Emerson

THIS IS A BORZOI BOOK

PUBLISHED BY ALFRED A. KNOPF

This selection by Peter Washington first published in
Everyman’s Library, 2004
Copyright © 2004 by Everyman’s Library

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright
Conventions. Published in the United States by Alfred A. Knopf, a division of Random House, Inc., New York, and simultaneously in Canada by Random House of Canada Limited, Toronto. Distributed by Random House, Inc., New York. Published in the United Kingdom by Everyman’s Library, Northburgh House, 10 Northburgh Street, London EC1V 0AT. Distributed by Random House (UK) Ltd.

US website: www.randomhouse.com/everymans

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Emerson, Ralph Waldo, 1803-1882.

[Poems. Selections]
Emerson : poems / edited by Peter Washington.
p. cm.—(Everyman’s library pocket poets)
eISBN: 978-0-307-82362-5
I. Washington, Peter. II. Title. III. Series.

PS1624.A1 2004

2004046913

811′.3—dc22

v3.1

CONTENTS

Cover

Title Page

Copyright

From POEMS (1847)

The Rhodora

The Humble-Bee

Fable

Astræa

Etienne de la Boéce

Suum Cuique

Compensation

Forbearance

Berrying

Thine Eyes Still Shined

Eros

Loss and Gain

Hamatreya

The Snow-Storm

Painting and Sculpture

Holidays

From the Persian of Hafiz

Ghaselle

Xenophanes

The Day’s Ration

Blight

Musketaquid

Hymn (‘By the rude bridge that arched the flood’)

The Sphinx

Each and All

The Problem

To Rhea

The Visit

Uriel

The World-Soul

From MAY-DAY AND OTHER PIECES (1867)

Brahma

Nemesis

Fate

Freedom

Ode Sung in the Town Hall

Boston Hymn

Love and Thought

Lover’s Petition

Una

Letters

Rubies

Merlin’s Song

The Test

Nature I

Nature II

The Romany Girl

My Garden

The Titmouse

Days

Sea-Shore

Two Rivers

Waldeinsamkeit

Terminus

The Past

Experience

Compensation

Culture

Politics

Heroism

Character

Friendship

Beauty

Manners

Art

Spiritual Laws

Unity

Worship

Quatrains

From SELECTED POEMS (1876)

The Nun’s Aspiration

Hymn (‘We love the venerable house’)

Cupido

Boston

Silence

The Three Dimensions

Motto to ‘The Poet’

Motto to ‘Gifts’

Motto to ‘Nature’

Motto to ‘Nominalist and Realist’

Motto to ‘History’

South Wind

From THE UNPUBLISHED POEMS

‘William does thy frigid soul’

‘Perhaps thy lot in life is higher’

Song

‘I spread my gorgeous sail’

‘O what is Heaven but the fellowship’

‘Ah strange strange strange’

‘See yonder leafless trees against the sky’

‘Do that which you can do’

‘Few are free’

Van Buren

The Future

Rex

‘And when I am entombed in my place’

‘Bard or dunce is blest, but hard’

‘It takes philosopher or fool’

‘Tell men what they knew before’

‘I use the knife’

‘There is no evil but can speak’

‘The sea reflects the rosy sky’

‘In this sour world, O summerwind’

‘Look danger in the eye it vanishes’

‘As I walked in the wood’

‘I sat upon the ground’

‘Good Charles the spring’s adorer’

‘Around the man who seeks a noble end’

‘In the deep heart of man a poet dwells’

‘O what are heroes prophets men’

‘Yet sometime to the sorrow stricken’

The Bohemian Hymn

‘Kind & holy were the words’

‘Divine Inviters! I accept’

‘Go if thou wilt ambrosial Flower’