William Brighty Rands

William Brighty Rands Poems

Great, wide, beautiful, wonderful World,
With the wonderful water round you curled,
And the wonderful grass upon your breast--
World, you are beautifully drest.
...

IF the butterfly courted the bee,
And the owl the porcupine;
If churches were built in the sea,
And three times one was nine;
...

I am the cat of cats. I am
The everlasting cat!
Cunning, and old, and sleek as jam,
The everlasting cat!
...

When Love arose in heart and deed
To wake the world to greater joy,
'What can she give me now?' said Greed,
Who thought to win some costly toy.
...

Into the skies, one summer's day,
I sent a little Thought away;
Up to where, in the blue round,
The sun sat shining without sound.
...

Godfrey Gordon Gustavus Gore —
No doubt you have heard the name before —
Was a boy who never would shut a door!
...

There once was a wood, and a very thick wood,
So thick that to walk was as much as you could;
But a sunbeam got in, and the trees understood.
...

I SAW a new world in my dream,
Where all the folks alike did seem:
There was no Child, there was no Mother,
There was no Change, there was no Other.
...

THIS is the way we dress the Doll:—
You may make her a shepherdess, the Doll,
If you give her a crook with a pastoral hook,
But this is the way we dress the Doll.
...

Winifred Waters sat and sighed
Under a weeping willow;
When she went to bed she cried,
Wetting all the pillow;
...

11.

Brown eyes,
Straight nose;
Dirt pies,
Rumpled clothes;
...

Seven sweet singing birds up in a tree;
Seven swift sailing ships white upon the sea;
Seven bright weather-cocks shining in the sun;
Seven slim race-horses ready for a run;
...

Nine grenadiers, with bayonets in their guns;
Nine bakers' baskets, with hot cross buns;
Nine brown elephants standing in a row;
Nine new velocipedes, good ones to go;
...

The Cuckoo sat in the old pear-tree,
Cuckoo!
Raining or snowing, nought cared he.
Cuckoo!
...

William Brighty Rands Biography

Born in 1823, William Brighty Rands published several volumes of children's literature anonymously and contributed to various periodicals under various pseudonyms, especially Matthew Browne, Henry Holbeach, and T. Talker. He worked as a reporter in the House of Commons and died in 1882. His major publications were: [Browne, Matthew] Chaucer's England (London: Hurst and Blackett, 1869). Lilliput Levee (1864) Lilliput Lectures (London: Strahan, 1871). PR 5209 R2 L5 York University Library Lilliput Revels (New York: G. Routledge, 1871). Microopaque. New York : Readex Microprint, 1970. Center of Research Libraries Database. Lilliput Legends (1872) W. B. Rand, Lilliput Lyrics, ed. R. Brimley Johnson (London: John Lane, the Bodley Head, 1899). del F Fisher Rare Book Library)

The Best Poem Of William Brighty Rands

Great, Wide, Beautiful, Wonderful World

Great, wide, beautiful, wonderful World,
With the wonderful water round you curled,
And the wonderful grass upon your breast--
World, you are beautifully drest.

The wonderful air is over me,
And the wonderful wind is shaking the tree,
It walks on the water, and whirls the mills,
And talks to itself on the tops of the hills.

You friendly Earth! how far do you go,
With the wheat-fields that nod and the rivers that flow,
With cities and gardens, and cliffs, and isles,
And people upon you for thousands of miles?

Ah, you are so great, and I am so small,
I tremble to think of you, World, at all;
And yet, when I said my prayers to-day,
A whisper inside me seemed to say,
"You are more than the Earth, though you are such a dot:
You can love and think, and the Earth cannot!"

William Brighty Rands Comments

Brenda Boyes 29 April 2018

I loved the poem we learned at school I wish I lived in a caravan, with a horse to drive like the Pedlar man

6 2 Reply
Goblin Train 30 January 2012

It would be great to have A Shooting Song added to the collection of poems by Mr Rand available here.

28 13 Reply

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