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Forty Two Poems
Contents:
TO A POET
A THOUSAND YEARS HENCE
I who am dead a thousand years,
And wrote this sweet archaic song,
Send you my words for messengers
The way I shall not pass along.
I care not if you bridge the seas,
Or ride secure the cruel sky,
Or build consummate palaces
Of metal or of masonry.
But have you wine and music still,
And statues and a bright-eyed love,
And foolish thoughts of good and ill,
And prayers to them who sit above?
How shall we conquer? Like a wind
That falls at eve our fancies blow,
And old Moeonides the blind
Said it three thousand years ago.
O friend unseen, unborn, unknown,
Student of our sweet English tongue,
Read out my words at night, alone:
I was a poet, I was young.
Since I can never see your face,
And never shake you by the hand,
I send my soul through time and space
To greet you. You will understand.
Contents:
Chicago: James Elroy Flecker, "To a Poet a Thousand Years Hence," Forty Two Poems, ed. Keil, Heinrich, 1822-1894 and trans. Seaton, R. C. in Forty Two Poems (New York: George E. Wood, ""Death-bed"" edition, 1892), Original Sources, accessed April 18, 2025, http://originalsources.com/Document.aspx?DocID=UW233Y55GAE3KYD.
MLA: Flecker, James Elroy. "To a Poet a Thousand Years Hence." Forty Two Poems, edited by Keil, Heinrich, 1822-1894, and translated by Seaton, R. C., in Forty Two Poems, New York, George E. Wood, ""Death-bed"" edition, 1892, Original Sources. 18 Apr. 2025. http://originalsources.com/Document.aspx?DocID=UW233Y55GAE3KYD.
Harvard: Flecker, JE, 'To a Poet a Thousand Years Hence' in Forty Two Poems, ed. and trans. . cited in ""Death-bed"" edition, 1892, Forty Two Poems, George E. Wood, New York. Original Sources, retrieved 18 April 2025, from http://originalsources.com/Document.aspx?DocID=UW233Y55GAE3KYD.
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