from The Coronation of Cuan and Padraigin

When, in September, summer's nearly done,
And summer wars have all been lost and won,
The days grow shorter and hot days are few,
And equinox is near, and moon is new,
Before the fields' harvest has grown ripe,
Before the reaper's scythes make their first swipe,
The call goes forth to all Atlantian lands.
His Majesty King Logan now commands

Medieval Poetry of Thomas Broadpaunch

from Epistle to a Lady

by Alexander Pope

Men, some to bus'ness, some to pleasure take;

But ev'ry woman is at heart a rake;

Men, some to quiet, some to public strife;

But ev'ry lady would be queen for life.

Yet mark the fate of a whole sex of queens!

Pow'r all their end, but beauty all the means.

In youth they conquer with so wild a rage

As leaves them scare a subject in their age:

from To His Coy Mistress

by Andrew Marvel

Had we but world enough, and time,

This coyness lady, were no crime.

We would sit down, and think which way

To walk, and pass our long love's day.

Thou by the Indian Ganges' side

Shouldst rubies find: I by the tide

Of Humber could complain.  I would

Love you ten years before the Flood,

Here bygynneth the Book of

the Tales of Caunterbury

by Geoffery Chaucer

Whan that Aprill, with his shoures soote

The droghte of March hath perced to the roote

And bathed every venyne in swich licour,

Of which vertu engendred is the flour;

Whan Zephirus eek with his sweete breeth

Inspired hath in every holt and heeth

The tendre croppes, and the yonge sonne

Hath in the Ram his halfe cours yronne,

And smale foweles maken melodye,

That slepen al the nyght with open eye-

(So pricken hem Nature in hir corages);

Thanne longen folk to goon on pilgrimages

Written in Middle English--Have Annie or CC read it aloud to hear the sounds of the words.

On the Vanity of Earthly Greatness

by Arthur Guiterman

The tusks that clashed in mighty brawls

Of mastodons, are billiard ball.

The sword of Charlemagne the Just

Is ferric oxide known as rust.

The grizzly bear whose potent hug

Was feared by all, is now a rug.

Great Caesar's bust in on the shelf,

And I don't feel so well myself!