Holidays

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Ralph Waldo Emerson
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Emerson Poems: A-C
Emerson Poems: D-G
Emerson Poems: H-O
Emerson Poems: P-Z

Hamatreya
Hermione
Holidays
The House
The Humblebee
Initial Love
Loss and Gain
Merlin I
Merlin II
Merops
Mithridates
Monadnoc
Musketaquid
Ode to William H. Channing
Ode To Beauty

Texts : Early Emerson Poems : Emerson Poems: H-O : HOLIDAYS

Holidays

From fall to spring the russet acorn,
Fruit beloved of maid and boy,
Lent itself beneath the forest
To be the children's toy.

Pluck it now; in vain: thou canst not,
Its root has pierced yon shady mound,
Toy no longer, it has duties;
It is anchored in the ground.

Year by year the rose-lipped maiden,
Play-fellow of young and old,
Was frolic sunshine, dear to all men,
More dear to one than mines of gold.

Whither went the lovely hoyden?—
Disappeared in blessed wife,
Servant to a wooden cradle,
Living in a baby's life.

Still thou playest;— short vacation
Fate grants each to stand aside;
Now must thou be man and artist;
'Tis the turning of the tide.

from: Emerson, Ralph Waldo.  Early Poems of Ralph Waldo Emerson. New York, Boston, Thomas Y. Crowell & Company: 1899. Introduction by Nathan Haskell Dole. 

[ Home ] [ Up ] [ Hamatreya ] [ Hermione ] [ Holidays ] [ The House ] [ The Humblebee ] [ Initial Love ] [ Loss and Gain ] [ Merlin I ] [ Merlin II ] [ Merops ] [ Mithridates ] [ Monadnoc ] [ Musketaquid ] [ Ode to William H. Channing ] [ Ode To Beauty ] [ Emerson Poems: A-C ] [ Emerson Poems: D-G ] [ Emerson Poems: H-O ] [ Emerson Poems: P-Z ]