“The Highwayman” by Alfred Noyes is a haunting narrative poem that tells a tragic tale of love and sacrifice in 18th-century England.
1900s
Where-Away by James Whitcomb Riley
Where-Away by James Whitcomb Riley O the Lands of Where-Away! Tell us?tell us?where are they? Through the darkness and the dawn We have journeyed on and on? From the cradle to the cross? From possession unto loss,? Seeking still, from day to day, For the lands of Where-Away. When our baby-feet were first Planted…
Whispers of Immortality by T. S. Eliot
Whispers of Immortality by T. S. Eliot Webster was much possessed by death And saw the skull beneath the skin; And breastless creatures under ground Leaned backward with a lipless grin. Daffodil bulbs instead of balls Stared from the sockets of the eyes! He knew that thought clings round dead limbs Tightening its lusts and…
The Fathers by Siegfried Sassoon
The Fathers by Siegfried Sassoon Snug at the club two fathers sat, Gross, goggle-eyed, and full of chat. One of them said: “My eldest lad Writes cheery letters from Bagdad. But Arthur’s getting all the fun At Arras with his nine-inch gun.” “Yes,” wheezed the other, “that’s the luck! My boy’s quite broken-hearted, stuck…
Memorial Day by Joyce Kilmer
Memorial Day by Joyce Kilmer “Dulce et decorum est” The bugle echoes shrill and sweet, But not of war it sings to-day. The road is rhythmic with the feet Of men-at-arms who come to pray. The roses blossom white and red On tombs where weary soldiers lie; Flags wave above the honored dead And martial…
Tavern by Edna St. Vincent Millay
Tavern by Edna St. Vincent Millay I’ll keep a little tavern Below the high hill’s crest, Wherein all grey-eyed people May set them down and rest. There shall be plates a-plenty, And mugs to melt the chill Of all the grey-eyed people Who happen up the hill. There sound will sleep the traveller, And…
Love and a Question by Robert Frost
Love and a Question by Robert Frost A STRANGER came to the door at eve, And he spoke the bridegroom fair. He bore a green-white stick in his hand, And, for all burden, care. He asked with the eyes more than the lips For a shelter for the night, And he turned and looked at…
His Dream by W. B. Yeats
His Dream by W. B. Yeats I swayed upon the gaudy stern The butt end of a steering oar, And everywhere that I could turn Men ran upon the shore. And though I would have hushed the crowd There was no mother’s son but said, What is the figure in a shroud Upon a gaudy…
Wild Asters by Sara Teasdale
Wild Asters by Sara Teasdale In the spring I asked the daisies If his words were true, And the clever little daisies Always knew. Now the fields are brown and barren, Bitter autumn blows, And of all the stupid asters Not one knows. Sara Teasdale (1884-1933) was an American lyric poet known for her intimate…
Indifference by Edna St. Vincent Millay
Indifference by Edna St. Vincent Millay I said, for Love was laggard, O, Love was slow to come, “I’ll hear his step and know his step when I am warm in bed; But I’ll never leave my pillow, though there be some As would let him in and take him in with tears!” I said….