Poetry Codex

Modern

Hilaire Belloc

1870–1953

Hilaire Belloc (1870–1953) was a French-born English writer and Liberal MP, educated at Balliol College, Oxford, who wrote history, travel books, essays, novels and verse. He was a close friend of G. K. Chesterton, and a Catholic apologist.

His verse, from Verses and Sonnets (1896) and Verses (1910), ranges from serious lyrics of Sussex and of faith to comic and satirical ballads such as the “Dedicatory Ode” and “Lines to a Don.” The Cautionary Tales and Bad Child’s Book of Beasts are his best-known children’s verse.

Poems (181)

  1. To Dives
  2. Stanzas Written on Battersea Bridge during a South-Westerly Gale
  3. The South Country
  4. Noël
  5. The Birds
  6. Our Lord and Our Lady
  7. Courtesy
  8. The Night
  9. To the Balliol Men Still in Africa
  10. The Rebel
  11. Auvergnat
  12. Drinking Dirge
  13. West Sussex Drinking Song
  14. A Ballad on Sociological Economics
  15. Heretics All
  16. The Death and Last Confession of Wandering Peter
  17. Dedicatory Ode
  18. Dedication on the Gift of a Book to a Child
  19. Fille-la-Haine
  20. The Moon's Funeral
  21. The Happy Journalist
  22. Lines to a Don
  23. The Yellow Mustard
  24. On Hygiene
  25. The Politician; or, the Irish Earldom
  26. Short Ballad and Postscript on Consols
  27. Love and Honour
  28. Her Music
  29. The Poor of London
  30. The Justice of the Peace
  31. Her Youth
  32. A Moral Alphabet: A
  33. A Moral Alphabet: B
  34. A Moral Alphabet: C
  35. A Moral Alphabet: D
  36. A Moral Alphabet: E
  37. A Moral Alphabet: F
  38. A Moral Alphabet: G
  39. A Moral Alphabet: H
  40. A Moral Alphabet: I
  41. A Moral Alphabet: J
  42. A Moral Alphabet: K
  43. A Moral Alphabet: L
  44. A Moral Alphabet: M
  45. A Moral Alphabet: N
  46. A Moral Alphabet: O
  47. A Moral Alphabet: P
  48. A Moral Alphabet: Q
  49. A Moral Alphabet: R
  50. A Moral Alphabet: S
  51. A Moral Alphabet: T
  52. A Moral Alphabet: U
  53. A Moral Alphabet: V
  54. A Moral Alphabet: W
  55. A Moral Alphabet: X
  56. A Moral Alphabet: Y
  57. A Moral Alphabet: Z
  58. Song
  59. Dedication
  60. Introduction to The Bad Child's Book of Beasts
  61. The Yak
  62. The Polar Bear
  63. The Lion
  64. The Tiger
  65. The Dromedary
  66. The Whale
  67. The Hippopotamus
  68. The Dodo
  69. The Marmozet
  70. The Camelopard
  71. The Learned Fish
  72. The Elephant
  73. The Big Baboon
  74. The Rhinoceros
  75. The Frog
  76. Introduction to Cautionary Tales for Children
  77. Jim, Who ran away from his Nurse, and was eaten by a Lion
  78. Henry King, Who chewed bits of String, and was early cut off in Dreadful Agonies
  79. Matilda, Who told Lies, and was Burned to Death
  80. Franklin Hyde, Who caroused in the Dirt and was corrected by His Uncle
  81. Godolphin Horne, Who was cursed with the Sin of Pride, and Became a Boot-Black
  82. Algernon, Who played with a Loaded Gun, and, on missing his Sister was reprimanded by his Father
  83. Hildebrand, Who was frightened by a Passing Motor, and was brought to Reason
  84. Lord Lundy, Who was too Freely Moved to Tears, and thereby ruined his Political Career
  85. Lord Lundy (Second Canto)
  86. Rebecca, Who slammed Doors for Fun and Perished Miserably
  87. George, Who played with a Dangerous Toy, and suffered a Catastrophe of considerable Dimensions
  88. Charles Augustus Fortescue, Who always Did what was Right, and so accumulated an Immense Fortune
  89. Lord Roehampton
  90. Lord Calvin
  91. Lord Henry Chase
  92. Lord Heygate
  93. Lord Epsom
  94. Lord Finchley
  95. Lord Ali-Baba
  96. Lord Hippo
  97. Lord Uncle Tom
  98. Lord Lucky
  99. Lord Canton
  100. Lord Abbott
  101. A Dedication
  102. Sonnet: Lift up your hearts in Gumber, laugh the Weald
  103. Sonnet: I was like one that keeps the deck by night
  104. Sonnet: Rise up and do begin the day’s adorning
  105. Sonnet: The Winter Moon has such a quiet car
  106. Sonnet: Whatever moisture nourishes the Rose
  107. Sonnet: Mortality is but the Stuff you wear
  108. Sonnet: Not for the luckless buds our roots may bear
  109. Sonnet: That which is one they shear and make it twain
  110. Sonnet: Shall any man for whose strong love another
  111. Sonnet: They that have taken wages of things done
  112. Sonnet: Beauty that Parent is to deathless Rhyme
  113. Sonnet: What are the names for Beauty? Who shall praise
  114. Sonnet: Your life is like a little winter’s day
  115. Sonnet: Now shall the certain purpose of my soul
  116. Sonnet: Because my faltering feet may fail to dare
  117. Sonnet: When you to Acheron’s ugly water come
  118. Sonnet: We will not whisper, we have found the place
  119. Sonnet: I went to sleep at Dawn in Tuscany
  120. Sonnet: Mother of all my cities once there lay
  121. Sonnet: November is that historied Emperor
  122. Sonnet: Hoar Time about the House betakes him slow
  123. Sonnet: It freezes: all across a soundless sky
  124. Sonnet: O my companion, O my sister Sleep
  125. Sonnet: Are you the end, Despair, or the poor least
  126. Sonnet: But oh! not Lovely Helen, nor the pride
  127. Sonnet: The world’s a stage. The light is in one’s eyes
  128. Sonnet: The world’s a stage--and I’m the Super man
  129. Sonnet: The world’s a stage. The trifling entrance fee
  130. The Fanatic
  131. The Early Morning
  132. The Leader
  133. A Bivouac
  134. Verses to a Lord Who, in the House of Lords, Said That Those Who Opposed the South African Adventure Confused Soldiers with Money-Grubbers
  135. The Prophet Lost in the Hills at Evening
  136. The End of the Road
  137. An Oracle That Warned the Writer When on Pilgrimage
  138. Homage
  139. Newdigate Poem
  140. The Loser
  141. In a Boat
  142. The Ring
  143. Cuckoo!
  144. The Little Serving Maid
  145. Drinking Song, on the Excellence of Burgundy Wine
  146. Ha’nacker Mill
  147. Tarantella
  148. The Chaunty of the “Nona”
  149. The Winged Horse
  150. Strephon’s Song (from “The Cruel Shepherdess”)
  151. Ballade of the Unanswered Question
  152. Ballade to Our Lady of Czestochowa
  153. Ballade of Hell and of Mrs Roebeck
  154. Ballade of Unsuccessful Men
  155. Ballade of the Heresiarchs
  156. On His Books
  157. On Noman, a Guest
  158. A Trinity
  159. On Torture, a Public Singer
  160. On Paunch, a Parasite
  161. On Lady Poltagrue, a Public Peril
  162. The Mirror
  163. The Elm
  164. The Telephone
  165. The Statue
  166. Epitaph on the Favourite Dog of a Politician
  167. Epitaph on the Politician Himself
  168. Another on the Same
  169. On Mundane Acquaintances
  170. On a Rose for Her Bosom
  171. On the Little God
  172. On a Prophet
  173. On a Dead Hostess
  174. On a Great Election
  175. On a Mistaken Mariner
  176. On a Sleeping Friend
  177. Fatigued
  178. On Benicia, who Wished Him Well
  179. The False Heart
  180. Partly from the Greek
  181. The Ballad of Val-ès-Dunes

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