This is one of my favourite poems (question below)?

Question

I find it very beautiful as I do the other poems I have posted which are not mine but were written long ago by famous poets. I was interested to know in this climate of paedophile hysteria whether such great beautiful poetry as this would be criticised as not acceptable and perverted. I found it under a website labelled Famous British paedophiles even though these people (ernest dowson and John Cowper Powys) were never charged with harming a child in their lives and these poems were given as the only evidence.

What do you think of them?

I watched the glory of her childhood change,
Half-sorrowful to find the child I knew,
(Loved long ago in lily-time)
Become a maid, mysterious and strange,
With fair, pure eyes-- dear eyes, but not the eyes I knew
Of old, in the olden time!

Till on my doubting soul the ancient good
Of her dear childhood in the new disguise
Dawned, and I hastened to adore
The glory of her waking maidenhood,
And found the old tenderness within her deepening eyes,
But kinder than before.

Ernest Dowson.

O fairy form, O flower-like face,
O piteous tender breast,
Why did you come with your childish grace
And trouble my heart's rest ?

The tide, my darling, is bitter and deep
That washes that cruel shore.
The happy lovers are those that sleep
And love not any more.

Calm filmy dreams thro' each tired head
Flow softly, mingle and flow.
The happy lovers are those that are dead,
That died full long ago.

O child, forgive me; I lie, I lie
With an evil blasphemy!
I lie to the clouds in the air above!
I lie to the earth and the sea!

The living, the living must worship love!
The dead, the dead must be.

Answer 1

Why would you even want to look at a website like that?

Answer 2

I think the poems are beautiful and celebrate the innocence of youth...I do NOT see paedophilic connotations with either, and would suggest that those who "do" have their own demons to wrestle with and should not read such implication into other people's work. Even murderers see beauty in life, so there is no reason to believe a paedophile would not be able to see the tenderness and innocence in a child. Also, who is to say that their inclinations were for girls? So, I say the poems are tender and that they belong in an age that could use words like "gay" without meaning "homosexual" and "saucy" without meaning "sexy". Just as burglers have the best locks (because they see a potential thief in everyone), so too do those afraid of caring for children without feeling "funny" when they hug a child. We have become a society of perverts who fear extremes we believe are rampant, but only because out of 300 million people, we are told about the half dozen who make the papers...and hence, see one in every face that looks at a child with "any" kind of love in their mind at all.

so very, very sad.

Answer 3

Without analysing the poems too much, i feel that the first is more of a child becoming a woman. The coming of age if you like. The second worries me a little as it speaks of love with a child, not parent/child love, but more the wrongness of an adult wanting to show his love to that child. Obviously though, if these were the only pieces of evidence in the seperate cases of these two people, they would never have been enough to prosecute. They are not hard evidence and provide no solid proof of what may/may not have been happening in these two people's lives, or others affected by them.

Answer 4

Lewis Carrol never harmed a child in his life, but you would not perhaps, have left him alone with you children.
The poems are great by the way

Answer 5

I think they are both lovely. Thank-you for sharing.

Answer 6

2 points says it all.

Answer 7

Um I do not like it. sorry:/


i find it boring.

Answer 8

thanks for 2 points