Poems of William Blake

William Blake
SONGS OF INNOCENCE AND OF EXPERIENCE
and THE BOOK of THEL

SONGS OF INNOCENCE
INTRODUCTION
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.
"Drop thy pipe, thy happy pipe;
Sing thy songs of happy cheer:!"
So I sang the same
again,
While he wept with joy to hear.
"Piper, sit thee down and write
In a book, that all may read."
So he vanish'd from my
sight;
And I pluck'd a hollow reed,
And I made a rural pen,
And I stain'd the water clear,
And I wrote my happy songs

Every child may joy to hear.
THE SHEPHERD
How sweet is the Shepherd's sweet lot!
From the morn to the evening he stays;
He
shall follow his sheep all the day,
And his tongue shall be filled with praise.
For he hears the lambs' innocent call,
And he hears the ewes' tender reply;
He is
watching while they are in peace,
For they know when their Shepherd is nigh.
THE ECHOING GREEN
The sun does arise,
And make happy the skies;
The merry bells ring
To welcome
the Spring;
The skylark and thrush,
The birds of the bush,
Sing louder around
To
the bells' cheerful sound;
While our sports shall be seen
On the echoing Green.
Old John, with white hair,
Does laugh away care,
Sitting under the oak,
Among the
old folk.
They laugh at our play,
And soon they all say,
"Such, such were the joys


When we all -- girls and boys --
In our youth-time were seen
On the echoing Green."

Till the little ones, weary,
No more can be merry:
The sun does descend,
And our
sports have an end.
Round the laps of their mothers
Many sisters and brothers,
Like
birds in their nest,
Are ready for rest,
And sport no more seen
On the darkening
green.
THE LAMB
Little Lamb, who make 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, wolly, bright;
Gave thee such a tender voice,
Making all the vales rejoice?

Little Lamb, who made thee?
Dost thou know who made thee?
Little Lamb, I'll tell thee;
Little Lamb, I'll tell thee:
He is called by thy name,
For
He calls Himself a Lamb
He is meek, and He is mild,
He became a little child.
I a
child, and thou a lamb,
We are called by His name.
Little Lamb, God bless thee!

Little Lamb, God bless thee!
THE LITTLE BLACK BOY
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, pointed to the east, began to say:
"Look on the rising sun: there God does live,
And gives His light, and gives His heat
away,
And flowers and trees and beasts and men receive
Comfort in morning, joy in
the noonday.
"And we are put on earth a little space,
That we may learn to bear the beams of love

And these black bodies and this sunburnt face
Is but a cloud, and like a shady grove.
"For when our souls have learn'd the heat to bear,

The cloud will vanish, we shall hear
His voice,
Saying, 'Come out from the grove, my love and care
And round my golden
tent like lambs rejoice',"
Thus did my mother say, and kissed me;
And thus I say to little English boy.
When I
from black and he from white cloud free,
And round the tent of God like lambs we joy
I'll shade him from the heat till he can bear
To lean in joy upon our Father's knee;

And then I'll stand and stroke his silver hair,
And be like him, and he will then love me.
THE BLOSSOM
Merry, merry sparrow!
Under leaves so green
A happy blossom
Sees you, swift as

arrow,
Seek your cradle narrow,
Near my bosom.
Pretty, pretty robin!
Under
leaves so green
A happy blossom
Hears you sobbing, sobbing,
Pretty, pretty robin,

Near my bosom.
THE CHIMNEY-SWEEPER
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."
And so he was quiet, and that very night,
As Tom was a-sleeping, he had such a sight!
--
That thousands of sweepers, Dick, Joe, Ned, and Jack,
Were all of them locked up
in coffins of black.
And by came an angel, who had a bright key,
And he opened the coffins, and let them
all free;
Then down a green plain, leaping, laughing, they run,
And wash in a river,
and shine in the sun.
Then naked and white,