Poems by Henry David Thoreau | Poetree

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All Things Are Current Found

All Things Are Current Found

ALL things are current found

On earthly ground,

Spirits and elements

Have their descents.

Night and day, year on year,

High and low, far and near,

These are our own aspects,

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Henry David Thoreau

Salmon Brook

Salmon Brook

SALMON Brook,

Penichook,

Ye sweet waters of my brain,

When shall I look,

Or cast the hook,

In your waves again?

Silver eels,

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Henry David Thoreau

Though All The Fates

Though All The Fates

THOUGH all the fates should prove unkind,

Leave not your native land behind.

The ship, becalmed, at length stands still;

The steed must rest beneath the hill;

But swiftly still our fortunes pace

To find us out in every place.

The vessel, though her masts be firm,

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Henry David Thoreau

Light-Winged Smoke

Light-Winged Smoke

LIGHT-WINGED Smoke, Icarian bird,

Melting thy pinions in thy upward flight,

Lark without song, and the messenger of dawn,

Circling above the hamlets as thy nest;

Or else, departing dream, and shadowy form

Of midnight vision, gathering up thy skirts;

By night star-veiling, and by day

Darkening the light and blotting out the sun;

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Henry David Thoreau

The Poet's Delay

The Poet's Delay

IN vain I see the morning rise,

In vain observe the western blaze,

Who idly look to other skies,

Expecting life by other ways.

Amidst such boundless wealth without,

I only still am poor within,

The birds have sung their summer out,

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Henry David Thoreau

Within the Circuit of This Plodding Life

Within the Circuit of This Plodding Life

Within the circuit of this plodding life

There enter moments of an azure hue,

Untarnished fair as is the violet

Or anemone, when the spring strews them

By some meandering rivulet, which make

The best philosophy untrue that aims

But to console man for his grievances

I have remembered when the winter came,

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Henry David Thoreau

Sic Vita

Sic Vita

I am a parcel of vain strivings tied

By a chance bond together,

Dangling this way and that, their links

Were made so loose and wide,

Methinks,

For milder weather.

A bunch of violets without their roots,

And sorrel intermixed,

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Henry David Thoreau

Like A Soul

Like A Soul

Sending

In delinquency

To disappoint

The amber of water

At a high soul

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Henry David Thoreau

The Fisher’s Boy

The Fisher’s Boy

MY life is like a stroll upon the beach,

As near the ocean’s edge as I can go;

My tardy steps its waves sometimes o’erreach,

Sometimes I stay to let them overflow.

My sole employment is, and scrupulous care,

To place my gains beyond the reach of tides,—

Each smoother pebble, and each shell more rare,

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Henry David Thoreau

Men Say They Know Many Things

Men Say They Know Many Things

Men say they know many things;

But lo! they have taken wings, —

The arts and sciences,

And a thousand appliances;

The wind that blows

Is all that any body knows.

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Henry David Thoreau

Low-Anchored Cloud

Low-Anchored Cloud

Low-anchored cloud,

Newfoundland air,

Fountain-head and source of rivers,

Dew-cloth, dream-drapery,

And napkin spread by fays;

Drifting meadow of the air,

Where bloom the daisied banks and violets,

And in whose fenny labyrinth

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Henry David Thoreau

On Fields O'er Which The Reaper's Hand Has Pass'd

On Fields O'er Which The Reaper's Hand Has Pass'd

On fields o'er which the reaper's hand has pass'd

Lit by the harvest moon and autumn sun,

My thoughts like stubble floating in the wind

And of such fineness as October airs,

There after harvest could I glean my life

A richer harvest reaping without toil,

And weaving gorgeous fancies at my will

In subtler webs than finest summer haze.

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Henry David Thoreau