[ { "title": "To Heaven", "author": "Ben Jonson", "lines": [ "Good and great God, can I not think of thee", "But it must straight my melancholy be?", "Is it interpreted in me disease", "That, laden with my sins, I seek for ease?", "Oh be thou witness, that the reins dost know", "And hearts of all, if I be sad for show,", "And judge me after; if I dare pretend", "To ought but grace or aim at other end.", "As thou art all, so be thou all to me,", "First, midst, and last, converted one, and three;", "My faith, my hope, my love; and in this state", "My judge, my witness, and my advocate.", "Where have I been this while exil'd from thee?", "And whither rap'd, now thou but stoop'st to me?", "Dwell, dwell here still. O, being everywhere,", "How can I doubt to find thee ever here?", "I know my state, both full of shame and scorn,", "Conceiv'd in sin, and unto labour borne,", "Standing with fear, and must with horror fall,", "And destin'd unto judgment, after all.", "I feel my griefs too, and there scarce is ground", "Upon my flesh t' inflict another wound.", "Yet dare I not complain, or wish for death", "With holy Paul, lest it be thought the breath", "Of discontent; or that these prayers be", "For weariness of life, not love of thee." ], "linecount": "26" }, { "title": "Going to Heaven!", "author": "Emily Dickinson", "lines": [ "Going to Heaven!", "I don't know when --", "Pray do not ask me how!", "Indeed I'm too astonished", "To think of answering you!", "Going to Heaven!", "How dim it sounds!", "And yet it will be done", "As sure as flocks go home at night", "Unto the Shepherd's arm!", "", "Perhaps you're going too!", "Who knows?", "If you should get there first", "Save just a little space for me", "Close to the two I lost --", "The smallest \"Robe\" will fit me", "And just a bit of \"Crown\" --", "For you know we do not mind our dress", "When we are going home --", "", "I'm glad I don't believe it", "For it would stop my breath --", "And I'd like to look a little more", "At such a curious Earth!", "I'm glad they did believe it", "Whom I have never found", "Since the might Autumn afternoon", "I left them in the ground." ], "linecount": "27" }, { "title": "I went to Heaven", "author": "Emily Dickinson", "lines": [ "I went to Heaven --", "'Twas a small Town --", "Lit -- with a Ruby --", "Lathed -- with Down --", "", "Stiller -- than the fields", "At the full Dew --", "Beautiful -- as Pictures --", "No Man drew.", "People -- like the Moth --", "Of Mechlin -- frames --", "Duties -- of Gossamer --", "And Eider -- names --", "Almost -- contented --", "I -- could be --", "'Mong such unique", "Society --" ], "linecount": "16" }, { "title": "We pray -- to Heaven", "author": "Emily Dickinson", "lines": [ "We pray -- to Heaven --", "We prate -- of Heaven --", "Relate -- when Neighbors die --", "At what o'clock to heaven -- they fled --", "Who saw them -- Wherefore fly?", "", "Is Heaven a Place -- a Sky -- a Tree?", "Location's narrow way is for Ourselves --", "Unto the Dead", "There's no Geography --", "", "But State -- Endowal -- Focus --", "Where -- Omnipresence -- fly?" ], "linecount": "11" }, { "title": "Except to Heaven, she is nought.", "author": "Emily Dickinson", "lines": [ "Except to Heaven, she is nought.", "Except for Angels -- lone.", "Except to some wide-wandering Bee", "A flower superfluous blown.", "", "Except for winds -- provincial.", "Except by Butterflies", "Unnoticed as a single dew", "That on the Acre lies.", "", "The smallest Housewife in the grass,", "Yet take her from the Lawn", "And somebody has lost the face", "That made Existence -- Home!" ], "linecount": "12" }, { "title": "How far is it to Heaven?", "author": "Emily Dickinson", "lines": [ "How far is it to Heaven?", "As far as Death this way --", "Of River or of Ridge beyond", "Was no discovery.", "", "How far is it to Hell?", "As far as Death this way --", "How far left hand the Sepulchre", "Defies Topography." ], "linecount": "8" }, { "title": "TO HEAVEN", "author": "Robert Herrick", "lines": [ "Open thy gates", "To him who weeping waits,", "And might come in,", "But that held back by sin.", "Let mercy be", "So kind, to set me free,", "And I will straight", "Come in, or force the gate." ], "linecount": "8" }, { "title": "Ode to Heaven", "author": "Percy Bysshe Shelley", "lines": [ "CHORUS OF SPIRITS:", "", "FIRST SPIRIT:", "Palace-roof of cloudless nights!", "Paradise of golden lights!", "Deep, immeasurable, vast,", "Which art now, and which wert then", "Of the Present and the Past,", "Of the eternal Where and When,", "Presence-chamber, temple, home,", "Ever-canopying dome,", "Of acts and ages yet to come!", "", "Glorious shapes have life in thee,", "Earth, and all earth's company;", "Living globes which ever throng", "Thy deep chasms and wildernesses;", "And green worlds that glide along;", "And swift stars with flashing tresses;", "And icy moons most cold and bright,", "And mighty suns beyond the night,", "Atoms of intensest light.", "", "Even thy name is as a god,", "Heaven! for thou art the abode", "Of that Power which is the glass", "Wherein man his nature sees.", "Generations as they pass", "Worship thee with bended knees.", "Their unremaining gods and they", "Like a river roll away:", "Thou remainest such--alway!--", "", "SECOND SPIRIT:", "Thou art but the mind's first chamber,", "Round which its young fancies clamber,", "Like weak insects in a cave,", "Lighted up by stalactites;", "But the portal of the grave,", "Where a world of new delights", "Will make thy best glories seem", "But a dim and noonday gleam", "From the shadow of a dream!", "", "THIRD SPIRIT:", "Peace! the abyss is wreathed with scorn", "At your presumption, atom-born!", "What is Heaven? and what are ye", "Who its brief expanse inherit?", "What are suns and spheres which flee", "With the instinct of that Spirit", "Of which ye are but a part?", "Drops which Nature's mighty heart", "Drives through thinnest veins! Depart!", "", "What is Heaven? a globe of dew,", "Filling in the morning new", "Some eyed flower whose young leaves waken", "On an unimagined world:", "Constellated suns unshaken,", "Orbits measureless, are furled", "In that frail and fading sphere,", "With ten millions gathered there,", "To tremble, gleam, and disappear." ], "linecount": "58" } ]