Work / Charles Lamb

Who first invented work, and bound the free

And holyday-rejoicing spirit down

To the ever-haunting importunity

Of business in the green fields, and the town--

To plough, loom, anvil, spade--and oh! most sad

To that dry drudgery at the desk's dead wood?

To A Young Friend / Charles Lamb

To a Young Friend 

On Her Twenty-First Birthday

Crown me a cheerful goblet, while I pray

A blessing on thy years, young Isola;

Young, but no more a child. How swift have flown

To me thy girlish times, a woman grown

Beneath my heedless eyes! in vain I rack

My fancy to believe the almanac,

That speaks thee Twenty-One. Thou shouldst have still

remain'd a child, and at thy sovereign will

Gambol'd about our house, as in times past.

To A River In Which A Child Was Drowned / Charles Lamb

Smiling river, smiling river,

On thy bosom sun-beams play;

Though they're fleeting and retreating,

Thou hast more deceit than they.

In they channel, in thy channel,

Choked with ooze and grav'lly stones,

Deep immersed, and unhearsed,

Lies young Edward's corse: his bones.

She Is Going / Charles Lamb

For their elder Sister's hair

Martha does a wreath prepare

Of bridal rose, ornate and gay:

To-morrow is the wedding day.

She is going

Queen Oriana's Dream / Charles Lamb

On a bank with roses shaded, 

Whose sweet scent the violets aided,

Violets whose breath alone

Yields but feeble smell or none

(Sweeter bed Jove ne'er reposed on

When his eyes Olympus closed on),

While o'erhead six slaves did hold

Canopy of cloth o'gold,

On The Sight Of Swans In Kensington Gardens / Charles Lamb

Queen-Brid that sittest on thy shining nest,

And thy young cygnets without sorrow hatchest,

And thou, thou other royal bird, that watchest

Lest the white mother wandering feet molest:

Shrined are your offspring in a crystal cradle,

Brighter than Helen's ere she yet had burst

Her shelly prison. They shall be born at first

Strong, active, graceful, perfect, swan-like able

To tread the land or waters with security.

Leisure / Charles Lamb

They talk of time, and of time's galling yoke,

That like a millstone on man's mind doth press,

Which only works and business can redress:

Of divine Leisure such foul lies are spoke,

Wounding her fair gifts with calumnious stroke.

But might I, fed with silent meditation,

Assoiled live from that fiend Occupation--

Improbus Labor, which my spirits hath broke--

In The Album Of A Clergyman's Lady / Charles Lamb

An Album is a Garden, not for show

Planted, but use; where wholesome herbs should grown.

A Cabinet of curious porcelain, where

No fancy enters, but what's rich or rare.

A Chapel, where mere ornamental things

Are pure as crowns of saints, or angels' wings.

Composed At Midnight / Charles Lamb

From broken visions of perturbed rest

I wake, and start, and fear to sleep again.

How total a privation of all sounds,

Sight, and familiar objects, man, bird, beast,

Herb, tree, or flower, and prodigal light of heaven.

'Twere some relief to catch the drowsy cry

Of the mechanic watchman, or the noise

Of revel reeling home from midnight cups.

Angel Help / Charles Lamb

This rare tablet doth include

Poverty with Sanctitude.

Past midnight this poor maid hath spun,

And yet the work is not half done,

Which must supply from earnings scant

A feeble bed-rid parent's want.

Her sleep-charged eyes exemption ask

And Holy hands take up the task;

Unseen the rock and spindle ply,

And do her earthly drudgery.