Our First Families

Katharine Lee Bates 1859 (Falmouth) – 1929 (Wellesley)



SWEET are the manners of the wood,
Our only old society,
Where all the folk are glad and good
In unrebuked variety.
Within this gentle commonweal
No envy falls with fairy gold
On jewel-weed and Solomon's seal,
Moth mullein and marsh marigold.
No rubied vines despise the lot
Of ragged neighbors; whether moss
Be flat or tufted matters not,
Pale peat or glittering feather-moss.
The common milkwort holds estates
And wears his purple royalty;
The bluets keep their ancient traits
With quiet Quaker loyalty.
These families of long descent,
Our tutors in amenities,
Have pedigrees of such extent
They well may share serenities.
Ere first the hollow Catacombs
Thrilled to a Christian litany
There bloomed beside the redmen's homes
Spicebush and fragrant dittany.
This rock's huge shadow rested on
Gentian and nodding trillium
Before the rise of Babylon,
Before the fall of Ilium.

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Submitted on May 13, 2011

Modified on March 05, 2023

44 sec read
121

Quick analysis:

Scheme ABABCDCDEFEFGBGBHIHFJBJKKLKL
Closest metre Iambic tetrameter
Characters 856
Words 145
Stanzas 1
Stanza Lengths 28

Katharine Lee Bates

Katharine Lee Bates is remembered as the author of the words to the anthem America the Beautiful Bates was born in Falmouth Massachusetts and lived as an adult on Centre Street in Newton Massachusetts An historic plaque marks the site of her home The daughter of a Congregational pastor she graduated from Wellesley College in 1880 and for many years was a professor of English literature at Wellesley While teaching there she was elected a member of the newly formed Pi Gamma Mu honor society for the social sciences because of her interest in history and politics for which she also studied She lived at Wellesley with Katharine Coman who herself was a history and political economy teacher and founder of the Wellesley College Economics department The pair lived together for twenty-five years until Comans death in 1915 It is debated if this relationship was an intimate lesbian relationship as different sources maintain or a platonic relationship called sometimes Boston marriages as the local historical society of her birthplace maintain more…

All Katharine Lee Bates poems | Katharine Lee Bates Books

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