#john clare poems

[sictransitgloriamvndi]

Triumph of Death

Why should man's high aspiring mind Burn in him with so proud a breath, When all his haughty views can find In this world yields to death? The fair, the brave, the vain, the wise, The rich, the poor, the great, and small, Are each but worm's anatomies To strew his quiet hall.

Power may make many earthly gods, Where gold and bribery's guilt prevails, But death's unwelcome, honest odds Kick o'er the unequal scales. The flattered great may clamours raise Of power, and their own weakness hide, But death shall find unlooked-for ways To end the farce of pride.

An arrow hurtled eer so high, From een a giant's sinewy strength, In Time's untraced eternity Goes but a pigmy length; Nay, whirring from the tortured string, With all its pomp of hurried flight, Tis by the skylark's little wing Outmeasured in its height.

Just so man's boasted strength and power Shall fade before death's lightest stroke, Laid lower than the meanest flower, Whose pride oer-topt the oak; And he who, like a blighting blast, Dispeopled worlds with war's alarms Shall be himself destroyed at last By poor despised worms.

Tyrants in vain their powers secure, And awe slaves' murmurs with a frown, For unawed death at last is sure To sap the babels down. A stone thrown upward to the sky Will quickly meet the ground agen; So men-gods of earth's vanity Shall drop at last to men;

And Power and Pomp their all resign, Blood-purchased thrones and banquet halls. Fate waits to sack Ambition's shrine As bare as prison walls, Where the poor suffering wretch bows down To laws a lawless power hath passed; And pride, and power, and king, and clown Shall be Death's slaves at last.

Time, the prime minister of Death! There's nought can bribe his honest will. He stops the richest tyrant's breath And lays his mischief still. Each wicked scheme for power all stops, With grandeurs false and mock display, As eve's shades from high mountain tops Fade with the rest away.

Death levels all things in his march,  Nought can resist his mighty strength; The palace proud, triumphal arch, Shall mete its shadow's length. The rich, the poor, one common bed Shall find in the unhonoured grave, Where weeds shall crown alike the head Of tyrant and of slave. 

- John Clare

[derangedrhythms]

John Clare, The New Faber Book of Love Poems; from ‘Song’, ed. James Fenton

TEXT ID: And even silence found a tongue To haunt me all the summer long

[dabiconcordia]

Sudden Shower

Black grows the southern sky, betokening rain, And humming hive-bees homeward hurry bye: They feel the change; so let us shun the grain, And take the broad road while our feet are dry. Ay, there some dropples moistened on my face, And pattered on my hat—tis coming nigh! Let's look about, and find a sheltering place. The little things around, like you and I, Are hurrying through the grass to shun the shower. Here stoops an ash-tree—hark! the wind gets high, But never mind; this ivy, for an hour, Rain as it may, will keep us dryly here: That little wren knows well his sheltering bower, Nor leaves his dry house though we come so near. by John Clare

[alliwanttodoiscollectpoetry]

I am by John Clare

[seraphinesaintclair]

John Clare

[thequietabsolute]

John Clare, from April [1821]

[loveindeeair]

That voice is gone with every pleasing tone

Loved but one moment and the next alone

[p-isforpoetry]

"I Am!" by John Clare ‖ Tom Hiddleston (12/02) [without music]

This is a re-upload of Tom reading poetry for Ximalaya FM from 2019 without the background music.

"I Am!" by John Clare I am—yet what I am none cares or knows; My friends forsake me like a memory lost: I am the self-consumer of my woes— They rise and vanish in oblivious host, Like shadows in love’s frenzied stifled throes And yet I am, and live—like vapours tossed Into the nothingness of scorn and noise, Into the living sea of waking dreams, Where there is neither sense of life or joys, But the vast shipwreck of my life’s esteems; Even the dearest that I loved the best Are strange—nay, rather, stranger than the rest. I long for scenes where man hath never trod A place where woman never smiled or wept There to abide with my Creator, God, And sleep as I in childhood sweetly slept, Untroubling and untroubled where I lie The grass below—above the vaulted sky.

Source: Ximalaya FM

[litandlifequotes]

I am the self-consumer of my woes―

"I Am!" by John Clare

[peaceofheartt]

Morning, John Clare

[kaleidescopicmind]

"I long for scenes where man hath never trod

A place where woman never smiled or wept

There to abide with my Creator, God,

And sleep as I in childhood sweetly slept,

Untroubling and untroubled where I lie

The grass below—above the vaulted sky."

Poem: I am! by John Clare, as featured in Penny Dreadful | Above The Vaulted Sky S2EP5

Gif: @penydreadful

[symphonyoflovenet]

I never saw so sweet a face As that I stood before. My heart has left its dwelling-place And can return no more

John Clare, First Love

[youhavereachedtheendofpie]

First Love

I ne’er was struck before that hour

With love so sudden and so sweet,

Her face it bloomed like a sweet flower

And stole my heart away complete.

My face turned pale as deadly pale,

My legs refused to walk away,

And when she looked, what could I ail?

My life and all seemed turned to clay.

And then my blood rushed to my face

And took my eyesight quite away,

The trees and bushes round the place

Seemed midnight at noonday.

I could not see a single thing,

Words from my eyes did start—

They spoke as chords do from the string,

And blood burnt round my heart.

Are flowers the winter’s choice?

Is love’s bed always snow?

She seemed to hear my silent voice,

Not love's appeals to know.

I never saw so sweet a face

As that I stood before.

My heart has left its dwelling-place

And can return no more.

John Clare

[bwthornton]

The Instinct of Hope by John Clare

#JohnClare #poetry #poems #photography

The Instinct of Hope by John Clare

#JohnClare #poetry #poems #photography

[seraphinesaintclair]

John Clare, from “Song: ‘Love lives beyond the tomb’”

[thequietabsolute]

I AM – yet what I am none cares or knows, My friends forsake me like a memory lost; I am the self-consumer of my woes, They rise and vanish in oblivion’s host. Like shadows in love-frenzied stifled throes And yet I am, and live like vapours tost

Into the nothingness of scorn and noise, Into the living sea of waking dreams, Where there is neither sense of life or joys, But the vast shipwreck of my life’s esteems; And e'en the dearest – that I love the best – Are strange – nay, rather stranger than the rest.

I long for scenes where man has never trod, A place where woman never smiled or wept; There to abide with my Creator, God, And sleep as I in childhood sweetly slept: Untroubling and untroubled where I lie, The grass below – above the vaulted sky.

‘I Am’, by John Clare. 1844?