William Ernest Henley London Poems

Out of the poisonous East,
Over a continent of blight,
Like a maleficent Influence released
From the most squalid cellerage of hell,
...

There's never a delicate nurseling of the year
But our huge London hails it, and delights
To wear it on her breast or at her ear,
...

Take any station, pavement, circus, corner,
...

He's called The General from the brazen craft
And dash with which he sneaks a bit of road
And all its fares; challenged, or chafed, or chaffed,
...

So went our boys when Edward Sixth, the King,
Chartered Christ's Hospital, and died. And so
Full fifteen generations in a string
...

Far out of bounds he'd figured-in a race
Of West-End traffic pitching to his loss.
...

Who says Drum-Major says a man of mould,
Shaking the meek earth with tremendous tread,
And pacing still, a triumph to behold,
...

Army Reserve; a worshipper of Bobs,
With whom he stripped the smock from Candahar;
Neat as his mount, that neatest among cobs;
...

An ill March noon; the flagstones gray with dust;
An all-round east wind volleying straws and grit;
...

Time, the old humourist, has a trick to-day
Of moving landmarks and of levelling down,
Till into Town the Suburbs edge their way,
...

'Liza's old man's perhaps a little shady,
'Liza's old woman's prone to booze and cring;
But 'Liza deems herself a perfect lady,
...

The Artist muses at his ease,
Contented that his work is done,
And smiling-smiling!-as he sees
...

Joy of the Milliner, Envy of the Line,
Star of the Parks, jack-booted, sworded, helmed,
He sits between his holsters, solid of spine;
...

His beat lies knee-high through a dust of story-
A dust of terror and torture, grief and crime;
...