|
Classic and Contemporary Poetry
ACADEME, by EDWIN ARNOLD Poet Analysis Poet's Biography First Line: Pleasanter than the hills of thessaly Last Line: And death a happy ending. Subject(s): Athens, Greece | |||
PLEASANTER than the hills of Thessaly, Nearer and dearer to the poet's heart Than the blue ripple belting Salamis, Or long grass waving over Marathon, Fair Academe, most holy Academe, Thou art, and hast been, and shalt ever be. I would be numbered now with things that were, Changing the wasting fever of to-day For the dear quietness of yesterday: I would be ashes, underneath the grass, So I had wandered in thy platane walks One happy summer twilight, -- even one: Was it not grand and beautiful and rare, The music and the wisdom and the shade, The music of the pebble-paven rills, And olive boughs, and bowered nightingales, Chorussing joyously the joyous things Told by the gray Silenus of the grove, Low-fronted and large-hearted Socrates! O, to have seen under the olive blossoms But once, -- once only in a mortal life, The marble majesties of ancient gods! And to have watched the ring of listeners, The Grecian boys gone mad for love of truth, The Grecian girls gone pale for love of him Who taught the truth, who battled for the truth; And girls and boys, women and bearded men, Crowding to hear and treasure in their hearts Matter to make their lives a happiness, And death a happy ending. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...THE ACHARNIANS: IN PRAISE OF THE POET by ARISTOPHANES THE UNKNOWN GOD by ANNA LETITIA BARBAULD INCOGNITA IN THE TEMPLE OF THESEUS by SEYMOUR GREEN WHEELER BENJAMIN A VOICE FROM ACADEME by ROBERT WILLIAMS BUCHANAN A PRIZE FOR EURIPIDES by RICHARD EUGENE BURTON CHILDE HAROLD'S PILGRIMAGE: CANTO 2 by GEORGE GORDON BYRON LINES [WRITTEN] IN THE TRAVELLER'S BOOK AT ORCHOMENUS by GEORGE GORDON BYRON THE WOODEN WALLS OF ATHENS by DELPHIC ORACLE |
|