Robert Pollok

Robert Pollok Poems

Robert Pollok Biography

Robert Pollok (c. 1798 – 15 September 1827) was a Scottish poet best known for The Course of Time, published the year of his death. Pollok was born at North Moorhouse Farm, Loganswell Renfrewshire, Scotland. Sources differ on the exact year of his birth, some giving 1789, some 1798, and some 1799. He studied at the University of Glasgow for the ministry of the United Secession Church. During this time, he anonymously published three poems: Helen of the Glen, The Persecuted Family, and Ralph Gemmell. After Pollok's death, these would be published together under his name as Tales of the Covenanters. In 1827, shortly before leaving the University, Pollok published what was to be his final and most famous work: The Course of Time, a ten-book poem in blank verse. By its fourth edition, The Course of Time had sold 78,000 copies and was popular as far away as North America. Later that year, suffering from tuberculosis, Pollok was advised by his doctors to travel to Italy. He left Scotland with this intention, but his health worsened rapidly, and he died at Shirley (at that time near, and now a part of Southampton) on the 15th of September. He was buried in the nearby churchyard of St Nicholas, Millbrook. When the church was demolished, his memorial obelisk was removed and now stands in the grounds of Holy Trinity Church, Millbrook. Another monument to Pollok stands in Newton Mearns, Scotland, at the junction of the Glasgow/Ayr Road and the Old Mearns Road. It was unveiled on September 24, 1900, and bears the inscription "Robert Pollok, Author of 'The Course of Time' / Born 1798 Died 1827 / He soared untrodden heights and seemed at home".)

The Best Poem Of Robert Pollok

Native Scenery

Nor do I of that isle remember aught
Of prospect more sublime and beautiful.
Than Scotia's northern battlement of hills,
Which first I from my father's house beheld,
At dawn of life; beloved in memory still,
And standard still of rural imagery.
What most resembles them the fairest seems,
And stirs the eldest sentiments of bliss;
And, pictured on the tablet of my heart,
Their distant shapes eternally remain,
And in my dreams their cloudy tops arise.

----- Four trees I pass not by,
Which o'er our house their evening shadow threw;
Three ash, and one of elm. Tall trees they were,
And old, and had been old a century
Before my day. None living could say aught
About their youth; but they were goodly trees;
And oft I wondered, as I sat and thought
Beneath their summer shade, or, in the night
Of winter, heard the spirits of the wind
Growling among their boughs,-- how they had grown
So high, in such a rough tempestuous place;
And when a harmless branch, torn by the blast,
Fell down, I mourned, as if a friend had fallen.

These I distinctly hold in memory still,
And all the desert scenery around.
Nor strange, that recollection there should dwell,
Where first I heard of God's redeeming love;
First felt and reasoned, loved and was beloved;
And first awoke the harp to holy song:

To hoar and green there was enough of joy.
Hopes, friendships, charities, and warm pursuit,
Gave comfortable flow to youthful blood.
And there were old remembrances of days,
When, on the glittering dews of orient life,
Shone sunshine hopes, unfailed, unperjured then:
And there were spots, and earnest vows of love,
Uttered, when passion's boisterous tide ran high,
Sincerely uttered, though but seldom kept:
And there were angel looks, and sacred hours
Of rapture, hours that in a moment passed,
And yet were wished to last for evermore;
And venturous exploits, and hardy deeds,
And bargains shrewd, achieved in manhood's prime;
And thousand recollections, gay and sweet.

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