Rupert Brooke Quotations

A kiss makes the heart young again and wipes out the years.

A book may be compared to your neighbor: if it be good, it cannot last too long; if bad, you cannot get rid of it too early.

Breathless, we flung us on a windy hill, Laughed in the sun, and kissed the lovely grass.

The cool kindliness of sheets, that soon smooth away trouble; and the rough male kiss of blankets.

We always love those who admire us; we do not always love those whom we admire.

Cities, like cats, will reveal themselves at night.

Laughed in the sun, and kissed the lovely grass.

And think, this heart, all evil shed away, / A pulse in the eternal mind, no less / Gives somewhere back the thoughts by England given.

Now, God be thanked who has matched us with His hour, / And caught our youth, and wakened us from sleeping.

Fish say, they have their stream and pond;But is there anything beyond?

They love the Good; they worship Truth; / They laugh uproariously in youth; / (And when they get to feeling old, / They up and shoot themselves, I'm told).

A pulse in the eternal mind, no less, gives somewhere back the thoughts by England given. Her sights and sounds; dreams happy as her day; and laughter, learnt of friends; and gentleness, in hearts at peace, under an English heaven.

And then you suddenly cried and turned away.

Somewhere, behind space and time, Is wetter water, slimier slime

And see, no longer blinded by our eyes.

For England's the one land, I know, / Where men with Splendid Hearts may go; / And Cambridgeshire, of all England, / The shire for Men who Understand.

If I should die, think only this of me: / That there's some corner of a foreign field / That is for ever England. There shall be / In that rich earth a richer dust concealed.

There are three good things in this world. One is to read poetry, another is to write poetry, and the best of all is to live poetry.

I have need to busy my heart with quietude.

They say that the Dead die not, but remain Near to the rich heirs of their grief and mirth. I think they ride the calm mid-heaven, as these, In wise majestic melancholy train, And watch the moon, and the still-raging seas, And men, coming and going on the earth.

All the little emptiness of love!

Hearts at peace, under an English heaven.

War knows no power. Safe shall be my going, Secretly armed against all death's endeavour; Safe though all safety's lost; safe where men fall; And if these poor limbs die, safest of all.

But only agony, and that has ending; And the worst friend and enemy is but Death.

I thought when love for you died, I should die. It's dead. Alone, most strangely, I live on.

Incredibly, inordinately, devastatingly, immortally, calamitously, hearteningly, adorably beautiful.

If I should die, think only this of me: that there's some corner of a foreign field that is for ever England.

Store up reservoirs of calm and content and draw on them at later moments when the source isn't there, but the need is very great.

But the best I've known Stays here, and changes, breaks, grows old, is blown About the winds of the world, and fades from brains Of living men, and dies.

Blow out, you bugles, over the rich Dead! There's none of these so lonely and poor of old, But, dying, has made us rarer gifts than gold.

Oh! death will find me long before I tire of watching you.

I have been so great a lover: filled my days So proudly with the splendour of Love's praise, The pain, the calm, and the astonishment, Desire illimitable, and silent content, And all dear names men use, to cheat despair, For the perplexed and viewless streams that bear Our hearts at random down the dark of life.

I know what things are good: friendship and work and conversation. These I shall have.

It's all a terrible tragedy. And yet, in it's details, it's great fun. And - apart from the tragedy - I've never felt happier or better in my life than in those days in Belgium.

I have a thousand images of you in an hour; all different and all coming back to the same. I think of you once against a sky line: and on the hill that Sunday morning. The light and the shadow and quietness and the rain and the wood. And you. Your arms and lips and hair and shoulders and voice - you.

One may not doubt that, somehow Good Shall come of Water and of Mud; And sure, the reverent eye must see A purpose in Liquidity.

Now, God be thanked Who has matched us with His hour, And caught our youth, and wakened us from sleeping, With hand made sure, clear eye, and sharpened power, To turn, as swimmers into cleanness leaping.

I shall desire and I shall find The best of my desires; The autumn road, the mellow wind That soothes the darkening shires. And laughter, and inn-fires.

Spend in pure converse our eternal day; Think each in each, immediately wise; Learn all we lacked before; hear, know, and say What this tumultuous body now denies; And feel, who have laid our groping hands away; And see, no longer blinded by our eyes.

Ponder deep wisdom, dark or clear, Each secret fishy hope or fear. Fish say, they have their Stream and Pond; But is there anything Beyond? This life cannot be All, they swear, For how unpleasant, if it were! One may not doubt that, somehow, Good Shall come of Water and of Mud; And, sure, the reverent eye must see A Purpose in Liquidity.

Proud, then, clear-eyed and laughing, go to greet Death as a friend!

And I shall find some girl perhaps, and a better one than you, With eyes as wise, but kindlier, and lips as soft, but true, and I dare say she will do.

These laid the world away; poured out the red Sweet wine of youth; gave up the years to be Of work and joy, and that unhoped serene, That men call age; and those who would have been, Their sons, they gave, their immortality.

But somewhere, beyond Space and Time, is wetter water, slimier slime! And there (they trust) there swimmeth one who swam ere rivers were begun, immense of fishy form and mind, squamous omnipotent, and kind.

And in my flower-beds, I think, Smile the carnation and the pink.

Just now the lilac is in bloom All before my little room.

But there's wisdom in women, of more than they have known, And thoughts go blowing through them, are wiser than their own.

And in that Heaven of all their wish, there shall be no more land, say fish

There's little comfort in the wise

Infinite hungers leap no more I in the chance swaying of your dress; and love has changed to kindliness.

Love is a breach in the walls, a broken gate, Love sells the proud heart's citadel to fate.

Youth is stranger than fiction.

Down the blue night the unending columns press In noiseless tumult, break and wave and flow

The worst of slaves is he whom passion rules.

Mud unto mud!--Death eddies near-- Not here the appointed End, not here! But somewhere, beyond Space and Time, Is wetter water, slimier slime!

Oh! death will find me, long before I tire Of watching for you; and swing me suddenly Into the shade and loneliness and mire Of the last land!

Canada is a live country - live, but not, like the States, kicking.

Stands the Church clock at ten to three? And is there honey still for tea?

Fish say, they have their Stream and Pond; But is there anything Beyond?

Yet, behind the night, Waits for the great unborn, somewhere afar, Some white tremendous daybreak.

For Cambridge people rarely smile, Being urban, squat, and packed with guile.

In your arms was still delight, Quiet as a street at night; And thoughts of you, I do remember, Were green leaves in a darkened chamber, Were dark clouds in a moonless sky.

.. . . would I were In Grantchester, in Grantchester!