Oscar Wilde

The sea was sapphire coloured, and the
Burned like a heated opal through the air;
We hoisted sail; the wind was blowing
For the blue lands that to the eastward lie

HE wild bee reels from bough to bough With his furry coat and his gauzy wing
Now in a lily-cup, and now Setting a jacinth bell a-swing, In his wandering; Sit closer love: it was here I trow I made that vow, Swore that two lives should be like...

ME down,
O Christ, and help me
reach thy hand,            For I am drowning in a stormier sea            Than Simon on thy lake of Galilee:
The wine of life is spilt upon the sand,

In the glad springtime when leaves were green,
O merrily the throstle sings
I sought, amid the tangled sheen,
Love whom mine eyes had never seen,

IT is full Winter now: the trees are bare, Save where the cattle huddle from the cold Beneath the pine, for it doth never wear The Autumn's gaudy livery whose gold Her jealous brother pilfers, but is true To the green doublet; bitter is the wind, ...

The seasons send their ruin as they go,
For in the spring the narciss shows its
Nor withers till the rose has flamed to red,
And in the autumn purple violets blow,

To drift with every passion till my soul Is a stringed lute on which all winds can play,
Is it for this that I have given away Mine ancient wisdom, and austere control
- Methinks my life is a twice-written scroll Scrawled over on some bo...

A
NG of gold and a milk-white dove Are goodly gifts for thee, And a hempen rope for your own love To hang upon a tree
For you a House of Ivory (Roses are white in the rose-bower)
A narrow bed for me to lie (White,...

OR
IC
)
HE apple trees are hung with gold, And birds are loud in Arcady, The sheep lie bleating in the fold, The wild goat runs across the wold, But yesterday his love he told, I know he will come back to me...

WO crownèd Kings, and One that stood alone With no green weight of laurels round his head, But with sad eyes as one uncomforted, And wearied with man's never-ceasing moan For sins no bleating victim can atone, And sweet long lips with tears and ki...

HE was a Grecian lad, who coming home With pulpy figs and wine from Sicily Stood at his galley's prow, and let the foam Blow through his crisp brown curls unconsciously, And holding wave and wind in boy's despite Peered from his dripping seat acro...

Sweet,
I blame you not, for mine the fault was, had I not been made of common clayI had climbed the higher heights unclimbed yet, seen the fuller air, the larger day
From the wildness of my wasted passion I had struck a better, clearer s...