WHAT IS THE GRASS?

BY WALT WHITMAN

A child said, What is the grass? fetching it to me with full hands;

How could I answer the child? I do not know what it is, any more than he.

I guess it must be the flag of my disposition, out of hopeful green stuff woven.

Or I guess it is the handkerchief of the Lord,
A scented gift and remembrancer, designedly dropt,
Bearing the owner's name someway in the corners,
that we may see and remark, and say, Whose?

And now it seems to me the beautiful uncut hair of graves.

Tenderly will I use you, curling grass;

It may be that you transpire from the breasts of young men ;

It may be if I had known them I would have loved

them;

It may be you are from old people, and from women, and from offspring taken soon out of their mothers' laps;

And here you are the mothers' laps.

What do you think has become of the young and old

men?

And what do you think has become of the women and children?

They are alive and well somewhere;

The smallest sprout shows there is really no death; And if ever there was, it led forward life, and did not wait at the end to arrest it,

And ceas'd the moment life appear'd.

All goes onward and outward-nothing collapses; And to die is different from what any one supposed, and luckier.

HIS PILGRIMAGE

BY SIR WALTER RALEIGH

Give me my scallop-shell of quiet,
My staff of faith to walk upon,
My scrip of joy, immortal diet,
My bottle of salvation,

My gown of glory, hope's true gage;
And thus I'll take my pilgrimage.

Blood must be my body's balmer;
No other balm will there be given;
Whilst my soul, like quiet palmer,
Travelleth towards the land of heaven;
Over the silver mountains,

Where spring the nectar fountains:

There will I kiss

The bowl of bliss;

And drink mine everlasting fill
Upon every milken hill.

My soul will be a-dry before;
But, after, it will thirst no more.

THE TIGER

BY WILLIAM BLAKE

Tiger, tiger, burning bright
In the forests of the night,
What immortal hand or eye
Could frame thy fearful symmetry?

In what distant deeps or skies
Burnt the fire of thine eyes?

On what wings dare he aspire?
What the hand dare seize the fire?

And what shoulder and what art Could twist the sinews of thy heart? And, when thy heart began to beat, What dread hand and what dread feet?

What the hammer? What the chain? In what furnace was thy brain? What the anvil? What dread grasp Dare its deadly terrors clasp?

When the stars threw down their spears, And water'd heaven with their tears, Did He smile His work to see?

Did He who made the lamb make thee?

Tiger, tiger, burning bright

In the forests of the night,
What immortal hand or eye
Dare frame thy fearful symmetry?

From IL PENSEROSO

BY JOHN MILTON

Oft on a Plat of rising ground,
I hear the far-off Curfeu sound,
Over som wide-water'd shoar,
Swinging slow with sullen roar;
Or if the Ayr will not permit,
Som still removèd place will fit,
Where glowing Embers through the room
Teach light to counterfeit a gloom,
Far from all resort of mirth,
Save the Cricket on the hearth,
Or the Belmans drousie charm,

To bless the dores from nightly harm:
Or let my Lamp at midnight hour,
Be seen in som high lonely Towr,
Where I may oft out-watch the Bear,

With thrice great Hermes, or unsphear
The spirit of Plato to unfold

What Worlds, or what vast Regions hold
The immortal mind that hath forsook
Her mansion in this fleshly nook:
And of those Daemons that are found
In fire, air, flood, or under ground,
Whose power hath a true consent
With Planet or with Element.
Som time let Gorgeous Tragedy
In Scepter'd pall com sweeping by,
Presenting Thebs, or Pelops line,
Or the tale of Troy divine.

Or what (though rare) of later age,
Ennobled hath the Buskind stage.
And if ought els, great Bards beside,
In sage and solemn tunes have sung,
Of Turneys and of Trophies hung;
Of Forests, and inchantments drear,
Where more is meant than meets the ear.

GOING UP TO LONDON

BY NANCY BYRD TURNER

"As I went up to London,"

I heard a stranger say—
Going up to London

In such a casual way!

He turned the magic phrase
That has haunted all my days