Section: «Poems»
Verse (ancient Greek ὁ στίχος — row, structure), a term in versification used in several meanings:
artistic speech organized by division into rhythmically commensurate segments; poetry in the narrow sense; in particular, it implies the properties of versification of a particular tradition ("antique verse", "Akhmatova's verse", etc.);
a line of poetic text organized according to a certain rhythmic pattern ("My uncle of the most honest rules").
What Is Life?
And what is Life? An hour-glass on the run,A mist retreating from the morning sun,A busy, bustling, still-repeated dream.Its length? A minute's..
© John Clare
Turkeys
The turkeys wade the close to catch the beesIn the old border full of maple treesAnd often lay away and breed and comeAnd bring a brood of chelping..
© John Clare
To Napoleon
The heroes of the present and the pastWere puny, vague, and nothingness to thee:Thou didst a span grasp mighty to the last,And strain for glory when..
© John Clare
To Mary
I sleep with thee, and wake with thee,And yet thou art not there;I fill my arms with thoughts of thee,And press the common air.Thy eyes are gazing..
© John Clare
To John Milton
_'From his honoured friend, William Davenant'_Poet of mighty power, I fainWould court the muse that honoured thee,And, like Elisha's spirit, gainA..
© John Clare
To John Clare
Well, honest John, how fare you now at home?The spring is come, and birds are building nests;The old cock-robin to the sty is come,With olive..
© John Clare
To Anna Three Years Old
My Anna, summer laughs in mirth,And we will of the party be,And leave the crickets in the hearthFor green fields' merry minstrelsy.I see thee now..
© John Clare
To A Fallen Elm
Old Elm that murmured in our chimney topThe sweetest anthem autumn ever madeAnd into mellow whispering calms would dropWhen showers fell on thy many..
© John Clare
Thou Flower Of Summer
When in summer thou walkestIn the meads by the river,And to thyself talkest,Dost thou think of one ever--A lost and a lorn oneThat adores thee and..
© John Clare
The Yellowhammer
When shall I see the white-thorn leaves agen,And yellowhammers gathering the dry bentsBy the dyke side, on stilly moor or fen,Feathered with love and..
© John Clare
The Wood-Cutter's Night Song
Welcome, red and roundy sun,Dropping lowly in the west;Now my hard day's work is done,I'm as happy as the best.Joyful are the thoughts of home,Now..
© John Clare
The Winter's Spring
The winter comes; I walk alone,I want no bird to sing;To those who keep their hearts their ownThe winter is the spring.No flowers to please--no bees..
© John Clare
The Winter's Come
Sweet chestnuts brown like soling leather turn;The larch trees, like the colour of the Sun;That paled sky in the Autumn seemed to burn,What a strange..
© John Clare
The Vixen
Among the taller wood with ivy hung,The old fox plays and dances round her young.She snuffs and barks if any passes byAnd swings her tail and turns..
© John Clare
The Vanities Of Life
Vanity of vanities, all is vanity.--_Solomon_What are life's joys and gains?What pleasures crowd its ways,That man should take such painsTo seek them..
© John Clare
The Universal Epitaph
No flattering praises daub my stone,My frailties and my faults to hide;My faults and failings all are known—I liv'd in sin—in sin I died.And oh!..
© John Clare
The Tramp
He eats (a moment's stoppage to his song)The stolen turnip as he goes along;And hops along and heeds with careless eyeThe passing crowded stage coach..
© John Clare
The Thrush's Nest
Within a thick and spreading hawthorn bushThat overhung a molehill large and round,I heard from morn to morn a merry thrushSing hymns to sunrise, and..
© John Clare
The Swallow
Pretty swallow, once againCome and pass me in the rain.Pretty swallow, why so shy?Pass again my window by.The horsepond where he dips his wings,The..
© John Clare
The Stranger
When trouble haunts me, need I sigh?No, rather smile away despair;For those have been more sad than I,With burthens more than I could bear;Aye, gone..
© John Clare
The Soldier
Home furthest off grows dearer from the way;And when the army in the Indias layFriends' letters coming from his native placeWere like old neighbours..
© John Clare
The Sleep Of Spring
O for that sweet, untroubled restThat poets oft have sung!--The babe upon its mother's breast,The bird upon its young,The heart asleep without a..
© John Clare
The Skylark
The rolls and harrows lie at rest besideThe battered road; and spreading far and wideAbove the russet clods, the corn is seenSprouting its spiry..
© John Clare
The Shepherd's Tree
Huge elm, with rifted trunk all notched and scarred,Like to a warrior's destiny! I loveTo stretch me often on thy shadowed sward,And hear the laugh..
© John Clare
The Shepherd's Calendar - September
Harvest awakes the morning stillAnd toils rude groups the valleys fillDeserted is each cottage hearthTo all life save the crickets mirthEach burring..
© John Clare