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The Poetical Works of Oliver Wendell Holmes — Volume 01: Earlier Poems (1830-1836) By: Oliver Wendell Holmes (1809-1894) |
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OF OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES [1893 three volume set] CONTENTS: TO MY READERS
EARLIER POEMS (1830 1836).
OLD IRONSIDES
THE LAST LEAF
THE CAMBRIDGE CHURCHYARD
TO AN INSECT
THE DILEMMA
MY AUNT
REFLECTIONS OF A PROUD PEDESTRIAN
DAILY TRIALS, BY A SENSITIVE MAN
EVENING, BY A TAILOR
THE DORCHESTER GIANT
TO THE PORTRAIT OF "A LADY"
THE COMET
THE Music GRINDERS
THE TREADMILL SONG
THE SEPTEMBER GALE
THE HEIGHT OF THE RIDICULOUS
THE LAST READER
POETRY: A METRICAL ESSAY
TO MY READERS NAY, blame me not; I might have spared
Your patience many a trivial verse,
Yet these my earlier welcome shared,
So, let the better shield the worse. And some might say, "Those ruder songs
Had freshness which the new have lost;
To spring the opening leaf belongs,
The chestnut burs await the frost." When those I wrote, my locks were brown,
When these I write ah, well a day!
The autumn thistle's silvery down
Is not the purple bloom of May. Go, little book, whose pages hold
Those garnered years in loving trust;
How long before your blue and gold
Shall fade and whiten in the dust? O sexton of the alcoved tomb,
Where souls in leathern cerements lie,
Tell me each living poet's doom!
How long before his book shall die? It matters little, soon or late,
A day, a month, a year, an age,
I read oblivion in its date,
And Finis on its title page. Before we sighed, our griefs were told;
Before we smiled, our joys were sung;
And all our passions shaped of old
In accents lost to mortal tongue. In vain a fresher mould we seek,
Can all the varied phrases tell
That Babel's wandering children speak
How thrushes sing or lilacs smell? Caged in the poet's lonely heart,
Love wastes unheard its tenderest tone;
The soul that sings must dwell apart,
Its inward melodies unknown. Deal gently with us, ye who read
Our largest hope is unfulfilled,
The promise still outruns the deed,
The tower, but not the spire, we build. Our whitest pearl we never find;
Our ripest fruit we never reach;
The flowering moments of the mind
Drop half their petals in our speech. These are my blossoms; if they wear
One streak of morn or evening's glow,
Accept them; but to me more fair
The buds of song that never blow.
April 8, 1862. EARLIER POEMS 1830 1836 OLD IRONSIDES This was the popular name by which the frigate Constitution
was known. The poem was first printed in the Boston Daily
Advertiser, at the time when it was proposed to break up the
old ship as unfit for service. I subjoin the paragraph which
led to the writing of the poem. It is from the Advertiser of
Tuesday, September 14, 1830: "Old Ironsides. It has been affirmed upon good authority
that the Secretary of the Navy has recommended to the Board of
Navy Commissioners to dispose of the frigate Constitution. Since
it has been understood that such a step was in contemplation we
have heard but one opinion expressed, and that in decided
disapprobation of the measure. Such a national object of interest,
so endeared to our national pride as Old Ironsides is, should
never by any act of our government cease to belong to the Navy,
so long as our country is to be found upon the map of nations.
In England it was lately determined by the Admiralty to cut the
Victory, a one hundred gun ship (which it will be recollected bore
the flag of Lord Nelson at the battle of Trafalgar,) down to a
seventy four, but so loud were the lamentations of the people upon
the proposed measure that the intention was abandoned. We
confidently anticipate that the Secretary of the Navy will in like
manner consult the general wish in regard to the Constitution, and
either let her remain in ordinary or rebuild her whenever the
public service may require." New York Journal of Commerce. The poem was an impromptu outburst of feeling and was published
on the next day but one after reading the above paragraph... Continue reading book >>
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