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Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Searching... Author: howells, william Matches Found: 94 Howells, William Dean Poet's Biography Alternate Author Name(s): Howells, W. D. 94 poems available by this author A DOUBLE-BARRELLED SONNET TO MARK TWAIN: 1. FIRST BARREL Poem Text First Line: The man whose birthday we renown tonight Last Line: Gainsay him the glory of being sixty-seven. Subject(s): Birthdays; Twain, Mark (samuel Langhorne Clemens) A DOUBLE-BARRELLED SONNET TO MARK TWAIN: 2. SECOND BARREL Poem Text First Line: Oh, no! Hold on!' I hear his voice implore Last Line: "we will dine with you here till sunday night." Subject(s): Twain, Mark (samuel Langhorne Clemens) A SEASONABLE MORAL Poem Text First Line: The woman sang her ballad to the sky Last Line: The chance is such as you ought not to take. Subject(s): Begging & Beggars; Gifts & Giving; Good Samaritan; Grief; Sorrow; Sadness AFTER THE WEDDING Poem Text First Line: I thought we never should be rid of them! Last Line: To find our own past in their future there! Subject(s): Daughters; Love - Marital; Marriage; Parents; Wedded Love; Marriage - Love; Weddings; Husbands; Wives; Parenthood ALDRICH, 1866-1907 Poem Text First Line: What has become of it, your youth and mine Last Line: Planet you dwell, our youth and gladness are. Subject(s): Aldrich, Thomas Bailey (1836-1907); Novels & Novelists; Poetry & Poets; Youth ANOTHER DAY Poem Text First Line: Another day, and with it that brute joy Last Line: At any rate, it is another day! Subject(s): Day AVERY First Line: All night long they heard, in the house BEFORE THE GATE First Line: They gave the whole long day to idle laughter BLACK CROSS FARM Poem Text First Line: After full many a mutual delay Last Line: The secret of the black cross back with us. Subject(s): Crosses; Emptiness; Farm Life; Home; Secrets; Agriculture; Farmers BREAKFAST IS MY BEST MEAL: OVERHEARD AT CARLSBAD Poem Text First Line: Breakfast is my best meal, and I reckon it's always been Last Line: But it fairly makes me sick! Breakfast is my best meal. Subject(s): Cooking & Cooks; Family Life; Food & Eating; Cookery; Relatives BY THE SEA First Line: I walked with her I love by the sea Subject(s): Sea CALVARY Poem Text First Line: If he could doubt on his triumphant cross Last Line: My god, my god! Why hast thou forsaken me? Subject(s): Calvary; Jesus Christ - Suffering & Sacrifice CAPRICE Poem Text First Line: She hung the cage at the window Last Line: Of blinding love upon his lips. Subject(s): Love - Beginnings CHANGE Poem Text First Line: Sometimes, when after spirited debate Last Line: Then, in the deathless days before she died. Subject(s): Death; Dead, The CHRISTMAS Poem Text First Line: Youth, in the heart of faith now wearing old Last Line: Eternal in youth, and hope, and love and home! Subject(s): Christmas; Hope; Love; Youth; Nativity, The; Optimism COMPANY Poem Text First Line: I thought, 'how terrible, if I were seen Last Line: "I thought, ""why should I, if the rest are so?" Subject(s): God; Judgment Day; Sin; End Of The World; Doomsday; Fall Of Man CONSCIENCE Poem Text First Line: Judge me not as I judge myself, o lord! Last Line: Forgive the evil I must not forgive! Subject(s): Forgiveness; God; Judgments; Clemency CONVENTION First Line: He falters on the threshold DEAD First Line: Something lies in the room DUNLEVY'S LAST TRIP Poem Text First Line: It was against the law, in such case made and provided Last Line: "I don't hardly believe that I could explain exactly." Subject(s): Flight; Rivers; Flying EMPTY HOUSE First Line: The wet trees hung above the walls Last Line: So full of ruin's solemn grace, %and haunted with the ghost of home Subject(s): Home EQUALITY Poem Text First Line: The beautiful dancing-women wove their maze Last Line: "shall be as all the saints are, in the dust." Subject(s): Dancing & Dancers; Lust; Seduction; Theater & Theaters; Women's Rights; Stage Life; Feminism EXCEPT AS LITTLE CHILDREN' First Line: Lost selves of us poor men and women grown EXPERIENCE Poem Text First Line: The first time, when at night I went about Last Line: Such things the heart can bear and yet not break. Subject(s): Death; Love - Loss Of; Dead, The FATHER AND MOTHER: A MYSTERY Poem Text First Line: The father: 'now it is over.' Last Line: "the father: ""help me to believe!" Subject(s): Death - Children; Fathers & Daughters; Grief; Mothers & Daughters; Death - Babies; Sorrow; Sadness FORLORN First Line: Red roses, in the slender vases burning Last Line: Over the threshold, not the less, forever %he felt her going on his broken heart Subject(s): Grief FRIENDS AND FOES Poem Text First Line: Bitter the things one's enemies will say Last Line: The things one's friends will say in one's defence. Subject(s): Enemies; Friendship FROM GENERATION TO GENERATION Poem Text First Line: Innocent spirits, bright, immaculate ghosts! Last Line: As your fate is to die, our fate is to be born. GIFT AND COUNTRY IN THE FALL: A LONG-DISTANCE ECLOGUE Poem Text First Line: Morrison. Hello! Hello! Is that you, wetherbee? Last Line: Later, you'd better look for us in town. Subject(s): Autumn; Cities; Country Life; Seasons; Fall; Urban Life GONE First Line: Is it the shrewd october wind Subject(s): Love GOOD SOCIETY Poem Text First Line: Yes, I suppose it is well to make some sort of exclusion Last Line: You should shut yourself on the wrong side of the fence. Subject(s): Social Classes; Caste HEREDITY Poem Text First Line: That swollen paunch you are doomed to bear Last Line: And yet, away, you charnel thing! Subject(s): Ancestors & Ancestry; Character; Evil; Heritage; Heredity HOPE Poem Text First Line: We sailed and sailed upon the desert sea Last Line: Like yonder land. Perhaps -- perhaps -- perhaps! Subject(s): Sea; Ocean IF Poem Text First Line: Yes, death is at the bottom of the cup Last Line: That drop untasted might be somehow spilled. IN AUGUST First Line: All the long august afternoon Subject(s): August IN EARLIEST SPRING Poem Text First Line: Tossing his mane of snows in wildest eddies and tangles Last Line: Leafless there by my door, trembled a sense of the rose. Variant Title(s): Earliest Spring Subject(s): March (month) IN MARCH THE EARLIEST BLUBIRD CAME IN THE DARK Poem Text First Line: How often, when I wake from sleep at night Last Line: Over it, and gulfed me in its deeps below. Subject(s): Ill-tempered; Night; Bedtime JOSEPH A. HOWELLS Poem Text First Line: Stone, upon which with hands of boy and man Last Line: There needs no room for blame: blame there was none. Subject(s): Brothers; Praise; Half-brothers JUDGMENT DAY Poem Text First Line: Before him weltered like a shoreless sea Last Line: He lifted up the pity of his face. LABOR AND CAPITAL; IMPRESSION Poem Text First Line: A spiteful snow pit through the bitter day Last Line: The company's man. LIFE Poem Text First Line: Once a thronged throughfare that wound afar Last Line: Footsore, at nightfall limping to death's door. Subject(s): Death; Wandering & Wanderers; Dead, The; Wanderlust; Vagabonds; Tramps; Hoboes LIVING Poem Text First Line: How passionately I will my life away Last Line: To hurl myself into the changeless grave! Subject(s): Death; Life; Dead, The LOUISE, THE SLAVE First Line: They both came aboard there, at cairo Variant Title(s): The Pilo MATERIALS OF A STORY Poem Text First Line: I met a friend of mine the other day Last Line: At the street crossing. I went on up town. Subject(s): Clergy; Prisons & Prisoners; Priests; Rabbis; Ministers; Bishops; Convicts MIDWAY Poem Text First Line: So blithe the birds sang in the trees Last Line: Or care will catch me soon. Subject(s): Free Will & Determinism; Nature MORTALITY Poem Text First Line: How many times have I lain down at night Last Line: Remained afraid to die! Subject(s): Death; Fear; Mortality; Sleep; Dead, The MULBERRIES First Line: On the rialto bridge we stand MYSTERIES First Line: Once on my mother's breast, a child, I crept NOVEMBER; IMPRESSION Poem Text First Line: A weft of leafless spray Last Line: The ruin now so intolerably sad. Subject(s): November ON A BRIGHT WINTER DAY Poem Text First Line: Foolish old heart, as glad of wind and sun Last Line: Off, mocking fear, and let the young heart play! Subject(s): Aging; Youth PARABLE Poem Text First Line: The young man who had great possessions dreamed Last Line: Ever went empty-handed from his door. Subject(s): Good Samaritan; Jesus Christ; Poverty PEONAGE Poem Text First Line: How tired the recording angel must begin Last Line: Holding me debtor, while I live, to ill. Subject(s): Sin PILOT'S STORY First Line: It was a story the pilot told, with his back to his hearers POETS FRIENDS First Line: The robin sings in the elm QUESTION Poem Text First Line: Shall it be after the long misery Last Line: To feel the sole impossibility. Subject(s): Death; Dead, The RACE Poem Text First Line: Leave me here those looks of yours! Last Line: Unto each that yet shall live. Subject(s): Beauty; Race Awareness; Youth RESPITE Poem Text First Line: Drowsing, the other afternoon, I lay Last Line: That now again beneath their lids are hot. Subject(s): Death; Dreams; Mothers; Dead, The; Nightmares REWARD AND PUNISHMENT Poem Text First Line: You are the best and the worst of everything you require Last Line: You shall be for yourself both the praise and the blame. Subject(s): Evil; Good; Praise; Punishment ROYAL PORTRAITS (AT LUDWIGSHOF) First Line: Confronting each other the pictures stare Last Line: Confronted the conscious pictures stare, %and their secret back into darkness dies Subject(s): Courts And Courtiers; Portraits SAINT CHRISTOPHER First Line: In the narrow venetian street Subject(s): Christopher, Christoper (3d Century); Italy SOCIETY Poem Text First Line: I looked and saw a splendid pageantry Last Line: The revellers above them thronged and prest. Subject(s): Justice SOLITUDE Poem Text First Line: Ah, you cannot befriend me, with all your love's tender persistence! Last Line: Under the spell of our life's innermost mystery, pain. Subject(s): Pain; Pity; Suffering; Misery SOME ONE ELSE Poem Text First Line: Live my life over? I would rather not Last Line: And were I you, I might improve on yours. Subject(s): Errors; Experience; Life; Mistakes; Fallacies SONG THE ORIOLE SINGS First Line: There is a bird that comes and sings Subject(s): Nature SORROW, MY SORROW Poem Text First Line: Sorrow, my sorrow, I thought that you would be Last Line: Beyond yourself you must abide with me. Subject(s): Grief; Sorrow; Sadness SPHINX Poem Text First Line: We who are nothing but self, and have no manner of being Last Line: Is it eternal death, or is it infinite life? Subject(s): Death; Future Life; Sleep; Dead, The; Retribution; Eternity; After Life STATISTICS Poem Text First Line: So many men, on such a date of may Last Line: Your facts are facts, yet somewhere there is god. Subject(s): Crime & Criminals; God; Murder; Rape; Suicide SYMPATHY Poem Text First Line: Friend, neighbor, stranger, as the case may be Last Line: Scorched fiercest, if it might not be the same. Subject(s): Soul; Sympathy; Empathy TEMPERAMENT Poem Text First Line: Where love and hate, honor and infamy Last Line: Back to that mystery when we go there. Subject(s): Future Life; Life; Retribution; Eternity; After Life THANKSGIVING Poem Text First Line: Lord, for the erring thought Last Line: Quicken our gratitude. Variant Title(s): The Undiscovered Country Subject(s): Holidays; Thanksgiving THE AMERICAN JOKE (READ AT THE BIRTHDAY DINNER TO S.L. CLEMENS) Poem Text First Line: A traveller from the old world, just escaped Last Line: "I type their master-mood. Mark twain made me." Subject(s): Birthdays; Jokes; Twain, Mark (samuel Langhorne Clemens); Writing & Writers THE BATTLE IN THE CLOUDS Poem Text First Line: Where the dews and the rains of heaven have their Last Line: Chanting solemn music for the souls that passed below. Subject(s): American Civil War; Lookout Mountain, Battle Of (1863); United States - History THE BEWILDERED GUEST Poem Text First Line: I was not asked if I should like to come Last Line: We know we shall not meet him here again. Subject(s): Guests; Hospitality; Life; Visiting THE BURDEN Poem Text First Line: I writhed beneath my burden, fumed and groaned Last Line: "to be the burden than bear it, and pity me!" Subject(s): Strength THE CHRISTMAS SPIRIT Poem Text First Line: About the end of august, one hot day Last Line: His voice came back, and I—awoke, of course. Subject(s): Christmas; Santa Claus; Nativity, The; Nicholas, Saint THE FACE AT THE WINDOW Poem Text First Line: We had gone down at christmas, where our host Last Line: "only the fact could make my story true." Subject(s): Christmas; Fathers; Ghosts; Story-telling; Supernatural; Nativity, The THE KING DINES; IMPRESSION Poem Text First Line: Two people on a bench in boston commons Last Line: Of the day round him for his dining-room. Subject(s): Boston Common; Food & Eating; Homeless THE LITTLE CHILDREN Poem Text First Line: Suffer little children to come unto me,' Last Line: The anti-christ of schrecklichkeit. Subject(s): Children; Evil; Hell; Jesus Christ - Life & Ministry; Childhood THE MOTHER Poem Text First Line: Is the nurse gone now? And are we alone at last? Last Line: The father (joyously): no, no; good-morning, mother. Subject(s): Babies; Fathers; Love - Marital; Mothers; Infants; Wedded Love; Marriage - Love THE PASSENGERS OF A RETARDED SUBMERSIBLE Poem Text First Line: The american people: / what was it kept you so long, brave german submersible? Last Line: Shall be ever the home for us this land can never be. Subject(s): Germany; Lusitania (ship); World War I; Germans; First World War THE TWO WIVES Poem Text First Line: The colonel rode by his picket-line Last Line: Alone could make his with life. Subject(s): War THE WIT SUPREME, AND SOVEREIGN SAGE THOMAS BAILEY ALDRICH Poem Text First Line: Not here, where that quick, subtle spirit of his Last Line: He hospitably waits and bids us come. Subject(s): Aldrich, Thomas Bailey (1836-1907); Novels & Novelists; Poetry & Poets THORN First Line: Every rose, you sang, has its thorn THROUGH THE MEADOW First Line: The summer sun was soft and bland TIME Poem Text First Line: Do you wish me, then, away? Last Line: Eternity and I are one. Subject(s): Future Life; Time; Retribution; Eternity; After Life TO A GREAT EDITOR Poem Text First Line: In every human life, however filled Last Line: You shall remain when it has passed away. Subject(s): Alden, Henry Mills (1836-1919); Critics & Criticism; Editors; Praise TO JOHN BURROUGHS Poem Text First Line: From blossomed boughs and nesting birds Last Line: All nature hails her son, john burroughs. Subject(s): Burroughs, John (1837-1921); Love; Nature TO-MORROW Poem Text First Line: Old fraud, I know you in that gay disguise Last Line: All the dull yesterdays that I have known. Subject(s): Future; Past; Time TWELVE P.M. Poem Text First Line: To get home from some scene of gayety Last Line: Confronted the eternal verity. Subject(s): Hallucinations & Illusions; Realism; Truth VISION Poem Text First Line: Within a poor man's squalid home I stood Last Line: The poor man's landlord leading down to dine. WEATHER-BREEDER Poem Text First Line: Ah, not to know that such a happiness Last Line: Alone could mother misery like this! Subject(s): Pain; Suffering; Misery WHAT SHALL IT PROFIT? Poem Text First Line: If I lay waste, and wither up with doubt Last Line: What do I gain by that I have undone? Variant Title(s): Faith;doubt Subject(s): Faith; Belief; Creed |
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