Poems by Phillis Wheatley

All Poems Original Poems Translations

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To a Clergyman on the Death of His Lady

Where contemplation finds her sacred spring,

Where heav'nly music makes the arches ring,

Where virtue reigns unsully'd and divine,

Where wisdom thron'd, and all the graces shine,

There sits thy spouse amidst the radiant throng,

While praise eternal warbles from her tongue;

There choirs angelic shout her welcome round,

With perfect bliss, and peerless glory crown'd.

by Phillis Wheatley

To Captain H---d, of the 65th Regiment

Say, muse divine, can hostile scenes delight

The warrior's bosom in the fields of fight?

Lo! here the christian and the hero join

With mutual grace to form the man divine.

In H——-D see with pleasure and surprise,

Where valour kindles, and where virtue lies:

Go, hero brave, still grace the post of fame,

And add new glories to thine honour'd name,

by Phillis Wheatley

Isaiah LXIII

Say, heav'nly muse, what king or mighty God,

That moves sublime from Idumea's road?

In Bosrah's dies, with martial glories join'd,

His purple vesture waves upon the wind.

Why thus enrob'd delights he to appear

In the dread image of the Pow'r of war?

Compres'd in wrath the swelling wine-press groan'd,

It bled, and pour'd the gushing purple round.

by Phillis Wheatley

On the Death of a Young Gentleman

Who taught thee conflict with the pow'rs of night,

To vanquish satan in the fields of light?

Who strung thy feeble arms with might unknown,

How great thy conquest, and how bright thy crown!

War with each princedom, throne, and pow'r is o'er,

The scene is ended to return no more.

O could my muse thy seat on high behold,

How deckt with laurel, how enrich'd with gold!

by Phillis Wheatley

An Answer To The Rebus, By The Author Of These Poems

The poet asks, and Phillis can't refuse

To show th' obedience of the Infant muse.

She knows the Quail of most inviting taste

Fed Israel's army in the dreary waste;

And what's on Britain's royal standard borne,

But the tall, graceful, rampant Unicorn?

The Emerald with a vivid verdure glows

Among the gems which regal crowns compose;

by Phillis Wheatley

To the Right Honourable William, Earl of Dartmouth

Hail, happy day, when, smiling like the morn,

Fair Freedom rose New-England to adorn:

The northern clime beneath her genial ray,

Dartmouth, congratulates thy blissful sway:

Elate with hope her race no longer mourns,

Each soul expands, each grateful bosom burns,

While in thine hand with pleasure we behold

The silken reins, and Freedom's charms unfold.

by Phillis Wheatley

To SM a Young African Painter

To show the lab'ring bosom's deep intent,

And thought in living characters to paint,

When first thy pencil did those beauties give,

And breathing figures learnt from thee to live,

How did those prospects give my soul delight,

A new creation rushing on my sight?

Still, wond'rous youth! each noble path pursue,

On deathless glories fix thine ardent view:

by Phillis Wheatley

On The Death Of A Young Lady Of Five Years Of Age

From dark abodes to fair etherial light

Th' enraptur'd innocent has wing'd her flight;

On the kind bosom of eternal love

She finds unknown beatitude above.

This known, ye parents, nor her loss deplore,

She feels the iron hand of pain no more;

The dispensations of unerring grace,

Should turn your sorrows into grateful praise;

by Phillis Wheatley

On The Death of The Rev'd Dr Sewall

E'er yet the morning heav'd its Orient head

Behold him praising with the happy dead.

Hail! happy Saint, on the immortal Shore.

We hear thy warnings and advice no more:

Then let each one behold with wishful eyes

The saint ascending to his native Skies,

From hence the Prophet wing'd his rapturous way

To mansions pure, to fair celestial day. —

by Phillis Wheatley

To a Gentleman and Lady on the Death of the Lady's Brother and Sister

On Death's domain intent I fix my eyes,

Where human nature in vast ruin lies,

With pensive mind I search the drear abode,

Where the great conqu'ror has his spoils bestow'd;

There there the offspring of six thousand years

In endless numbers to my view appears:

Whole kingdoms in his gloomy den are thrust,

And nations mix with their primeval dust:

by Phillis Wheatley

On Recollection

Mneme begin. Inspire, ye sacred nine,

Your vent'rous Afric in her great design.

Mneme, immortal pow'r, I trace thy spring:

Assist my strains, while I thy glories sing:

The acts of long departed years, by thee

Recover'd, in due order rang'd we see:

Thy pow'r the long-forgotten calls from night,

That sweetly plays before the fancy's sight.

by Phillis Wheatley

A Funeral Poem On The Death Of C E An Infant Of Twelve Months

Through airy roads he wings his instant flight

To purer regions of celestial light;

Enlarg'd he sees unnumber'd systems roll,

Beneath him sees the universal whole,

Planets on planets run their destin'd round,

And circling wonders fill the vast profound.

Th' ethereal now, and now th' empyreal skies

With growing splendors strike his wond'ring eyes:

by Phillis Wheatley