John Clare Quotes

1793–1864 England

John Clare (13 July 1793 – 20 May 1864) was an English poet, commonly known as "the Northamptonshire Peasant Poet". The son of a farm labourer, he was born at Helpston near Peterborough.

England
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Random John Clare quote

19 quotes

The riddle nature could not prove
Was nothing else but secret love.

Arts may ply fantastic anatomy but nature is always herself in her wildest moods of extravagence.

The ivyed oaks dark shadow falls
Oft picking up with wondering gaze
Some little thing of other days
Saved from the wreck of time.

And don't despise your betters cause they're old.

Throw not my words away, as many do;
They're gold in value, though they're cheap to you.

Superstition lives longer than books, it is engraved on the human mind 'til it becomes a part of its existence.

Popularity of Authorship (1824)

E'en 'plaining flies to thee have spoke,
Poor trifles as they be;
And oft the spider's web thou'st broke,
To set the captive free.

And what is Life? — An hour-glass on the run

And what's more wonderful, when big loads foil
One ant or two to carry, quickly then
A swarm flock round to help their fellow-men.

To-morrow comes, true copy of to-day,
And empty shadow of what is to be;
Yet cheated Hope on future still depends,
And ends but only when our being ends.

Then what is Life?—When stripp'd of its disguise,
A thing to be desir'd it cannot be;
Since every thing that meets our foolish eyes
Gives proof sufficient of its vanity.

Fashion is her favourite disciple.

Popularity of Authorship (1824)

This world has suns, but they are overcast;
This world has sweets, but they're of ling'ring bloom;
Life still expects, and empty falls at last;
Warm Hope on tiptoe drops into the tomb.

O how I feel, just as I pluck the flower
And stick it to my breast — words can't reveal;
But there are souls that in this lovely hour
Know all I mean, and feel whate'er I feel.

Popularity of Authorship (1824)

When trouble haunts me, need I sigh?
No, rather smile away despair

I love to see the old heath's withered brake
Mingle its crimpled leaves with furze and ling,
While the old heron from the lonely lake
Starts slow and flaps its melancholy wing

None but imprison’d children now
Are seen, where dames with angry brow
Threaten each younker to his seat,
Who through the window, eyes the street;
Or from his horn-book turns away,
To mourn for liberty and play.

The Shephard’s Calendar (1827)

I am: yet what I am none cares or knows,
My friends forsake me like a memory lost:
I am the self-consumer of my woes,
They rise and vanish in oblivious host,
Like shades in love and death's oblivion lost:
And yet I am, and live with shadows tost

Attribution

Quotes and notes from Wikiquote: John Clare (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0.