This collection gathers together the best-loved gems of English-language verse, from the deeply moving to the hilariously silly. The poems span the entire range of verse from high drama to stuff-and-nonsense, and are presented in nine sections: Poems of Childhood and Youth; Poems of Love and Marriage; Poems of Life; Poems of Loss and Comfort; Poems of War and Peace; Poems to Read Aloud; Poems to Read Quietly; Poems of Animals and Nature, and Poems of Magic and Mystery. The anthology includes works by William Blake, Dylan Thomas, Seamus Heaney, Robert Burns, T.S. Eliot, Rudyard Kipling and W.B. Yeats, and the poems have all been chosen and arranged by Neil Philip. The volume is illustrated throughout with watercolour borders and decorative motifs by Isabelle Brent.