Contentment
Oliver Wendell Holmes
"Man wants but little here below."
LITTLE I ask; my wants are few;
I only wish a hut of stone,
(A very plain brown stone will do,)
That I may call my own;
And close at hand is such a one,
In yonder street that fronts the sun.
Plain food is quite enough for me;
Three courses are as good as ten;--
If Nature can subsist on three,
Thank Heaven for three. Amen!
I always thought cold victual nice;--
My choice would be vanilla-ice.
I care not much for gold or land;--
Give me a mortgage here and there,--
Some good bank-stock, some note of hand,
Or trifling railroad share,--
I only ask that Fortune send
A little more than I shall spend.
Honors are silly toys, I know,
And titles are but empty names;
I would, perhaps, be Plenipo,--
But only near St. James;
I'm very sure I should not care
To fill our Gubernator's chair.
Jewels are baubles; 't is a sin
To care for such unfruitful things;--
One good-sized diamond in a pin,--
Some, not so large, in rings,--
A ruby, and a pearl, or so,
Will do for me;--I laugh at show.
My dame should dress in cheap attire;
(Good, heavy silks are never dear;) -
I own perhaps I might desire
Some shawls of true Cashmere,--
Some marrowy crapes of China silk,
Like wrinkled skins on scalded milk.
I would not have the horse I drive
So fast that folks must stop and stare;
An easy gait--two forty-five--
Suits me; I do not care;--
Perhaps, for just a single spurt,
Some seconds less would do no hurt.
Of pictures, I should like to own
Titians aud Raphaels three or four,--
I love so much their style and tone,
One Turner, and no more,
(A landscape,--foreground golden dirt,--
The sunshine painted with a squirt.)
Of books but few,--some fifty score
For daily use, and bound for wear;
The rest upon an upper floor;--
Some little luxury there
Of red morocco's gilded gleam
And vellum rich as country cream.
Busts, cameos, gems,--such things as these,
Which others often show for pride,
I value for their power to please,
And selfish churls deride;--
One Stradivarius, I confess,
Two Meerschaums, I would fain possess.
Wealth's wasteful tricks I will not learn,
Nor ape the glittering upstart fool;--
Shall not carved tables serve my turn,
But all must be of buhl?
Give grasping pomp its double share,--
I ask but one recumbent chair.
Thus humble let me live and die,
Nor long for Midas' golden touch;
If Heaven more generous gifts deny,
I shall not miss them much,--
Too grateful for the blessing lent
Of simple tastes and mind content!
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Here Are Our Top Love Poems...
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I Would Live in Your Love
by Sara Teasdale (1884-1933)
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Sonnet From the Portuguese V
by Elizabeth Barrett Browning (1806-61)
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The Bungler
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Blue and White
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Desideria
by William Wordsworth (1770-1850)
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The Taxi
by Amy Lowell (1874-1925)
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by William Wordsworth (1770-1850)
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Song
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To a Butterfly
by William Wordsworth (1770-1850)
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Sonnet From the Portuguese V
by Elizabeth Barrett Browning (1806-61)
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She Tells Her Love by Robert Ranke Graves
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I Never Lost As Much by Emily Dickinson
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Heart, We Will Forget Him by Emily Dickinson
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O Mistress Mine by William Shakespeare
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Love by Robert Browning
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My Pretty Rose Tree by William Blake
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I Should Not Dare by Emily Dickinson
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One Day I Wrote Her Name by Edmund Spenser
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Tell me not, Sweet, by Richard Lovelace
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The Dream by Edna St. Vincent Millay
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The Dream by Edna St. Vincent Millay
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Hope is a Thing With Feathers by Emily Dickinson
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We Are Seven by William Wordsworth
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Mag by Carl Sandburg
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Ebb by Edna St. Vincent Millay
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I Sing by Emily Dickinson
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For Each Ecstatic Instant by Emily Dickinson
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Love Not Me by John Wilbye
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Mild Is The Parting Year by Walter Savage Landor