Favorite Poems

Ulysses, by Alfred Lord Tennyson It little profits that an idle king, By this still hearth, among these barren crags, Matched with an aged wife, I mete and dole Unequal laws unto a savage race, That hoard, and sleep, and feed, and know not me. I cannot rest from travel: I will drink Life to the lees: all times I have enjoyed Greatly, have suffered greatly, both with those That loved me, and alone; on shore, and when Through scudding drifts the rainy Hyades Vext the dim sea.   I am become a name; For always roaming with a hungry heart Much have I seen and known: cities of men And manners, climates, councils, governments, Myself not least, but honored of them all, And drunk delight of battle with my peers, Far on the ringing plains of windy Troy. I am a part of all that I have met; Yet all experience is an arch wherethrough Gleams that untraveled world, whose margin fades For ever and for ever when I move. How dull it is to pause, to make an end, To rust unburnished, not to shine in use!  As though to breathe were life. Life piled on life  Were all too little, and of one to me   Little remains: but every hour is saved From that eternal silence, something more, A bringer of new things; and vile it were  For some three suns to store and hoard myself,  And this gray spirit yearning in desire To follow knowledge, like a sinking star,  Beyond the utmost bound of human thought. ;     This is my son, mine own Telemachus,  To whom I leave the scepter and the isle -- Well-loved of me, discerning to fulfill This labor, by slow prudence to make mild  A rugged people, and through soft degrees Subdue them to the useful and the good.

Most blameless is he, centered in the sphere Of common duties, decent not to fail In offices of tenderness, and pay Meet adoration to my household gods, When I am gone. He works his work, I mine. There lies the port: the vessel puffs her sail: There gloom the dark broad seas. My mariners, Souls that have toiled, and wrought, and thought with me, That ever with a frolic welcome took The thunder and the sunshine, and opposed Free hearts, free foreheads -- you and I are old; Old age hath yet his honor and his toil; Death closes all: but something ere the end, Some work of noble note, may yet be done, Not unbecoming men that strove with Gods. The lights begin to twinkle from the rocks: The long day wanes: the slow moon climbs: the deep Moans round with many voices.  Come, my friends, 'Tis not too late to seek a newer world. Push off, and sitting well in order smite The sounding furrows; for my purpose holds To sail beyond the sunset, and the baths Of all the western stars, until I die. It may be we shall touch the Happy Isles, And see the great Achilles, whom we knew. Though much is taken, much abides; and though We are not now that strength which in old days Moved earth and heaven, that which we are, we are: One equal temper of heroic hearts, Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.

The Tempest, by William Shakespeare Our revels now are ended.  These our actors, As I foretold you, were all spirits, and Are melted into air, into thin air: And, like the baseless fabric of this vision, The cloud-capp'd towers, the gorgeous palaces, The solemn temples, the great globe itself, Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve, And, like this insubstantial pageant faded, Leave not a rack behind.  We are such stuff As dreams are made on, and our little life Is rounded with a sleep.

Unable to sleep, by Ryokan At night, deep in the mountains, I sit in meditation. The affairs of men never reach here; Everything is quiet and empty, All the incense has been swallowed up   by the endless night. My robe has become a garment of dew. Unable to sleep, I walk out into the woods -- Suddenly, above the highest peak,  the moon appears.

The Vagabond,     by Robert Louis Stevenson Give to me the life I love, Let the lave [rest] go by me, Give the jolly heaven above And the byway nigh me. Bed in the bush with stars to see, Bread I dip in the river -- There's the life for a man like me, There's the life forever. Let the blow fall soon or late, Let what will be over me; Give the face of earth around And the road before me. Wealth I seek not, hope nor love, Nor a friend to know me; All I seek, the heaven above And the road below me. Or let autumn fall on me Where afield I linger, Silencing the bird on tree, Biting the blue finger, White as meal the frosty field -- Warm the fireside haven -- Not to autumn will I yield, Nor to winter even! Let the blow fall soon or late, Let what will be over me; Give the face of earth around And the road before me. Wealth I seek not, hope nor love, Nor a friend to know me; All I seek, the heaven above And the road below me.

When I Heard the Learn'd Astronomer, by Walt Whitman When I heard the learn'd astronomer, When the proofs, the figures, were ranged in columns before me, When I was shown the charts and the diagrams, to add, divide,   and measure them, When I sitting heard the astronomer where he lectured with much applause in the lecture-room, How soon unaccountable I became tired and sick, Till rising and gliding out I wander'd off by myself, In the mystical moist night-air, and from time to time, Look'd up in perfect silence at the stars. Song of the Open Road, by Walt Whitman Afoot and light-hearted, I take to the open road, Healthy, free, the world before me, The long brown path before me, leading wherever I choose. Henceforth I ask not good-fortune; I myself am good fortune; Henceforth I whimper no more, postpone no more, need nothing, Strong and content, I travel the open road. Nothing Gold Can Stay, by Robert Frost Nature's first green is gold, Her hardest hue to hold. Her early leaf's a flower; But only so an hour. Then leaf subsides to leaf. So Eden sank to grief, So dawn goes down to day. Nothing gold can stay.

The Tramps, by Robert Service Can you recall, dear comrade, when we tramped God's land together, And we sang the old, old Earth-song, for our youth was very sweet; When we drank and fought and lusted, as we mocked at tie and tether, Along the road to Anywhere, the wide world at our feet -- Along the road to Anywhere, when each day had its story; When time was yet our vassal, and life's jest was still unstale; When peace unfathomed filled our hearts as, bathed in amber glory, Along the road to Anywhere we watched the sunsets pale? Alas! the road to Anywhere is pitfalled with disaster; There's hunger, want, and weariness, yet O we loved it so! As on we tramped exultantly, and no man was our master, And no man guessed what dreams were ours, as swinging heel and toe, We tramped the road to Anywhere, the magic road to Anywhere, The tragic road to Anywhere, such dear, dim years ago.

The Most Valiant Explorers, by Tennessee Williams Those who ignore the appropriate time of their going are the most valiant explorers, Going into a country that no one is meant to go into, The time coming after that isn't meant to come after ... Those that go on through time not meant to admit them are the most valiant explorers, Twisting crabwise on their bellies under crisscross barbed wire frontiers, Constantly higher, into more breathless country, onto vast snowy plateaus. Stunted men with fierce dogs rush toward them, firing above them to halt them. Under the falsely pitying corona of light before dawn in high country, They rise erect with the rigid pride of the hopeless to hold forth hopelessly forged documents, passport photos that bear them no present resemblance, and are told to go on, continuing being their glory...

Fare Lonely As Rhinoceros Abridged from the Sutta Nipata Put by the rod for all that lives, Nor harm thou anyone thereof; Long not for son -- how then for friend? Fare lonely as rhinoceros. Love cometh from companionship; In wake of love upsurges ill; Seeing the bane that comes of love, Fare lonely as rhinoceros. In ruth for all his bosom friends, A man, heart-chained, neglects the goal; Seeing this fear in fellowship, Fare lonely as rhinoceros. The heat and cold, and hunger, thirst, Wind, sun-beat, sting of gadfly, snake: Surmounting one and all of these, Fare lonely as rhinoceros. Free everywhere, at odds with none, And well content with this and that: Enduring dangers undismayed, Fare lonely as rhinoceros. Poise, amity, ruth and release Pursue, and timely sympathy; At odds with none in all the world, Fare lonely as rhinoceros.

A Single Excellent Night Majjhima Nikaya, Sutta 131 Let not a person revive the past Or on the future build his hopes; For the past has been left behind And the future has not been reached. Instead with insight let him see Each presently arisen state; Let him know that and be sure of it, Invincibly, unshakeably. Today the effort must be made; Tomorrow Death may come, who knows? No bargain with Mortality Can keep him and his hordes away, But one who dwells thus ardently, Relentlessly, by day, by night --- It is he, the Peaceful Sage has said, Who has had a single excellent night.

Excerpts from The Way of the Bodhisattva, by Shantideva

Bilbo's Song on Setting Out The Road goes ever on and on     Down from the door where it  began. Now far ahead the Road has gone,     And I must follow, if I can, Pursuing it with eager feet,     Until it joins some larger way Where many paths and errands meet.     And whither then? I cannot say. Bilbo's Song It's Too Late Now The Road goes ever on and on     Out from the door where it began. Now far ahead the Road has gone,     Let others follow it who can! Let them a journey new begin,     But I at last with weary feet Will turn towards the lighted inn.     My evening rest and sleep to meet.

Frodo's Song on Leaving Middle Earth Still round the corner there may wait     A new road or a secret gate; And though I oft have passed them by,     A day will come at last when I Shall take the hidden paths that run     West of the Moon, East of the Sun.

Best wood to burn These hardwoods burn well and slowly, Ash, beech, hawthorn, oak and holly. Softwoods flare up quick and fine, Birch, fir, hazel, larch and pine. Elm and willow you'll regret, Chestnut green and sycamore wet.