If It Should Come To Be
If it should come to be,
This proof of you and me,
This type and sign
Of hours that smiled and shone,
And yet seemed dead and gone
As old-world wine:
Of Them Within the Gate
Ask we no richer fate,
No boon above,
For girl child or for boy,
My gift of life and joy,
Your gift of love.
poem by William Ernest Henley
Added by Poetry Lover
Comment! | Vote! | Copy!
Your Heart Has Trembled To My Tongue
Your heart has trembled to my tongue,
Your hands in mine have lain,
Your thought to me has leaned and clung,
Again and yet again,
My dear,
Again and yet again.
Now die the dream, or come the wife,
The past is not in vain,
For wholly as it was your life
Can never be again,
My dear,
Can never be again.
poem by William Ernest Henley
Added by Poetry Lover
Comment! | Vote! | Copy!
The Skies Are Strown With Stars
The skies are strown with stars,
The streets are fresh with dew
A thin moon drifts to westward,
The night is hushed and cheerful.
My thought is quick with you.
Near windows gleam and laugh,
And far away a train
Clanks glowing through the stillness:
A great content's in all things,
And life is not in vain.
poem by William Ernest Henley
Added by Poetry Lover
Comment! | Vote! | Copy!
Fill A Glass With Golden Wine
Fill a glass with golden wine,
And the while your lips are wet
Set your perfume unto mine,
And forget.
Every kiss we take and give
Leaves us less of life to live.
Yet again! Your whim and mine
In a happy while have met.
All your sweets to me resign,
Nor regret
That we press with every breath,
Sighed or singing, nearer death.
poem by William Ernest Henley
Added by Poetry Lover
Comment! | Vote! | Copy!
The Spring, My Dear
The spring, my dear,
Is no longer spring.
Does the blackbird sing
What he sang last year?
Are the skies the old
Immemorial blue?
Or am I, or are you,
Grown cold?
Though life be change,
It is hard to bear
When the old sweet air
Sounds forced and strange.
To be out of tune,
Plain You and I . . .
It were better to die,
And soon!
poem by William Ernest Henley
Added by Poetry Lover
Comment! | Vote! | Copy!
To Me At My Fifth-Floor Window
To me at my fifth-floor window
The chimney-pots in rows
Are sets of pipes pandean
For every wind that blows;
And the smoke that whirls and eddies
In a thousand times and keys
Is really a visible music
Set to my reveries.
O monstrous pipes, melodious
With fitful tune and dream,
The clouds are your only audience,
Her thought is your only theme!
poem by William Ernest Henley
Added by Poetry Lover
Comment! | Vote! | Copy!
Gull In An Aery Morrice
Gulls in an aery morrice
Gleam and vanish and gleam . . .
The full sea, sleepily basking,
Dreams under skies of dream.
Gulls in an aery morrice
Circle and swoop and close . . .
Fuller and ever fuller
The rose of the morning blows.
Gulls, in an aery morrice
Frolicking, float and fade . . .
O, the way of a bird in the sunshine,
The way of a man with a maid!
poem by William Ernest Henley
Added by Poetry Lover
Comment! | Vote! | Copy!
I Gave My Heart To A Woman
I gave my heart to a woman –
I gave it her, branch and root.
She bruised, she wrung, she tortured,
She cast it under foot.
Under her feet she cast it,
She trampled it where it fell,
She broke it all to pieces,
And each was a clot of hell.
There in the rain and the sunshine
They lay and smouldered long;
And each, when again she viewed them,
Had turned to a living song.
poem by William Ernest Henley
Added by Poetry Lover
1 comment - Comment! | Vote! | Copy!
One With The Ruined Sunset
One with the ruined sunset,
The strange forsaken sands,
What is it waits, and wanders,
And signs with desparate hands?
What is it calls in the twilight -
Calls as its chance were vain?
The cry of a gull sent seaward
Or the voice of an ancient pain?
The red ghost of the sunset,
It walks them as its own,
These dreary and desolate reaches . . .
But O, that it walked alone!
poem by William Ernest Henley
Added by Poetry Lover
Comment! | Vote! | Copy!
There Is A Wheel Inside My Head
There is a wheel inside my head
Of wantonness and wine,
An old, cracked fiddle is begging without,
But the wind with scents of the sea is fed,
And the sun seems glad to shine.
The sun and the wind are akin to you,
As you are akin to June.
But the fiddle! . . . It giggles and twitters about,
And, love and laughter! who gave him the cue? -
He's playing your favourite tune.
poem by William Ernest Henley
Added by Poetry Lover
Comment! | Vote! | Copy!