the beggar and the poor, to the way-faring traveller, forever open is his door. His grief is their eternal joy, they make the roofs and walls to ring, till from the fire upon the hearse a little female babe does spring. And she is all of solid fire, and gems and gold, that none his hand dare stretch to touch her baby-form, or rep her in his swaddling band. But she comes to the man she loves, if young or old or rich or poor, they soon drive out the aged host, a beggar at another's door. He wanders weeping far away, until some other take him in, oft blind and age-bend, so distressed, until he can a maiden win. And to allay his freezing age the poor man takes her in his arms, the cottage fades before his sight, the garden and its lovely charms. The guests are scattered through the land, for the eye-altering alters all, the senses roll themselves in fear, and the flat earth becomes a ball. The stars, sun, moon all shrink away, a desert vast without a bound, and nothing left to eat or drink, and the dark desert all around. The honey of her infant lips, the bread and wine of her sweet smile, the wild game of her roving eye, do him to infancy beguile. For as he eats and drinks, he grows younger and younger every day, and on the desert wild they both wonder in terror and dismay. Like the wild stag she flees away, her fear plants many a sicket wild, while he pursues her night and day by various arts of love beguiled. By various arts of love and hate, till the wild deserts planted over with labyrinths of wayward love, where roam the lion, wolf, and boar. Till he becomes a wayward babe, and she a weeping woman old, then many a lover wanders here, the sun and stars are nearer rolled. The trees bring forth sweet ecstasy to all who in the desert roam, till many a city there is built, and many a pleasant shepherd's home. But when they find the frowning babe, terror strikes through the region wide. They cry, the babe, the babe is born, and flee away on every side. For who dare touch the frowning form, his arm is withered to its root. Bears, lions, wolves, all howling flee, and every tree does shed its fruit. And none can touch that frowning form, except it be a woman old. She nails him down upon the rock, and all is done, as I have told. My harp to me bring, of my love I will sing, who yesterday came me to see, with countenance bright, his eyes flesh and light, my choice among thousands is he. Though distant retired from the land of Dysias, where they lived in the brave days of old, the girl from thy heart shall never depart, till silent and laid in the mold. From Apin they came, in history famed, the stewards of high pedigree, courageous and bold when facing the foe, they never were known for to flee. Though scattered have been the branches so green, brave sons of the mountains wild, the spirit remains forever the same, descending from parent to child. Each sprig of green heather, that long has been severed on reaching the mountains so green, his spirit returns and is kindled by love, as he thinks of the days that have been. I must now bid farewell to the lad I love well, come back to me soon to the north, here a welcome doubt find, both hearty and kind, from hearts overflowing with mirth. By Fionn. End of poem, this recording is in the public domain. My last touches, by Robert Browning. Read for LibriVox.org by Richard Ooty. Ferrara That's my last touches, painted on the wall, looking as if she were alive. I call that piece a wonder now. Frau Pandoff's hands worked busily a day, and there she stands. Will please you sit and look at her? I said, Frau Pandoff, by design, for never read strangers like you that pictured countenance, the depth and passion of its earnest glance, but to myself they turned, since none puts by the curtain I have drawn for you but I, and seemed, as they would ask me if they durst, how such a glance came there. So not the first are you to turn and ask thus. Sir, it was not her husband's presence only, called that spot of joy into the Duchess's cheek. Perhaps, Frau Pandoff chance to say, her mantle laps over my lady's wrist too much, or paint must never hope to reproduce the faint half-flush that dies along her throat. Such stuff was courtesy, she thought, and cause enough for calling up that spot of joy. She had a heart, how shall I say, too soon made glad. Too easily impressed. She liked what air she looked on, and her looks went everywhere. Sir, it was all one. My favour at her breast, the dropping of the daylight in the west, the bow of cherries some officious fool broke in the orchard for her. The white mule she rode with round the terrace, all and each would draw from her like the approving speech, or blush at least. She thanked men, good, but thanked somehow, I know not how, as if she ranked my gift of a nine hundred years old name with anybody's gift. Who'd stoop to blame this sort of trifling, even had you skill in speech, which I have not, to make your will quite clear to such and one, and say, just this or that in you disgusts me. Here you miss or there exceed the mark. And if she let herself be lessened so, nor plainly set her wits to yours for sooth, and made excuse, in then would be some stooping. And I choose never to stoop. Oh, sir, she smiled, no doubt, when ere I passed her. But who passed without much the same smile? This grew. I gave commands. Then all smiles stopped together. There she stands as if alive. Well, please, you rise. We'll meet the company below. Then I repeat, the count your master's known munificence is ample warrant that no just pretence of mine for dowry will be disallowed. Though his fair daughter's self, as I avowed at starting, is my object. Nay, we'll go down together, sir. Notice Neptune, though, taming a seahorse, thought a rarity, which clouse of Innsbruck cast in bronze for me. End of poem. Ask nothing more of me, sweet. All I can give you, I give. Heart of my heart were it more, more would be laid at your feet. Love that should help you to live, song that should spur you to soar. All things were nothing to give, once to have sense of you more. Touch you and taste of you sweet, think you and breathe you and live. Swept of your wings as they soar, trodden by chance of your feet. I that have love and no more give you but love of you, sweet. He that hath more let him give. He that hath wings let him soar. Mine is the heart at your feet here that must love you to live. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. The one and the all by Johann Goethe, 1749 to 1832, published in 1821. Read for LibriVox.org. Called to a new employ in boundless space, the lonely Monet quits its accustomed place, and from life's weary round contented fleas. No more of passionate striving will perverse the hampering obligations long a curse. Free self-abandonment at last gives peace. Soul of the world, come pierce our being through. Across the drift of things our way to hue is our appointed task, our noblest war. Good spirits by our destined pathway still lead gently on, best masters of our will, toward that which made and makes all things that are. To shape for further ends what now has breath, let nothing harden into ice and death, works endless living action everywhere. What has not yet existed strives for birth, toward purer suns, more glorious colored earth, to rest in idle stillness not may dare. All must move onward, help transform the mass, assume a form to yet another pass. Tis but in seeming ought is fixed or still. In all things moves the eternal restless thought, for all, when comes the hour, must fall to naught if to persist in being is its will. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. On his love by Gaius Valerius Catalysts. Eighty-four to fifty-four B.C. Read for LibriVox.org. I hate and love. Why do I so? Perhaps you ask. I can't explain. The bitter fact I only know and torture racks my brain. I hate and love. Why so? I cannot tell. I feel it and endure the pains of hell. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. The Quarrel by Catherine Mansfield. Read for LibriVox.org by Colleen McMahon. Our quarrel seemed a giant thing. It made the room feel mean and small. The books, the lamp, the furniture, the very pictures on the wall, crowded upon us as we sat, pale and terrified, face to face. Why do you stay? she said. My room can never be your resting place. Katinka ere we part for life, I pray you walk once more with me. So, down the dark, familiar road, we paced together, silently. The sky, it seemed, on fire with stars. I said, Katinka, dear, look up. Like thirsty children, both of us drank from that giant loving cup. Who were those dolls, Katinka said? What were their stupid vague alarms? And suddenly we turned and laughed and rushed into each other's arms. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. The Sad Shepherd by W. B. Yitz. Read for LibriVox.org by Chad Horner from LibriVox. There was a man whom Sorrow named his friend, and he of his high comrade Sorrow dreaming, went walking with slow steps along the gleaming and humming sands where Windy searches wind, and he called loudly to the stars to bend from their peeled thrones and comfort him. But they, among themselves, laugh on and sing away, and then the man whom Sorrow named his friend cried out, Dim Sea, hear my most pettiest story. The sea swept on and cried her old and cried still, rolling along in dreams from hell to hell. He fled the persecution of her glory, and in a far-off gentle valley, stopping, cried all his story to the dewdrops glistening. But not they heard, for they are always listening, the dewdrops for the sound of their own dropping. And then the man whom Sorrow named his friend saw once again the shore and find a shell, and thought, I will my heavy story tell, till my own words re-echoing shall send their sadness through a hollow, purdy heart, and my own tale again for me shall sing, and my own whispering words be comforting, and, lo, my ancient burden made apart. Then he sang softly nigh the purdy rim, but the sad dweller by the sea-way's lone changed all he sang to inarticulate moon among her wildering worlds forgetting him, and, poem this recording is in the public. Satisfaction on Reading Not One Disatisfied by Walt Whitman by John Kendrick Spangs Read for LibriVox.org by Larry Wilson God spare the day when I am satisfied, enough is truly likened to a feast that leaves man satiate. The sluggishness of fullness comes apace, the dullness of a mind that knows all things, the lack of every sweet desire, no new sensation for the soul. To want no more? What vile estate is that? What holds the morrow for the soul that's satisfied? What holds the future for the mind content? Is aspiration worthless? Is much abused ambition then so vile? What is the essence of the joy of living? Must yesterday, tomorrow, and to-day all be the same, with nothing to be hoped for? Is not a soul thirst a joyous thing? Where lies content to him whose eye doth rest on higher things? What satiation compare to hope? Yet who among the satisfied have need of hope? What can he hope for if he's satisfied? Tis but conceit and nothing more to pray of satisfaction. God spare the day when I am satisfied. I do not want the earth, yet nothing less will leave me quite content, and once tis mine, I am very sure you'll find me roaming off after the universe. In DuPoem, this recording is in the public domain. Shall race hatred prevail? By Adeline Carter Watson Read for LibriVox.org by Mike Overby, Midland Washington By the tears of Negro mothers By the woes of Negro wives By the sighs of Negro children By your gallant snuffed out lives By the throne of God eternal Standing hard by Heaven's gate You shall crush this cursed infernal Western stigma Groundless hate And of Poem This recording is in the public domain. Silent Songs by Richard Henry Stoddard Read for LibriVox.org by Paul Bryan Stewart If I could ever sing the songs within me day and night, the only fit a compliment would be a loot of light. A thousand dreamy melodies begot with pleasant pain, like inclinations float around, the chambers of my brain. But when I strive to utter one, it mocks my feeble heart and leaves me silent with the thorns of music in my heart. End of Poem This Poem is in the public domain. Snow by Muriel Chokovska Read for LibriVox.org by Thomas Peter This night my body is an offering. I am carried to you. Years I was near you, and you were far. But tonight of all nights was not the night to be parted. I would feign go forth and seek you and sink down by you as the flakes falling outside sink into the cushioned ground. And that which is me is also a field glowing and boundless. End of Poem This recording is in the public domain. Sonnets by Michael Madhusidandat Read for LibriVox.org by Newgate Novelist I am not rich, nay, nor the future air to sparkling gold or silver heaped on store. There is no marble blushing on my floor with thousand varied dyes, no gilded chair, no cushions, carpets that by riches are brought from the Persian land or Turkish shore. There is no menial waiting at my door, attentive to the knell, and all things rare, born in remotest regions, that shine in and grace the rich man's hall are wanting here. These are not things that by blind fate have been allotted ever to the poor man's share. These are not things these eyes have ever seen though their proud names have sounded in this ear. But, oh, I grieve not, for the azure sky with all its host of stars that brightly shine, the green-robed earth with all her flowers divine, the verdant veils and every mountain high, those beautyous meads that now do glittering lie clad in bright sunshine. Oh, oh, all are mine, and much there is on which my ear and eye can feast luxurious. Why should I repine? The furious gale that howls and fiercely blows, the gentler breeze that sings with tranquil glee, the silver rill that gaily warbling flows, and in the dark and everlasting sea, all, all these bring oblivion for my woes, and all these have transcendent charms for me. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. The Stolen Child by William Butler Yates Read for LibriVox.org by Thomas S. N. Ewing Where dips the rocky highland of sleuth wood in the lake, there lies a leafy island where flapping herons wake the drowsy water rats. There we've hid our fairy vats full of berries and of reddest stolen cherries. Come away, O human child, to the waters and the wild, with a fairy hand in hand, for the world's more full of weeping than you can understand. Where the wave of moonlight glosses the dim-gray sands with light, far off by furthest rosses we footed all the night, weaving olden dances, mingling hands and mingling glances, till the moon has taken flight, to and fro we leap and chase the frothy bubbles, while the world is full of troubles and anxious in its sleep. Come away, O human child, to the waters and the wild, with a fairy hand in hand, for the world's more full of weeping than you can understand. Where the wandering water gushes from the hills above Glencar, in pools amongst the rushes that scare would be the star, we seek for slumbering trout and whispering in their ears, give them unquiet dreams, leaning softly out from ferns that drop their tears over the young streams. Come away, O human child, to the waters and the wild, with a fairy hand in hand, for the world's more full of weeping than you can understand. Away with us he's going, the solemn-eyed, he'll hear no more the lowing of the calves on the warm hillside, or the kettle on the hob sing peace into his breast, or see the brown mice bob round and round the oatmeal chest, for he comes to human child, to the waters and the wild, with a fairy hand in hand, for the world's more full of weeping than he can understand. In the poem this recording is in the public domain. Muffling, stifling its murmurs failing, lazily and incessantly floating down and down, silently sifting and veiling road, roof and railing, hiding difference, making unevenness even, into angles and crevices, softly drifting and sailing. All night it fell, and when full inches seven, it lay in the depth of its uncompacted lightness, its clouds blew off from a high and frosty heaven, and all woke earlier for the unaccustomed brightness of the winter dawning, the strange, unheavenly glare. The eye marveled, marveled at the dazzling whiteness, the ear hearkened to the stillness of the solemn air, no sound of wheel rumbling nor of footfalling, and the busy morning cries came thin and spare. Then boys I heard, as they went to school, calling, they gathered up the crystal manna to freeze their tongues with tasting, their hands with snowballing, or rioted in a drift, plunging up to the knees, or peering up from under the white most wonder. Oh, look at the trees, they cried, oh, look at the trees! With lessened load a few cards creak and blunder, following along the white deserted way. A country company long dispersed asunder, when now already the sun, in pale display standing by Paul's high dome, spread forth below his sparkling beams, and awoke the stir of the day. For now doors open, and war is waged with the snow, and trains of somber men, past tale of number, tread long brown paths as towards their toil they go. But even for them, no cares awhile encumber their minds diverted, the daily word unspoken, the daily thoughts of labour and sorrow slumber, at the sight of the beauty that greets them, for the charm they have broken. The trees are in their autumn beauty, the woodland piles are dry, under the October twilight the water mirrors a still sky. Upon the brimming water among the stones are nine and fifty swans. The nineteenth autumn has come upon me since I first made my count. I saw, before I had well finished, all suddenly mount and scatter wheeling in great broken rings upon their clamorous wings. I have looked upon those brilliant creatures, and now my heart is sore, all chained since I, hearing at twilight, the first time on this shore, the velvet of their wings above my head, trod with a lighter tread. Unwearyed still, lover by lover, they faddle in the cold confanion of all streams, or climb the air, their hearts have not grown old. Fashion or conquest wonder where they will, attend upon them still. But now they drift on the still water, mysterious, beautiful, among what rushes will they build, by what lakes edge or pool delight men's eyes when I awake some day to find they have flown away. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. Willow the Wisp by Swithin Saint Swithane Read for LibriVox.org Stonide conceded babbling ignorance, looks seeing knowledge in the face. And sayeth, thou art blind and in a trance, or thou wouldest know that I have every grace of earth and heaven. Thou knowest not, I know all things, and much have wrought. I am a God, down, down, bend thou the knee and worship me. And large-browed knowledge, standing half ashamed, looks down and listens, pitying. And sayeth in reply, thou art far famed for foolishness. I know not anything, but thou art blind, whereas I see thee as thou art. Thou seeest not me, a God, ah, ah, they told me at the school, thou work the fool. And ignorance cursing shouts, thou speakest lies. And knowledge laughing answers, no. And ignorance blackening, thunders, I am wise. And knowledge laughing answers, be it so, thou art the fool. Thou knowest not, and knowest not, thou knowest not art. I nothing know, yet know, I nothing know. And be it so, end of poem. This recording is in the public domain. The Windhover, to Christ our Lord, by Gerard Manley Hopkins, read for LibriVox.org by Tobias Loxley. I caught this morning, morning's minion, kingdom of the daylights, Dauphin, dappled dawn-drawn falcon, in his riding of the rolling level underneath him, steady air, and striding high there, how he rung upon the rain of a wimpling wing in his ecstasy. Then off, off forth on swing, as the skates heal, sweep smooth on a bow bend, the hurling gliding rebuffed the big wind, my heart in hiding stirred for a bird, the achieve of the mastery of the thing, brute beauty and valor and act, oh, air, pride, plume, hear, buckle. And the fire that breaks from thee, then, a billion times told lovelier, more dangerous, oh, my Chevalier, no wonder of it, sheer plod makes plow down, sillion, shine, and blue bleak embers, my dear, fall, gall themselves, and gash, gold, vermilion. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. Read for LibriVox.org by Winston Tharp. All the complicated details of the attiring and the disattiring are completed. A liquid moon moves gently along the long branches. Thus having prepared their buds against a sure winter, the wise trees stand sleeping in the cold. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain.