Henry Wadsworth Longfellow*

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807–1882) is a poet who achieved international success before other American writers had. He supported the abolitionist cause through his slim 1842 book Poems on Slavery, which he allowed the New England Anti-Slavery Tract Society to reprint and distribute free of royalties.

His verse romance Evangeline, A Tale of Acadie (1847), written in Virgilian dactylic hexameter, expounds the legend of Acadian lovers separated on the day they were to be wed when the English expelled French Canadian Acadians from Nova Scotia. The book won admiration on both sides of the Atlantic, and became the most celebrated American poem of the century.

The following poem, published in 1838, is one of several from Longfellow widely shared in classrooms and anthologized in school textbooks — making it well known to a wide readership. It appeared in his early collection, Voices of the Night (1839).

Longfellow is honoured in the Poets’ Corner of Westminster Abbey, which few other Americans have been.

A Psalm of Life

What The Heart Of The Young Man Said To The Psalmist.

Tell me not, in mournful numbers,
---Life is but an empty dream!
For the soul is dead that slumbers,
---And things are not what they seem.

Life is real! Life is earnest!
---And the grave is not its goal;
Dust thou art, to dust returnest,
---Was not spoken of the soul.

Not enjoyment, and not sorrow,
---Is our destined end or way;
But to act, that each to-morrow
---Find us farther than to-day.

Art is long, and Time is fleeting,
---And our hearts, though stout and brave,
Still, like muffled drums, are beating
---Funeral marches to the grave.

In the world’s broad field of battle,
---In the bivouac of Life,
Be not like dumb, driven cattle!
---Be a hero in the strife!

Trust no Future, howe’er pleasant!
---Let the dead Past bury its dead!
Act,— act in the living Present!
---Heart within, and God o’erhead!

Lives of great men all remind us
---We can make our lives sublime,
And, departing, leave behind us
---Footprints on the sands of time;

Footprints, that perhaps another,
---Sailing o’er life’s solemn main,
A forlorn and shipwrecked brother,
---Seeing, shall take heart again.

Let us, then, be up and doing,
---With a heart for any fate;
Still achieving, still pursuing,
---Learn to labor and to wait.

*This is the third Kingdom Poets post about Henry Wadsworth Longfellow: first post, second post.

Entry written by D.S. Martin. He is the author of six poetry collections including Angelicus (2021, Poiema/Cascade), plus three anthologies — available through Wipf & Stock. His new book The Role of the Moon, inspired by the Metaphysical Poets, is now available from Paraclete Press.

Emma Tatham

Emma Tatham (1829—1855) is a British poet, born in London, whose work was first published in On the Ocean of Time (1850),and subsequently in The Dream of Pythagoras and Other Poems (1854). She and her family were Wesleyan Methodists, attending the Great Queen Street Chapel. In 1847, they left London, moving to Margate in Kent, primarily due to a severe bout of whooping cough she experienced. She started a small school there, but her poor health did not permit her to continue. She also suffered a period of depression.

Her poems resonate with her Christian worldview. She was highly praised by critics — even those not companions in the faith. Matthew Arnold compared her with the French poet Eugénie de Guérin in one essay, and in another said, "she had a sincere vein of poetical feeling, a genuine aptitude for composition."

She corresponded with Methodist minister Benjamin Gregory, the pastor of the chapel in London, who encouraged her poetry. She shared with him about the poets she was reading. Her favourite was William Wordsworth; she described him as “like a forest stream, still and deep” — contrasting him with Byron who was “more like a troubled mountain cataract”. Gregory published a biography of Tatham in 1859.

Thou Who Dost Write Thy Name

In rapture's tears upon the rainbow's arch;
And trace it on the mountains with a swift
And eloquent lightning pen; and on the flowers
With pencil dipp'd in honey and the dye
Of morning's ruddy cheek and golden hair;
And on the eyes of childhood with sunbeams;
And on the wings of glorious butterfly
With powdery gems and gold;
On angels' foreheads with the flaming plume
Of intellect's white wing, dipp'd in the fire
Of inspiration; on the martyr's brow
With blood; and on the cataracts in heaps
Of thunder visible; and on clouds of storm
In rapturous blackness; and on morning's eyes
With fading stars; and on the hearts of saints
In Thy own beautiful image crimson-traced
As by a pierced hand:
O Thou whose poetry and love in one,
Walk forth where'er Thou art, and hand in hand
Encircle heaven and earth, Thou above praise!
Exalted infinitely; O great GOD!
Hear me, and make me a pure golden harp
For Thy soft finger. Might I be Thy bird,
Hidden from all, singing to Thee alone.

This post was suggested by a new friend of Kingdom Poets, Riccardo Ricci, an Italian evangelical missionary in Greece.

Entry written by D.S. Martin. He is the author of six poetry collections including Angelicus (2021, Poiema/Cascade), plus three anthologies — available through Wipf & Stock. His new book The Role of the Moon, inspired by the Metaphysical Poets, is available from Paraclete Press.

Nellie deVries

Nellie deVries is a Michigan poet, and the author of the new collection Japanese Garden: Four Seasons of Poems. (Resource Publications, 2026). Although she has authored three books for children through Baker Book House, this is her first poetry collection.

She was one of the participants in my festival circle group at the Festival of Faith & Writing back in 2014, and shared her poetry in my subsequent blog The 55 Project. Since then her poems have appeared in such publications as: Peninsula Poets, VietNow, Heart of Flesh, Exhale, and the anthologies Busy Griefs, Raw Towns; Michigan Roots, and Adam, Eve, & the Riders of the Apocalypse.

The following poem appeared in the anthology Adam, Eve, & the Riders of the Apocalypse edited by D.S. Martin (Poiema/Cascade, 2017).

Dwelling

2 Corinthians 5; 2 Timothy 4

In a Roman prison
the tentmaker looks at his hands,
calloused and needle-pricked,
and remembers a metaphor he had written:
...if the earthly tent we live in is destroyed,
we have a building from God, an eternal house
in heaven, not built by human hands.

He shudders at the chill autumn winds
and groans, longing to be clothed
wiht his heavenly dwelling.
With cold-gnarled fingers he grabs a quill
and writes, My dear son, I long to see you.
Bring my cloak, and my scrols, especially
the parchments. Come to me quickly.
Do your best to get here before winter.

Posted with permission of the poet.

Entry written by D.S. Martin. He is the author of six poetry collections including Angelicus (2021, Poiema/Cascade), plus three anthologies — available through Wipf & Stock. His new book The Role of the Moon, inspired by the Metaphysical Poets, is now available from Paraclete Press.

Petrarch*

Petrarch (1304―1374) is an Italian writer and intellectual who composed both in Latin and in the Italian vernacular. His masterwork, today known as Canzoniere, is a collection of 366 poems that have immeasurably influenced the Western tradition.

He was born in Arezzo, south of Florence. As a boy he met Dante Alighieri, who, like his parents, was of the White Guelph party, and a fellow Florentine exile. When he was 26, Petrarch received the patronage of the wealthy Colonna family, which enabled him to pursue his own interests, and to amass the largest private library in Europe. Especially in his latter years, he was a devout Roman Catholic who daily recited the Liturgy of the Hours.

Appearing this month from W.W. Norton is A.M. Juster’s new translation of Petrarch’s Canzoniere. He explains that his goal “was to imitate closely Petrarch’s music and fresh language, while being faithful to the text [trying to] sidestep problems of recent translations by translating sentences as units and avoiding word-for-word translation unless it worked as poetry.”

Dana Gioia’s responded to this new translation by saying, “I find it impossible to overpraise this new edition of Petrarch’s Canzoniere… A.M. Juster’s rhymed translations re-create Petrarch’s forms without losing either their lyrical passion or vernacular energy.”

from Canzoniere 264

I ponder, and self-pity then assails
my thoughts so much it keeps on leading me
to weeping differently,
since, seeing every day the end is near,
I ask God for those wings repeatedly,
so that with them my intellect could sail
out of this mortal jail
and up into the realm of Heaven’s spere,
and yet, until right now, no sigh, nor tear,
nor prayer has done much good, which fits the bill,
since anybody who can stand up straight,
yet falls along the way, deserves the fate
of lying on the ground against his will.
I see, trustworthy still,
forgiving, open arms; through torn apart
by what some do, my heart
is gripped by fear that rocks my mental state;
someone prods me; and it may be too late.

Posted with permission of the translator.

*This is the third Kingdom Poets post about Petrarch: first post, second post.

Entry written by D.S. Martin. He is the author of six poetry collections including Angelicus (2021, Poiema/Cascade), plus three anthologies — available through Wipf & Stock. His new book The Role of the Moon, inspired by the Metaphysical Poets, is now available from Paraclete Press.

Matthew Bridges

Matthew Bridges (1800—1894) is a poet and hymn-writer whose first book Jerusalem Regained: A Poem appeared in 1825 (L.B. Seeley and Son). He was an Anglican minister who at first wrote critically of Roman Catholicism. Under the influence of the Oxford Movement and John Henry Newman, he transferred his allegiance to the Catholic Church in 1848. His poetry collection, Babbicombe, or Visions of Memory, appeared in 1852.

Later in life he lived for several years in Quebec, but returned to England before he died.

The following hymn was written in 1851as a result of Bridges’ reflections on John’s Book of Revelation, including Revelation 19:12. The lyrics you see below are Bridges’ original version. In 1868, an Anglican priest named Godfrey Thring added six further verses to the hymn. The version you are likely familiar with has been distilled down to four verses —for printing in hymn books — from the earlier twelve.

Crown Him with Many Crowns

Crown him with many crowns,
The Lamb upon his throne;
Hark! how the heavenly anthem drowns
All music but its own:
Awake, my soul, and sing
Of him who died for thee,
And hail him as thy matchless king
Through all eternity.

Crown him the Virgin's Son!
The God Incarnate born,—
Whose arm those crimson trophies won
Which now his brow adorn!
Fruit of the mystic Rose
As of that Rose the Stem:
The Root, whence mercy ever flows,-
The Babe of Bethlehem!

Crown him the Lord of love!
Behold his hands and side, —
Rich wounds, yet visible above,
In beauty glorified:
No angel in the sky
Can fully bear that sight,
But downward bends his burning eye
At mysteries so bright!

Crown him the Lord of peace!
Whose power a scepter sways,
From pole to pole, —that wars may cease,
Absorbed in prayer and praise:
his reign shall know no end,
And round his pierced feet
Fair flowers of paradise extend
Their fragrance ever sweet.

Crown him the Lord of years!
The Potentate of time, —
Creator of the rolling spheres,
Ineffably sublime!
Glassed in a sea of light,
Where everlasting waves
Reflect his throne, —the Infinite!
Who lives, —and loves—and saves.

Crown him the Lord of heaven!
One with the Father known, —
And the blest Spirit, through him given
From yonder triune throne!
All hail! Redeemer, —Hail!
For Thou hast died for me;
Thy praise shall never, never fail
Throughout eternity!

Entry written by D.S. Martin. He is the author of six poetry collections including Angelicus (2021, Poiema/Cascade), plus three anthologies — available through Wipf & Stock. His new book The Role of the Moon, inspired by the Metaphysical Poets, is now available from Paraclete Press.

Gerard Manley Hopkins*

Gerard Manley Hopkins (1844—1889) is an influential English poet who became friends with Robert Bridges when they were both at Oxford University. He joined the Jesuit order in 1868, became a Parish Priest serving in Liverpool, and in 1884 he became a Classics Professor at University College, Dublin.

Hopkins’ father, Manley Hopkins, had also been a poet — having published a few titles, including A Philosopher's Stone and Other Poems (1843). However, their relationship became estranged when the younger Hopkins left the Anglicanism of his youth to join the Catholic church.

Although he is often referred to as one of the Victorian Era’s best poets, most of his poems were unpublished during his lifetime. It wasn’t until thirty years after his death that Robert Bridges (who was the United Kingdom’s Poet Laureate at the time) arranged for a volume of Hopkins’ work, simply called Poems, to be published. By 1930 the “sprung rhythm” of Hopkins’ poetry had come to be seen as an important innovation in 19th century poetry, by such people as W.H. Auden, T.S. Eliot, and Dylan Thomas.

from “Pilate”

...There is a day of all the year
When life revisits me, nerve and vein.
They all come here and stand before me clear
I try the Christus o'er again.
Sir! Christ! against this multitude I strain. —
Lord, but they cry so loud. And what am I?
And all in one say "Crucify!"

Before that rock, my seat, He stands;
And then — I choke to tell this out —
I give commands for water for my hands;
And some of those who stand about, —
Vespillo my centurion hacks out
Some ice that locks the glacier to the rocks
And in a basin brings the blocks.

I choose one; but when I desire
To wash before the multitude
The vital fire does suddenly retire
From hands now clammy with strange blood.
My frenzied working is not understood.
Now I grow numb. My tongue strikes on the gum
And cleaves, I struggle and am dumb.

I hear the multitude tramp by.
O here is the most piteous part,
For He whom I send forth to crucify,
Whispers "If thou have warmth at heart
Take courage; this shall need no further art."

*This is the fourth Kingdom Poets post about Gerard Manley Hopkins: first post, second post, third post.

Entry written by D.S. Martin. He is the author of six poetry collections including Angelicus (2021, Poiema/Cascade), plus three anthologies — available through Wipf & Stock. His new book The Role of the Moon, inspired by the Metaphysical Poets, is now available from Paraclete Press.

Laurence Housman

Laurence Housman (1865—1959) is an English playwright, writer and illustrator, and the younger brother of the better-known poet A.E. Housman. He worked for several London publishers as an illustrator on such books as Christina Rossetti’s Goblin Market (1893), and his sister’s novella The Were-Wolf (1896). As a writer he is best known for his plays, beginning with the Nativity play Bethlehem (1902). Along with his sister, Clemence Houseman, he became active in the suffrage movement.

He caught my attention as a poet to include in this blog due to his book Spikenard: A Book of Devotional Love-Poems (Grant Richards, 1898), and how frequently in the other things he wrote, his subject matter related to Biblical themes.

Housman was raised in an Anglican household, and became quite interested in transitioning his church affiliation from Anglican to Catholic when in his early thirties, going so far as to attend a Catholic retreat that culminated in an Easter Sunday Mass, which Housman, in his hesitance, only observed. He said,
-----“A week later I went to Paris on journalistic work for the Manchester
-----Guardian and when I saw, in some of the lovely French churches, the
-----tawdry statues, emblems, and ornaments with which modern
-----Catholicism allows its altars to be desecrated, I began to be glad of
-----my escape: unreasonably glad, perhaps, but I cannot dissociate false
-----art from false worship. If there be a Personal God, the beauty they
-----produce and cherish is for me the surest sign that His worshippers
-----have the truth in them: if beauty is betrayed, God is betrayed also.
-----And so the foolish vulgarity of modern Roman Catholic art was a
-----decisive aid to my escape from St. Peter's net an escape for which
-----I became more and more thankful as the years went on.”

Not that aesthetic concerns are unimportant, but this subjective (art-based rather than theological) argument, and the phrase “If there be a Personal God,” causes me to question the depth of Housman’s faith, which is borne out in some other details of his life. Even so, his poetry is well worth considering.

The following poem is the title piece from his 1898 collection, Spikenard.

Spikenard

As one who came with ointments sweet,
Abettors to her fleshly guilt,
And brake and poured them at Thy Feet,
And Worshipped Thee with spikenard spilt:
So from a body full of blame,
And tongue too deeply versed in shame,
Do I pour speech upon Thy Name.
O Thou, if tongue may yet beseech,
Near to Thine awful Feet let reach
This broken spikenard of my speech!

Entry written by D.S. Martin. He is the author of six poetry collections including Angelicus (2021, Poiema/Cascade), plus three anthologies — available through Wipf & Stock. His new book The Role of the Moon, inspired by the Metaphysical Poets, is now available from Paraclete Press.