Death

A writer wrote of the hearts of men, and he followed their tracks afar;
For his was a spirit that forced his pen to write of the things that are.
His heart grew tired of the truths he told, for his life was hard and grim;
His land seemed barren, its people cold, yet the world was dear to him;,
So he sailed away from the Streets of Strife, he travelled by land and sea,
In search of a people who lived a life as life in the world should be.

And he reached a spot where the scene was fair, with forest and field and wood,
And all things came with the seasons there, and each of its kind was good;
There were mountain-rivers and peaks of snow, there were lights of green and gold,
And echoing caves in the cliffs below, where a world-wide ocean rolled.
The lives of men from the wear of Change a...

Far to the Northward there lies a land,
A wonderful land that the winds blow over,
And none may fathom or understand
The charm it holds for the restless rover;
A great grey chaos, a land half made,
Where endless space is and no life stirreth;
There the soul of a man will recoil afraid
From the sphinx-like visage that Nature weareth.
But old Dame Nature, though scornful, craves
Her dole of death and her share of slaughter;
Many indeed are the nameless graves
Where her victims sleep by the Grey Gulf-water.

Slowly and slowly those grey streams glide,
Drifting along with a languid motion,
Lapping the reed-beds on either side,
Wending their way to the North Ocean.
Grey are the plains where the emus pass
Silent and slow, with their dead demeanour;
Ov...

Hope is the shadowy essence of a wish,
    A fond desire which floats before our eyes;
With lurid aberration, feverish,--
    We clutch the shadow which elusive, flies;
Though at our grasp the mocking fancy flees,
Hope still pursues and soothes realities.

Hope, as a mirage on the desert waste,
    Lures the lost traveler, by a vision fair
Of gushing fountains which he may not taste,
    Of streamlets cool depicted on the air;
With tongue outstretched and parched he onward speeds,
But as he moves the phantom scene recedes.

In the foul dungeon or the narrow cell,
    The prisoner doth pace his lonely beat,
And as he treads, his shackles clank a knell
    Responsive to each movement of his feet;
Yet through his grated window, he discerns
The star...

Them sudden flight had scatter'd over the plain,
Turn'd tow'rds the mountain, whither reason's voice
Drives us; I to my faithful company
Adhering, left it not. For how of him
Depriv'd, might I have sped, or who beside
Would o'er the mountainous tract have led my steps
He with the bitter pang of self-remorse
Seem'd smitten. O clear conscience and upright
How doth a little fling wound thee sore!

Soon as his feet desisted (slack'ning pace),
From haste, that mars all decency of act,
My mind, that in itself before was wrapt,
Its thoughts expanded, as with joy restor'd:
And full against the steep ascent I set
My face, where highest to heav'n its top o'erflows.

The sun, that flar'd behind, with ruddy beam
Before my form was broken; for in me
His rays...

Mine are the night and morning,
The pits of air, the gulf of space,
The sportive sun, the gibbous moon,
The innumerable days.

I hide in the solar glory,
I am dumb in the pealing song,
I rest on the pitch of the torrent,
In slumber I am strong.

No numbers have counted my tallies,
No tribes my house can fill,
I sit by the shining Fount of Life
And pour the deluge still;

And ever by delicate powers
Gathering along the centuries
From race on race the rarest flowers,
My wreath shall nothing miss.

And many a thousand summers
My gardens ripened well,
And light from meliorating stars
With firmer glory fell.

I wrote the past in characters
Of rock and fire the scroll,
The building in the coral sea,
The pla...

There is no sadness here. Oh, that my heart
Were calm and peaceful as these dreamy groves!
That all my hopes and passions, and deep loves,
Could sit in such an atmosphere of peace,
Where no unholy impulses would start
Responsive to the throes that never cease
To keep my spirit in such wild unrest.
'Tis only in the struggling human breast
That the true sorrow lives. Our fruitful joys
Have stony kernels hidden in their core.
Life in a myriad phases passeth here,
And death as various - an equal poise;
Yet all is but a solemn change - no more;
And not a sound save joy pervades the atmosphere.

O, gather me the rose, the rose,
While yet in flower we find it,
For summer smiles, but summer goes,
And winter waits behind it!

For with the dream foregone, foregone,
The deed forborne for ever,
The worm, regret, will canker on,
And Time will turn him never.

So well it were to love, my love,
And cheat of any laughter
The fate beneath us and above,
The dark before and after.

The myrtle and the rose, the rose,
The sunshine and the swallow,
The dream that comes, the wish that goes,
The memories that follow!

1874

The night cold as nuggets, dark as acorn,
against your chest; snow falling
like abandoned echoes releasing energy
into the spyglass, umbrella moon.

A solitary figure trapping hapless sparrows
not in a net but with his footprints
doubling as dungeons against the sun    -
here & there rusting eavestroughs ballooning
into avenging shadows their harpsichord voices
spun on dreams Dick Whittington once used to buy a cat.

And once Tom Thumb Upstaged Peter Pan by appearing
under a petunia but this is not likely to happen soon.

The dawn, forlorn & grey, is a court muffin's handkerchief
waved at a sailor far out at sea.

The piping of our slender, peaceful reeds
Whispers uncared for while the trumpets bray;
Song is thin air; our hearts' exulting play
Beats time but to the tread of marching deeds,
Following the mighty van that Freedom leads,
Her glorious standard flaming to the day!
The crimsoned pavement where a hero bleeds
Breathes nobler lessons than the poet's lay.
Strong arms, broad breasts, brave hearts, are better worth
Than strains that sing the ravished echoes dumb.
Hark! 't is the loud reverberating drum
Rolls o'er the prairied West, the rock-bound North
The myriad-handed Future stretches forth
Its shadowy palms. Behold, we come, - we come!

Turn o'er these idle leaves. Such toys as these
Were not unsought for, as, in languid dreams,
We lay beside our lotus-feedi...

The seraph sings before the manifest
God-One, and in the burning of the Seven,
And with the full life of consummate
Heaving beneath him like a mother's
Warm with her first-born's slumber in that
The poet sings upon the earth grave-riven,
Before the naughty world, soon self-forgiven
For wronging him, and in the darkness prest
From his own soul by worldly weights.
Even so, Sing, seraph with the glory! heaven is high;
Sing, poet with the sorrow! earth is low:
The universe's inward voices cry
'Amen' to either song of joy and woe:
Sing, seraph, poet, sing on equally!

Mark:
So, Maurice, you sail to-morrow, you say?
And you may or may not return?
Be sociable, man! for once in a way,
Unless you’re too old to learn.
The shadows are cool by the water side
Where the willows grow by the pond,
And the yellow laburnum’s drooping pride
Sheds a golden gleam beyond.
For the blended tints of the summer flowers,
For the scents of the summer air,
For all nature’s charms in this world of ours,
’Tis little or naught you care.
Yet I know for certain you haven’t stirred
Since noon from your chosen spot;
And you’ve hardly spoken a single word,
Are you tired, or cross, or what?
You’re fretting about those shares you bought,
They were to have gone up fast;
But I heard how they fell to nothing, in short,
They were given away ...

Sometimes I hear fine ladies sing,
Sometimes I smoke and drink with men;
Sometimes I play at games of cards,
Judge me to be no strong man then.

The strongest moment of my life
Is when I think about the poor;
When, like a spring that rain has fed,
My pity rises more and more.

The flower that loves the warmth and light,
Has all its mornings bathed in dew;
My heart has moments wet with tears,
My weakness is they are so few.

            Section One

    "Give the engines room,
    Give the engines room."
    Louder, faster
    The little band-master
    Whips up the fluting,
    Hurries up the tooting.
    He thinks that he stands,
                    # To be read, or chanted, with the heavy buzzing bass
                            of fire-engines pumping. #
    The reins in his hands,
    In the fire-chief's place
    In the night alarm chase.
    The cymbals whang,
    The kettledrums bang: -
                    # In this passage the reading or chanting
                            is shriller and higher. #
    "Clear the street,
    Clear the street,
    Clear the street - Boom, boom.
    In the evening gloom,
    In the evening gloom,
    Give...

Rabbi, begone! Thy powers
Bring loss to us and ours.
Our ways are not as Thine.
Thou lovest men, we--swine.
Oh, get you hence, Omnipotence,
And take this fool of Thine!
His soul? What care we for his soul?
What good to us that Thou hast made him whole,
Since we have lost our swine?

And Christ went sadly.
He had wrought for them a sign
Of Love, and Hope, and Tenderness divine;
They wanted--swine.
Christ stands without your door and gently knocks;
But if your gold, or swine, the entrance blocks,
He forces no man's hold--he will depart,
And leave you to the treasures of your heart.

No cumbered chamber will the Master share,
But one swept bare
By cleansing fires, then plenished fresh and fair
With meekness, and humility, and ...

Come, my Celia, let us prove
While we may the sports of love;
Time will not be ours forever,
He at length our good will sever.

Spend not then his gifts in vain;
Suns that set may rise again,
But if once we lose this light,
'Tis with us perpetual night.

Why should we defer our joys?
Fame and rumour are but toys.
Cannot we delude the eyes
Of a few poor household spies?
Or his easier ears beguile,
So removed by our wile?

'Tis no sin love's fruits to steal;
But the sweet theft to reveal,
To be taken, to be seen,
These have crimes accounted been.

Let us go hence, my songs; she will not hear.
Let us go hence together without fear;
Keep silence now, for singing-time is over,
And over all old things and all things dear.
She loves not you nor me as all we love her.
Yea, though we sang as angels in her ear,
She would not hear.

Let us rise up and part; she will not know.
Let us go seaward as the great winds go,
Full of blown sand and foam; what help is here?
There is no help, for all these things are so,
And all the world is bitter as a tear.
And how these things are, though ye strove to show,
She would not know.

Let us go home and hence; she will not weep.
We gave love many dreams and days to keep,
Flowers without scent, and fruits that would not grow,
Saying ‘If thou wilt, thrust in thy si...

    To create dream -
    the pearl thru wine effect,
    oil and vinegar viscidity
    of giant salad leaves
    basking on the
    broken picnic table
    like so many lemurs
    taken to a
    Malagasy forest.

    Liverwurst on rye,
    cuff-links drag
    the hard, mica table;
    so, why be afraid
    'cause spume from waves
    glows upward
    in so many trails of
    grey-laden smoke?

    This island looks like a loaf,
    a dot or mole on inviting cheeks,
    to me; so wary, invariably, of land
    (and perhaps the Sand Man)
    amongst all those wandering eyes,
    especially the sea-scape,
    curl of snake
    illuminated
    in a sudden, tropic shower.

    See the sudden bandanna ...

This fell when Christmas lights were done,
Red rose leaves will never make wine;
But before the Easter lights begun;
The ways are sair fra’ the Till to the Tyne.

Two lovers sat where the rowan blows
And all the grass is heavy and fine,
By the gathering-place of the sea-swallows
When the wind brings them over Tyne.

Blossom of broom will never make bread,
Red rose leaves will never make wine;
Between her brows she is grown red,
That was full white in the fields by Tyne.

“O what is this thing ye have on,
Show me now, sweet daughter of mine?”
“O father, this is my little son
That I found hid in the sides of Tyne.

“O what will ye give my son to eat,
Red rose leaves will never make wine?”
“Fen-water and adder’s meat,
The ways a...