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About this book:

The Magical World of Poetry is an anthology of over one hundred ninety poetical works: some all-time favorites such as Annabel Lee, Paul Revere's Ride, and The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock; as well as many lesser known gems.

The book contains poems by Geoffrey Chaucer, William Shakespeare, Edgar Allan Poe, Sara Teasdale, Edgar Guest, Eugene Field, Emily Dickinson, Walt Whitman, T.S. Eliot, Robert Frost, Frances E. W. Harper, George Moses Horton, and many others.

The internet edition of this book can be read online here.

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Refreshing this page will randomly select another poem to be displayed at the right.

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The Magical World of Poetry was edited by
Mark James Wooding

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Notes on the text: I am not a scholar, and I make no pretense of this being a scholarly work. There are multiple versions of many of these poems, and as a general rule I tried to use the last printed version before the author's death. I don't claim to have done so in every case. With some of the older works I've left the archaic spelling, but not in every case. In the past what is now a "u" was written as "v", and "v" as "u" (which is probably why "w" is pronounced double "u" and not double "v"). I tried to avoid the older usages of "u" and "v". In a few works I used predominantly (but not necessarily exclusively) modern spelling. In most other works I left them as I found them. This may make them more difficult to read, but I found the diversity appealing. The decisions were largely subjective. I recommend that anyone who wants to try and research other versions begin with Google Books as a source. -MJW

The Unseen Playmate

by  Robert Louis Stevenson

When children are playing alone on the green,
In comes the playmate that never was seen.
When children are happy and lonely and good,
The Friend of the Children comes out of the wood.

Nobody heard him and nobody saw,
His is a picture you never could draw,
But he's sure to be present, abroad or at home,
When children are happy and playing alone.

He lies in the laurels, he runs on the grass,
He sings when you tinkle the musical glass;
Whene'er you are happy and cannot tell why,
The Friend of the Children is sure to be by!

He loves to be little, he hates to be big,
'Tis he that inhabits the caves that you dig;
'Tis he when you play with your soldiers of tin
That sides with the Frenchmen and never can win.

'Tis he, when at night you go off to your bed,
Bids you go to your sleep and not trouble your head;
For wherever they're lying, in cupboard or shelf,
'Tis he will take care of your playthings himself!






Website copyright © 2010 Mark James Wooding