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").

Go Winter!

Go, Winter! Go thy ways! We want againThe twitter of the bluebird and the wren;Leaves ever greener growing, and the shineOf Summer's sun--not..

© James Whitcomb Riley

Bewildering Emotions

The merriment that followed was subdued--As though the story-teller's attitudeWere dual, in a sense, appealing quiteAs much to sorrow as to mere..

© James Whitcomb Riley

August

A day of torpor in the sullen heatOf Summer's passion: In the sluggish streamThe panting cattle lave their lazy feet,With drowsy eyes, and dream.Long..

© James Whitcomb Riley

Man's Devotion

A lover said, 'O Maiden, love me well,For I must go away:And should ANOTHER ever come to tellOf love--What WILL you say?'And she let fall a royal..

© James Whitcomb Riley

Luther Benson

AFTER READING HIS AUTOBIOGRAPHYPOOR victim of that vulture curseThat hovers o'er the universe,With ready talons quick to strikeIn every human heart..

© James Whitcomb Riley

May I Not Weep With You

Let me come in where you sit weeping—aye,Let me, who have not any child to die,Weep with you for the little one whose loveI have known nothing of.The..

© James Whitcomb Riley

Anselmo

Years did I vainly seek the good Lord's grace--,Prayed, fasted, and did penance dire and dread;Did kneel, with bleeding knees and rainy face,And..

© James Whitcomb Riley

Becalmed

1Would that the winds might only blowAs they blew in the golden long ago--!Laden with odors of Orient islesWhere ever and ever the sunshine..

© James Whitcomb Riley

Being His Mother

Being his mother--when he goes awayI would not hold him overlong, and soSometimes my yielding sight of him grows OSo quick of tears, I joy he did not..

© James Whitcomb Riley

June

Queenly month of indolent repose!I drink thy breath in sips of rare perfume,As in thy downy lap of clover-bloomI nestle like a drowsy child and..

© James Whitcomb Riley

Has She Forgotten?

I.Has she forgotten? On this very MayWe were to meet here, with the birds and bees,As on that Sabbath, underneath the treesWe strayed among the..

© James Whitcomb Riley

Harlie

Fold the little waxen handsLightly. Let your warmest tearsSpeak regrets, but never fears,--Heaven understands!Let the sad heart, o'er the tomb,Lift..

© James Whitcomb Riley

Grandfather Squeers

'My grandfather Squeers,' said The Raggedy Man,As he solemnly lighted his pipe and began--'The most indestructible man, for his years,And the..

© James Whitcomb Riley

Blind

You think it is a sorry thingThat I am blind. Your pityingIs welcome to me; yet indeed,I think I have but little needOf it. Though you may marvel..

© James Whitcomb Riley

The Old Times Were The Best

Friends, my heart is half awearyOf its happiness to-night:Though your songs are gay and cheery,And your spirits feather-light,There's a ghostly music..

© James Whitcomb Riley

My Mary

My Mary, O my Mary!The simmer-skies are blue;The dawnin' brings the dazzle,An' the gloamin' brings the dew,--The mirk o' nicht the gloryO' the moon..

© James Whitcomb Riley

Marthy Ellen

They's nothin' in the name to strikeA feller more'n common like!'Taint liable to git no praiseNer nothin' like it nowadays;An' yit that name o' her'n..

© James Whitcomb Riley

Moon-Drowned

'Twas the height of the fete when we quitted the riot,And quietly stole to the terrace alone,Where, pale as the lovers that ever swear by it,The moon..

© James Whitcomb Riley

A Spring Song And A Later

She sang a song of May for me,Wherein once more I heardThe mirth of my glad infancy--The orchard's earliest bird--The joyous breeze among the..

© James Whitcomb Riley

An Old Year's Address

'I have twankled the strings of the twinkering rain;I have burnished the meteor's mail;I have bridled the windWhen he whinnied and whinedWith a bunch..

© James Whitcomb Riley

How It Happened

I got to thinkin' of her--both her parents dead and gone--And all her sisters married off, and none but her and JohnA-livin' all alone there in that..

© James Whitcomb Riley

Home At Night

When chirping crickets fainter cry,And pale stars blossom in the sky,And twilight's gloom has dimmed the bloomAnd blurred the butterfly:When..

© James Whitcomb Riley

Intellectual Limitations

Parunts knows lots more than us,But they don't know _all_ things,--'Cause we ketch 'em, lots o' times,Even on little small things.One time Winnie..

© James Whitcomb Riley

Mr. Hammond's Parable--The Dreamer

IHe was a Dreamer of the Days:Indolent as a lazy breezeOf midsummer, in idlest waysLolling about in the shade of trees.The farmer turned--as he..

© James Whitcomb Riley

At Crown Hill

Leave him here in the freshgreening grasses and treesAnd the symbols of love, and the solace of these-The saintly white lilies and blossoms he..

© James Whitcomb Riley