The Last of May

1811 –

1863

  (IN REPLY TO AN INVITATION DATED ON THE 1ST.)

 By fate's benevolent award,
    Should I survive the day,
  I'll drink a bumper with my lord
    Upon the last of May.

  That I may reach that happy time
    The kindly gods I pray,
  For are not ducks and pease in prime
    Upon the last of May?

  At thirty boards, 'twixt now and then,
    My knife and fork shall play;
  But better wine and better men
    I shall not meet in May.

  And though, good friend, with whom I dine,
    Your honest head is gray,
  And, like this grizzled head of mine,
    Has seen its last of May;

  Yet, with a heart that's ever kind,
    A gentle spirit gay,
  You've spring perennial in your mind,
    And round you make a May!

This poem is in the public domain.

At the Zoo

First I saw the white bear, then I saw the black;
Then I saw the camel with a hump upon his back;
Then I saw the grey wolf, with mutton in his maw;
Then I saw the wombat waddle in the straw;
Then I saw the elephant a-waving of his trunk;
Then I saw the monkeys—mercy, how unpleasantly they smelt!

William Makepeace Thackeray

1863

The Garret

     With pensive eyes the little room I view,
       Where, in my youth, I weathered it so long;
     With a wild mistress, a stanch friend or two,
       And a light heart still breaking into song:
     Making a mock of life, and all its cares,
       Rich in the glory of my rising sun,
     Lightly I vaulted up four pair of stairs,
       In the brave days when I was twenty-one.

     Yes; 'tis a garret—let him know't who will—
       There was my bed—full hard it was and small.
     My table there—and I decipher still
       Half a lame couplet charcoaled on the wall.
     Ye joys,

William Makepeace Thackeray

2018

Jolly Jack

     When fierce political debate
       Throughout the isle was storming,
     And Rads attacked the throne and state,
       And Tories the reforming,
     To calm the furious rage of each,
       And right the land demented,
     Heaven sent us Jolly Jack, to teach
      The way to be contented.

     Jack's bed was straw, 'twas warm and soft,
       His chair, a three-legged stool;
     His broken jug was emptied oft,
       Yet, somehow, always full.
     His mistress' portrait decked the wall,
       His mirror had a crack;
     Yet, gay and glad, though this was all
       His we

William Makepeace Thackeray

2018

Poems

The Last of May

More by this poet

At the Zoo

The Garret

Jolly Jack

Poems

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The Last of May

More by this poet

At the Zoo

The Garret

Jolly Jack

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