Francis Thompson
Francis Thompson
Francis Thompsonwas an English poet and ascetic. After attending college, he moved to London to become a writer, but could only find menial work and became addicted to opium, and was a street vagrant for years. A married couple read his poetry and rescued him, publishing his first book Poems in 1893. Thompson lived as an unbalanced invalid in Wales and at Storrington, but wrote three books of poetry, with other works and essays, before dying of tuberculosis in 1907...
NationalityEnglish
ProfessionPoet
Date of Birth16 December 1859
pain ends born
Nothing begins, and nothing ends, That is not paid with moan; For we are born in others pain And perish in our own.
family mother loneliness
The desolation and terror of, for the first time, realizing that the mother can lose you, or you her, and your own abysmal loneliness and helplessness without her.
jesus heaven littles
Little Jesus, was Thou shy Once, and just so small as I? And what did it feel like to be Out of Heaven, and just like me?
heaven looks nursery
Look for me in the nurseries of Heaven.
moving moon shining
The innocent moon, that nothing does but shine,Moves all the labouring surges of the world.
spring home feet
Spring is come home with her world-wandering feet, And all things are made young with your desires.
men paradise may
There is no expeditious road To pack and label men for God, And save them by the barrel-load. Some may perchance, with strange surprise, Have blundered into Paradise.
serenity gold thrones
But lilies, stolen from grassy mold, No more curled state unfold, Translated to a vase of gold; In burning throne though they keep still Serenities unthawed and chill.
mother baby earth
Baby smiled, mother wailed, Earthward while the sweetling sailed; Mother smiled, baby wailed, When to earth came Viola.
essence simplicity soul
So for thy spirit did devise Its Maker seemly garniture, Of its own essence parcel pure.-- From grave simplicities a dress, And reticent demureness, And love encinctured with reserve; Which the woven vesture would subserve. For outward robes in their ostents Should show the soul's habiliments. Therefore I say,--Thou'rt fair even so, But better Fair I use to know.
baby development growing
Babies breathe a lot more rapidly than adults do, and what's more, they're also growing quickly and so they're absorbing lots more into the body and they're more fragile in terms of development and so on.
summer wine flames
Summer set lip to earth's bosom bare, And left the flushed print in a poppy there: Like a yawn of fire from the grass it came, And the fanning wind puffed it to flapping flame. With burnt mouth red like a lion's it drank The blood of the sun as he slaughtered sank, And dipped its cup in the purpurate shine When the eastern conduits ran with wine.
devil howl know-how
The devil doesn't know how to sing, only how to howl.
stars flower power
All things by immortal power. Near of far, to each other linked are, that thou canst not stir a flower without troubling of a star.