William Blake (1757-1827)
Holy Thursday: Is this a holy thing to see
1Is this a holy thing to see
2In a rich and fruitful land,
3Babes reduc'd to misery,
4Fed with cold and usurous hand?
5Is that trembling cry a song?
6Can it be a song of joy?
7And so many children poor?
8It is a land of poverty!
9And their sun does never shine,
10And their fields are bleak and bare,
11And their ways are fill'd with thorns:
12It is eternal winter there.
13For where-e'er the sun does shine,
14And where-e'er the rain does fall,
15Babe can never hunger there,
16Nor poverty the mind appall.
Online text copyright © 2009, Ian Lancashire (the Department of English) and the University of Toronto.
Published by the Web Development Group, Information Technology Services, University of Toronto Libraries.
Original text: William Blake, Songs of Experience (1794). Blake's Illuminated Books, ed. David Bindman (Princeton, NJ: William Blake Trust; London: Tate Gallery, 1991-). See Vol. 2. PR 4142 B46 1991 ROBA.
First publication date:
1794
RPO poem editor: Northrop Frye
RP edition: 3RP 2.282.
Recent editing: 4:2002/3/14
Rhyme: abab
Other poems by William Blake
