Into my heart an air that kills

(by Alfred Edward Housman)

Into my heart an air that kills

From yon far country blows;

What are those blue remembered hills,

What spires, what farms are those?

That is the land of lost content,

I see it shining plain,

The happy highways where I went

And cannot come again.

MY HEART'S IN THE HIGHLANDS

(by Robert Burns)

My heart's in the Highlands, my heart is not here,

My heart's in the Highlands, a-chasing the deer,

A-chasing the wild deer, and following the roe —

My heart's in the Highlands wherever I go!

Farewell to the Highlands, farewell to the North,

The birth-place of valour, the country of worth!

Whenever I wander, wherever I rove,

The hills of the Highlands for ever I love.

Farewell to the mountains high cover'd with snow,

Farewell to the straths and green valleys below;

Farewell to the forests and wild-hanging woods,

Farewell to the torrents and loud-pouring floods!

My heart's in the Highlands, my heart is not here;

My heart's in the Highlands, a-chasing the deer;

A-chasing the wild deer, and following the roe,

My heart's in the Highlands wherever I go!

A RED, RED ROSE

(by Robert Burns)

O, my luve¹ is like a red, red rose,

That's newly sprung in June;

O, my luve is like the melodie²,

That's sweetly play'd in tune

As fair art thou, my bonnie lass,³

So deep in luve am I;

And I will luve thee still, my dear,

Till a' the seas gang dry.⁴

Till a' the seas gang dry, my dear.

And the rocks melt wi' the sun;⁵

And I will luve thee still, my dear,

While the sands o' life⁶ shall run.

And fare-thee-,⁷ weel my only luve!

And fare-thee-weel a while!

And I will come again, my luve,

Tho'⁸ it were ten thousand mile!

WRITTEN IN MARCH

(by William Wordsworth)

The cock is crowing,

The stream is flowing,

The small birds twitter,

The lake doth⁹ glitter,

The green field-sleeps in the sun;

The oldest and youngest

Are at work with the strongest;

The cattle are grazing,

Their heads never raising;

There are forty feeding like one!

Like an army defeated

The snow hath retreated,

And now doth fare ill

On the top of the bare hill;

The plough-boy is whooping — anon — anon;

There's joy in the mountains;

There's life in the fountains;

Small clouds are sailing,

Blue sky prevailing;

The rain is over and gone!

THOSE EVENING BELLS

(by Thomas Moore)

I

Those evening bells! those evening bells!

How many a tale their music tells,

Of youth, and home, and that sweet time,

When last I heard their soothing chime!

II

Those joyous hours are past away!

And many a heart, that then was gay,

Within the tomb now darkly dwells,

And hears no more those evening bells!

III

And so 'twill be when I am gone;

That tuneful peal will still ring on,

While other bards shall walk these dells

And sing your praise, sweet evening bells!

SONNET 116

(by William Shakespeare)

Let me not to the marriage of true minds

Admit impediments. Love is not love

Which alters when it alteration finds,

Or bends with the remover to remove:

O, no! It is an ever-fixed mark,

That looks on tempests and is never shaken;

It is the star to every wandering bark,

Whose worth's unknown, although its height be taken.

Love's not Time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks,

Within his bending sickle's compass come;

Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks,

But bears it out even to the edge of doom.

If this be error, and upon me proved,

I never writ, nor no man ever loved.

SONNET CXXX

(by William Shakespeare)

My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun;

Coral is far more red than her lips' red;

If snow be white, why then her breasts are dun;

If hairs be wires, black wires grow on her head.

I have seen roses damask'd, red and white,

But no such roses see I in her cheeks;

And in some perfumes is there more delight

Than in the breath that from my mistress reeks,

I love to hear her speak, yet well I know

That music hath a far more pleasing sound;

I grant I never saw a goddess go;

My mistress, when she walks, treads on the ground:

And yet, by heaven, I think my love as rare

As any she belied with false compare.

SONNET XCI

(by William Shakespeare)

Some glory in their birth, some in their skill,

Some in their wealth, some in their bodies' force

Some in their garments, though new-fangled ill,

Some in their hawks and hounds, some in their horse;

And every humour hath his adjunct pleasure,

Wherein it finds a joy above the rest:

But these particulars are not my measure;

All these I better in one general best.

Thy love is better than high birth to me,

Richer than wealth, prouder than garments' cost,

Of more delights than hawks or horses be;

And, having thee, of all men's pride I boast.

Wretched in this alone, that thou mayst take

All this away and me most wretched make.

WHEN YOU ARE OLD

(by William Butler Yeats)

When you are old and full of sleep

And nodding by the fire, take down the book

And showly read, and dream of the soft look

Your eyes had once and of their shadows deep,

How many loved your moments of glad grace

And loved your beauty with love false of true

But one man loved the pilgrim soul in you

And loved the sorrows beside the glowing bars

Murmur a little sadly how Love fled,

And paced upon the mountains overhead

And heed his face amid a crowd of stars.

IF

(by Rudyard Kipling)

If you can keep your head when all about you

Are losing theirs and blaming it on you;

If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,

But make allowance for their doubting too;

If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,

Or, being lied about, don't deal in lies,

Or, being hated, don't give way to hating,

And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise;

If you can dream — and not make dreams your master;

If you can think — and not make thoughts your aim;

If you can meet with triumph and disaster

And treat those two impostors just the same;

If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken

Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,

Or watch the things you gave your life to broken,

And stoop and build 'em up with wornout tools;

If you can make one heap of all your winnings

And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,

And lose, and start again ,at your beginnings

And never breathe a word about your loss;

If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew

To serve your turn long after they are gone,

And so hold on when there is nothing in you

Except the Will which says to them: "Hold on";

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,

Or walk with kings — nor lose the common touch;

If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you;

If all men count with you, but none too much;

If you can fill the unforgiving minute

With sixty seconds' worth of distance run —

Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,

And — which is more — you'll be a Man, my son!