by Admin | Dec 26, 2025 | December Poems, Emerald Book Club, Poems, Poetry
December by Thomas Bailey Aldrich
Only the sea intoning,
Only the wainscot-mouse,
Only the wild wind moaning
Over the lonely house.
Darkest of all Decembers
Ever my life has known,
Sitting here by the embers,
Stunned and helpless, alone—
Dreaming of two graves lying
Out in the damp and chill:
One where the buzzard, flying,
Pauses at Malvern Hill;
The other—alas! the pillows
Of that uneasy bed
Rise and fall with the billows
Over our sailor's head.
Theirs the heroic story —
Died, by frigate and town!
Theirs the Calm and the Glory,
Theirs the Cross and the Crown.
Mine to linger and languish
Here by the wintry sea.
Ah, faint heart! in thy anguish,
What is there left to thee?
Only the sea intoning,
Only the wainscot-mouse,
Only the wild wind moaning
Over the lonely house.
by Admin | Dec 26, 2025 | December Poems, Poems, Poetry
December by Rebecca Hey
As human life begins and ends with woe,
So doth the year with darkness and with storm.
Mute is each sound, and vanish'd each fair form
That wont to cheer us; yet a sacred glow—
A moral beauty,—to which Autumn's show,
Or Spring's sweet blandishments, or Summer's bloom,
Are but vain pageants,—mitigate the gloom,
What time December's angry tempests blow.
'Twas when the "Earth had doff'd her gaudy trim,
As if in awe," that she received her Lord;
And angels jubilant attuned the hymn
Which the church echoes still in sweet accord,
And ever shall, while Time his course doth fill,
'Glory to God on high! on earth, peace and good will!'
by Admin | Dec 26, 2025 | December Poems, Poems, Poetry
December Days by Caleb Prentiss
Ruthless winter's rude career
Comes to close the parting year;
Fleecy flakes of snow descend,
Boreal winds the welkin rend.
Reflect, oh man! and well remember
That dull old age is dark December;
For soon the year of life is gone,
When hoary hairs like snow come on.
by Admin | Dec 26, 2025 | December Poems, Poems, Poetry
Come, come thou bleak December wind,
And blow the dry leaves from the tree!
Flash, like a Love-thought, thro' me, Death
And take a Life that wearies me.
by Admin | Dec 15, 2025 | Holy Sonnets, John Donne, Poems
Holy Sonnet VIII: If Faithful Souls Be Alike Glorified by John Donne
If faithful souls be alike glorified
As angels, then my fathers soul doth see,
And adds this even to full felicity,
That valiantly I hells wide mouth o'erstride:
But if our minds to these souls be descried
By circumstances, and by signs that be
Apparent in us, not immediately,
How shall my mind's white truth by them be tried?
They see idolatrous lovers weep and mourn,
And vile blasphemous conjurers to call
On Jesus name, and Pharisaical
Dissemblers feign devotion. Then turn,
O pensive soul, to God, for he knows best
Thy true grief, for he put it in my breast.
