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Classic and Contemporary Poetry
ECHOES: 33, by WILLIAM ERNEST HENLEY Poet Analysis Poet's Biography
First Line: The ways are green with the gladdening sheen
Last Line: Know life's a dream worth dreaming.
Alternate Author Name(s): Henley, W. E.
Subject(s): Life
First Line: The ways are green with the gladdening sheen
Last Line: Know life's a dream worth dreaming.
Alternate Author Name(s): Henley, W. E.
Subject(s): Life
The ways are green with the gladdening sheen
Of the young year's fairest daughter.
O, the shadows that fleet o'er the spring wheat!
O, the magic of the running water!
The spirit of spring is in everything,
The banners of spring are streaming,
We march to a tune from the fifes of June,
And life's a dream worth dreaming.
It's all very well to sit and spell
At the lesson there's no gainsaying;
But what the deuce are wont and use
When the whole mad world's a-maying?
When the meadow glows, and the orchard snows,
And the air's with love-motes teeming,
When fancies break, and the senses wake,
O, life's a dream worth dreaming!
What Nature has writ with her lusty wit
Is worded so wisely and kindly
That whoever had dipped in her manuscript
Must up and follow her blindly.
Now the summer prime is her blithest rhyme
In the being and the seeming,
And they have heard the overword
Know life's a dream worth dreaming.
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