poetry

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Great_Young_Dog

A Boy And His Dog
by Edgar Guest
A boy and his dog make a glorious pair:
No better friendship is found anywhere,
For they talk and they walk and they run and they play,
And they have their deep secrets for many a day;
And that boy has a comrade who thinks and who feels,
Who walks down the road with a dog at his heels.

He may go where he will and his dog will be there,
May revel in mud and his dog will not care;
Faithful he’ll stay for the slightest command
And bark with delight at the touch of his hand;
Oh, he owns a treasure which nobody steals,
Who walks down the road with a dog at his heels.

No other can lure him away from his side;
He’s proof against riches and station and pride;
Fine dress does not charm him, and flattery’s breath
Is lost on the dog, for he’s faithful to death;
He sees the great soul which the body conceals—
Oh, it’s great to be young with a dog at your heels!

On This Day

March 7, 1923 – The New Republic publishes Robert Frost’s poem “Stopping By Woods on a Snowy Evening.” The poem, beginning with the famous line “Whose woods these are, I think I know. His house is in the village though,” has introduced millions of American students to poetry.

Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening

BY ROBERT FROST
Whose woods these are I think I know.  
His house is in the village though;  
He will not see me stopping here  
To watch his woods fill up with snow.  

My little horse must think it queer  
To stop without a farmhouse near  
Between the woods and frozen lake  
The darkest evening of the year.  

He gives his harness bells a shake  
To ask if there is some mistake.  
The only other sound’s the sweep  
Of easy wind and downy flake.  

The woods are lovely, dark and deep,  
But I have promises to keep,  
And miles to go before I sleep,  
And miles to go before I sleep.

The Gift Outright

BY ROBERT FROST

The land was ours before we were the land’s.
She was our land more than a hundred years
Before we were her people. She was ours
In Massachusetts, in Virginia,
But we were England’s, still colonials,
Possessing what we still were unpossessed by,
Possessed by what we now no more possessed.
Something we were withholding made us weak
Until we found out that it was ourselves
We were withholding from our land of living,
And forthwith found salvation in surrender.
Such as we were we gave ourselves outright
(The deed of gift was many deeds of war)
To the land vaguely realizing westward,
But still unstoried, artless, unenhanced,
Such as she was, such as she would become.

The Road Not Taken

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood
And sorry I could not travel both 
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that, the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood and I—
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.

by Robert Frost

The Open Window

by Edward R. Sill 

My tower was grimly builded, 
         With many a bolt and bar, 
“And here,” I thought, “I will keep my life 
         From the bitter world afar.” 

Dark and chill was the stony floor, 
        Where never a sunbeam lay, 
And the mould crept up on the dreary wall, 
        With its ghost touch, day by day. 

One morn, in my sullen musings, 
        A flutter and cry I heard; 
And close at the rusty casement 
        There clung a frightened bird. 

Then back I flung the shutter 
        That was never before undone, 
And I kept till its wings were rested 
        The little weary one. 

But in through the open window, 
        Which I had forgot to close, 
There had burst a gush of sunshine 
        And a summer scent of rose. 

For all the while I had burrowed 
        There in my dingy tower, 
Lo! the birds had sung and the leaves had danced 
        From hour to sunny hour. 

And such balm and warmth and beauty 
        Came drifting in since then, 
That window still stands open 
        And shall never be shut again.

“Let Every Day Be Christmas”
by Norman Wesley Brooks

Christmas is forever, not for just one day,
for loving, sharing, giving, are not to put away
like bells and lights and tinsel, in some box upon a shelf.
The good you do for others is good you do yourself.

Peace on Earth, good will to men,
kind thoughts and words of cheer,
are things we should use often
and not just once a year.

Remember too the Christ-child, grew up to be a man;
to hide him in a cradle, is not our dear Lord’s plan.
So keep the Christmas spirit, share it with others far and near,
from week to week and month to month, throughout the entire year!

On This Day

December 9, 1854 – The Examiner prints Alfred Lord Tennyson’s poem “The Charge of the Light Brigade,” which commemorates the courage of 600 British soldiers charging a heavily defended position during the Battle of Balaklava, in the Crimea, just six weeks earlier.

The Charge of the Light Brigade

BY ALFRED, LORD TENNYSON

I
Half a league, half a league, 
Half a league onward, 
All in the valley of Death 
   Rode the six hundred. 
“Forward, the Light Brigade! 
Charge for the guns!” he said. 
Into the valley of Death 
   Rode the six hundred. 

II
“Forward, the Light Brigade!” 
Was there a man dismayed? 
Not though the soldier knew 
   Someone had blundered. 
   Theirs not to make reply, 
   Theirs not to reason why, 
   Theirs but to do and die. 
   Into the valley of Death 
   Rode the six hundred. 

III
Cannon to right of them, 
Cannon to left of them, 
Cannon in front of them 
   Volleyed and thundered; 
Stormed at with shot and shell, 
Boldly they rode and well, 
Into the jaws of Death, 
Into the mouth of hell 
   Rode the six hundred. 

IV
Flashed all their sabres bare, 
Flashed as they turned in air 
Sabring the gunners there, 
Charging an army, while 
   All the world wondered. 
Plunged in the battery-smoke 
Right through the line they broke; 
Cossack and Russian 
Reeled from the sabre stroke 
   Shattered and sundered. 
Then they rode back, but not 
   Not the six hundred. 

V
Cannon to right of them, 
Cannon to left of them, 
Cannon behind them 
   Volleyed and thundered; 
Stormed at with shot and shell, 
While horse and hero fell. 
They that had fought so well 
Came through the jaws of Death, 
Back from the mouth of hell, 
All that was left of them, 
   Left of six hundred. 

VI
When can their glory fade? 
O the wild charge they made! 
   All the world wondered. 
Honour the charge they made! 
Honour the Light Brigade, 
   Noble six hundred!