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Best Famous Thomas Edward Brown Poems

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Written by Thomas Edward Brown | Create an image from this poem

Pain

 The Man that hath great griefs I pity not; 
’Tis something to be great 
In any wise, and hint the larger state, 
Though but in shadow of a shade, God wot! 

Moreover, while we wait the possible, 
This man has touched the fact, 
And probed till he has felt the core, where, packed 
In pulpy folds, resides the ironic ill.
And while we others sip the obvious sweet— Lip-licking after-taste Of glutinous rind, lo! this man hath made haste, And pressed the sting that holds the central seat.
For thus it is God stings us into life, Provoking actual souls From bodily systems, giving us the poles That are His own, not merely balanced strife.
Nay, the great passions are His veriest thought, Which whoso can absorb, Nor, querulous halting, violate their orb, In him the mind of God is fullest wrought.
Thrice happy such an one! Far other he Who dallies on the edge Of the great vortex, clinging to a sedge Of patent good, a timorous Manichee; Who takes the impact of a long-breathed force, And fritters it away In eddies of disgust, that else might stay His nerveless heart, and fix it to the course.
For there is threefold oneness with the One; And he is one, who keeps The homely laws of life; who, if he sleeps, Or wakes, in his true flesh God’s will is done.
And he is one, who takes the deathless forms, Who schools himself to think With the All-thinking, holding fast the link, God-riveted, that bridges casual storms.
But tenfold one is he, who feels all pains Not partial, knowing them As ripples parted from the gold-beaked stem, Wherewith God’s galley onward ever strains.
To him the sorrows are the tension-thrills Of that serene endeavour, Which yields to God for ever and for ever The joy that is more ancient than the hills.


Written by Thomas Edward Brown | Create an image from this poem

Specula

 When He appoints to meet thee, go thou forth— 
It matters not 
If south or north, 
Bleak waste or sunny plot.
Nor think, if haply He thou seek’st be late, He does thee wrong.
To stile or gate Lean thou thy head, and long! It may be that to spy thee He is mounting Upon a tower, Or in thy counting Thou hast mista’en the hour.
But, if He comes not, neither do thou go Till Vesper chime.
Belike thou then shalt know He hath been with thee all the time.
Written by Thomas Edward Brown | Create an image from this poem

If Thou Couldst Empty All Thyself Of Self

 If thou could'st empty all thyself of self, 
Like to a shell dishabited,
Then might He find thee on the ocean shelf, 
And say, "This is not dead,"
And fill thee with Himself instead.
But thou are all replete with very thou And hast such shrewd activity, That when He comes He says, "This is enow Unto itself - 'twere better let it be, It is so small and full, there is no room for me.
"
Written by Thomas Edward Brown | Create an image from this poem

My Garden

 A garden is a lovesome thing, God wot!
Rose plot,
Fringed pool,
Ferned grot--
The veriest school
Of peace; and yet the fool
Contends that God is not--
Not God! in gardens! when the eve is cool?
Nay, but I have a sign;
'Tis very sure God walks in mine.
Written by Thomas Edward Brown | Create an image from this poem

Land Ho!

 I know ’tis but a loom of land, 
Yet is it land, and so I will rejoice, 
I know I cannot hear His voice 
Upon the shore, nor see Him stand; 
Yet is it land, ho! land.
The land! the land! the lovely land! ‘Far off,’ dost say? Far off—ah, bless?d home! Farewell! farewell! thou salt sea-foam! Ah, keel upon the silver sand— Land, ho! land.
You cannot see the land, my land, You cannot see, and yet the land is there— My land, my land, through murky air— I did not say ’twas close at hand— But—land, ho! land.
Dost hear the bells of my sweet land, Dost hear the kine, dost hear the merry birds? No voice, ’tis true, no spoken words, No tongue that thou may’st understand— Yet is it land, ho! land.
It’s clad in purple mist, my land, In regal robe it is apparell?d, A crown is set upon its head, And on its breast a golden band— Land, ho! land.
Dost wonder that I long for land? My land is not a land as others are— Upon its crest there beams a star, And lilies grow upon the strand— Land, ho! land.
Give me the helm! there is the land! Ha! lusty mariners, she takes the breeze! And what my spirit sees it sees— Leap, bark, as leaps the thunderbrand— Land, ho! land.


Written by Thomas Edward Brown | Create an image from this poem

Dora

 SHE knelt upon her brother's grave, 
 My little girl of six years old-- 
He used to be so good and brave, 
 The sweetest lamb of all our fold; 
He used to shout, he used to sing, 
Of all our tribe the little king-- 
And so unto the turf her ear she laid, 
To hark if still in that dark place he play'd.
No sound! no sound! Death's silence was profound; And horror crept Into her aching heart, and Dora wept.
If this is as it ought to be, My God, I leave it unto Thee.
Written by Thomas Edward Brown | Create an image from this poem

Salve!

 TO live within a cave--it is most good; 
 But, if God make a day, 
 And some one come, and say, 
'Lo! I have gather'd faggots in the wood!' 
 E'en let him stay, 
And light a fire, and fan a temporal mood! 

So sit till morning! when the light is grown 
 That he the path can read, 
 Then bid the man God-speed! 
His morning is not thine: yet must thou own 
They have a cheerful warmth--those ashes on the stone.
Written by Thomas Edward Brown | Create an image from this poem

Opifex

 As I was carving images from clouds,
And tinting them with soft ethereal dyes
Pressed from the pulp of dreams, one comes, and cries:--
"Forbear!" and all my heaven with gloom enshrouds.
"Forbear!" Thou hast no tools wherewith to essay The delicate waves of that elusive grain: Wouldst have due recompense of vulgar pain? The potter's wheel for thee, and some coarse clay! "So work, if work thou must, O humbly skilled! Thou hast not known the Master; in thy soul His spirit moves not with a sweet control; Thou art outside, and art not of the guild.
" Thereat I rose, and from his presence passed, But, going, murmured:--"To the God above, Who holds my heart, and knows its store of love, I turn from thee, thou proud iconoclast.
" Then on the shore God stooped to me, and said:-- "He spake the truth: even so the springs are set That move thy life, nor will they suffer let, Nor change their scope; else, living, thou wert dead.
"This is thy life: indulge its natural flow, And carve these forms.
They yet may find a place On shelves for them reserved.
In any case, I bid thee carve them, knowing what I know.
"
Written by Thomas Edward Brown | Create an image from this poem

Risus Dei

 Methinks in Him there dwells alway
A sea of laughter very deep,
Where the leviathans leap,
And little children play,
Their white feet twinkling on its crisped edge;
But in the outer bay
The strong man drives the wedge
Of polished limbs,
And swims.
Yet there is one will say:-- 'It is but shallow, neither is it broad'-- And so he frowns; but is he nearer God? One saith that God is in the note of bird, And piping wind, and brook, And all the joyful things that speak no word: Then if from sunny nook Or shade a fair child's laugh Is heard, Is not God half? And if a strong man gird His loins for laughter, stirred By trick of ape or calf-- Is he no better than a cawing rook? Nay 'tis a Godlike function; laugh thy fill! Mirth comes to thee unsought; Mirth sweeps before it like a flood the mill Of languaged logic; thought Hath not its source so high; The will Must let it by: For though the heavens are still, God sits upon His hill, And sees the shadows fly; And if He laughs at fools, why should He not? 'Yet hath a fool a laugh'--Yea, of a sort; God careth for the fools; The chemic tools Of laughter He hath given them, and some toys Of sense, as 'twere a small retort Wherein they may collect the joys Of natural giggling, as becomes their state: The fool is not inhuman, making sport For such as would not gladly be without That old familiar noise: Since, though he laugh not, he can cachinnate-- This also is of God, we may not doubt.
'Is there an empty laugh?' Best called a shell From which a laugh has flown, A mask, a well That hath no water of its own, Part echo of a groan, Which, if it hide a cheat, Is a base counterfeit; But if one borrow A cloak to wrap a sorrow That it may pass unknown, Then can it not be empty.
God doth dwell Behind the feigned gladness, Inhabiting a sacred core of sadness.
'Yet is there not an evil laugh?' Content-- What follows? When Satan fills the hollows Of his bolt-riven heart With spasms of unrest, And calls it laughter; if it give relief To his great grief, Grudge not the dreadful jest.
But if the laugh be aimed At any good thing that it be ashamed, And blush thereafter, Then it is evil, and it is not laughter.
There are who laugh, but know not why: Whether the force Of simple health and vigour seek a course Extravagant, as when a wave runs high, And tips with crest of foam the incontinent curve, Or if it be reserve Of power collected for a goal, which had, Behold! the man is fresh.
So when strung nerve, Stout heart, pent breath, have brought you to the source Of a great river, on the topmost stie Of cliff, then have you bad All heaven to laugh with you; yet somewhere nigh A shepherd lad Has wondering looked, and deemed that you were mad.
Written by Thomas Edward Brown | Create an image from this poem

Ibant Obscur?

 To-night I saw three maidens on the beach,
Dark-robed descending to the sea,
So slow, so silent of all speech,
And visible to me
Only by that strange drift-light, dim, forlorn,
Of the sun's wreck and clashing surges born.
Each after other went, And they were gathered to his breast-- It seemed to me a sacrament Of some stern creed unblest: As when to rocks, that cheerless girt the bay, They bound thy holy limbs, Andromeda.