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You smile upon your friend to-day, To-day his ills are over; You hearken to the lover’s say, And happy is the lover. ‘Tis late to hearken, late to smile, But better late than never: I shall have lived a little while Before I die for ever.

A. E. Housman

Earth and high heaven are fixed of old and founded strong.
A. E. HOUSMAN

Earth Heaven High Strong
I think that to transfuse emotion – not to transmit thought but to set up in the reader’s sense a vibration corresponding to what was felt by the writer – is the peculiar function of poetry.
A. E. HOUSMAN

Emotion Poetry Reader Transmit
The house of delusions is cheap to build but drafty to live in.
A. E. HOUSMAN
You smile upon your friend to-day, To-day his ills are over; You hearken to the lover’s say, And happy is the lover. ‘Tis late to hearken, late to smile, But better late than never: I shall have lived a little while Before I die for ever.
A. E. HOUSMAN

Death Excellence Friendship Live Lover Myself Smile
The thoughts of others Were light and fleeting, Of lovers’ meeting Or luck or fame. Mine were of trouble, And mine were steady; So I was ready When trouble came.
A. E. HOUSMAN

Deep Feeling Light Love Lover Luck Thought Understand
And silence sounds no worse than cheers After earth has stopped the ears.
A. E. HOUSMAN

Cheer Doubt Ear Emotion Fear Scare Silence Sound Stop Worse
The laws of God, the laws of man, He may keep that will and can; Not I: let God and man decree Laws for themselves and not for me.
A. E. HOUSMAN
They put arsenic in his meat And stared aghast to watch him eat; They poured strychnine in his cup And shook to see him drink it up.
A. E. HOUSMAN

Cup Drink Eat Meat
Therefore, since the world has still Much good, but much less good than ill.
A. E. HOUSMAN

Goodness Sick World
I find Cambridge an asylum, in every sense of the word.
A. E. HOUSMAN
Who made the world I cannot tell; ‘Tis made, and here am I in hell. My hand, though now my knuckles bleed, I never soiled with such a deed.
A. E. HOUSMAN

Hands Hell Myself World
Stone, steel, dominions pass, Faith too, no wonder; So leave alone the grass That I am under.
A. E. HOUSMAN

Faith Grass Leave Myself Stone Wonder
And how am I to face the odds Of man’s bedevilment and God’s? I, a stranger and afraid In a world I never made.
A. E. HOUSMAN

Afraid Face God Man Myself World
Lovers lying two and two Ask not whom they sleep beside, And the bridegroom all night through Never turns him to the bride.
A. E. HOUSMAN

Boundation Feel Lover Lying Night Power Satisfy Self Esteem Sleep Try
Poetry is not the thing said, but the way of saying it.
A. E. HOUSMAN

Poetry Words Writing
In every American there is an air of incorrigible innocence, which seems to conceal a diabolical cunning.
A. E. HOUSMAN

Conceal Country Cunning

You smile upon your friend to-day, To-day his ills are over; You hearken to the lover’s say, And happy is the lover. ‘Tis late to hearken, late to smile, But better late than never: I shall have lived a little while Before I die for ever.

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You smile upon your friend to-day, To-day his ills are over; You hearken to the lover’s say, And happy is the lover. ‘Tis late to hearken, late to smile, But better late than never: I shall have lived a little while Before I die for ever.

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Popular Authors

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