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Life, to be sure, is nothing much to lose, But young men think it is, and we were young.

A. E. Housman

Good religious poetry… is likely to be most justly appreciated and most discriminately relished by the undevout.
A. E. HOUSMAN
Luck’s a chance, but trouble’s sure.
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
Great literature should do some good to the reader: must quicken his perception though dull, and sharpen his discrimination though blunt, and mellow the rawness of his personal opinions.
A. E. HOUSMAN

Knowledge Literature Low Mad Opinion Perception Personal Stupid Thinking
The rainy Pleiads wester Orion plunges prone, And midnight strikes and hastens, And I lie down alone.
A. E. HOUSMAN

Alone Hatton Lying Midnight Orion Prone Rain Strike Wester
Strapped, noosed, nighing his hour, He stood and counted them and cursed his luck; And then the clock collected in the tower Its strength, and struck.
A. E. HOUSMAN

Collection Count Curse Himself Strength
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
Therefore, since the world has still Much good, but much less good than ill.
A. E. HOUSMAN

Goodness Sick World
With rue my heart is laden For golden friends I had, For many a rose-lipped maiden And many a lightfoot lad.
A. E. HOUSMAN

Friendship Heart Maidan
Do not ever read books about versification: no poet ever learnt it that way. If you are going to be a poet, it will come to you naturally and you will pick up all you need from reading poetry.
A. E. HOUSMAN

Book Learning Poet Poetry Reading
Nature, not content with denying him the ability to think, has endowed him with the ability to write.
A. E. HOUSMAN

Ability Himself Nature Thinking Writing
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
That is the land of lost content, I see it shining plain, the happy highways where I went and cannot come again.
A. E. HOUSMAN

Content Lost Myself Plain Shine
All knowledge is precious whether or not it serves the slightest human use.
A. E. HOUSMAN

Human Knowledge Precious Service
A moment’s thought would have shown him. But a moment is a long time, and thought is a painful process.
A. E. HOUSMAN

Believe Humanity Long Luck Moment Pain Painful Struggle
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

Life, to be sure, is nothing much to lose, But young men think it is, and we were young.

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Life, to be sure, is nothing much to lose, But young men think it is, and we were young.

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Popular Authors

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