Kit Wright – From Humpty Dumpty, the Official Autobiography

9.  Ode to Autumn – Humpty looks back on his life.

Humpty Dumpty had a lean summer
Humpty Dumpty’s spring was a ******.
Humpty’s winter was no good at all
But Humpty Dumpty had a GREAT FALL.

by Matthew Prior

Sir, I admit your general rule
That every poet is a fool!
But you yourself may serve to show it,
That every fool is not a poet.

                                 Matthew Prior

by Joyce Grenfell

If I should go before the rest of you
Chuck not a flower nor inscribe a stone,
Nor, when I am gone, speak in a Sunday voice
But be the usual selves that I have known.
Weep, if you must, parting is hell
But life goes on - so sing as well.

                              Joyce Grenfell

by John Gillespie McGee Jr.

Oh, I have slipped the surly bonds of earth
and danced the skies on laughter-silvered wings.
Sunward I've climbed, and joined the tumbling
mirth of sun-split clouds, and done a hundred
things you have not dreamed of - wheeled
and soared and swung high in the sunlit silence.
Hovr'ring there, I've chased the shouting wind along,
and flung my eager craft through footless halls of air.
Up, up, the long, delirious, burning blue,
I've topped the windswept heights with easy grace
where never lark, or even eagle flew.
And while with silent, lifting mind I've trod
the high untrespassed sanctity of space,
put out my hand, and touched the face of God.

                      John Gillespie Magee, Jr., September 3, 1941

by Leigh Hunt

Jenny kissed me when we met,
Jumping from the chair she sat in.
Time, you thief! who love to get
Sweets into your list, put that in.
Say I'm weary, say I'm sad;
Say that health and wealth have missed me;
Say I'm growing old, but add-
Jenny kissed me!