"The World Is Against Me" by Edgar A. Guest

 

The World Is Against Me

'The world is against me,' he said with a sigh.

'Somebody stops every scheme that I try.

The world has me down and it's keeping me there;

I don't get a chance. Oh, the world is unfair!

When a fellow is poor then he can't get a show;

The world is determined to keep him down low.'

'What of Abe Lincoln?' I asked. 'Would you say

That he was much richer than you are to-day?

He hadn't your chance of making his mark,

And his outlook was often exceedingly dark;

Yet he clung to his purpose with courage most grim

And he got to the top. Was the world against him?'

'What of Ben Franklin? I've oft heard it said

That many a time he went hungry to bed.

He started with nothing but courage to climb,

But patiently struggled and waited his time.

He dangled awhile from real poverty's limb,

Yet he got to the top. Was the world against him?

'I could name you a dozen, yes, hundreds, I guess,

Of poor boys who've patiently climbed to success;

All boys who were down and who struggled alone,

Who'd have thought themselves rich if your fortune they'd known;

Yet they rose in the world you're so quick to condemn,

And I'm asking you now, was the world against them?'

Enjoy the poem with beautiful music.

poem video👇

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Who wrote the poem "The World Is Against Me"?

Edgar Albert Guest (August 20, 1881 ~ August 5, 1959)

Edgar Albert Guest was a Britishborn American poet who was popular in the first half of the 20th century. He wrote 11,000 poems which were syndicated in 300 newspapers. He became known as the People's Poet because his poems were easy to read and had an inspirational and optimistic view of everyday life with such themes as family, work, children, and God.

"The World Is Against Me" explanation

Some people are born with all the riches and advantages and yet crumble to self-inflicted tragedies. Some people are born with all kinds of misfortune and yet rise to fulfilled, happy life with sheer determination and perseverance. Although we cannot choose the conditions of our birth or upbringing, we can control how we deal with them. It is useless to complain about things we cannot change. Rather, we should focus what we can do to make the situation better, always reminding ourselves of things and people that we should be grateful for.

"Song of the Old Mother" by William Butler Yeats

 

Song of the Old Mother

I rise in the dawn, and I kneel and blow

Till the seed of the fire flicker and glow;

And then I must scrub and bake and sweep

Till stars are beginning to blink and peep;

And the young lie long and dream in their bed

Of the matching of ribbons for bosom and head,

And their days go over in idleness,

And they sigh if the wind but lift a tress:

While I must work because I am old,

And the seed of the fire gets feeble and cold.

Enjoy the poem with beautiful music.

poem video👇

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Who wrote the poem "Song of the Old Mother"?

William Butler Yeats (June 13, 1865 – January 28, 1939)

William Butler Yeats was an Irish poet, playwright, prose writer, and is widely considered as one of the greatest poets of the 20^th century. He was born to the Protestant, Anglo-Irish community that considered themselves English people born in Ireland and had largely controlled the economic, political, and social life of Ireland. However, Yeats strongly affirmed his Irish nationality and found inspiration in Irish legends and the occult in his early career. Later his poetry became more physical and realistic. He was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1923. 

"Song of the Old Mother" explanation

In the poem, the speaker is an aged woman who has many difficult household duties. The overall atmosphere implies her displeasure with the young children idly lying in bed dreaming about trifles. This poem was published in The Wind Among The Reeds in 1899 when 34-year-old Yeats was deep in love with Irish tradition and culture. Some critics interpret the poem that the old woman symbolizes the country of Ireland, serving her master England, while the English, symbolized by the idle children, are absorbed in petty matters.

"Sonnets are full of love" by Christina Rossetti

 

Sonnets are full of love

Sonnets are full of love, and this my tome

Has many sonnets: so here now shall be

One sonnet more, a love sonnet, from me

To her whose heart is my heart’s quiet home,

To my first Love, my Mother, on whose knee

I learnt love-lore that is not troublesome;

Whose service is my special dignity,

And she my loadstar while I go and come

And so because you love me, and because

I love you, Mother, I have woven a wreath

Of rhymes wherewith to crown your honored name:

In you not fourscore years can dim the flame

Of love, whose blessed glow transcends the laws

Of time and change and mortal life and death.

Enjoy the poem with beautiful music.

poem video👇

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Who wrote the poem "Sonnets are full of love"?

Christina Rossetti (December 5, 1830 ~ December 29, 1894)

Christina Rossetti was an English poet who was lauded as one of the foremost female poets of the 19th-century Victorian era. She wrote romantic, devotional, and children's poems, marked by symbolism and intense feeling. Her literary status was often compared to that of Elizabeth Barren Browning, and upon Browning's death in 1861, Rossetti was hailed as Browning's rightful successor. She opposed slavery, cruelty to animals, and the exploitation of girls in under-age prostitution. Rossetti suffered from Graves' disease in the later decades of her life. In 1893, she was diagnosed of breast cancer and died of a recurrence in 1894.

"Sonnets are full of love" explanation

In the poem, the speaker expresses her deep love for her mother and cherishes their relationship. Rossetti was educated at home by her parents, and especially her mother is said to have played an important role in her education as a writer. This poem is dedicated to her mother and was published in her collection A Pageant and Other Poems.

"Mother O' Mine" by Rudyard Kipling

 

Mother o' Mine

If I were hanged on the highest hill,

Mother o' mine, O mother o' mine!

I know whose love would follow me still,

Mother o' mine, O mother o' mine!

 

If I were drowned in the deepest sea,

Mother o' mine, O mother o' mine!

I know whose tears would come down to me,

Mother o' mine, O mother o' mine!

 

If I were damned of body and soul,

I know whose prayers would make me whole,

Mother o' mine, O mother o' mine!

Enjoy the poem with beautiful music.

poem video👇

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Who wrote the poem "Mother O' Mine"?

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. 

"Mother O' Mine" explanation

In the poem, the speaker praises and appreciates a mother’s unconditional love. A mother will always love her children no matter what and will do anything for them. This poem was published in the beginning of Kipling’s 1892 novel The Light That Failed. Some critics speculate that Kipling added this poem in the novel (which had a sad ending) to soothe his mother who reportedly preferred a happy ending to the novel.

"In Secret We Thirst" by Hermann Hesse

 

In Secret We Thirst

Graceful, spiritual,

with the gentleness of arabesques

our life is similar

to the existence of fairies

that spin in soft cadence

around nothingness

to which we sacrifice

the here and now

 

Dreams of beauty, youthful joy

like a breath in pure harmony

with the depth of your young surface

where sparkles the longing for the night

for blood and barbarity

 

In the emptiness, spinning, without aims or needs

dance free our lives

always ready for the game

yet, secretly, we thirst for reality

for the conceiving, for the birth

we are thirst for sorrows and death

Enjoy the poem with beautiful music.

poem video👇

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Who wrote the poem "In Secret We Thirst"?

Hermann Hesse (July 2, 1877 – August 9, 1962)

Hermann Hesse was a German-born Swiss poet, novelist, and painter. He was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1946. His works were deeply influenced by Eastern mysticism and explored such themes as individuals’ search for authenticity, identity, and spirituality.

"In Secret We Thirst" explanation

In the poem, the speaker observes an ironic human propensity to secretly yearn for reality such as sorrows, violence, and death even in the most clam and joyful moments of life. This is one of the poems included in his last novel The Glass Bead Game with which Hesse won the Nobel Prize of Literature in 1946.

"In Time of Silver Rain" by Langston Hughes

 

In Time Of Silver Rain

In time of silver rain

The earth puts forth new life again,

Green grasses grow

And flowers lift their heads,

And over all the plain

The wonder spreads

 

Of Life,

Of Life,

Of life!

 

In time of silver rain

The butterflies lift silken wings

To catch a rainbow cry,

And trees put forth new leaves to sing

In joy beneath the sky

As down the roadway

Passing boys and girls

Go singing, too,

 

In time of silver rain When spring

And life

Are new.

 

Enjoy the poem with beautiful music.

poem video👇

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Who Wrote the poem  "In Time of Silver Rain"?

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.

"In Time of Silver Rain" explanation

In the poem, the speaker cherishes spring rain; how it brings joy and life to the world. Humans as well as nature celebrates the beauty and the life the rain brings.

"To the Skylark" by William Wordsworth

 

To the Skylark

Ethereal minstrel! pilgrim of the sky!

Dost thou despise the earth where cares abound?

Or, while the wings aspire, are heart and eye

Both with thy nest upon the dewy ground?

Thy nest which thou canst drop into at will,

Those quivering wings composed, that music still!

 

Leave to the nightingale her shady wood;

A privacy of glorious light is thine;

Whence thou dost pour upon the world a flood

Of harmony, with instinct more divine;

Type of the wise who soar, but never roam;

True to the kindred points of Heaven and Home!

Enjoy the poem with beautiful music

poem video

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Who wrote the poem "To the Skylark"?

William Wordsworth  (April 7, 1770 – April 23, 1850)

William Wordsworth was an English poet who pioneered the Romantic Movement with his close friend and fellow poet, Samuel Taylor Coleridge. He famously defined poetry as “the spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings.” Using the ordinary language “really used by men,” he wrote beautiful poetry with sweet imagery, often based around the natural world. He suffered from depression, which was reflected in somber undertones in his poems. He was the Poet Laureate for Queen Victoria from 1843 until his death from pleurisy in 1850.

"To the Skylark" explanation

In the poem, the speaker describes a skylark, who flies and sings high up in the air, still attending to its nest. The skylark in the poem is the symbol of the wise man who soars so high in the intellectual/ philosophical sphere and yet does not forget about his ordinary duties such as taking care of family. The poem was written in 1825 as a partially critical response to “To a Skylark” by Percy Bysshe Shelley which was written five years earlier.

"Mowing" by Robert Frost

 

Mowing

There was never a sound beside the wood but one,

And that was my long scythe whispering to the ground.

What was it it whispered? I knew not well myself;

Perhaps it was something about the heat of the sun,

Something, perhaps, about the lack of sound—

And that was why it whispered and did not speak.

It was no dream of the gift of idle hours,

Or easy gold at the hand of fay or elf:

Anything more than the truth would have seemed too weak

To the earnest love that laid the swale in rows,

Not without feeble-pointed spikes of flowers

(Pale orchises), and scared a bright green snake.

The fact is the sweetest dream that labor knows.

My long scythe whispered and left the hay to make.

Enjoy the poem with beautiful music

poem video👇

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Who wrote the poem "Mowing"?

Robert Frost (March 26, 1874 – January 29, 1963)

Robert Frost was an American poet who was born in San Francisco, California. Frost’s life was marked by grief and loss. When he was 11, his father died of tuberculosis, leaving just eight dollars. Frost’s mother died of cancer when he was 26. Mental illness ran in his family. He and his mother suffered from depression, and his sister and his daughter were committed to mental hospitals. Using realistic depictions of rural life, his poems often examined complex social and philosophical themes. Frost’s first book was published at the age of 40, but he ended up winning four Pulitzer Prizes for poetry and becoming the most famous poet of his time.

"Mowing" explanation

In the poem, Frost uses natural imagery so eloquently to cherish the value of simple, hard labor. When your mind wanders and negative feelings creep in, try to do some simple manual labor. Often, it will clear your head and make you feel so much better.

"Beeny Cliff" by Thomas Hardy

 

Beeny Cliff 

I

O the opal and the sapphire of that wandering western sea,

And the woman riding high above with bright hair flapping free–

The woman whom I loved so, and who loyally loved me.

I I

The pale mews plained below us, and the waves seemed far away

In a nether sky, engrossed in saying their ceaseless babbling say,

As we laughed light-heartedly aloft on that clear-sunned March day.

III

A little cloud then cloaked us, and there flew an irised rain,

And the Atlantic dyed its levels with a dull misfeatured stain,

And then the sun burst out again, and purples prinked the main.

 

 

IV

—Still in all its chasmal beauty bulks old Beeny to the sky,

And shall she and I not go there once again now March is nigh,

And the sweet things said in that March say anew there by and by?

V

What if still in chasmal beauty looms that wild weird western shore,

The woman now is-elsewhere-whom the ambling pony bore,

And nor knows nor cares for Beeny, and will laugh there nevermore.

Enjoy the poem with soothing music.

poem video👇

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Who wrote the poem "Beeny Cliff"?

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.

"Beeny Cliff" explanation

In the poem, the speaker recalls his memories of good times of him and his lover, who is no longer with him. Hardy met his first wife Emma in Cornwell in 1870, fell in love, and married in 1874. They became estranged, and Emma died in 1912 at the age of 72. Her death had a traumatic effect on Hardy, and he revisited places related to their relationship in Cornwell. He wrote this poem in 1913 about their visit to Beeny cliff in March 1870, when they were still in love, more than 40 years later.