William Blake
William Blake (November 28, 1757 - August 12, 1827) was an English poet, painter, and printmaker. Largely unrecognized during his lifetime, Blake's work is now considered seminal in the history of both poetry and the visual arts. Blake's prophetic poetry has been said to form "what is in proportion to its merits the least read body of poetry in the (English) language". His visual artistry has led one modern critic to proclaim him "far and away the greatest artist Britain has ever produced". Although he only once travelled any further than a day's walk outside London over the course of his life, his creative vision engendered a diverse and symbolically rich corpus, which embraced 'imagination' as "the body of God", or "Human existence itself". Source
The Ecchoing Green
The sun does arise,
And make happy the skies.
The merry bells ring
To welcome the Spring.
The sky-lark and thrush,
The birds of the bush,
Sing louder around,
To the bells’ cheerful sound.
While our sports shall be seen
On the Ecchoing Green.
Old John, with white hair
Does laugh away care,
Sitting under the oak,
Among the old folk,
They laugh at our play,
And soon they all say.
‘Such, such were the joys.
When we all girls & boys,
In our youth-time were seen,
On the Ecchoing Green.’
Till the little ones weary
No more can be merry
The sun does descend,
And our sports have an end:
Round the laps of their mothers,
Many sisters and brothers,
Like birds in their nest,
Are ready for rest;
And sport no more seen,
On the darkening Green.
Published:
1789
Length:
Regular
Literary Movements:
Romanticism
Anthology Years:
2022
2023
2024
Themes:
Childhood & Coming of Age
Joy & Praise
Nature
Poems of Place
Literary Devices:
Dialogue
conversation between two or more people as a feature of a book, play, or movie
End Rhyme
when a poem has lines ending with words that sound the same
Personification
the attribution of human qualities to a non-human thing
Simile
a comparison between two unlike things using the words “like” or “as”