This is included for the benefit of
reciters and their audiences who have found the entire poem too long for
declamation.
reciters and their audiences who have found the entire poem too long for
declamation.
Wilde - Poems
_The author's name first appeared on the title-page of the Seventh
Edition_. _It was included in the Collected Edition of the author's
Poems published by Messrs. Methuen in 1908 and 1909_.
* * * * *
_Wilde's Poems were first published in volume form in 1881_, _and were
reprinted four times before the end of 1882_. _A new edition with
additional poems_, _including Ravenna_, _The Sphinx_, _and The Ballad of
Reading Gaol_, _was first published_ (_limited issues on hand-made paper
and Japanese vellum_) _by Methuen & Co. in March 1908_. _A further
edition_ (_making the seventh_) _with some omissions from the issue of
1908_, _but including two new poems_, _was published in September 1909_.
_Eighth Edition_, _November 1909_. _Ninth Edition_, _December 1909_.
PREFACE
IT is thought that a selection from Oscar Wilde's early verses may be of
interest to a large public at present familiar only with the always
popular _Ballad of Reading Gaol_, also included in this volume. The
poems were first collected by their author when he was twenty-sex years
old, and though never, until recently, well received by the critics, have
survived the test of NINE editions. Readers will be able to make for
themselves the obvious and striking contrasts between these first and
last phases of Oscar Wilde's literary activity. The intervening period
was devoted almost entirely to dramas, prose, fiction, essays, and
criticism.
ROBERT ROSS
REFORM CLUB,
_April_ 5, 1911.
CONTENTS
PAGE
PREFACE v
THE BALLAD OF READING GAOL (_Complete Version_) 1
THE BALLAD OF READING GAOL (_Shorter Version_) 61
AVE IMPERATRIX 89
TO MY WIFE (WITH A COPY OF MY POEMS) 100
MAGDALEN WALKS 102
THEOCRITUS--A VILLANELLE 106
SONNETS--
GREECE 108
PORTIA (TO ELLEN TERRY) 110
FABIEN DEI FRANCHI (TO HENRY IRVING) 112
PHEDRE (TO SARAH BERNHARDT) 114
ON HEARING THE DIES IRAE SUNG IN THE 116
SISTINE CHAPEL
AVE MARIA GRATIA PLENA 118
LIBERTATIS SACRA FAMES 120
ROSES AND RUE 122
FROM 'THE GARDEN OF EROS' 128
THE HARLOT'S HOUSE 140
FROM 'THE BURDEN OF ITYS' 144
FLOWER OF LOVE 158
NOTE
AT the end of the complete text will be found a shorter version based on
the original draft of the poem.
This is included for the benefit of
reciters and their audiences who have found the entire poem too long for
declamation. I have tried to obviate a difficulty, without officiously
exercising the ungrateful prerogatives of a literary executor, by falling
back on a text which represents the author's first scheme for a
poem--never intended of course for recitation.
ROBERT ROSS
* * * * *
IN MEMORIAM
C. T. W.
Sometimes trooper of
The Royal Horse Guards
Obiit H. M. Prison
Reading, Berkshire
July 7th, 1896
THE BALLAD OF READING GAOL
I
HE did not wear his scarlet coat,
For blood and wine are red,
And blood and wine were on his hands
When they found him with the dead,
The poor dead woman whom he loved,
And murdered in her bed.
He walked amongst the Trial Men
In a suit of shabby grey;
A cricket cap was on his head,
And his step seemed light and gay;
But I never saw a man who looked
So wistfully at the day.
I never saw a man who looked
With such a wistful eye
Upon that little tent of blue
Which prisoners call the sky,
And at every drifting cloud that went
With sails of silver by.
I walked, with other souls in pain,
Within another ring,
And was wondering if the man had done
A great or little thing,
When a voice behind me whispered low,
'_That fellow's got to swing_. '
Dear Christ! the very prison walls
Suddenly seemed to reel,
And the sky above my head became
Like a casque of scorching steel;
And, though I was a soul in pain,
My pain I could not feel.
I only knew what hunted thought
Quickened his step, and why
He looked upon the garish day
With such a wistful eye;
The man had killed the thing he loved,
And so he had to die.
Yet each man kills the thing he loves,
By each let this be heard,
Some do it with a bitter look,
Some with a flattering word,
The coward does it with a kiss,
The brave man with a sword!
Some kill their love when they are young,
And some when they are old;
Some strangle with the hands of Lust,
Some with the hands of Gold:
The kindest use a knife, because
The dead so soon grow cold.
Edition_. _It was included in the Collected Edition of the author's
Poems published by Messrs. Methuen in 1908 and 1909_.
* * * * *
_Wilde's Poems were first published in volume form in 1881_, _and were
reprinted four times before the end of 1882_. _A new edition with
additional poems_, _including Ravenna_, _The Sphinx_, _and The Ballad of
Reading Gaol_, _was first published_ (_limited issues on hand-made paper
and Japanese vellum_) _by Methuen & Co. in March 1908_. _A further
edition_ (_making the seventh_) _with some omissions from the issue of
1908_, _but including two new poems_, _was published in September 1909_.
_Eighth Edition_, _November 1909_. _Ninth Edition_, _December 1909_.
PREFACE
IT is thought that a selection from Oscar Wilde's early verses may be of
interest to a large public at present familiar only with the always
popular _Ballad of Reading Gaol_, also included in this volume. The
poems were first collected by their author when he was twenty-sex years
old, and though never, until recently, well received by the critics, have
survived the test of NINE editions. Readers will be able to make for
themselves the obvious and striking contrasts between these first and
last phases of Oscar Wilde's literary activity. The intervening period
was devoted almost entirely to dramas, prose, fiction, essays, and
criticism.
ROBERT ROSS
REFORM CLUB,
_April_ 5, 1911.
CONTENTS
PAGE
PREFACE v
THE BALLAD OF READING GAOL (_Complete Version_) 1
THE BALLAD OF READING GAOL (_Shorter Version_) 61
AVE IMPERATRIX 89
TO MY WIFE (WITH A COPY OF MY POEMS) 100
MAGDALEN WALKS 102
THEOCRITUS--A VILLANELLE 106
SONNETS--
GREECE 108
PORTIA (TO ELLEN TERRY) 110
FABIEN DEI FRANCHI (TO HENRY IRVING) 112
PHEDRE (TO SARAH BERNHARDT) 114
ON HEARING THE DIES IRAE SUNG IN THE 116
SISTINE CHAPEL
AVE MARIA GRATIA PLENA 118
LIBERTATIS SACRA FAMES 120
ROSES AND RUE 122
FROM 'THE GARDEN OF EROS' 128
THE HARLOT'S HOUSE 140
FROM 'THE BURDEN OF ITYS' 144
FLOWER OF LOVE 158
NOTE
AT the end of the complete text will be found a shorter version based on
the original draft of the poem.
This is included for the benefit of
reciters and their audiences who have found the entire poem too long for
declamation. I have tried to obviate a difficulty, without officiously
exercising the ungrateful prerogatives of a literary executor, by falling
back on a text which represents the author's first scheme for a
poem--never intended of course for recitation.
ROBERT ROSS
* * * * *
IN MEMORIAM
C. T. W.
Sometimes trooper of
The Royal Horse Guards
Obiit H. M. Prison
Reading, Berkshire
July 7th, 1896
THE BALLAD OF READING GAOL
I
HE did not wear his scarlet coat,
For blood and wine are red,
And blood and wine were on his hands
When they found him with the dead,
The poor dead woman whom he loved,
And murdered in her bed.
He walked amongst the Trial Men
In a suit of shabby grey;
A cricket cap was on his head,
And his step seemed light and gay;
But I never saw a man who looked
So wistfully at the day.
I never saw a man who looked
With such a wistful eye
Upon that little tent of blue
Which prisoners call the sky,
And at every drifting cloud that went
With sails of silver by.
I walked, with other souls in pain,
Within another ring,
And was wondering if the man had done
A great or little thing,
When a voice behind me whispered low,
'_That fellow's got to swing_. '
Dear Christ! the very prison walls
Suddenly seemed to reel,
And the sky above my head became
Like a casque of scorching steel;
And, though I was a soul in pain,
My pain I could not feel.
I only knew what hunted thought
Quickened his step, and why
He looked upon the garish day
With such a wistful eye;
The man had killed the thing he loved,
And so he had to die.
Yet each man kills the thing he loves,
By each let this be heard,
Some do it with a bitter look,
Some with a flattering word,
The coward does it with a kiss,
The brave man with a sword!
Some kill their love when they are young,
And some when they are old;
Some strangle with the hands of Lust,
Some with the hands of Gold:
The kindest use a knife, because
The dead so soon grow cold.
