The Road Not Taken by Robert Frost

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,

And sorry I could not travel both

And be one traveler, long I stood

And looked down one as far as I could

To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair,

And having perhaps the better claim,

Because it was grassy and wanted wear;

Though as for that, the passing there

Had worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally lay

In leaves no step had trodden black.

Oh, I kept the first for another day!

Yet knowing how way leads to way,

I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh

Somewhere ages and ages hence:

Two roads diverged in a wood, and I,

I took the one less traveled by,

And that has made all the difference.

When I Heard the Learn'd Astronomer by Walt Whitman

When I heard the learn'd astronomer,

When the proofs, the figures,

were ranged in columns before me,

When I was shown the charts and diagrams,

to add, divide, and measure them,

When I sitting heard the astronomer

where he lectured with much applause in the lecture-room,

How soon unaccountable I became tired and sick,

Till rising and gliding out I wander'd off by myself,

In the mystical moist night-air,

and from time to time,

Look'd up in perfect silence at the stars.

Solitude by Ella Wheeler Wilcox

Laugh, and the world laughs with you;

Weep, and you weep alone;

For the sad old earth must borrow its mirth,

But has trouble enough of its own.

Sing, and the hills will answer;

Sigh, it is lost on the air;

The echoes bound to a joyful sound,

But shrink from voicing care.

Rejoice, and men will seek you;

Grieve, and they turn and go;

They want full measure of all your pleasure,

But they do not need your woe.

Be glad, and your friends are many;

Be sad, and you lose them all.

There are none to decline your nectared wine,

But alone you must drink life's gall.

Feast, and your halls are crowded;

Fast, and the world goes by.

Succeed and give, and it helps you live,

But no man can help you die.

There is room in the halls of pleasure

For a large and lordly train,

But one by one we must all file on

Through the narrow aisles of pain.

Alone by Edgar Allan Poe

From childhood's hour I have not been

As others were; I have not seen

As others saw; I could not bring

My passions from a common spring.

From the same source I have not taken

My sorrow; I could not awaken

My heart to joy at the same tone;

And all I loved, I loved alone.

Then - in my childhood, in the dawn

Of a most stormy life - was drawn

From every depth of good and ill

The mystery which binds me still:

From the torrent, or the fountain,

From the red cliff of the mountain,

From the sun that round me rolled

In its autumn tint of gold,

From the lightning in the sky

As it passed me flying by,

From the thunder and the storm,

And the cloud that took the form

(When the rest of Heaven was blue)

Of a demon in my view.

Reply to Flanders Fields

by John Mitchell

Oh! sleep in peace where poppies grow;

The torch your falling hands let go

Was caught by us, again held high,

A beacon light in Flanders sky

That dims the stars to those below.

You are our dead, you held the foe,

And ere the poppies cease to blow,

We'll prove our faith in you who lie

In Flanders Fields.

Oh! rest in peace, we quickly go

To you who bravely died, and know

In other fields was heard the cry,

For freedom's cause, of you who lie,

So still asleep where poppies grow,

In Flanders Fields.

As in rumbling sound, to and fro,

The lightning flashes, sky aglow,

The mighty hosts appear, and high

Above the din of battle cry,

Scarce heard amidst the guns below,

Are fearless hearts who fight the foe,

And guard the place where poppies grow.

Oh! sleep in peace, all you who lie

In Flanders Fields.

And still the poppies gently blow,

Between the crosses, row on row.

The larks, still bravely soaring high,

Are singing now their lullaby

To you who sleep where poppies grow

In Flanders Fields.

Crossing The Bar

by Alfred Lord Tennyson.

Sunset and evening star,
And one clear call for me!
And may there be no moaning of the bar,
When I put out to sea,
But such a tide as moving seems asleep,
Too full for sound and foam,
When that which drew from out the boundless deep
Turns again home.

Twilight and evening bell,
And after that the dark!
And may there be no sadness of farewell,
When I embark;
For thou from out our bourne of Time and Place
The flood may bear me far,
I hope to see my Pilot face to face
When I have crossed the bar.