Mane's Musings

A Noiseless Patient Spider                                                            BY WALT WHITMAN "A Noiseless Patient Spider" is a short poem by Walt Whitman , published in an 1891 edition of Leaves of Grass . It was originally part of his poem "Whispers of Heavenly Death" , written expressly for  The Broadw ay, A London Magazine, issue 10 (October 1868), numbered as stanza "3" . It was retitled "A Noiseless  Patient Spider" and reprinted as part of a larger cluster in Passage to India (1871).   A noiseless patient spider,   I mark’d where on a little promontory it stood isolated,   Mark’d how to explore the vacant vast surrounding,   It launch’d forth filament, filament, filament, out of itself,   Ever unreeling them, ever tirelessly speeding them.   And ...

A Prayer for My Daughter                                                                                 BY WILLIAM BUTLER YEATS Once more the storm is howling, and half hid    Under this cradle-hood and coverlid    My child sleeps on. There is no obstacle    But Gregory's Wood and one bare hill    Whereby the haystack and roof-levelling wind,    Bred on the Atlantic, can be stayed;    And for an hour I have walked and prayed    Because of the great gloom that is in my mind. I have walked and prayed for this young child an hour, And heard the sea-wind scream upon the tower, And under the arches of the bridge, and scream In the elms above the flooded stream; Imagining in excited reverie Th...

Because I could not stop for Death  Launch Audio in a New Window                                                                                BY  EMILY DICKINSON Because I could not stop for Death – He kindly stopped for me – The Carriage held but just Ourselves – And Immortality. We slowly drove – He knew no haste And I had put away My labor and my leisure too, For His Civility – We passed the School, where Children strove At Recess – in the Ring – We passed the Fields of Gazing Grain – We passed the Setting Sun – Or rather – He passed Us – The Dews drew quivering and Chill – For only Gossamer, my Gown – My Tippet – only Tulle – We paused before a House that seemed A Swelling of the Ground – The Roof was scarcely v...