Robert Louis Stevenson (1850-1894) was worn in Edinburgh, Scotland, and suffered from frail health all through childhood, an affliction that would follow him into adulthood and manifest itself ultimately as tuberculosis. He initially set out to be a lawyer and was admitted to the bar in 1875, though he never practiced. He is best known for his tales Treasure Island and The Strange Case of Doctor Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, though he wrote a number of other stories, excellent essays, and of course poems. Constantly searching for a climate that would ease his suffering, he died quite young at the age of 44 and was buried high on Mt. Vaea in his final home of Samoa, the site of which is immortalized in the poem “Requiem” contained within these pages. I was first introduced to his timeless A Child’s Garden of Verses by my mother as a child myself, and the simple, extremely perceptive moments beautifully rendered in Stevenson’s effortless cadences and perfect rhymes went a long way, I imagine, to making me believe from an early age that poetry was the best way to explain and discover everything, and subsequently made me want to be a poet mys...

The Land of Nod From breakfast on through all the day At home among my friends I stay, But every night I go abroad Afar into the land of Nod.   All by myself I have to go, With none to tell me what to do— All alone beside the streams And up the mountain-sides of dreams.   The strangest things are there for me, Both things to eat and things to see, And many frightening sights abroad Till morning in the land of Nod.   Try as I like to find the way, I never can get back by day, Nor can remember plain and clear The curious music that I hear....

“Introduction A CHILD'S GARDEN OF VERSES To Alison Cunningham Bed in Summer A Thought At the Seaside Young Night Thought Whole Duty of Children Rain Pirate Story Foreign Lands Windy Nights Travel Singing Looking Forward A Good Play Where Go the Boats? Auntie’s Skirts The Land of Counterpane The Land of Nod My Shadow System A Good Boy Escape at Bedtime Marching Song The Cow Happy Thought The Wind Keepsake Mill Good and Bad Children Foreign Children The Sun’s Travels The Lamplighter My Bed Is a Boat The Moon The Swing Time to Rise Looking-Glass River Fairy Bread From a Railway Carriage Winter-Time The Hayloft Farewell to the Farm Northwest Passage I. Good Night II. Shadow March III. In Port The Child Alone 1. The Unseen Playmate 2. My Ship and I 3. My Kingdom 4. Picture-Books in Winter 5. My Treasures 6. Block City 7. The Land of Story-Books 8. Armies in the Fire 9. The Little Land Garden Days 1. Night and Day 2. Nest Eggs 3. The Flowers 4. Summer Sun 5. The Dumb Soldier 6. Autumn Fires 7. The Gardener 8. Historical Associations Envoys 1. To Willie and Henrietta 2. To...

Walt Whitman (1819-1892) is widely considered to be the greatest and most influential of all American poets. The first edition of LEAVES OF GRASS, his sole book which he would continue to revise over the course of his life expanding and rewriting it until the year of his death, appeared in 1855. This volume endeavors to recreate that debut edition as much as an e-book’s virtual typesetting will allow....

I celebrate myself, And what I assume you shall assume, For every atom belonging to me as good belongs to you.   I loafe and invite my soul, I lean and loafe at my ease . . . . observing a spear of summer grass.   Houses and rooms are full of perfumes . . . . the shelves are crowded with perfumes, I breathe the fragrance myself, and know it and like it, The distillation would intoxicate me also, but I shall not let it.   The atmosphere is not a perfume . . . . it has no taste of the distillation . . . . it is odorless, It is for my mouth forever . . . . I am in love with it, I will go to the bank by the wood and become undisguised and naked, I am mad for it to be in contact with me.   The smoke of my own breath, Echos, ripples, and buzzed whispers . . . . loveroot, silkthread, crotch and vine, My respiration and inspiration . . . . the beating of my heart . . . . the passing of blood and air through my lungs, “The sniff of green leaves and dry leaves, and of the shore and darkcolored sea-rocks, and of hay in the barn, The sound of the belched words of my voice . . . . words loosed to the eddies of the wind, A fe...

Contents Introduction "Frontispiece" "Letter from Ralph Waldo Emerson" "Original Title Page" "Entered according to Act of Congress..." "Preface" "Song of Myself" "A Song for Occupations" "To Think of Time" "The Sleepers" "I Sing the Body Electric" "Faces" "Song of the Answerer" "Europe the 72d and 73d Years of These States" "A Boston Ballad" "There Was a Child Went Forth" "Who Learns My Lesson Complete" "Great Are the Myths" About the Editor Also by William Ralph Press...