Few modern literary careers are as unlikely as that of W. H. Davies. Davies did not start writing poetry until he was about thirty after having spent his adult life to that point as a tramp, beggar, and drifter. He wrote his first book of verse in the crowded kitchen of a cheap lodging house. Part of the appeal of Davies, the "tramp-poet," was always that of the literary curiosity, but he became a prolific and respected lyric poet. Most admired for his short nature poems, he won the praise of such acute readers of poetry as Ezra Pound and Edith Sitwell. Davies contributed to all five volumes of Edward Marsh's Georgian Anthology, and he is remembered as one of the Georgian poets. Like the other Georgians, his critical reputation has had little staying power.

William Henry Davies was born in Newport, Monmouthshire, in 1871. Though he is often...