[ { "title": "Patience Taught by Nature", "author": "Elizabeth Barrett Browning", "lines": [ "'O DREARY life,' we cry, ' O dreary life ! '", "And still the generations of the birds", "Sing through our sighing, and the flocks and herds", "Serenely live while we are keeping strife", "With Heaven's true purpose in us, as a knife", "Against which we may struggle ! Ocean girds", "Unslackened the dry land, savannah-swards", "Unweary sweep, hills watch unworn, and rife", "Meek leaves drop year]y from the forest-trees", "To show, above, the unwasted stars that pass", "In their old glory: O thou God of old,", "Grant me some smaller grace than comes to these !--", "But so much patience as a blade of grass", "Grows by, contented through the heat and cold." ], "linecount": "14" }, { "title": "Nature", "author": "George Herbert", "lines": [ "Full of rebellion, I would die,", "Or fight, or travel, or deny", "That thou has aught to do with me.", "O tame my heart;", "It is thy highest art", "To captivate strong holds to thee.", "", "If thou shalt let this venom lurk,", "And in suggestions fume and work,", "My soul will turn to bubbles straight,", "And thence by kind", "Vanish into a wind,", "Making thy workmanship deceit.", "", "O smooth my rugged heart, and there", "Engrave thy rev'rend law and fear;", "Or make a new one, since the old", "Is sapless grown,", "And a much fitter stone", "To hide my dust, than thee to hold." ], "linecount": "18" }, { "title": "Modern Love XXXV: It Is No Vulgar Nature", "author": "George Meredith", "lines": [ "It is no vulgar nature I have wived.", "Secretive, sensitive, she takes a wound", "Deep to her soul, as if the sense had swooned,", "And not a thought of vengeance had survived.", "No confidences has she: but relief", "Must come to one whose suffering is acute.", "O have a care of natures that are mute!", "They punish you in acts: their steps are brief.", "What is she doing? What does she demand", "From Providence or me? She is not one", "Long to endure this torpidly, and shun", "The drugs that crowd about a woman's hand.", "At Forfeits during snow we played, and I", "Must kiss her. 'Well performed!' I said: then she:", "''Tis hardly worth the money, you agree?'", "Save her? What for? To act this wedded lie!" ], "linecount": "16" }, { "title": "What Being in Rank-Old Nature", "author": "Gerard Manley Hopkins", "lines": [ "What being in rank-old nature should earlier have that breath been", "That hйre pйrsonal tells off these heart-song powerful peals?—", "A bush-browed, beetle-brуwed bнllow is it?", "With a soъth-wйsterly wнnd blъstering, with a tide rolls reels", "Of crumbling, fore-foundering, thundering all-surfy seas in; seen", "Ъnderneath, their glassy barrel, of a fairy green.", ". . . . . . . .", "Or a jaunting vaunting vaulting assaulting trumpet telling" ], "linecount": "8" }, { "title": "That Nature Is a Heraclitean Fire and of the Comfort of the Resurrection", "author": "Gerard Manley Hopkins", "lines": [ "Cloud-puffball, torn tufts, tossed pillows ' flaunt forth, then chevy on an air-", "built thoroughfare: heaven-roysterers, in gay-gangs ' they throng; they glitter in marches.", "Down roughcast, down dazzling whitewash, ' wherever an elm arches,", "Shivelights and shadowtackle in long ' lashes lace, lance, and pair.", "Delightfully the bright wind boisterous ' ropes, wrestles, beats earth bare", "Of yestertempest's creases; in pool and rut peel parches", "Squandering ooze to squeezed ' dough, crust, dust; stanches, starches", "Squadroned masks and manmarks ' treadmire toil there", "Footfretted in it. Million-fuelèd, ' nature's bonfire burns on.", "But quench her bonniest, dearest ' to her, her clearest-selvèd spark", "Man, how fast his firedint, ' his mark on mind, is gone!", "Both are in an unfathomable, all is in an enormous dark", "Drowned. O pity and indig ' nation! Manshape, that shone", "Sheer off, disseveral, a star, ' death blots black out; nor mark", " Is any of him at all so stark", "But vastness blurs and time ' beats level. Enough! the Resurrection,", "A heart's-clarion! Away grief's gasping, ' joyless days, dejection.", " Across my foundering deck shone", "A beacon, an eternal beam. ' Flesh fade, and mortal trash", "Fall to the residuary worm; ' world's wildfire, leave but ash:", " In a flash, at a trumpet crash,", "I am all at once what Christ is, ' since he was what I am, and", "This Jack, joke, poor potsherd, ' patch, matchwood, immortal diamond,", " Is immortal diamond." ], "linecount": "24" }, { "title": "Nature", "author": "Henry Wadsworth Longfellow", "lines": [ "As a fond mother, when the day is o'er,", "Leads by the hand her little child to bed,", "Half willing, half reluctant to be led,", "And leave his broken playthings on the floor,", "Still gazing at them through the open door,", "Nor wholly reassured and comforted", "By promises of others in their stead,", "Which though more splendid, may not please him more;", "So Nature deals with us, and takes away", "Our playthings one by one, and by the hand", "Leads us to rest so gently, that we go", "Scarce knowing if we wish to go or stay,", "Being too full of sleep to understand", "How far the unknown transcends the what we know." ], "linecount": "14" }, { "title": "The Good-Natured Girls", "author": "Jane Taylor", "lines": [ "Two good little children, named Mary and Ann,", "Both happily live, as good girls always can;", "And though they are not either sullen or mute,", "They seldom or never are heard to dispute.", "", "If one wants a thing that the other would like­", "Well,­what do they do? Must they quarrel and strike?", "No, each is so willing to give up her own,", "That such disagreements are there never known.", "", "If one of them happens to have something nice,", "Directly she offers her sister a slice;", "And never, like some greedy children, would try", "To eat in a corner with nobody by!", "", "When papa or mamma has a job to be done;", "These good little children immediately run;", "Nor dispute whether this or the other should go,", "They would be ashamed to behave themselves so!", "", "Whatever occurs, in their work or their play,", "They are willing to yield, and give up their own way:", "Then now let us try their example to mind,", "And always, like them, be obliging and kind." ], "linecount": "20" }, { "title": "The Worship of Nature", "author": "John Greenleaf Whittier", "lines": [ "The harp at Nature's advent strung", "Has never ceased to play;", "The song the stars of morning sung", "Has never died away.", "", "And prayer is made, and praise is given,", "By all things near and far;", "The ocean looketh up to heaven,", "And mirrors every star.", "", "Its waves are kneeling on the strand,", "As kneels the human knee,", "Their white locks bowing to the sand,", "The priesthood of the sea!", "", "They pour their glittering treasures forth,", "Their gifts of pearl they bring,", "And all the listening hills of earth", "Take up the song they sing.", "", "The green earth sends its incense up", "From many a mountain shrine;", "From folded leaf and dewy cup", "She pours her sacred wine.", "", "The mists above the morning rills", "Rise white as wings of prayer;", "The altar-curtains of the hills", "Are sunset's purple air.", "", "The winds with hymns of praise are loud,", "Or low with sobs of pain, --", "The thunder-organ of the cloud,", "The dropping tears of rain.", "", "With drooping head and branches crossed", "The twilight forest grieves,", "Or speaks with tongues of Pentecost", "From all its sunlit leaves.", "", "The blue sky is the temple's arch,", "Its transept earth and air,", "The music of its starry march", "The chorus of a prayer.", "", "So Nature keeps the reverent frame", "With which her years began,", "And all her signs and voices shame", "The prayerless heart of man." ], "linecount": "40" }, { "title": "Sonnet XXV: O Why Should Nature", "author": "Michael Drayton", "lines": [ "O why should Nature niggardly restrain", "That foreign nations relish not our tongue?", "Else should my lines glide on the waves of Rhene", "And crown the Pyrens with my living song.", "But, bounded thus, to Scotland get you forth,", "Thence take you wing unto the Orcades;", "There let my verse get glory in the North,", "Making my sighs to thaw the frozen seas;", "And let the Bards within that Irish isle,", "To whom my Muse with fiery wing shall pass,", "Call back the stiff-neck'd rebels from exile,", "And mollify the slaught'ring Gallowglass;", "And when my flowing numbers they rehearse,", "Let wolves and bears be charmed with my verse." ], "linecount": "14" }, { "title": "On the Universality and Other Attributes of the God of Nature", "author": "Philip Freneau", "lines": [ "ALL that we see, about, abroad,", "What is it all, but nature's God?", "In meaner works discovered here", "No less than in the starry sphere.", "", "In seas, on earth, this God is seen;", "All that exist, upon Him lean;", "He lives in all, and never strayed", "A moment from the works He made:", "", "His system fixed on general laws", "Bespeaks a wise creating cause;", "Impartially He rules mankind", "And all that on this globe we find.", "", "Unchanged in all that seems to change,", "Unbounded space is His great range;", "To one vast purpose always true,", "No time, with Him, is old or new.", "", "In all the attributes divine", "Unlimited perfectings shine;", "In these enwrapt, in these complete,", "All virtues in that centre meet.", "", "This power doth all powers transcend,", "To all intelligence a friend,", "Exists, the greatest and the best", "Throughout all the worlds, to make them blest.", "", "All that He did He first approved,", "He all things into being loved;", "O'er all He made He still presides,", "For them in life, or death provides." ], "linecount": "28" }, { "title": "The Prayer of Nature", "author": "George Gordon, Lord Byron", "lines": [ "Father of Light! great God of Heaven!", " Hear'st thou the accents of despair?", "Can guilt like man's be e'er forgiven?", " Can vice atone for crimes by prayer?", "", "Father of Light, on thee I call!", " Thou see'st my soul is dark within;", "Thou, who canst mark the sparrow's fall,", " Avert from me the death of sin.", "", "No shrine I seek, to sects unknown;", " Oh, point to me the path of truth!", "Thy dread Omnipotence I own;", " Spare, yet amend, the faults of youth.", "", "Let bigots rear a gloomy fane,", " Let Superstition hail the pile,", "Let priests, to spread their sable reign,", " With tales of mystic rites beguile.", "", "Shall man confine his Maker's sway", " To Gothic domes of mouldering stone?", "Thy temple is the face of day;", " Earth, Ocean, Heaven thy boundless throne.", "", "Shall man condemn his race to Hell,", " Unless they bend in pompous form?", "Tell us that all, for one who fell,", " Must perish in the mingling storm?", "", "Shall each pretend to reach the skies,", " Yet doom his brother to expire,", "Whose soul a different hope supplies,", " Or doctrines less severe inspire?", "", "Shall these, by creeds they can't expound,", " Prepare a fancied bliss or woe?", "Shall reptiles, groveling on the ground,", " Their great Creator's purpose know?", "", "Shall those, who live for self alone,", " Whose years float on in daily crime--", "Shall they, by Faith, for guilt atone,", " And live beyond the bounds of Time?", "", "Father! no prophet's laws I seek,--", " _Thy_ laws in Nature's works appear;--", "I own myself corrupt and weak,", " Yet will I _pray_, for thou wilt hear!", "", "Thou, who canst guide the wandering star,", " Through trackless realms of aether's space;", "Who calm'st the elemental war,", " Whose hand from pole to pole I trace:", "", "Thou, who in wisdom plac'd me here,", " Who, when thou wilt, canst take me hence,", "Ah! whilst I tread this earthly sphere,", " Extend to me thy wide defence.", "", "To Thee, my God, to thee I call!", " Whatever weal or woe betide,", "By thy command I rise or fall,", " In thy protection I confide.", "", "If, when this dust to dust's restor'd,", " My soul shall float on airy wing,", "How shall thy glorious Name ador'd", " Inspire her feeble voice to sing!", "", "But, if this fleeting spirit share", " With clay the Grave's eternal bed,", "While Life yet throbs I raise my prayer,", " Though doom'd no more to quit the dead.", "", "To Thee I breathe my humble strain,", " Grateful for all thy mercies past,", "And hope, my God, to thee again", " This erring life may fly at last." ], "linecount": "64" }, { "title": "Nature’s Law: A Poem", "author": "Robert Burns", "lines": [ "LET other heroes boast their scars,", " The marks of sturt and strife:", "And other poets sing of wars,", " The plagues of human life:", "Shame fa’ the fun, wi’ sword and gun", " To slap mankind like lumber!", "I sing his name, and nobler fame,", " Wha multiplies our number.", "", "", "Great Nature spoke, with air benign,", " “Go on, ye human race;", "This lower world I you resign;", " Be fruitful and increase.", "The liquid fire of strong desire", " I’ve pour’d it in each bosom;", "Here, on this had, does Mankind stand,", " And there is Beauty’s blossom.”", "", "", "The Hero of these artless strains,", " A lowly bard was he,", "Who sung his rhymes in Coila’s plains,", " With meikle mirth an’glee;", "Kind Nature’s care had given his share", " Large, of the flaming current;", "And, all devout, he never sought", " To stem the sacred torrent.", "", "", "He felt the powerful, high behest", " Thrill, vital, thro’ and thro’;", "And sought a correspondent breast,", " To give obedience due:", "Propitious Powers screen’d the young flow’rs,", " From mildews of abortion;", "And low! the bard—a great reward—", " Has got a double portion!", "", "", "Auld cantie Coil may count the day,", " As annual it returns,", "The third of Libra’s equal sway,", " That gave another Burns,", "With future rhymes, an’ other times,", " To emulate his sire:", "To sing auld Coil in nobler style", " With more poetic fire.", "", "", "Ye Powers of peace, and peaceful song,", " Look down with gracious eyes;", "And bless auld Coila, large and long,", " With multiplying joys;", "Lang may she stand to prop the land,", " The flow’r of ancient nations;", "And Burnses spring, her fame to sing,", " To endless generations!" ], "linecount": "48" }, { "title": "Art Above Nature: To Julia", "author": "Robert Herrick", "lines": [ "When I behold a forest spread", "With silken trees upon thy head;", "And when I see that other dress", "Of flowers set in comeliness;", "When I behold another grace", "In the ascent of curious lace,", "Which, like a pinnacle, doth shew", "The top, and the top-gallant too;", "Then, when I see thy tresses bound", "Into an oval, square, or round,", "And knit in knots far more than I.", "Can tell by tongue, or True-love tie;", "Next, when those lawny films I see", "Play with a wild civility;", "And all those airy silks to flow,", "Alluring me, and tempting so--", "I must confess, mine eye and heart", "Dotes less on nature than on art." ], "linecount": "18" }, { "title": "To Nature", "author": "Samuel Coleridge", "lines": [ "It may indeed be fantasy when I", "Essay to draw from all created things", "Deep, heartfelt, inward joy that closely clings;", "And trace in leaves and flowers that round me lie", "Lessons of love and earnest piety.", "So let it be; and if the wide world rings", "In mock of this belief, it brings", "Nor fear, nor grief, nor vain perplexity.", "So will I build my altar in the fields,", "And the blue sky my fretted dome shall be,", "And the sweet fragrance that the wild flower yields", "Shall be the incense I will yield to Thee,", "Thee only God! and thou shalt not despise", "Even me, the priest of this poor sacrifice." ], "linecount": "14" }, { "title": "Sonnet XVI: In Nature Apt", "author": "Sir Philip Sidney", "lines": [ "In nature apt to like when I did see", "Beauties, which were of many carats fine,", "My boiling sprites did thither soon incline,", "And, Love, I thought that I was full of thee:", "", "But finding not those restless flames in me,", "Which others said did make their souls to pine,", "I thought those babes of some pin's hurt did whine,", "By my love judging what love's pain might be.", "", "But while I thus with this young lion played,", "Mine eyes (shall I say curst or blest?) beheld", "Stella; now she is nam'd, need more be said?", "", "In her sight I a lesson new have spell'd,", "I now hav learn'd Love right, and learn'd even so,", "As who by being poisoned doth poison know." ], "linecount": "14" }, { "title": "Sonnet VII: When Nature", "author": "Sir Philip Sidney", "lines": [ "When Nature made her chief work, Stella's eyes,", "In color black why wrapp'd she beams so bright?", "Would she in beamy black, like painter wise,", "Frame daintiest lustre, mix'd of shades and light?", "", "Or did she else that sober hue devise,", "In object best to knit and strength our sight,", "Lest if no veil those brave gleams did disguise,", "They sun-like should more dazzle than delight?", "", "Or would she her miraculous power show,", "That whereas black seems Beauty's contrary,", "She even if black doth make all beauties flow?", "", "Both so and thus, she minding Love shoud be", "Placed ever there, gave him this mourning weed,", "To honor all their deaths, who for her bleed." ], "linecount": "14" }, { "title": "Astrophel and Stella VII: When Nature Made Her Chief Work", "author": "Sir Philip Sidney", "lines": [ "When Nature made her chief work, Stella's eyes,", "In colour black why wrapt she beams so bright?", "Would she in beamy black, like painter wise,", "Frame daintiest lustre, mix'd of shades and light?", "Or did she else that sober hue devise,", "In object best to knit and strength our sight;", "Lest, if no veil these brave gleams did disguise,", "They, sunlike, should more dazzle than delight?", "Or would she her miraculous power show,", "That, whereas black seems beauty's contrary,", "She even in black doth make all beauties flow?", "Both so, and thus,--she, minding Love should be", "Plac'd ever there, gave him this mourning weed", "To honour all their deaths who for her bleed." ], "linecount": "14" }, { "title": "Nature that Washed Her Hands in Milk", "author": "Sir Walter Raleigh", "lines": [ "Nature, that washed her hands in milk,", "And had forgot to dry them,", "Instead of earth took snow and silk,", "At love's request to try them,", "If she a mistress could compose", "To please love's fancy out of those.", "", "Her eyes he would should be of light,", "A violet breath, and lips of jelly;", "Her hair not black, nor overbright,", "And of the softest down her belly;", "As for her inside he'd have it", "Only of wantonness and wit.", "", "At love's entreaty such a one", "Nature made, but with her beauty", "She hath framed a heart of stone;", "So as Love, by ill destiny,", "Must die for her whom nature gave him", "Because her darling would not save him.", "", "But time, which nature doth despise", "And rudely gives her love the lie,", "Makes hope a fool, and sorrow wise,", "His hands do neither wash nor dry;", "But being made of steel and rust,", "Turns snow and silk and milk to dust.", "", "The light, the belly, lips, and breath,", "He dims, discolors, and destroys;", "With those he feeds but fills not death,", "Which sometimes were the food of joys.", "Yea, time doth dull each lively wit,", "And dries all wantonness with it.", "", "Oh, cruel time, which takes in trust", "Our youth, or joys, and all we have,", "And pays us but with age and dust;", "Who in the dark and silent grave", "When we have wandered all our ways", "Shuts up the story of our days." ], "linecount": "36" }, { "title": "The Gladness of Nature", "author": "William Cullen Bryant", "lines": [ "Is this a time to be cloudy and sad,", "When our mother Nature laughs around;", "When even the deep blue heavens look glad,", "And gladness breathes from the blossoming ground?", "", "There are notes of joy from the hang-bird and wren,", "And the gossip of swallows through all the sky;", "The ground-squirrel gaily chirps by his den,", "And the wilding bee hums merrily by.", "", "The clouds are at play in the azure space,", "And their shadows at play on the bright green vale,", "And here they stretch to the frolic chase,", "And there they roll on the easy gale.", "", "There's a dance of leaves in that aspen bower,", "There's a titter of winds in that beechen tree,", "There's a smile on the fruit, and a smile on the flower,", "And a laugh from the brook that runs to the sea.", "", "And look at the broad-faced sun, how he smiles", "On the dewy earth that smiles in his ray,", "On the leaping waters and gay young isles;", "Ay, look, and he'll smile thy gloom away." ], "linecount": "20" }, { "title": "Sonnet 20: A woman's face with nature's own hand painted", "author": "William Shakespeare", "lines": [ "A woman's face with nature's own hand painted,", "Hast thou, the master mistress of my passion;", "A woman's gentle heart, but not acquainted", "With shifting change, as is false women's fashion:", "An eye more bright than theirs, less false in rolling,", "Gilding the object whereupon it gazeth;", "A man in hue all 'hues' in his controlling,", "Which steals men's eyes and women's souls amazeth.", "And for a woman wert thou first created;", "Till Nature, as she wrought thee, fell a-doting,", "And by addition me of thee defeated,", "By adding one thing to my purpose nothing.", " But since she prick'd thee out for women's pleasure,", " Mine be thy love and thy love's use their treasure." ], "linecount": "14" }, { "title": "Nature's Hymn to the Deity", "author": "John Clare", "lines": [ "All nature owns with one accord", "The great and universal Lord:", "The sun proclaims him through the day,", "The moon when daylight drops away,", "The very darkness smiles to wear", "The stars that show us God is there,", "On moonlight seas soft gleams the sky", "And \"God is with us\" waves reply.", "", "Winds breathe from God's abode \"we come,\"", "Storms louder own God is their home,", "And thunder yet with louder call,", "Sounds \"God is mightiest over all\";", "Till earth right loath the proof to miss", "Echoes triumphantly \"He is,\"", "And air and ocean makes reply,", "God reigns on earth, in air and sky.", "", "All nature owns with one accord", "The great and universal Lord:", "Insect and bird and tree and flower--", "The witnesses of every hour--", "Are pregnant with his prophesy", "And \"God is with us\" all reply.", "The first link in the mighty plan", "Is still--and all upbraideth man." ], "linecount": "24" }, { "title": "Fragment: Rome and Nature", "author": "Percy Bysshe Shelley", "lines": [ "Rome has fallen, ye see it lying", "Heaped in undistinguished ruin:", "Nature is alone undying." ], "linecount": "3" }, { "title": "Nature, the gentlest mother", "author": "Emily Dickinson", "lines": [ "Nature, the gentlest mother,", "Impatient of no child,", "The feeblest or the waywardest, --", "Her admonition mild", "", "In forest and the hill", "By traveller is heard,", "Restraining rampant squirrel", "Or too impetuous bird.", "", "How fair her conversation,", "A summer afternoon, --", "Her household, her assembly;", "And when the sun goes down", "", "Her voice among the aisles", "Incites the timid prayer", "Of the minutest cricket,", "The most unworthy flower.", "", "When all the children sleep", "She turns as long away", "As will suffice to light her lamps;", "Then, bending from the sky", "", "With infinite affection", "And infiniter care,", "Her golden finger on her lip,", "Wills silence everywhere." ], "linecount": 24, "source": "Project Gutenberg — Poems by Emily Dickinson, Three Series, Complete (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/12242)" }, { "title": "Nature rarer uses yellow", "author": "Emily Dickinson", "lines": [ "Nature rarer uses yellow", "Than another hue;", "Saves she all of that for sunsets, --", "Prodigal of blue,", "", "Spending scarlet like a woman,", "Yellow she affords", "Only scantly and selectly,", "Like a lover's words." ], "linecount": 8, "source": "Project Gutenberg — Poems by Emily Dickinson, Three Series, Complete (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/12242)" }, { "title": "We thirst at first, -- 't is Nature's act", "author": "Emily Dickinson", "lines": [ "We thirst at first, -- 't is Nature's act;", "And later, when we die,", "A little water supplicate", "Of fingers going by.", "", "It intimates the finer want,", "Whose adequate supply", "Is that great water in the west", "Termed immortality." ], "linecount": 8, "source": "Project Gutenberg — Poems by Emily Dickinson, Three Series, Complete (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/12242)" } ]