His Life      His Writings      His Creations      His Study
      Popular Culture      Internet Resources      About This Site     


The Ancient Track:
The Complete Poetical Works
of H.P. Lovecraft
------=-O-=------

By H.P. Lovecraft
Edited by S.T. Joshi

[Cover]

From the Introduction

     This volume includes all known poems by H. P. Lovecraft in existence, including untitled or fragmentary poems found in letters and other documents. . . . Lovecraft’s poetry must be regarded as a far lesser facet of his literary output than his fiction, essays, and letters, but it merits collection precisely because it is an important ancillary to these other bodies of his work. To date, Lovecraft’s poetry has been scattered in several different volumes whose textual accuracy has not always been exemplary, while several poems have remained uncollected. This collected edition of Lovecraft’s verse is not likely to affect his literary standing to any significant degree, but it may yield some insights into the man and his work that have heretofore remained obscure. A few of his poems, at least, have substantial merits of their own that deserve recognition.

Contents

    Introduction
  1. Juvenilia (1897–1905)
    • The Poem of Ulysses, or The Odyssey
    • Ovid’s Metamorphoses
    • H. Lovecraft’s Attempted Journey betwixt Providence & Fall River on the N.Y.N.H. & H.R.R.
    • Poemata Minora, Volume II
      • Ode to Selene or Diana
      • To the Old Pagan Religion
      • On the Ruin of Rome
      • To Pan
      • On the Vanity of Human Ambition
    • C.S.A. 1861–1865: To the Starry Cross of the SOUTH
    • De Triumpho Naturae
  2. Fantasy and Horror
    • To the Late John H. Fowler, Esq.
    • The Unknown
    • The Poe-et’s Nightmare
    • The Rutted Road
    • Nemesis
    • Astrophobos
    • Psychopompos: A Tale in Rhyme
    • The Eidolon
    • A Cycle of Verse
      • Oceanus
      • Clouds
      • Mother Earth
    • Despair
    • Revelation
    • The House
    • The City
    • To Edward John Moreton Drax Plunkett, Eighteenth Baron Dunsany
    • The Nightmare Lake
    • Bells
    • On Reading Lord Dunsany’s Book of Wonder
    • To a Dreamer
    • With a Copy of Wilde’s Fairy Tales
    • [On The Thing in the Woods by Harper Williams]
    • The Cats
    • Primavera
    • Festival
    • Hallowe’en in a Suburb
    • [On Ambrose Bierce]
    • The Wood
    • The Outpost
    • The Ancient Track
    • The Messenger
    • Fungi from Yuggoth
        1. The Book
        2. Pursuit
        3. The Key
        4. Recognition
        5. Homecoming
        6. The Lamp
        7. Zaman’s Hill
        8. The Port
        9. The Courtyard
        10. The Pigeon-Flyers
        11. The Well
        12. The Howler
        13. Hesperia
        14. Star-Winds
        15. Antarktos
        16. The Window
        17. A Memory
        18. The Gardens of Yin
        19. The Bells
        20. Night-Gaunts
        21. Nyarlathotep
        22. Azathoth
        23. Mirage
        24. The Canal
        25. St. Toad’s
        26. The Familiars
        27. The Elder Pharos
        28. Expectancy
        29. Nostalgia
        30. Background
        31. The Dweller
        32. Alienation
        33. Harbour Whistles
        34. Recapture
        35. Evening Star
        36. Continuity
    • Bouts Rimés
      • Beyond Zimbabwe
      • The White Elephant
    • In a Sequester’d Providence Churchyard Where Once Poe Walk’d
    • To Mr. Finlay, upon His Drawing for Mr. Bloch’s Tale, “The Faceless God”
    • To Clark Ashton Smith, Esq., upon His Phantastick Tales, Verses, Pictures, and Sculptures
    • Nathicana
  3. Occasional Verse
    • The Members of the Men’s Club of the First Universalist Church of Providence, R.I., to Its President, About to Leave for Florida on Account of His Health
    • To Mr. Terhune, on His Historical Fiction
    • To Mr. Munroe, on His Instructive and Entertaining Account of Switzerland
    • Regner Lodbrog’s Epicedium
    • To an Accomplished Young Gentlewoman on Her Birthday, Decr. 2, 1914
    • On Receiving a Picture of Swans
    • To Charlie of the Comics
    • On the Cowboys of the West
    • To Samuel Loveman, Esquire, on His Poetry and Drama, Writ in the Elizabethan Style
    • The Bookstall
    • Content
    • The Smile
    • Inspiration
    • Respite
    • Brotherhood
    • Lines on Graduation from the R.I. Hospital’s School of Nurses
    • Fact and Fancy
    • Percival Lowell
    • Prologue to “Fragments from an Hour of Inspiration” by Jonathan E. Hoag
    • Earth and Sky
    • To M. W. M.
    • Lines on the 25th. Anniversary of the Providence Evening News, 1892–1917
    • To the Nurses of the Red Cross
    • To the Arcadian
    • Laeta; A Lament
    • To Mr. Kleiner, on Receiving from Him the Poetical Works of Addison, Gay, and Somerville
    • A Pastoral Tragedy of Appleton, Wisconsin
    • Damon and Delia, a Pastoral
    • To Delia, Avoiding Damon
    • Hellas
    • Ambition
    • Damon: A Monody
    • Hylas and Myrrha: A Tale
    • John Oldham: A Defence
    • Myrrha and Strephon
    • Wisdom
    • Tryout’s Lament for the Vanished Spider
    • Cindy: Scrub-Lady in a State Street Skyscraper
    • The Voice
    • On a Grecian Colonnade in a Park
    • The Dream
    • To Alfred Galpin, Esq.
    • On Receiving a Portraiture of Mrs. Berkeley, ye Poetess
    • To a Youth
    • On the Return of Maurice Winter Moe, Esq., to the Pedagogical Profession
    • To Mr. Galpin
    • Sir Thomas Tryout
    • To Damon
    • To Rheinhart Kleiner, Esq.
    • Chloris and Damon
    • To Endymion
    • To Mr. Baldwin, on Receiving a Picture of Him in a Rural Bower
    • Damon and Lycë
    • [On the Pyramids]
    • [Stanzas on Samarkand]
    • To Samuel Loveman, Esq.
    • To George Kirk, Esq.
    • My Favourite Character
    • [On the Double-R Coffee House]
    • [On Rheinhart Kleiner Being Hit by an Automobile]
    • [To Frank Belknap Long on His Birthday]
    • A Year Off
    • To an Infant
    • To George Willard Kirk, Gent., of Chelsea-Village, in New-York, upon His Birthday, Novr. 25, 1925
    • [On Old Grimes by Albert Gorton Greene]
    • In Memoriam: Oscar Incoul Verelst of Manhattan: 1920–1926
    • The Return
    • Hedone
    • To Miss Beryl Hoyt
    • To a Sophisticated Young Gentleman
    • Veteropinguis Redivivus
    • To a Young Poet in Dunedin
    • [Metrical Example]
    • The Odes of Horace: Book III, ix
    • Gaudeamus
    • The Greatest Law
    • [Sonnet Study]
    • To Samuel Loveman Esq.
    • Verses Designed to Be Sent by a Friend of the Author to His Brother-in-Law on New Year’s Day
    • [Last of an elder race . . .]
    • [’Tis a sprig of green shamrock . . .]
  4. Satire
    • Providence in 2000 A.D.
    • Fragment on Whitman
    • [On Robert Browning]
    • Ad Criticos
      • Liber Primus
      • Liber Secundus
      • Liber Tertius
      • Liber Quartus
    • Frustra Praemunitus
    • De Scriptore Mulieroso
    • On a Modern Lothario
    • The End of the Jackson War
    • The Power of Wine: A Satire
    • Gryphus in Asinum Mutatus
    • The Simple Speller’s Tale
    • [On Slang]
    • Ye Ballade of Patrick von Flynn
    • The Isaacsonio-Mortoniad
    • Unda; or, The Bride of the Sea
    • [On “Unda; or, The Bride of the Sea”]
    • Gems from In a Minor Key
    • The State of Poetry
    • The Magazine Poet
    • My Lost Love
    • The Beauties of Peace
    • Epitaph on ye Letterr Rrr........
    • The Dead Bookworm
    • Ad Balneum
    • [On Kelso the Poet]
    • Futurist Art
    • The Nymph’s Reply to the Modern Business Man
    • Pacifist War Song—1917
    • The Poet of Passion
    • On the Death of a Rhyming Critic
    • To the Incomparable Clorinda
    • To Saccharissa, Fairest of Her Sex
    • To Rhodoclia—Peerless Among Maidens
    • To Belinda, Favourite of the Graces
    • To Heliodora—Sister of Cytheraea
    • To Mistress Sophia Simple, Queen of the Cinema
    • The Introduction
    • Grace
    • To Col. Linkaby Didd
    • Amissa Minerva
    • [On Prohibition]
    • Monody on the Late King Alcohol
    • The Pensive Swain
    • To Phillis
    • The Poet’s Rash Excuse
    • On Religion
    • The Pathetick History of Sir Wilful Wildrake
    • Medusa: A Portrait
    • Simplicity: A Poem
    • Plaster-All
    • To Zara
    • Waste Paper
    • [On a Politician]
    • [On a Room for Rent]
    • [On J. F. Roy Erford]
    • Lines upon the Magnates of the Pulp
    • Dead Passion’s Flame
    • Arcadia
    • Lullaby for the Dionne Quintuplets
    • The Decline and Fall of a Man of the World
    • [Epigrams]
    • Life’s Mystery
    • On Mr. L. Phillips Howard’s Profound Poem Entitled “Life’s Mystery”
    • On an Accomplished Young Linguist
    • “The Poetical Punch” Pushed from His Pedestal
    • The Road to Ruin
    • Sors Poetae
  5. Seasonal and Topographical
    • Quinsnicket Park
    • New England
    • March
    • A Mississippi Autumn
    • A Rural Summer Eve
    • Brumalia
    • On Receiving a Picture of the Marshes at Ipswich
    • Spring
    • A Garden
    • April
    • On Receiving a Picture of ye Towne of Templeton, in the Colonie of Massachusetts-Bay, with Mount Monadnock, in New-Hampshire, Shewn in the Distance
    • Autumn
    • Sunset
    • Old Christmas
    • A Summer Sunset and Evening
    • A Winter Wish
    • Ver Rusticum
    • A June Afternoon
    • The Spirit of Summer
    • August
    • April Dawn
    • January
    • October [1]
    • Christmas
    • [On Marblehead]
    • [On a Scene in Rural Rhode Island]
    • Providence
    • Solstice
    • October [2]
    • [On Newport, Rhode Island]
    • The East India Brick Row
    • On an Unspoil’d Rural Prospect
    • Saturnalia
    • [Christmas Greetings]
  6. Amateur Affairs
    • To the Members of the Pin-Feathers on the Merits of Their Organisation, and of Their New Publication, The Pinfeather
    • To the Rev. James Pyke
    • To the Members of the United Amateur Press Association from the Providence Amateur Press Club
    • The Bay-Stater’s Policy
    • R. Kleiner, Laureatus, in Heliconem
    • Providence Amateur Press Club (Deceased) to the Athenaeum Club of Journalism
    • To Mr. Lockhart, on His Poetry
    • To Jonathan E. Hoag, Esq.
    • To Arthur Goodenough, Esq.
    • To the Eighth of November
    • To the A.H.S.P.C., on Receipt of the Christmas Pippin
    • Greetings
    • To Jonathan Hoag, Esq.
    • In Memoriam: J. E. T. D.
    • To the A.H.S.P.C., on Receipt of the May Pippin
    • Helene Hoffman Cole: 1893–1919
    • On Collaboration
    • Birthday Lines to Margfred Galbraham
    • Ad Scribam
    • Ex-Poet’s Reply
    • To Two Epgephi
    • Theobaldian Aestivation
    • The Prophecy of Capys Secundus
    • To Mr. Hoag
    • On a Poet’s Ninety-first Birthday
    • To Saml: Loveman, Gent.
    • To Mr. Hoag
    • The Feast
    • Lines for Poets’ Night at the Scribblers’ Club
    • To Mr. Hoag
    • To Mr. Hoag
    • To Jonathan Hoag
    • To Jonathan E. Hoag, Esq.
    • The Absent Leader
    • Ave atque Vale
    • To “The Scribblers”
  7. Politics and Society
    • New-England Fallen
    • On the Creation of Niggers
    • On a New-England Village Seen by Moonlight
    • To General Villa
    • The Teuton’s Battle-Song
    • 1914
    • The Crime of Crimes
    • An American to Mother England
    • Temperance Song
    • The Rose of England
    • Lines on Gen. Robert Edward Lee
    • Britannia Victura
    • Iterum Conjunctae
    • The Peace Advocate
    • To Greece, 1917
    • Ode for July Fourth, 1917
    • An American to the British Flag
    • The Volunteer
    • Ad Britannos—1918
    • On a Battlefield in Picardy
    • The Link
    • To Alan Seeger
    • Germania—1918
    • The Conscript
    • To Maj.-Gen. Omar Bundy, U.S.A.
    • Theodore Roosevelt
    • North and South Britons
  8. Personal
    • [To His Mother on Thanksgiving]
    • An Elegy on Franklin Chase Clark, M.D.
    • [The Solace of Georgian Poetry]
    • [On Phillips Gamwell]
    • An Elegy on Phillips Gamwell, Esq.
    • Sonnet on Myself
    • Phaeton
    • Monos: An Ode
    • Oct. 17, 1919
    • To S. S. L.—Oct. 17, 1920
    • S. S. L.: Christmas 1920
    • To Xanthippe, on Her Birthday—March 16, 1925
    • Είς Σφίγγην
    • [On Cheating the Post Office]
    • An Epistle to the Rt. Honble Maurice Winter Moe, Esq.
    • [Anthem of the Kappa Alpha Tau]
    • Edith Miniter
    • [Little Sam Perkins]
  9. Alfredo; A Tragedy
  10. Fragments
    Notes
    A Chronology of Lovecraft’s Poems
    Index of Titles
    Index of First Lines

Bibliographic Information

The Ancient Track: The Complete Poetical Works of H.P. Lovecraft. By H.P. Lovecraft, Edited by S.T. Joshi. San Francisco, CA: Night Shade Books; 2001; hard cover: ISBN 1-892389-15-0; trade paper: ISBN 1-892389-16-9.

Purchasing This Book

This book may be purchased from Amazon.com in hard cover or trade paper, or directly from the publisher, Night Shade Books.

 
 
Return to Sources of Lovecraft’s Works
   Last Revised 18 October 2003
URL: http://www.hplovecraft.com/writings/sources/at.asp
 
   Home       Contact Us       Copyright © 1998-2008 by Donovan K. Loucks.  All Rights Reserved       Search       Site Map