"There is Another Sky" by Emily Dickinson

 

There is Another Sky

There is another sky,

Ever serene and fair,

And there is another sunshine,

Though it be darkness there;

Never mind faded forests, Austin,

Never mind silent fields-

Here is a little forest,

Whose leaf is ever green;

Here is a brighter garden,

Where not a frost has been;

In its unfading flowers

I hear the bright bee hum:

Prithee, my brother,

Into my garden come!

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Poem Video👇 

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Who wrote the poem "There is Another Sky"?

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

Emily Elizabeth Dickinson an American poet, was not widely known during her life, but now she is respected as one of the greatest American poets. She was born in Amherst, Massachusetts, and lived there all her life in isolation. She wouldn't invite any guests nor get out of her bedroom, and maintained social intercourses only by letters in her latter years. Dickinson wrote nearly 1,800 poems, but published only 10 poems and one letter during her lifetime.

"There is Another Sky" explanation

"There is Another Sky" is a sonnet about the beauty of her garden, "Garden of Eden" as she called it. The poem was included in her letter sent to her brother, asking him to come back home. She ardently hoped for his return.

"Afternoon on a Hill" by Edna St. Vincent Millay

Afternoon on a Hill

I will be the gladdest thing

Under the sun!

I will touch a hundred flowers

And not pick one.

 

I will look at cliffs and clouds

With quiet eyes,

Watch the wind bow down the grass,

And the grass rise.

 

And when lights begin to show

Up from the town,

I will mark which must be mine,

And then start down!

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Who wrote the poem "Afternoon on a Hill"?

Edna St. Vincent Millay (February 22, 1892 - October 19, 1950)

Edna St. Vincent Millay was an American poet, playwright, political activist, and feminist. Her rebellious viewpoints were reflected in both her works and her uninhibited lifestyle involving many passing relationships with both sexes. As a well known feminist of her time, she inspired a generation of American women. She became the first female to win the Pulitzer Prize in poetry in 1923. She died from a heart attack at the age of 58 and is buried alongside her husband in Austerlitz, New York.

 

"Afternoon on a Hill" Explanation

In the poem, the speaker calmly describes her plan to go up on a hill, watch the grass in the wind, and touch the flowers under the sun. The effective use of straightforward words and literary devices such as anaphora, alliteration, and imagery creates simple yet peaceful feelings about nature and perhaps life itself.

"Since There's No Help" (Sonnet 61) by Michael Drayton

 

Since There's No Help (Sonnet 61)

Since there’s no help, come let us kiss and part.

Nay, I have done, you get no more of me;

And I am glad, yea glad with all my heart,

That thus so cleanly I myself can free.

Shake hands for ever, cancel all our vows,

And when we meet at any time again,

Be it not seen in either of our brows

That we one jot of former love retain.

Now at the last gasp of Love’s latest breath,

When, his pulse failing, Passion speechless lies;

When Faith is kneeling by his bed of death,

And Innocence is closing up his eyes—

Now, if thou wouldst, when all have given him over,

From death to life thou might’st him yet recover!

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Who wrote the poem "Since There's No Help"?

Michael Drayton (1563 – December 23, 1631)

Michael Drayton was an English poet in the Elizabethan era. Although almost nothing about his early life is known, it is speculated that Drayton was a servant who became famous through patronage. He wrote many love poems but lived and died a bachelor. Drayton was the first to make the term "ode" popular in England.

"Since There's No Help" explanation

"Since There's No Help" (Sonnet 61) is Drayton's most famous poem. In the poem, the speaker adamantly declares the ending of a love relationship at first. But later, the speaker desperately tries to change the situation and revive the relationship. Some scholars suggest that the poem was inspired by Anne Goodere, eldest daughter of his benefactor Sir Henry Goodere.

"Love's Philosophy" by Percy Bysshe Shelley

 

Love's Philosophy

The fountains mingle with the river

And the rivers with the ocean,

The winds of heaven mix for ever

With a sweet emotion;

Nothing in the world is single,

All things by a law divine

In one another's being mingle—

Why not I with thine?

 

See the mountains kiss high heaven,

And the waves clasp one another;

No sister-flower would be forgiven

If it disdain'd its brother;

And the sunlight clasps the earth,

And the moonbeams kiss the sea—

What is all this sweet work worth

If thou kiss not me?

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Poem Video👇

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Who wrote the poem "Love's Philosophy"?

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.

"Love's Philosophy" explanation

The poem consists of two 8-line stanzas with an ABABCDCD rhyme structure. The poet compares the connection between natural things and the relationship between him and his beloved. He expresses his desire for union of love just like unity in nature, using Personification, Metaphor, and the Rhetorical question.

 

"Bright Star" by John Keats

 

Bright Star

Bright star! would I were steadfast as thou art—

Not in lone splendour hung aloft the night,

And watching, with eternal lids apart,

Like Nature's patient sleepless Eremite,

The moving waters at their priestlike task

Of pure ablution round earth's human shores,

Or gazing on the new soft fallen mask

Of snow upon the mountains and the moors—

No—yet still steadfast, still unchangeable,

Pillow'd upon my fair love's ripening breast,

To feel for ever its soft fall and swell,

Awake for ever in a sweet unrest,

Still, still to hear her tender-taken breath,

And so live ever—or else swoon to death.

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Who wrote the poem "Bright Star"?

John Keats (October 31, 1795 – February 23, 1821)

John Keats was an English Romantic poet. He was born in London as the eldest of 4 children. His works had been published for only 4 years before his death from tuberculosis at the age of 25. After his premature death, he became one of the most popular English poets. His poetic style distinctively causes extreme emotions through natural imagery.

"Bright Star" explanation

In the poem, addressing to a star, the poet wishes his love to be as constant as the star. The poem is punctuated as a single sentence with the rhyme form of the Shakespearean sonnet (ABABCDCDEFEFGG). It is said to have been a declaration of Keats' love for Fanny Brawne, his fiancée and muse.

 

 

“A Red, Red Rose” by Robert Burns

 

A Red, Red Rose

O my Luve is like a red, red rose

That’s newly sprung in June;

O my Luve is like the melody

That’s sweetly played in tune.

 

So fair art thou, my bonnie lass,

So deep in luve am I;

And I will luve thee still, my dear,

Till a’ the seas gang dry.

 

Till a’ the seas gang dry, my dear,

And the rocks melt wi’ the sun;

I will love thee still, my dear,

While the sands o’ life shall run.

 

And fare thee weel, my only luve!

And fare thee weel a while!

And I will come again, my luve,

Though it were ten thousand mile.

Enjoy “A Red, Red Rose” with beautiful music.

Poem Video👇

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Who wrote the poem “A Red, Red Rose”?

Robert Burns (January 25, 1759 – July 21, 1796)

Robert Burns was a Scottish poet and lyricist and is widely regarded as the national poet of Scotland, also known as "the National Bard." He pioneered the Romantic movement. He died at the age of 37 on the day his son Maxwell was born. After his death, his writings greatly influenced both liberalism and socialism. He also became a cultural icon in Scotland and among Scottish emigrants and their descendants worldwide. In 2009, he was voted as the greatest Scot by the Scottish people in a vote run by a Scottish TV channel.

“A Red, Red Rose” explanation

"A Red, Red Rose" was a Scottish song, first published in 1794 in a collection of traditional Scottish songs. During the last 7 years of his life, Burns worked on projects to preserve traditional Scottish songs, and this was a part of the collection. Burns reportedly heard the song sung by a country girl, so inspired and wrote the lyrics down. Although it is often published as a poem, it has the form of a ballad and is meant to be sung aloud. It describes the speaker’s everlasting love for his or her beloved.

“How Do I Love Thee?” by Elizabeth Barrett Browning

 

“How Do I Love Thee?”

How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.

I love thee to the depth and breadth and height

My soul can reach, when feeling out of sight

For the ends of being and ideal grace.

I love thee to the level of every day's

Most quiet need, by sun and candle-light.

I love thee freely, as men strive for right.

I love thee purely, as they turn from praise.

I love thee with the passion put to use

In my old griefs, and with my childhood's faith.

I love thee with a love I seemed to lose

With my lost saints. I love thee with the breath,

Smiles, tears, of all my life; and, if God choose,

I shall but love thee better after death.

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Poem Video👇

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Who wrote the poem “How Do I Love Thee?” 

Elizabeth Barrett Browning (March 6, 1806 — June 29, 1861)

Elizabeth Barrett Browning was an English poet of the Victorian era, famous in England and the U.S. during her lifetime. She was the eldest of 12 children and wrote poetry from 11. She was an avid reader and writer, and Shakespeare was her favorite. From 15, she suffered from frail health due to intense head and spinal pain and lung problems throughout her life. After her 1844 volume "Poems" had a great success, Robert Browning, an English poet and playwright, was inspired to write to her, praising her work. The two met in 1845, fell in love, and soon got married. Their special bond had an important influence on their respective subsequent writings. Her work also had a great influence on famous contemporary writers such as the American poets Edgar Allan Poe and Emily Dickinson.

“How Do I Love Thee?” explanation.

The poem was originally published as "number 43" out of a collection of 44 love sonnets, "Sonnets from the Portuguese." Elizabeth was initially reluctant to publish the poems because they were too personal. But her husband Robert Browning urged her to publish them, insisting that they were the best sequence of English sonnets since Shakespeare. For some privacy, she published them as translations of foreign sonnets, particularly Portuguese, probably because of Robert's nickname for her: "my little Portuguese."

Sonnet 18 (Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?) by William Shakespeare

 

Sonnet 18 (Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?)

Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?

Thou art more lovely and more temperate:

Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,

And summer’s lease hath all too short a date;

Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,

And often is his gold complexion dimm'd;

And every fair from fair sometime declines,

By chance or nature’s changing course untrimm'd;

But thy eternal summer shall not fade,

Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow’st;

Nor shall death brag thou wander’st in his shade,

When in eternal lines to time thou grow’st:

So long as men can breathe or eyes can see,

So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.

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Poem Video👇

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Who wrote the poem "Sonnet 18"?

William Shakespeare (April 26, 1564 – April 23, 1616)

William Shakespeare was an English playwright, poet, and actor of the Renaissance era. He is regarded as the greatest writer in the English language, often called England's national poet and the "Bard of Avon." Few public records remain about his private life, causing speculations about his physical appearances, sexuality, religious beliefs and the authorship of some of his works. His works demonstrate a wide range of human emotions and conflicts, touching so many people's minds throughout the world for over 400 years.

Sonnet 18 explanation

"Sonnet 18" is one of the most famous of the 154 sonnets written by Shakespeare. In the poem, comparing the young man with a summer's day, the speaker notes that the young man has better qualities than a summer's day. The speaker also notes the changing and diminishing nature of a summer's day and states that the young man will live forever in the poem as long as it can be read. There is an irony in the poem: it is not the young man but the description of him that is eternalized, but the poem contains few despcriptions of the young man, whereas it contains vivid and lasting descriptions of a summer's day, which the young man is supposed to outlive.

"A Psalm of Life" by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

 

A Psalm of Life

Tell me not, in mournful numbers,

Life is but an empty dream!

For the soul is dead that slumbers,

And things are not what they seem.

 

Life is real! Life is earnest!

And the grave is not its goal;

Dust thou art, to dust returnest,

Was not spoken of the soul.

 

Not enjoyment, and not sorrow,

Is our destined end or way;

But to act, that each to-morrow

Find us farther than to-day.

 

Art is long, and Time is fleeting,

And our hearts, though stout and brave,

Still, like muffled drums, are beating

Funeral marches to the grave.

 

In the world’s broad field of battle,

In the bivouac of Life,

Be not like dumb, driven cattle!

Be a hero in the strife!

 

Trust no Future, howe’er pleasant!

Let the dead Past bury its dead!

Act,— act in the living Present!

Heart within, and God o’erhead!

 

Lives of great men all remind us

We can make our lives sublime,

And, departing, leave behind us

Footprints on the sands of time;

 

Footprints, that perhaps another,

Sailing o’er life’s solemn main,

A forlorn and shipwrecked brother,

Seeing, shall take heart again.

 

Let us, then, be up and doing,

With a heart for any fate;

Still achieving, still pursuing,

Learn to labor and to wait.

Enjoy "A Psalm of Life" with beautiful music.

Poem Video👇

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Who wrote the poem "A Psalm of Life"?

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (February 27, 1807 – March 24, 1882)

 

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow was an American poet and educator. He was one of the most famous American poets of the 19th century, both domestically and internationally, and was one of the few American writers honored in the Poets' Corner of Westminster Abbey. Longfellow was born in Portland, Maine (then still part of Massachusetts). He studied at Bowdoin College and became a professor there and later at Harvard University. His poems were known for their musicality, often including stories of mythology and legend.

 

A Psalm of Life explanation

In the poem, the speaker (a young man) responds to a Biblical teachings that this human life is unimportant and we are made of dust and eventually return to dust. The speaker encourages the readers to live actively, and neither to lament the past nor to take the future for granted. Longfellow wrote this poem, inspired by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe. He was also inspired by a sincere conversation about life with his friend and fellow Harvard professor, Cornelius Conway Felton. Longfellow was further inspired by the death of his first wife, Mary Storer Potter, who died in 1835 after a miscarriage. 

"It Couldn't Be Done" by Edgar Albert Guest

 

“It Couldn't Be Done”

Somebody said that it couldn’t be done

But he with a chuckle replied

That “maybe it couldn’t,” but he would be one

Who wouldn’t say so till he’d tried.

So he buckled right in with the trace of a grin

On his face. If he worried he hid it.

He started to sing as he tackled the thing

That couldn’t be done, and he did it!

 

Somebody scoffed: “Oh, you’ll never do that;

At least no one ever has done it;”

But he took off his coat and he took off his hat

And the first thing we knew he’d begun it.

With a lift of his chin and a bit of a grin,

Without any doubting or quiddit,

He started to sing as he tackled the thing

That couldn’t be done, and he did it.

 

There are thousands to tell you it cannot be done,

There are thousands to prophesy failure,

There are thousands to point out to you one by one,

The dangers that wait to assail you.

But just buckle in with a bit of a grin,

Just take off your coat and go to it;

Just start in to sing as you tackle the thing

That “cannot be done,” and you’ll do it.

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Poem Video👇

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What is the poem "It Couldn't Be Done" about?

The poem is about doing the things that have never been done before and the things that people say you could not do. The poem is encouraging the readers to do things that never have been done before, even if everyone is saying that it can not be done.

When you try to go outside of your comfort zone and do difficult things, so many people will try to drag you down. They will tell you that no one has ever done it, you're destined to fail, or the dangers are imminent. The poem encourages you to be brave, keep grinding, and do the difficult things despite all the negativity around you.