Last night I picked up an old book of poetry that I have had for many years.  The small red book was published in 1933 has the odd title of “Additional Poems to the Golden Treasury”.  There are at least a dozen small little pieces of torn paper that bookmark pages where some of my favorites are.  I thumbed through the book and absorbed again some old favorites which lead me to pick up two other poetry books in my library and thumb through their bookmarked pages.  From a little less than an hour last night I have typed here this morning parts of some favorites I wanted to share.  I feel a little like I am cheating in putting up this blog today as it will be mostly filled with the work of others.  Yet, I am doing so with great respect and gratitude for these famous writers whose even meter and rhyme sprinkle my spirit with joy each time I read their work.  

From When You are Old by W. B. Yeats
When you are old and grey and full of sleep,
And nodding by the fire, take down this book,
And slowly read, and dream of the soft look
Your eyes had once, and of their shadows deep; 

From I Love You by Sara Teasdale
When April bends above me
and finds me fast asleep,
Dust need not keep the secret
A live heart died to keep.
 
From The Raven by Edgar Allan Poe
Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered, weak and weary,
Over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore,
While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping,
As of some one gently rapping, rapping at my chamber door.

From Two In The Campagna by Robert Browning
For me, I touched a thought, I know,
Has tantalized me many times,
Like turns of thread the spiders throw
Mocking across our path for rhymes.
 
From A Word to Husbands by Ogden Nash
To keep your marriage brimming
With love in the loving cup,
Whenever you’re wrong, admit it;
Whenever you’re right, shut up.

From A Poison Tree by William Blake
I was angry with my friend;
I told my wrath, my wrath did end.
I was angry with my foe:
I told it not, my wrath did grow.

From Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening by Robert Frost
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep.

From If by Rudyard Kipling
If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with Kings – nor lose the common touch,
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,
If all men count with you, but none too much;
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it,
And – which is more – you’ll be a Man, my son!

Last lines of The Star-Spangled Banner by Francis Scott Key
Then conquer we must, when our cause it is just,
And this be our motto: “In God is our trust.”
And the star-spangled banner in triumph shall wave
O’er the land of the free and the home of the brave!

From A Match by Algernon Charles Swinburne
If love were what the words are,
And love were like the tune
With double sound and single
Delight our lips would mingle
With kisses glad as birds are
That get sweet rain at noon.

From A Birthday by Christina Georgina Rossetti
My heart is like a singing bird
Whose nest is in a watered shoot;
My heart is like an apple-tree
Whose boughs are bent with thick-set fruit;
My heart is like a rainbow shell
That paddles in a halcyon sea;
My heart is gladder than all these,
Because my love is come to me.

From A Man’s Requirements by Elizabeth Barrett Browning
Love me Sweet, with all thou art,
Feeling, thinking, seeing;
Love me in the lightest part,
Love me in full being.

Well written poetry that is smooth and even in the way it is crafted can move me deeply.  I know from trying to write poems myself how difficult it is to mold words in this manner.  Also, I realize the talent needed to write poetry I either do not possess or else have never brought it forth in a satisfactory way.  This makes me all the more grateful to those who paint  beautiful portraits with words.

He who draws noble delights from sentiments of poetry is a true poet, though he has never written a line in all his life.  George Sand