HOME

POEMS

CREATE

STUFF

ABOUT

John Keats : To My Brothers

Small, busy flames play through the fresh laid coals,
	And their faint cracklings o'er our silence creep
	Like whispers of the household gods that keep
A gentle empire o'er fraternal souls.
And while, for rhymes, I search around the poles,
	Your eyes are fix'd as in poetic sleep,
	Upon the lore so voluble and deep,
That aye at fall of night our care condoles.
This is your birthday Tom, and I rejoice
	That thus it passes smoothly, quietly.
Many such eves of gently whisp'ring noise
	May we together pass, and calmly try
What are this world's true joys,—ere the great voice,
	From its fair face, shall bid our spirits fly. 

John Keats (1795-1821)	1816

If you came here from the main Poems page, the BACK button on your web browser will bring you back there

Note 1: When we convert poems to HTML (WEB) format for viewing here, some modifications may occur to the formatting (e.g. indenting) - all poems are correctly formatted for print.

Note 2: if you came to this page following a search engine query, you can find the Portable Poetry home page at www.portablepoetry.com.

Note 3: Feel free to copy these poems and footnotes for your personal and private use. For other uses please get in touch with us first. This poem is believed to be in the public domain. All footnotes are copyright Portable Poetry.