The Tiger / William Blake

Tiger! Tiger! burning bright

In the forests of the night,

What immortal hand or eye

Could frame thy fearful symmetry?

In what distant deeps or skies

Burnt the fire of thine eyes?

On what wings dare he aspire?

What the hand dare seize the fire?

The Sick Rose / William Blake

O Rose, thou art sick!

The invisible worm,

That flies in the night,

In the howling storm,

Has found out thy bed

Of crimson joy;

And his dark secret love

Does thy life destroy.

The Land of Dreams / William Blake

Awake, awake my little Boy!

Thou wast thy Mother's only joy:

Why dost thou weep in thy gentle sleep?

Awake! thy Father does thee keep.

"O, what land is the Land of Dreams?

What are its mountains, and what are its streams?

O Father, I saw my Mother there,

Among the lillies by waters fair.

The Lamb / William Blake

Little lamb, who made thee?

Dost thou know who made thee?

Gave thee life, and bid thee feed

By the stream and o'er the mead;

Gave thee clothing of delight,

Softest clothing, woolly, bright;

Gave thee such a tender voice,

Making all the vales rejoice?

Little lamb, who made thee?

Dost thou know who made thee?

The Garden of Love / William Blake

I went to the Garden of Love,

And saw what I never had seen:

A Chapel was built in the midst,

Where I used to play on the green.

And the gates of this Chapel were shut,

And "Thou shalt not" writ over the door;

So I turned to the Garden of Love,

That so many sweet flowers bore;

The Clod and the Pebble / William Blake

"Love seeketh not itself to please,

Nor for itself hath any care,

But for another gives its ease,

And builds a heaven in hell's despair."

So sung a little Clod of Clay,

Trodden with the cattle's feet,

But a Pebble of the brook

Warbled out these metres meet:

The Shepherd / William Blake

How sweet is the Shepherd's sweet lot!

From the morn to the evening he strays;

He shall follow his sheep all the day,

And his tongue shall be filled with praise.

For he hears the lamb's innocent call,

And he hears the ewe's tender reply;

He is watchful while they are in peace,

For they know when their Shepherd is nigh.

The Schoolboy / William Blake

I love to rise in a summer morn

When the birds sing on every tree;

The distant huntsman winds his horn,

And the skylark sings with me.

Oh, what sweet company!

But to go to school in a summer morn,

Oh! it drives all joy away;

Under a cruel eye outworn

The little ones spend the day

In sighing and dismay.

The Little Black Boy / William Blake

My mother bore me in the southern wild,

And I am black, but oh! my soul is white.

White as an angel is the English child,

But I am black as if bereaved of light.

My mother taught me underneath a tree,

And, sitting down before the heat of day,

She took me on her lap and kissed me,

And pointing to the east began to say:

The Chimney Sweeper / William Blake

When my mother died I was very young,

And my father sold me while yet my tongue

Could scarcely cry 'weep! 'weep! 'weep! 'weep!

So your chimneys I sweep, and in soot I sleep.

There's little Tom Dacre, who cried when his head,

That curled like a lamb's back, was shaved: so I said,

"Hush, Tom! never mind it, for when your head's bare,

You know that the soot cannot spoil your white hair."

Night / William Blake

The sun descending in the west,

The evening star does shine;

The birds are silent in their nest,

And I must seek for mine.

The moon like a flower,

In heaven's high bower,

With silent delight

Sits and smiles on the night.

The Sunflower / William Blake

Ah, Sunflower! weary of time,

Who countest the steps of the sun,

Seeking after that sweet golden clime

Where the traveller's journey is done;

Where the youth pined away with desire

And the pale virgin shrouded in snow

Arise from their graves, and aspire

Where my Sunflower wishes to go.

The Fly / William Blake

Little Fly,

Thy summer's play

My thoughtless hand

Has brushed away.

Am not I

A fly like thee?

Or art not thou

A man like me?

My Pretty Rose-Tree / William Blake

A flower was offered to me,

Such a flower as May never bore;

But I said, "I've a pretty rose-tree",

And I passed the sweet flower o'er.

Then I went to my pretty rose-tree,

To tend her by day and by night;

But my rose turned away with jealousy,

And her thorns were my only delight.

Love's Secret / William Blake

Never seek to tell thy love,

Love that never told can be;

For the gentle wind doth move

Silently, invisibly.

I told my love, I told my love,

I told her all my heart,

Trembling, cold, in ghastly fears.

Ah! she did depart!

London / William Blake

I wander thro' each charter'd street,

Near where the charter'd Thames does flow,

And mark in every face I meet

Marks of weakness, marks of woe.

In every cry of every Man,

In every Infant's cry of fear,

In every voice, in every ban,

The mind-forg'd manacles I hear.

Jerusalem / William Blake

And did those feet in ancient time

Walk upon England's mountains green?

And was the holy Lamb of God

On England's pleasant pastures seen?

And did the Countenance Divine

Shine forth upon our clouded hills?

And was Jerusalem builded here

Among these dark satanic mills?

Introduction to Songs of Innocence / William Blake

Piping down the valleys wild,

Piping songs of pleasant glee,

On a cloud I saw a child,

And he laughing said to me:

"Pipe a song about a Lamb!"

So I piped with merry cheer.

"Piper, pipe that song again;"

So I piped: he wept to hear.

Infant Sorrow / William Blake

My mother groaned, my father wept;

Into the dangerous world I leapt,

Helpless, naked, piping loud,

Like a fiend hid in a cloud.

Struggling in my father's hands,

Striving against my swaddling bands,

Bound and weary, I thought best

To sulk upon my mother's breast.

I Heard an Angel / William Blake

I heard an Angel singing

When the day was springing,

"Mercy, Pity, Peace

Is the world's release."

Thus he sung all day

Over the new mown hay,

Till the sun went down

And haycocks looked brown.