“Who would attain to summits still and fair,Must nerve himself through valleys of despair.”
Source: Leafs On An Idle Breeze - My Inspirational Poems (Annotated Edition)
“There is no chance, no destiny, no fate,Can circumvent or hinder or controlThe firm resolve of a determined soul.Gifts count for nothing; will alone is great;All things give way before it soon or late.What obstacle can stay the mighty forceOf the sea seeking river in its course,Or cause the ascending orb of day to wait?”
Source: Leafs On An Idle Breeze - My Inspirational Poems (Annotated Edition)
“Distrust that man who tells you to distrust. He takes the measure of his own small soul, and thinks the world no larger.”
Source: Complete Poetical Works of Ella Wheeler Wilcox (Delphi Classics)
“Distrust that man who tells you to distrust.”
Source: Complete Poetical Works of Ella Wheeler Wilcox (Delphi Classics)
“No one will grieve because your lips are dumb.”
Source: Poems of power
“The two kinds of people on earth are the people who lift and the people who lean.”
“Change is the watchword of progression.”
Source: Complete Poetical Works of Ella Wheeler Wilcox (Delphi Classics)
“The world has a thousand creeds, and never a one have I;
Nor church of my own, though a million spires are pointing the way on high.
But I float on the bosom of faith, that bears me along like a river;
And the lamp of my soul is alight with love, for life, and the world, and the Giver.”
“Rejoice, and men will seek you;
Grieve, and they turn and go,
They want full measure of all your pleasure,
But they do not need your woe.
Be glad, and your friends are many;
Be sad, and you lose them all,--
There are none to decline your nectar'd wine,
But alone you must drink life's gall.”
Source: Complete Poetical Works of Ella Wheeler Wilcox (Delphi Classics)
“The days grow shorter, the nights grow longer,
The headstones thicken along the way;
And life grows sadder, but love grows stronger
For those who walk with us day by day.”
Source: Leafs On An Idle Breeze - My Inspirational Poems (Annotated Edition)
“But though that place I never gain,
Herein lies comfort for my pain:
I will be worthy of it.”
Source: Poems of Ella Wheeler Wilcox: Passion
“Content is not the pathway to great deeds.”
Source: Complete Poetical Works of Ella Wheeler Wilcox (Delphi Classics)
“It has always been my belief that children inherit the suppressed tendencies of their parents. A clergyman's son frequently shows abnormal tastes for the pleasures that his father denied himself.”
Source: The Story of a Literary Career
“A day which passed without a poem from my pen I considered lost and misused.”
Source: The Story of a Literary Career
“... love moves the world along.”
Source: Leafs On An Idle Breeze - My Inspirational Poems (Annotated Edition)
“Love is the only duty that we know.”
Source: Poems of power
“Keep out of the past. It is haunted.”
Source: Complete Poetical Works of Ella Wheeler Wilcox (Delphi Classics)
“Trust in your own untried capacity.”
“It is time that outraged public sentiment cry out in detestation of the outrages committed in the name of religion.”
“One bitter time of mourning, I remember, When day, and night, my sad heart did complain, My life, I said, was one cold, bleak December, And all its pleasures, were but whited pain.”
Source: Complete Poetical Works of Ella Wheeler Wilcox (Delphi Classics)
“I knew it the first of the summer, I knew it the same at the end, That you and your love were plighted, But couldn't you be my friend?”
Source: Leafs On An Idle Breeze - My Inspirational Poems (Annotated Edition)
“Why dost thou shrink from my approach, O Man? Why dost thou ever flee in fear, and cling To my false rival, Life? I do but bring Thee rest and calm. Then wherefore dost thou ban And curse me? Since the forming of God's plan I have not hurt or harmed a mortal thing, I have bestowed sweet balm for every sting, And peace eternal for earth's stormy span.”
Source: Complete Poetical Works of Ella Wheeler Wilcox (Delphi Classics)
“'Tis they who are in their own chambers haunted By thoughts that like unbidden guests intrude, And sit down, uninvited and unwanted, And make a nightmare of the solitude.”
Source: Leafs On An Idle Breeze - My Inspirational Poems (Annotated Edition)
“When the heart grows weary, all things seem dreary; When the burden grows heavy, the way seems long. Thank God for sending kind death as an ending, Like a grand Amen to a minor song.”
Source: Complete Poetical Works of Ella Wheeler Wilcox (Delphi Classics)
“How will it be when one of us alone Goes on that strange last journey of the soul? That certain search for an uncertain goal, That voyage on which no comradeship is known?”
Source: Leafs On An Idle Breeze - My Inspirational Poems (Annotated Edition)
“Unwearied, and with springing steps elate, I had conveyed my wealth along the road. The empty sack proved now a heavier load: I was borne down beneath its worthless weight. I stumbled on, and knocked at Death's dark gate. There was no answer. Stung by sorrow's goad I forced my way into that grim abode, And laughed, and flung Life's empty sack to Fate.”
Source: Leafs On An Idle Breeze - My Inspirational Poems (Annotated Edition)
“I was as pure as the morning When I first looked on your face; I knew I never could reach you In your high, exalted place.”
Source: Complete Poetical Works of Ella Wheeler Wilcox (Delphi Classics)
“God made poor woman with no heart, But gave her skill, and tact, and art, And so she lives, and plays her part. We must not blame, but pity her.”
Source: Complete Poetical Works of Ella Wheeler Wilcox (Delphi Classics)
“I'm sorry for the anguished hearts that break with passion's strain, But I'm sorrier for the poor starved souls that never knew love's pain, Who hunger on through barren years not tasting joys they crave, For sadder far is such a lot than weeping o'er a grave.”
Source: Complete Poetical Works of Ella Wheeler Wilcox (Delphi Classics)
“Wiped the cold dew-drops from his cheek And sought the mourner's side again. "Once more, dear lady, I must speak: Your last remaining son was slain Just at the closing of the fight; Twas he who sent me here to-night." "God knows," the man said afterward, "The fight itself was not so hard."”
Source: Picked Poems
“And she has a thousand virtues and not one acknowledged sin, But she is the sort of person you could liken to a pin. And she pricks you, and she sticks you, in a way that can't be said, When you seek for what has hurt you, why, you cannot find the head.”
Source: Complete Poetical Works of Ella Wheeler Wilcox (Delphi Classics)
“The sin and the shame and the sorrow, The crime and the want and the woe That are born there in your workshop, No hand can paint, you know.”
Source: Leafs On An Idle Breeze - My Inspirational Poems (Annotated Edition)
“Be careful what rubbish you toss in the tide. On outgoing billows it drifts from your sight, But back on the incoming waves it may ride And land at your threshold again before night. Be careful what rubbish you toss in the tide.”
Source: Complete Poetical Works of Ella Wheeler Wilcox (Delphi Classics)
“You never can tell when you send a word, Like an arrow shot from a bow By an archer blind, be it cruel or kind, Just where it may chance to go!”
Source: Leafs On An Idle Breeze - My Inspirational Poems (Annotated Edition)
“Thank Fate for foes! I hold mine dear As valued friends. He cannot know The zest of life who runneth here His earthly race without a foe.”
Source: Complete Poetical Works of Ella Wheeler Wilcox (Delphi Classics)
“There are ghosts in the room. As I sit here alone, from the dark corners there They come out of the gloom, And they stand at my side and they lean on my chair.”
Source: Complete Poetical Works of Ella Wheeler Wilcox (Delphi Classics)
“Dear friend, I pray thee, if thou wouldst be proving Thy strong regard for me, Make me no vows. Lip-service is not loving; Let thy faith speak for thee.”
Source: Complete Poetical Works of Ella Wheeler Wilcox (Delphi Classics)
“I think I never passed so sad an hour, Dear friend, as that one at the church to-night. The edifice from basement to the tower Was one resplendent blaze of coloured light.”
Source: Complete Poetical Works of Ella Wheeler Wilcox (Delphi Classics)
“Through strife the slumbering soul awakes, We learn on error's troubled route The truths we could not prize without The sorrow of our sad mistakes.”
Source: Complete Poetical Works of Ella Wheeler Wilcox (Delphi Classics)
“And he who has dwelt with his heart alone, Hears all the music in friendship's tone. So better and better I comprehend How sorrow ever would be our friend.”
Source: Leafs On An Idle Breeze - My Inspirational Poems (Annotated Edition)
“There was hell in her eyes! She was worn and jaded Her soul is at war with the life she has led. As I looked on that face so strangely faded I wonder God did not strike me dead.”
Source: Complete Poetical Works of Ella Wheeler Wilcox (Delphi Classics)
“Lady beware. Fan not the harmless glow Of admiration into ardent love, Lean not with red curled smiling lips above The flickering spark of sinless flame, and blow, Lest in the sudden waking of desire Thou, like the child, shalt perish in the fire.”
Source: Leafs On An Idle Breeze - My Inspirational Poems (Annotated Edition)
“It stands in the light transfigured, It speaks from the heights above, "Each Soul Is Its Own Redeemer; There Is No Law But Love."”
Source: Complete Poetical Works of Ella Wheeler Wilcox (Delphi Classics)
“The passion you forbade my lips to utter Will not be silenced. You must hear it in The sullen thunders when they roll and mutter: And when the tempest nears, with wail and din, I know your calm forgetfulness is broken, And to your heart you whisper, "He has spoken."”
Source: Leafs On An Idle Breeze - My Inspirational Poems (Annotated Edition)
“While forced to dwell apart from thy dear face, Love, robed like sorrow, led me by the hand And taught my doubting heart to understand That which has puzzled all the human race.”
Source: Complete Poetical Works of Ella Wheeler Wilcox (Delphi Classics)
“Love gives us copious potions of delight, Of pain and ecstasy, and peace and care; Love leads us upward, to the mountain height, And, like an angel, stands beside us there; Then thrusts us, demon-like, in some abyss: Where, in the darkness of despair, we grope, Till, suddenly, Love greets us with a kiss And guides us back to flowery fields of hope.”
Source: Leafs On An Idle Breeze - My Inspirational Poems (Annotated Edition)
“O skies, be calm! O winds, blow free - Blow all my ships safe home to me! But if thou sendest some a-wrack, To never more come sailing back, Send any - all that skim the sea, But bring my love-ship home to me.”
Source: Picked Poems
“Let us clear a little space, And make Love a burial-place. He is dead, dear, as you see, And he wearies you and me.”
Source: Complete Poetical Works of Ella Wheeler Wilcox (Delphi Classics)
“Thou canst not force my soul to wish thee ill, That is the only evil that can kill.”
Source: Leafs On An Idle Breeze - My Inspirational Poems (Annotated Edition)
“Yes, I have dreams. I ofttimes dream of Love As radiant and brilliant as a star. As changeless, too, as that fixed light afar Which glorifies vast worlds of space above.”
Source: Complete Poetical Works of Ella Wheeler Wilcox (Delphi Classics)
