"Always" by Pablo Neruda

 

Always

I am not jealous

of what came before me.

 

Come with a man

on your shoulders,

come with a hundred men in your hair,

come with a thousand men between your breasts and your feet,

come like a river

full of drowned men

which flows down to the wild sea,

to the eternal surf, to Time!

 

Bring them all

to where I am waiting for you;

we shall always be alone,

we shall always be you and I

alone on earth,

to start our life!

Enjoy the poem with beautiful music.

poem video👇

https://youtu.be/wldeTmd4_Mo

Who wrote the poem "Always"?

Pablo Neruda (July 12, 1904 – September 23, 1973)

Pablo Neruda was a Chilean poet and politician who won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1971. He wrote in various styles, including surrealist poems and passionate love poems. After Neruda experienced Spanish Civil War as a diplomat in Spain, he became a devoted Communist for the rest of his life. Neruda is often called one of the greatest poets of the 20^th century.

"Always" explanation

In the poem, the speaker expresses his genuine and unconditional love for his beloved, stating that he is not jealous of her experiences with her past lovers. 

"One Word Is Too Often Profaned" by Percy Bysshe Shelley

 

One Word Is Too Often Profaned

One word is too often profaned

For me to profane it;

One feeling too falsely disdained

For thee to disdain it;

One hope is too like despair

For prudence to smother;

And pity from thee more dear

Than that from another.

 

I can give not what men call love;

But wilt thou accept not

The worship the heart lifts above

And the heavens reject not,

The desire of the moth for the star,

Of the night for the morrow,

The devotion to something afar

From the sphere of our sorrow?

Enjoy the poem with beautiful music.

poem video👇 

https://youtu.be/Bey6XYm1gBI

Who wrote the poem "One Word Is Too Often Profaned"?

Percy Bysshe Shelley (August 4, 1792 – July 8, 1822)

Percy Bysshe Shelley was one of the major English Romantic poets. His literary reputation steadily grew after his death, and he greatly influenced subsequent poets such as Browing, Hardy, and Yeats. He had suffered from family crises, ill health, and a backlash against his atheism and radical political views. His second wife, Mary Shelley, was the author of "Frankenstein." He died at the age of 29 in a boating accident.

"One Word Is Too Often Profaned" explanation

 In the poem, the speaker describes his relationship with his beloved that is more than love, which is too often misused and vulgarized. He expresses his pure devotion of her, and even pity from her is better than love from another woman. This poem was written for Jane Williams. The poet and his wife Mary met Jane Williams and her lover Edward Ellerker Williams in Pisa in 1821. The two couples befriended each other, and the poet in particular developed a special “platonic” relationship with Jane Williams and wrote many poems for her. Shelley and Edward Williams drowned together in a sailing accident in 1822.

"Each Day A Life" by Robert William Service

 

Each Day A Life

I count each day a little life,

With birth and death complete;

I cloister it from care and strife

And keep it sane and sweet.

 

With eager eyes I greet the morn,

Exultant as a boy,

Knowing that I am newly born

To wonder and to joy.

 

And when the sunset splendours wane

And ripe for rest am I,

Knowing that I will live again,

Exultantly I die.

 

O that all Life were but a Day

Sunny and sweet and sane!

And that at Even I might say:

"I sleep to wake again."

Enjoy the  poem with beautiful music.

poem video👇

https://youtu.be/5M1CBjLWveI

Who wrote the poem "Each Day A Life"?

Robert W. Service (January 16, 1874 – September 11, 1958)

Robert William Service was a British-Canadian poet and writer. As a bank clerk, he had to travel widely in the Western U.S. and Canada. When his bank sent him to the Yukon, he wrote poems about the Klondike Gold Rush and achieved an immediate and great commercial success. His poems had often been criticized as literarily inferior by the critics, as in the case of Rudyard Kipling, and he was nicknamed “the Canadian Kipling.” This, however, didn’t bother Service, who classified his work as “verse, not poetry.”

"Each Day A Life" explanation

In the poem, the speaker describes his relationship with his beloved that is more than love, which is too often misused and vulgarized. He expresses his pure devotion of her, and even pity from her is better than love from another woman. This poem was written for Jane Williams. The poet and his wife Mary met Jane Williams and her lover Edward Ellerker Williams in Pisa in 1821. The two couples befriended each other, and the poet in particular developed a special “platonic” relationship with Jane Williams and wrote many poems for her. Shelley and Edward Williams drowned together in a sailing accident in 1822.

"I Look into My Glass" by Thomas Hardy

 

I look into my glass

I look into my glass,

And view my wasting skin,

And say, “Would God it came to pass

My heart had shrunk as thin!”

 

For then, I, undistrest

By hearts grown cold to me,

Could lonely wait my endless rest

With equanimity.

 

But Time, to make me grieve,

Part steals, lets part abide;

And shakes this fragile frame at eve

With throbbings of noontide.

Enjoy the poem with beautiful music.

poem video👇

https://youtu.be/Q4-51MTNp3g

Who wrote the poem "I look into my glass"?

Thomas Hardy (June 2, 1840 – January 11, 1928)

Thomas Hardy was an English novelist and poet. His father was a stonemason and local builder, and he trained and worked as an architect for ten years before beginning his successful writing career as a novelist in 1871. Later he left fiction writing for poetry and considered himself mainly as a poet. He was a Victorian realist, influenced by Romanticism, and his poetry often deals with cynical observations upon desolation of human condition. He had a strong influence on later poets such as Robert Frost, Dylan Thomas, and Philip Larkin.

"I look into my glass" explanation

In the poem, speaker looks into the mirror and realizes discordance between his physical symptoms of aging and his metal state of youth. Due to this discordance, his wait for “endless rest” (death) is lonely and painful.

"A Love Song for Lucinda" by Langston Hughes

 

A Love Song for Lucinda

Love

Is a ripe plum

Growing on a purple tree.

Taste it once

And the spell of its enchantment

Will never let you be.

Love

Is a bright star

Glowing in far Southern skies.

Look too hard

And its burning flame

Will always hurt your eyes.

Love

Is a high mountain

Stark in a windy sky.

If you

Would never lose your breath

Do not climb too high. 

Enjoy the poem with beautiful music.

poem video👇

https://youtu.be/YlOWP7lVTJU

Who wrote the poem "A Love Song for Lucinda"?

Langston Hughes (February 1, 1901 – May 22, 1967)

 

Langston Hughes was an African-American poet, social activist, novelist, playwright, and columnist who pioneered the literary art form called “jazz poetry.” He is also known as a leader of the Harlem Renaissance. Self-admittedly influenced by Paul Lawrence Dunbar, Carl Sandburg, and Walt Whitman, Hughes is known for insightful portrayals of black life and culture of his time.

"A Love Song for Lucinda" explanation

In the poem, the speaker describes love’s bitter-sweet and risky nature through the effective use of metaphors.

"Why do I love" You, Sir? by Emily Dickinson

 

"Why do I love" You, Sir?

"Why do I love" You, Sir?

Because --

The Wind does not require the Grass

To answer -- Wherefore when He pass

She cannot keep Her place.

 

Because He knows -- and

Do not You --

And We know not --

Enough for Us

The Wisdom it be so --

 

The Lightning -- never asked an Eye

Wherefore it shut -- when He was by --

Because He knows it cannot speak --

And reasons not contained --

-- Of Talk --

There be -- preferred by Daintier Folk --

 

The Sunrise -- Sire -- compelleth Me --

Because He's Sunrise -- and I see --

Therefore -- Then --

I love Thee --

Enjoy the poem with beautiful music.

poem video👇

https://youtu.be/WijXdJpb0gU

Who wrote the poem <"Why do I love" You, Sir?>

Emily Elizabeth Dickinson (December 10, 1830 – May 15, 1886)

Emily Elizabeth Dickinson was an American poet who was born in Amherst, Massachusetts. She spent most of her adult life at the family home in isolation, attending to her ill mother. Introverted and timid, she never married or sought a permanent romantic relationship all her life. Although she wrote nearly 1,800 poems during her lifetime, her poetry was largely misunderstood or underrated while she was alive. Her poems were quite original and disregarded many conventional rules, containing short lines, typically lacking titles, and often using imperfect rhyme and odd-looking syntax. Her poetry however captures universal feelings in a simple sentence with unique but resonating metaphors and reflects the poet’s lively, imaginative, and dynamic inner world. Her poetic genius began to be appreciated only after her death when her sister published her works. Now Dickinson is regarded as one of the most important American poets.

<"Why do I love" You, Sir?> explanation

In the poem, the speaker talks about the reason she loves God. Like the grass moved by the wind and an eye shut by the lightning, there is no reason for her love for God other than the simple fact that God exists. Dickinson is known for her lifelong inner struggle with religious belief and her reluctance to mindlessly conform to the conventional religious expectations of her time.

"Artist's Life" by Wheeler Wilcox

 

Artist's Life 

Of all the waltzes the great Strauss wrote,

mad with melody, rhythm--rife

From the very first to the final note,

Give me his 'Artist's Life!'

 

It stirs my blood to my finger ends,

Thrills me and fills me with vague unrest,

And all that is sweetest and saddest blends

Together within my breast.

 

It brings back that night in the dim arcade,

In love's sweet morning and life's best prime,

When the great brass orchestra played and played,

And set our thoughts to rhyme.

 

It brings back that Winter of mad delights,

Of leaping pulses and tripping feet,

And those languid moon-washed Summer nights

When we heard the band in the street.

 

It brings back rapture and glee and glow,

It brings back passion and pain and strife,

And so of all the waltzes I know,

Give me the 'Artist's Life.'

 

For it is so full of the dear old time--

So full of the dear friends I knew.

And under its rhythm, and lilt, and rhyme,

I am always finding--you.

Enjoy the poem with beautiful music

poem video👇

https://youtu.be/oHC2EoCuG2Y

Who wrote the poem "Artist's Life"?

Ella Wheeler Wilcox (November 5, 1850 – October 30, 1919)

Ella Wheeler Wilcox was an American author and poet who wrote “Solitude,” which contains the famous lines “Laugh, and the world laughs with you; weep, and you weep alone.” Popular among people rather than among literary critics, she often displayed in her poems cheerful and optimistic sentiments in plain and rhyming words. After she married Robert Wilcox in 1884, the couple became interested in spiritualism and promised each other that whoever died first would return and communicate with the other. After her husband died in 1916 after over 30 years of marriage, she was overwhelmed by grief and waited long to hear from her deceased husband in vain. She also believed in reincarnation. She died of cancer in 1919.

"Artist's Life" explanation

The speaker in the poem is addressing the listener (perhaps her beloved) about her love for the song, “Artist’s Life” by Johann Strauss. She loves the music because of all the memories with the listener it brings back and various strong emotions related to those memories. Strauss was an Austrian composer of light music of the 19^th century. Strauss wrote “Artist’s Life” in 1867 after the Austrian army’s defeat in the Battle of Königgrätz against Prussia to uplift the morale of his people.

"Four-Feet" by Rudyard Kipling

 

Four-Feet

I have done mostly what most men do,

And pushed it out of my mind;

But I can't forget, if I wanted to,

Four-Feet trotting behind.

 

Day after day, the whole day through --

Wherever my road inclined --

Four-Feet said, "I am coming with you!"

And trotted along behind.

 

Now I must go by some other round, --

Which I shall never find --

Somewhere that does not carry the sound

Of Four-Feet trotting behind.

Enjoy the poem with beautiful music.

poem video 👇

https://youtu.be/fh8zMugs3IE

Who wrote the poem "Four-Feet" ?

Joseph Rudyard Kipling (December 30, 1865 - January 18, 1936)

Joseph Rudyard Kipling was an English journalist, novelist, and poet. He was one of the most popular writers in England in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. He was born in India, and his work including "The Jungle Book" showed much Indian influence. 

"Four-Feet"  explanation

In the poem, the speaker describes his love and companionship for his dog and the sorrow for its loss. In Kipling’s another verse “The Power of the Dog,” the poet also warns of heartbreak in wait for any dog lovers because of their short lifespan relative to humans’.

"One Day I Wrote her Name" by Edmund Spenser (Amoretti LXXV)

 

Amoretti LXXV: One Day I Wrote her Name

One day I wrote her name upon the strand,

But came the waves and washed it away:

Again I wrote it with a second hand,

But came the tide, and made my pains his prey.

"Vain man," said she, "that dost in vain assay,

A mortal thing so to immortalize;

For I myself shall like to this decay,

And eke my name be wiped out likewise."

"Not so," (quod I) "let baser things devise

To die in dust, but you shall live by fame:

My verse your vertues rare shall eternize,

And in the heavens write your glorious name:

Where whenas death shall all the world subdue,

Our love shall live, and later life renew."

Enjoy the poem with beautiful music.

poem video👇

https://youtu.be/8yE-1UNxWNg

Who wrote the poem "One Day I Wrote her Name"?

Edmund Spencer (1552 or 1553 – January 13, 1599)

Edmund Spencer was an English poet, often considered as one of the greatest poets in the English language. Little is known about his family and childhood. He attended the Merchant Taylor School and later studied literature and religion at Cambridge University. Along with his poetry, he also had a political career, serving various official posts including a secretary to the Lord Deputy of Ireland. After his first wife died in 1594, he soon married Elizabeth Boyle, for whom he wrote many love poems.

"One Day I Wrote her Name"  explanation.

This poem is part of Amoretti, a sonnet cycle written by Spenser to cherish his love and marriage to Elizabeth Boyle. In the poem, the speaker tries to write his beloved’s name on the sand only to be washed away by the waves. But he keeps trying to make his love for his beloved immortal.