Quote#Speech
O friend unseen, unborn, unknown
Quote byJames Elroy Flecker · 1884–1915
Commonly attributed — not confirmed in an authoritative edition. Cited on Wikiquote to: "To a Poet a Thousand Years Hence", ll. 17-20. Forty-two Poems (1911).
English (original)
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.
— James Elroy Flecker
More from James Elroy Flecker
When the great markets by the sea shut fast All that calm Sunday that goes on and on: When even lovers find their peace at last, And Earth is but a star, that once had shone.
When even lovers find their peace at last, And Earth is but a star, that once had shone.
We who with songs beguile your pilgrimage: And swear that Beauty lives though lilies die, We Poets of the proud old lineage Who sing to find your hearts, we know not why.
West of these out to seas colder than the Hebrides I must go Where the fleet of stars is anchored and the young Star captains glow.
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,
I have seen old ships sail like swans asleep.