Athlete Dying Young The time you won your town the race We chaired you through the market-place; Man and boy stood cheering by, And home we brought you shoulder-high. s Today, the road all runners come, Shoulder-high we bring you home, And set you at your threshold down, Townsman of a stiller town. 10Smart lad, to slip betimes away From fields where glory does not stay, And early though the laurel1 grows It withers quicker than the rose. Eyes the shady night has shut Cannot see the record cut,? broken 1. In ancient Greece and Rome victorious athletes were crowned with laurel wreaths.
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1950 / A. E. HOUSMAN
IS And silence sounds no worse than cheers After earth has stopped the ears: 20Now you will not swell the rout? Of lads that wore their honours out, Runners whom renown outran And the name died before the man. crcnvd
So set, before its echoes fade, The fleet foot on the sill of shade, And hold to the low lintel up The still- defended challenge-cup.
25 And round that early laurelled head Will flock to gaze the strengthless dead And find unwithered on its curls The garland briefer than a girl's.
1896
Terence,' This Is Stupid Stuff
'Terence, this is stupid stuff: You eat your victuals fast enough; There can't be much amiss, 'tis clear, To see the rate you drink your beer,
s But oh, good Lord, the verse you make, It gives a chap the belly-ache. The cow, the old cow, she is dead; It sleeps well, the horned head: We poor lads, 'tis our turn now
10 To hear such tunes as killed the cow. Pretty friendship 'tis to rhyme Your friends to death before their time Moping melancholy mad: Come, pipe a tune to dance to, lad.'
15 Why, if 'tis dancing you would be, There's brisker pipes than poetry. Say, for what were hop-yards meant, Or why was Burton built on Trent?2 Oh many a peer3 of England brews
20 Livelier liquor than the Muse, And malt does more than Milton can To justify God's ways to man.4 Ale, man, ale's the stuff to drink For fellows whom it hurts to think:
1. The Poems of Terence Hearsay was Housman's 3. A reference to the 'beer barons,' brewery mag- intended title for The Shropshire Lad. nates raised to the peerage (i.e., made nobles). 2. Burton-on-Trent is the most famous of all 4. Cf. Milton's promise in Paradise Lost (1.17-26) English brewing towns. to 'justify the ways of God to men.'
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TERENCE , THI S I S STUPI D STUF F / 195 1 25 Look into the pewter pot To see the world as the world's not. And faith, 'tis pleasant till 'tis past: The mischief is that 'twill not last. Oh I have been to Ludlow5 fair 30 And left my necktie God knows where, And carried half-way home, or near, Pints and quarts of Ludlow beer: Then the world seemed none so bad, And I myself a sterling lad; 35 And down in lovely muck I've lain, Happy till I woke again. Then I saw the morning sky: Heigho, the tale was all a lie; The world, it was the old world yet, 40 I was I, my things were wet, And nothing now remained to do But begin the game anew. Therefore, since the world has still Much good, but much less good than ill, 45 And while the sun and moon endure Luck's a chance, but trouble's sure, I'd face it as a wise man would, And train for ill and not for good. 'Tis true the stuff I bring for sale 50 Is not so brisk a brew as ale: Out of a stem that scored' the hand cut I wrung it in a weary land. But take it: if the smack is sour, The better for the embittered hour; 55 It should do good to heart and head When your soul is in my soul's stead; And I will friend you, if I may, In the dark and cloudy day. There was a king reigned in the East: 60 There, when kings will sit to feast, They get their fill before they think With poisoned meat and poisoned drink. He gathered all that springs to birth From the many-venomed earth; 65 First a little, thence to more, He sampled all her killing store; And easy, smiling, seasoned sound, Sate the king when healths went round. They put arsenic in his meat 70 And stared aghast to watch him eat; They poured strychnine in his cup And shook to see him drink it up: They shook, they stared as white's their shirt: 5. A market town in Shropshire.
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1952 / A. E. HOUSMAN
Them it was their poison hurt. 75 ?I tell the tale that I heard told. Mithridates, he died old.6
1896
The Chestnut Casts His Flambeaux'
The chestnut casts his flambeaux, and the flowers Stream from the hawthorn in the wind away, The doors clap to, the pane is blind with showers.
Pass me the can,' lad; there's an end of May. tankard
5 There's one spoilt spring to scant our mortal lot, One season ruined of our little store. May will be fine next year as like as not: Oh ay, but then we shall be twenty-four.
We for a certainty are not the first 10 Have sat in taverns while the tempest hurled Their hopeful plans to emptiness, and cursed Whatever brute and blackguard made the world.
It is in truth iniquity on high To cheat our sentenced souls of aught they crave, 15 And mar the merriment as you and I Fare on our long fool's-errand to the grave.
Iniquity it is; but pass the can. My lad, no pair of kings our mothers bore; Our only portion is the estate of man: 20 We want the moon, but we shall get no more.
If here today the cloud of thunder lours0 looks threatening Tomorrow it will hie? on far behests;0 go quickly / commands The flesh will grieve on other bones than ours Soon, and the soul will mourn in other breasts.
25 The troubles of our proud and angry dust Are from eternity, and shall not fail. Bear them we can, and if we can we must. Shoulder the sky, my lad, and drink your ale.
6. The story of Mithridates, king of Pontus, who 1. Literally, torches. Housman here refers to the made himself immune to poison by taking small erect flower clusters (white, dashed with red and doses daily, is told in
