A. E. Housman
A. E. Housman
Alfred Edward Housman, usually known as A. E. Housman, was an English classical scholar and poet, best known to the general public for his cycle of poems A Shropshire Lad. Lyrical and almost epigrammatic in form, the poems wistfully evoke the dooms and disappointments of youth in the English countryside. Their beauty, simplicity and distinctive imagery appealed strongly to late Victorian and Edwardian taste, and to many early 20th-century English composers both before and after the First World War. Through...
NationalityEnglish
ProfessionPoet
Date of Birth26 March 1859
The house of delusions is cheap to build but drafty to live in.
All knowledge is precious whether or not it serves the slightest human use.
That is the land of lost content, I see it shining plain, the happy highways where I went and cannot come again.
Lovers lying two and two Ask not whom they sleep beside, And the bridegroom all night through Never turns him to the bride.
The bells they sound on Bredon, And still the steeples hum. "Come all to church, good people"- Oh, noisy bells, be dumb; I hear you, I will come.
Tomorrow, more's the pity, Away we both must hie, To air the ditty and to earth I.
There, like the wind through woods in riot, Through him the gale of life blew high; The tree of man was never quiet: Then 'twas the Roman, now 'tis I.
Oh who is that young sinner with the handcuffs on his wrist? And what has he been after that they groan and shake their fists? And wherefore is he wearing such a conscience-stricken air? Oh they're taking him to prison for the colour of his hair.
Earth and high heaven are fixed of old and founded strong.
Good night; ensured release, Imperishable peace, Have these for yours. * While sky and sea and land And earth's foundations stand And heaven endures. *These three lines are on the tablet over Housman's grave in the parish church at Ludlow, Shropshire, England
But men at whiles are sober And think by fits and starts. And if they think, they fasten Their hands upon their hearts
The rainy Pleiads wester Orion plunges prone, And midnight strikes and hastens, And I lie down alone.
The fairies break their dances And leave the printed lawn.
When the journey's over/There'll be time enough to sleep.