46 quotes
A Low Church mouse, who thinks that I
Am too papistical, and High.
The test of an abstract picture, for me, is not my first reaction to it, but how long I can stand it hanging on the wall of a room where I am living.
Sing on, with hymns uproarious,
Ye humble and aloof,
Look up! and oh how glorious
He has restored the roof!
Mount Zion (1931)
A large and most unfriendly rat
Comes in to see what we are at.
He says he thinks there is no God
And yet he comes... it’s rather odd.
No hope. And the X-ray photographs under his arm
Confirm the message. His wife stands timidly by.
The opposite brick-built house looks lofty and calm,
Its chimneys steady against the mackerel sky.
A Few Late Chrysanthemums (1954)
Broad of Church and ‘broad of Mind’,
Broad before and broad behind,
A keen ecclesiologist,
A rather dirty Wykehamist.
Mount Zion (1931)
But I'm dying now and done for,
What on earth was all the fun for?
I am ill and old and terrified and tight.
A Few Late Chrysanthemums (1954)
Milk and then just as it comes dear?
I’m afraid the preserve’s full of stones;
Beg pardon, I’m soiling the doileys
With afternoon tea-cakes and scones.
A Few Late Chrysanthemums (1954)
The Church’s Restoration
In eighteen-eighty-three
Has left for contemplation
Not what there used to be.
Mount Zion (1931)
In the Garden City Café with its murals on the wall
Before a talk on "Sex and Civics" I meditated on the Fall.
A Few Late Chrysanthemums (1954)
Phone for the fish-knives, Norman
As Cook is a little unnerved;
You kiddies have crumpled the serviettes
And I must have things daintily served.
A Few Late Chrysanthemums (1954)
Oh shall I see the Thames again?
The prow-promoted gems again,
As beefy ATS
Without their hats
Come shooting through the bridge?
And "cheerioh" and "cheeri-bye"
Across the waste of waters die,
And low the mists of evening lie
And lightly skims the midge.
New Bats in Old Belfries (1945)
We sat in the car park till twenty to one
And now I'm engaged to Miss Joan Hunter Dunn.
New Bats in Old Belfries (1945)
Yes, I haven't had enough sex.
Whist upon whist upon whist upon whist drive, in Institute, Legion and Social Club.
Horny hands that hold the aces which this morning held the plough.
Continual Dew (1937)
Pam, I adore you, Pam, you great big mountainous sports girl,
Whizzing them over the net, full of the strength of five:
That old Malvernian brother, you zephyr and khaki shorts girl,
Although he’s playing for Woking, can’t stand up to your wonderful backhand drive.
Old Lights for New Chancels (1940)
The old Great Western Railway shakes,
The old Great Western Railway spins;
The old Great Western Railway makes
Me very sorry for my sins.
Collected Poems (1958)
No love that in a family dwells,
No carolling in frosty air,
Nor all the steeple-shaking bells
Can with this single Truth compare—
That God was man in Palestine
And lives to-day in Bread and Wine.
A Few Late Chrysanthemums (1954)
In the licorice fields at Pontefract
My love and I did meet
And many a burdened licorice bush
Was blooming round our feet;
Red hair she had and golden skin,
Her sulky lips were shaped for sin,
Her sturdy legs were flannel-slack'd
The strongest legs in Pontefract.
A Few Late Chrysanthemums (1954)
And is it true? And is it true,
This most tremendous tale of all,
Seen in a stained-glass window's hue,
A Baby in an in ox's stall?
The Maker of the stars and sea
Became a Child on earth for me?