Classic and Contemporary Poetry
THE MEMORY OF BURNS, by JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER Poet Analysis Poet's Biography First Line: How sweetly come the holy psalms Last Line: The holly and the pine! Subject(s): Burns, Robert (1759-1796); Poetry & Poets | ||||||||
HOW sweetly come the holy psalms From saints and martyrs down, The waving of triumphal palms Above the thorny crown! The choral praise, the chanted prayers From harps by angels strung, The hunted Cameron's mountain airs, The hymns that Luther sung! Yet, jarring not the heavenly notes, The sounds of earth are heard, As through the open minster floats The song of breeze and bird! Not less the wonder of the sky That daisies bloom below; The brook sings on, though loud and high The cloudy organs blow! And, if the tender ear be jarred That, haply, hears by turns The saintly harp of Olney's bard, The pastoral pipe of Burns, No discord mars His perfect plan Who gave them both a tongue; For he who sings the love of man The love of God hath sung! To-day be every fault forgiven Of him in whom we joy! We take, with thanks, the gold of Heaven And leave the earth's alloy. Be ours his music as of spring, His sweetness as of flowers, The songs the bard himself might sing In holier ears than ours. Sweet airs of love and home, the hum Of household melodies, Come singing, as the robins come To sing in door-yard trees. And, heart to heart, two nations lean, No rival wreaths to twine, But blending in eternal green The holly and the pine! | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...ENVY OF OTHER PEOPLE'S POEMS by ROBERT HASS THE NINETEENTH CENTURY AS A SONG by ROBERT HASS THE FATALIST: TIME IS FILLED by LYN HEJINIAN OXOTA: A SHORT RUSSIAN NOVEL: CHAPTER 192 by LYN HEJINIAN LET ME TELL YOU WHAT A POEM BRINGS by JUAN FELIPE HERRERA JUNE JOURNALS 6/25/88 by JUAN FELIPE HERRERA FOLLOW ROZEWICZ by JUAN FELIPE HERRERA HAVING INTENDED TO MERELY PICK ON AN OIL COMPANY, THE POEM GOES AWRY by HICOK. BOB AMY WENTWORTH; FOR WILLIAM BRADFORD by JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER |
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