Quotes
Quotes - Hood
With fingers weary and worn,
With eyelids heavy and red,
A woman sat in unwomanly rags
Plying her needle and thread,--
Stitch! stitch! stitch!
O men with sisters dear,
O men with mothers and wives,
It is not linen you're wearing out,
But human creatures' lives!
Sewing at once a double thread,
A shroud as well as a shirt.
O God! that bread should be so dear,
And flesh and blood so cheap!
No blessed leisure for love or hope,
But only time for grief.
My tears must stop, for every drop
Hinders needle and thread.
A wife who preaches in her gown,
And lectures in her night-dress.
I saw old Autumn in the misty morn
Stand shadowless like silence, listening
To silence.
Peace and rest at length have come
All the day's long toil is past,
And each heart is whispering, "Home,
Home at last."
Ben Battle was a soldier bold,
And used to war's alarms;
But a cannon-ball took off his legs,
So he laid down his arms.
Pity it is to slay the meanest thing.
One more unfortunate
Weary of breath,
Rashly importunate,
Gone to her death.
Take her up tenderly,
Lift her with care;
Fashioned so slenderly,
Young, and so fair!
Alas for the rarity
Of Christian charity
Under the sun!
Even God's providence
Seeming estranged.
No sun--no moon--no morn--no noon,
No dawn--no dusk--no proper time of day,
No warmth--no cheerfulness--no healthful ease,
No road, no street, no t' other side the way,
No comfortable feel in any member--
No shade, no shine, no butterflies, no bees,
No fruits, no flowers, no leaves, no birds,
November!
No solemn sanctimonious face I pull,
Nor think I'm pious when I'm only bilious;
Nor study in my sanctum supercilious,
To frame a Sabbath Bill or forge a Bull.
Each cloud-capt mountain is a holy altar;
An organ breathes in every grove;
And the full heart's a Psalter,
Rich in deep hymn of gratitude and love.
His death, which happened in his berth,
At forty-odd befell:
They went and told the sexton, and
The sexton tolled the bell.
That fierce thing
They call a conscience.
It's very hard! Oh, Dick, my boy, It's very hard one can't enjoy A little private spouting; But sure as Lear or Hamlet lives, Up comes our master, Bounce! and gives The tragic Muse a routing.
It is not linen you're wearing out, But human creatures' lives.
The Autumn is old; The sere leaves are flying; He hath gather'd up gold, And now he is dying;-- Old age, begin sighing!
The year's in wane; There is nothing adorning; The night has no eve, And the day has no morning; Cold winter gives warning!
I saw old Autumn in the misty morn Stand shadowless like silence, listening To silence, for no lonely bird would sing Into his hollow ear from woods forlorn, Nor lowly hedge nor solitary thorn;-- Shaking his languid locks all dewy bright With tangled gossamer that fell by night, Pearling his coronet of golden corn.
