Walking to the Mail / Lord Alfred Tennyson

'John'.  I'm glad I walk'd.

         How fresh the meadows look

         Above the river, and, but a month ago,

         The whole hill-side was redder than a fox.

         Is yon plantation where this byway joins

         The turnpike? [1]

'James'. Yes.

Wages / Lord Alfred Tennyson

Glory of warrior, glory of orator, glory of song,

Paid with a voice flying by to be lost on an endless sea - 

Glory of Virtue, to fight, to struggle, to right the wrong - 

Nay, but she aimed not at glory, no lover of glory she:

Give her the glory of going on, and still to be.

Ulysses / Lord Alfred Tennyson

 Yet all experience is an arch wherethro'

  Gleams that untravell'd world, whose margin fades

  For ever and for ever when I move.

or

  It may be that the gulfs will wash us down:

  It may be we shall touch the Happy Isles,

  And see the great Achilles, whom we knew.

Of these lines well does Carlyle say what so many will feel: "These lines do not make me weep, but there is in me what would till whole Lacrymatorics as I read".

  It little profits that an idle king,

  By this still hearth, among these barren crags,

  Match'd with an aged wife, I mete and dole

  Unequal laws unto a savage race,

  That hoard, and sleep, and feed, and know not me.

To Virgil / Lord Alfred Tennyson

Roman Virgil, thou that singest

Ilion's lofty temples robed in fire,

Ilion falling, Rome arising,

wars, and filial faith, and Dido's pyre;

Landscape-lover, lord of language

more than he that sang the Works and Days,

All the chosen coin of fancy

flashing out from many a golden phrase;

To the Rev. F.D.Maurice / Lord Alfred Tennyson

Come, when no graver cares employ,

Godfather, come and see your boy:

Your presence will be sun in winter,

Making the little one leap for joy.

For, being of that honest few,

Who give the Fiend himself his due,

Should eighty-thousand college-councils

Thunder `Anathema,' friend, at you;

Tithonus / Lord Alfred Tennyson

The woods decay, the woods decay and fall,

The vapours weep their burthen to the ground,

Man comes and tills the field and lies beneath,

And after many a summer dies the swan.

Me only cruel immortality

Consumes: I wither slowly in thine arms,

Here at the quiet limit of the world,

A white-haired shadow roaming like a dream

The ever-silent spaces of the East,

Far-folded mists, and gleaming halls of morn.

Timbuctoo / Lord Alfred Tennyson

Deep in that lion-haunted island lies

    A mystic city, goal of enterprise.

    (Chapman.)

  I stood upon the Mountain which o'erlooks

  The narrow seas, whose rapid interval

  Parts Afric from green Europe, when the Sun

  Had fall'n below th' Atlantick, and above

  The silent Heavens were blench'd with faery light,

  Uncertain whether faery light or cloud,

  Flowing Southward, and the chasms of deep, deep blue

  Slumber'd unfathomable, and the stars

  Were flooded over with clear glory and pale.

The Voyage / Lord Alfred Tennyson

    I.

We left behind the painted buoy

  That tosses at the harbor-mouth;

And madly danced our hearts with joy,

  As fast we fleeted to the South:

How fresh was every sight and sound

  On open main or winding shore!

We knew the merry world was round,

  And we might sail for evermore.

The Spiteful Letter / Lord Alfred Tennyson

Here, it is here, the close of the year,

And with it a spiteful letter.

My name in song has done him much wrong,

For himself has done much better

The Sleeping Beauty / Lord Alfred Tennyson

 1

    Year after year unto her feet,

    She lying on her couch alone,

    Across the purpled coverlet,

    The maiden's jet-black hair has grown, [1]

    On either side her tranced form

    Forth streaming from a braid of pearl:

    The slumbrous light is rich and warm,

    And moves not on the rounded curl.

The Sailor Boy / Lord Alfred Tennyson

He rose at dawn and, fired with hope,

Shot o'er the seething harbor-bar,

And reach'd the ship and caught the rope,

And whistled to the morning star.

And while he whistled long and loud

He heard a fierce mermaiden cry,

`O boy, tho' thou art young and proud,

I see the place where thou wilt lie.

The Ringlet / Lord Alfred Tennyson

`Your ringlets, your ringlets,

  That look so golden-gay,

If you will give me one, but one,

  To kiss it night and day,

Then never chilling touch of Time

  Will turn it silver-gray;

And then shall I know it is all true gold

To flame and sparkle and stream as of old,

Till all the comets in heaven are cold,

  And all her stars decay.'

`Then take it, love, and put it by;

This cannot change, nor yet can I.'

The Revenge: A Ballad of the Fleet / Lord Alfred Tennyson

At Flores in the Azores Sir Richard Grenville lay,

And a pinnace, like a fluttered bird, came flying from far away:

"Spanish ships of war at sea! we have sighted fifty-three!"

Then sware Lord Thomas Howard: "'Fore God I am no coward;

But I cannot meet them here, for my ships are out of gear,

And the half my men are sick. I must fly, but follow quick.

We are six ships of the line; can we fight with fifty-three?"

The Princess / Lord Alfred Tennyson

Prologue

   Sir Walter Vivian all a summer's day

   Gave his broad lawns until the set of sun

   Up to the people:  thither flocked at noon

   His tenants, wife and child, and thither half

   The neighbouring borough with their Institute

   Of which he was the patron.  I was there

   From college, visiting the son,--the son

   A Walter too,--with others of our set,

   Five others:  we were seven at Vivian-place.

The Poet's Mind / Lord Alfred Tennyson

Clear as summer mountain streams,

  Bright as the inwoven beams,

  Which beneath their crisping sapphire

  In the midday, floating o'er

  The golden sands, make evermore

  To a blossom-starrèd shore.

  Hence away, unhallowed laughter!

The Poet / Lord Alfred Tennyson

 The poet in a golden clime was born,

  With golden stars above;

  Dower'd with the hate of hate, the scorn of scorn,[1]

  The love of love.

  He saw thro' [2] life and death, thro' [2] good and ill,

  He saw thro' [2] his own soul.

  The marvel of the everlasting will,

  An open scroll,

The Palace of Art / Lord Alfred Tennyson

  I built my soul a lordly pleasure-house

  Wherein at ease for aye to dwell.

  I said, "O Soul, make merry and carouse,

  Dear soul, for all is well".

  A huge crag-platform, smooth as burnish'd brass,

  I chose. The ranged ramparts bright

  From level meadow-bases of deep grass [1]

  Suddenly scaled the light.

The Miller's Daughter / Lord Alfred Tennyson

I met in all the close green ways,

  While walking with my line and rod,

  The wealthy miller's mealy face,

  Like the moon in an ivy-tod.

  He looked so jolly and so good--

  While fishing in the milldam-water,

  I laughed to see him as he stood,

  And dreamt not of the miller's daughter.

The Merman / Lord Alfred Tennyson

1

  Who would be

  A merman bold,

  Sitting alone,

  Singing alone

  Under the sea,

  With a crown of gold,

  On a throne?

The Mermaid / Lord Alfred Tennyson

1

  Who would be

  A mermaid fair,

  Singing alone,

  Combing her hair

  Under the sea,

  In a golden curl

  With a comb of pearl,

  On a throne?