Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

You're a poet
and don't know it,
but your feet show it--
they're Longfellows!


I don't remember when I first heard this silly little rhyme, but I heard and said it lots growing up. Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882) remains one of the most recognized names in American poetry, but his reputation faded throughout the 20th century. Readers in the middle years of the 1900s began to value complexity over clarity, and "serious" literature was divorced from "popular" literature, just as if the two couldn't coexist in one work or author. Longfellow fell victim to this split.


But he was wildly popular from the middle of the 19th century well into the 20th. His was the leading name among the group known as the "Fireside Poets," because they were so popular that, back in the days before we had the CSIs and the Law and Orders on every night, people actually sat by the fire and read to each other. The group was also know as the "Schoolroom Poets," because one or all of their pictures could be found on the walls of most any given classroom in America's schools.


Fortunately for Longfellow and his work, recent years have seen a revival of interest in his work as new schools of thought about literature—what it is and what it does—open (or in this case, reopen) works for enjoyment, appreciation and analysis.


This is "Mezzo Cammin," an adaptation of the Italian sonnet form, written when Longfellow was 35 years old, halfway through what he might have considered to be his likely longevity.


Half of my life is gone, and I have let
The years slip from me and have not fulfilled
The aspiration of my youth, to build
Some tower of song with lofty parapet.
Not indolence, nor pleasure, nor the fret
Of restless passions that would not be stilled,
But sorrow, and a care that almost killed,
Kept me from what I may accomplish yet;
Though, halfway up the hill, I see the Past
Lying beneath me with its sounds and sights,—
A city in the twilight dim and vast,
With smoking roofs, soft bells, and gleaming lights,—
And hear above me on the autumnal blast
The cataract of Death far thundering from the heights.


Today, 27 February 2007, is Henry Wadsworth Longfellow's 200th birthday.