Elizabeth Barrett Browning ( 10 of 96 )
Free men freely work:
Whoever fears God, fears to sit at ease.
Free men freely work:
Whoever fears God, fears to sit at ease.
The flower-girl's prayer to buy roses and pinks,
Held out in the smoke, like stars by day.
The flower-girl's prayer to buy roses and pinks,
Held out in the smoke, like stars by day.
A woman's always younger than a man of equal years.
A woman's always younger than a man of equal years.
The man, most man, works best for men: and, if most man indeed, he gets his manhood plainest from his read more
The man, most man, works best for men: and, if most man indeed, he gets his manhood plainest from his soul.
O rose, who dares to name thee?
No longer roseate now, nor soft, nor sweet,
But pale, read more
O rose, who dares to name thee?
No longer roseate now, nor soft, nor sweet,
But pale, and hard, and dry, as stubblewheat,--
Kept seven years in a drawer, thy titles shame thee.
How he sleepeth! having drunken
Weary childhood's mandragore,
From his pretty eyes have sunken
read more
How he sleepeth! having drunken
Weary childhood's mandragore,
From his pretty eyes have sunken
Pleasures to make room for more--
Sleeping near the withered nosegay which he pulled the day
before.
And I must bear
What is ordained with patience, being aware
Necessity doth front the universe
read more
And I must bear
What is ordained with patience, being aware
Necessity doth front the universe
With an invincible gesture.
He, in his developed manhood, stood, a little sunburn by the glare of life.
He, in his developed manhood, stood, a little sunburn by the glare of life.
There's not a crime
But takes its proper change out still in crime
If once rung on read more
There's not a crime
But takes its proper change out still in crime
If once rung on the counter of this world.
Books, books, books!
I had found the secret of a garret room
Piled high with cases in read more
Books, books, books!
I had found the secret of a garret room
Piled high with cases in my father's name;
Piled high, packed large,--where, creeping in and out
Among the giant fossils of my past,
Like some small nimble mouse between the ribs
Of a mastodon, I nibbled here and there
At this or that box, pulling through the gap,
In heats of terror, haste, victorious joy,
The first book first. And how I felt it beat
Under my pillow, in the morning's dark,
An hour before the sun would let me read!
My books!
At last, because the time was ripe,
I chanced upon the poets.
