Death

I had eight birds hatched in one nest,
Four cocks there were, and hens the rest.
I nursed them up with pain and care,
Nor cost, nor labour did I spare,
Till at the last they felt their wing,
Mounted the trees, and learned to sing;
Chief of the brood then took his flight
To regions far and left me quite.
My mournful chirps I after send,
Till he return, or I do end:
Leave not thy nest, thy dam and sire,
Fly back and sing amidst this choir.
My second bird did take her flight,
And with her mate flew out of sight;
Southward they both their course did bend,
And seasons twain they there did spend,
Till after blown by southern gales,
They norward steered with filled sails.
A prettier bird was no where seen,
Along the beach among the treen.
I have a...

It was deadly cold in Danbury town
    One terrible night in mid November,
    A night that the Danbury folk remember
For the sleety wind that hammered them down,
That chilled their faces and chapped their skin,
    And froze their fingers and bit their feet,
And made them ice to the heart within,
    And spattered and scattered
    And shattered and battered
Their shivering bodies about the street;
And the fact is most of them didn't roam
In the face of the storm, but stayed at home;
While here and there a policeman, stamping
To keep himself warm or sedately tramping
Hither and thither, paced his beat;
Or peered where out of the blizzard's welter
Some wretched being had crept to shelter,
And now, drenched through by the sleet, a muddled
Blur of a ma...

I 'm ashamed, - that 's the fact, - it 's a pitiful case, -
Won't any kind classmate get up in my place?
Just remember how often I've risen before, -
I blush as I straighten my legs on the floor!

There are stories, once pleasing, too many times told, -
There are beauties once charming, too fearfully old, -
There are voices we've heard till we know them so well,
Though they talked for an hour they'd have nothing to tell.

Yet, Classmates! Friends! Brothers! Dear blessed old boys!
Made one by a lifetime of sorrows and joys,
What lips have such sounds as the poorest of these,
Though honeyed, like Plato's, by musical bees?

What voice is so sweet and what greeting so dear
As the simple, warm welcome that waits for us here?
The love of our boyhood still breat...

Once we feared The Beast, when he followed us we ran,
Ran very fast though we knew
It was not right that The Beast should master Man;
But what could we Flint-workers do?
The Beast only grinned at our spears round his ears,
Grinned at the hammers that we made;
But now we will hunt him for the life with the Knife,
And this is the Buyer of the Blade!

Room for his shadow on the grass, let it pass
To left and right, stand clear!
This is the Buyer of the Blade, be afraid!
This is the great god Tyr!

Tyr thought hard till he hammered out a plan,
For he knew it was not right
(And it is not right) that The Beast should master Man;
So he went to the Children of the Night.
He begged a Magic Knife of their make for our sake.
When he begged for the Knife th...

'Tis pretty to be in Ballinderry,
    'Tis pretty to be in Ballindoon,
But 'tis prettier far in County Kerry
    Coortin' under the bran' new moon,
                Aroon, Aroon!

'Twas there by the bosom of blue Killarney
    They came by the hundther' a-coortin' me;
Sure I was the one to give back their blarney,
    An' merry was I to be fancy-free.

But niver a step in the lot was lighter,
    An' divvle a boulder among the bhoys,
Than Phelim O'Shea, me dynamither,
    Me illigant arthist in clock-work toys.

'Twas all for love he would bring his figgers
    Of iminent statesmen, in toy machines,
An' hould me hand as he pulled the thriggers
    An' scattered the thraytors to smithereens.

An' to see the Queen in her Crystial Pallus

I.

White as a lily moulded of Earth's milk
That eve the moon bloomed in a hyacinth sky;
Soft in the gleaming glens the wind went by,
Faint as a phantom clothed in unseen silk:
Bright as a naiad's leap, from shine to shade
The runnel twinkled through the shaken brier;
Above the hills one long cloud, pulsed with fire,
Flashed like a great enchantment-welded blade.
And when the western sky seemed some weird land,
And night a witching spell at whose command
One sloping star fell green from heav'n; and deep
The warm rose opened for the moth to sleep;
Then she, consenting, laid her hands in his,
And lifted up her lips for their first kiss.

II.

There where they part, the porch's steps are strewn
With wind-blown petals of the purple vine;
A...

I love the joyous thoughtless heart,
The revels of the youthful mind,
'Ere sad experience points the dart,
Which wounds so surely all mankind.

It glads me when the buoyant soul,
Unconscious ranges, fancy free,
Draining the sweets of pleasure's bowl,
And thinking all as blest as he.

Ah! me, yet sad it is to know,
The many griefs the future brings,
That time must change that note to woe,
Which now its merry carrol sings.

This "summer of the mind," alas!
Must have its autumn--leafless, bare,
When all these pleasing phantoms pass,
And end in winter, age, and care!

Such, such is life, the moral tells--
The tempest, and its sunny smiles,
A warning voice the cheerful bells,
The knell of death, our youth beguiles!

Why smile high stars the happier after rain?
Why is strong love the stronger after pain?
Ai me! ai me! thou wotest not nor I!

Why sings the wild swan heavenliest when it dies?
Why spake the dumb lips sweetest that we prize
For maddening memories? O why! O why!

Why are dead kisses dearer when they're dead?
Why are dead faces lovelier vanished?
And why this heart-ache? None can answer why!

We were very tired, we were very merry--
We had gone back and forth all night on the ferry.
It was bare and bright, and smelled like a stable--
But we looked into a fire, we leaned across a table,
We lay on a hill-top underneath the moon;
And the whistles kept blowing, and the dawn came soon.

We were very tired, we were very merry--
We had gone back and forth all night on the ferry;
And you ate an apple, and I ate a pear,
From a dozen of each we had bought somewhere;
And the sky went wan, and the wind came cold,
And the sun rose dripping, a bucketful of gold.

We were very tired, we were very merry,
We had gone back and forth all night on the ferry.
We hailed, "Good morrow, mother!" to a shawl-covered head,
And bought a morning paper, which neither of us...

Go, then, and join the murmuring city's throng!
Me thou dost leave to solitude and tears;
To busy phantasies, and boding fears,
Lest ill betide thee; but 'twill not be long
Ere the hard season shall be past; till then
Live happy; sometimes the forsaken shade
Remembering, and these trees now left to fade;
Nor, 'mid the busy scenes and hum of men,
Wilt thou my cares forget: in heaviness
To me the hours shall roll, weary and slow,
Till mournful autumn past, and all the snow
Of winter pale, the glad hour I shall bless
That shall restore thee from the crowd again,
To the green hamlet on the peaceful plain.

Years ago, when life was too violent for any to live very old, the Spirit invented a ruse to give great age to Man.

Late one fall, Ponchontas was keeping a slow fire to smoke his strips of salmon. It occurred to him that by stoking the flames gently with bits of chips, the fire would burn not only smoother, but more evenly.

Ponchontas held the block firmly and brought his axe to play on the extended limb. Suddenly, his grip faltered and the blade struck flesh drawing blood. Panicky, he thrashed about the sand scattering it into the face of the fire. Quite by accident, you see, as his foot only convulsed the pain his bleeding arm felt. One by one, the blood fell in drops then trickles, rivulets until a veritable torrent seemed loosed. Ponchontas screamed till the woods listened. The spirit that governs the pulp of the...

If this importunate heart trouble your peace
With words lighter than air,
Or hopes that in mere hoping flicker and cease;
Crumple the rose in your hair;
And cover your lips with odorous twilight and say,
"O Hearts of wind-blown flame!
O Winds, older than changing of night and day,
That murmuring and longing came
From marble cities loud with tabors of old
In dove-grey faery lands;
From battle-banners, fold upon purple fold,
Queens wrought with glimmering hands;
That saw young Niamh hover with love-lorn face
Above the wandering tide;
And lingered in the hidden desolate place
Where the last Phoenix died,
And wrapped the flames above his holy head;
And still murmur and long:
O piteous Hearts, changing till change be dead
In a tumultuous song':
...

In her last hour of life the tree
Gave up her glorious memories,
Wild scent of wood anemone,
The sapphire blue of April skies.

With faint but ever-strength'ning flame,
The dew-drenched hyacinthine spires
Were lost, as red-gold bracken came,
With maple bathed in living fires.

Grey smoke of ancient clematis
Towards the silver birch inclined,
And deep in thorny fastnesses
The coral bryony entwined.

Then softly through the dusky room
They strayed, fair ghosts of other days,
With breath like early cherry bloom,
With tender eyes and gentle ways.

They glimmered on the sombre walls,
They danced upon the oaken floor,
Till through the loudly silent halls
Joy reigned majestical once more.

Up blazed the fire, and, dazzling...

I Dreamed my soul went wandering in
An island dim with mystery;
An island that, because of sin,
No mortal eye shall ever see.

And while I walked, one came, unseen,
And gazed into my eyes: ah me!
Her presence was a rose between
The wind and me, blown dreamily.

The lily, that lifts up its dome,
A tabernacle for the bee,
A faery chapel fair as foam,
Had not her absolute purity.

The bird, that hymns the falling leaf,
That breaks its heart in melody,
Says to the soul no raptured grief
Such as her presence said to me.

That moment when I felt her eyes,
Their starry transport, instantly
I felt the indomitable skies,
With all their worlds, were less to me.

And when her hand lay in my own,
Far intimations flashed th...

(TO THE OMAR KHAYYÁM CLUB)

Great Omar, here to-night we drain a bowl
Unto thy long-since transmigrated soul,
    Ours all unworthy in thy place to sit,
Ours still to read in life's enchanted scroll.

For us like thee a little hour to stay,
For us like thee a little hour of play,
    A little hour for wine and love and song,
And we too turn the glass and take our way.

So many years your tomb the roses strew,
Yet not one penny wiser we than you,
The doubts that wearied you are with us still,
And, Heaven be thanked! your wine is with us too.

For, have the years a better message brought
To match the simple wisdom that you taught:
    Love, wine and verse, and just a little bread -
For these to live and count the rest as nought?

Th...

Farewell! a long farewell! O Poverty,
Affection's fondest dream how hast thou reft!
But though, on thy stern brow no trace is left
Of youthful joys, that on the cold heart die,
With thee a sad companionship I seek,
Content, if poor; for patient wretchedness,
Tearful, but uncomplaining of distress,
Who turns to the rude storm her faded cheek;
And Piety, who never told her wrong;
And calm Content, whose griefs no more rebel;
And Genius, warbling sweet, his saddest song,
When evening listens to some village knell,
Long banished from the world's insulting throng;
With thee, and thy unfriended children dwell.

A hilltop sought by every soothing breeze
That loves the melody of murmuring boughs,
Cool shades, green acreage, and antique house
Fronting the ocean and the dawn; than these
Old monks built never for the spirit's ease
Cloisters more calm - not Cluny nor Clairvaux;
Sweet are the noises from the bay below,
And cuckoos calling in the tulip-trees.
Here, a yet empty suitor in thy train,
Beloved Poesy, great joy was mine
To while a listless spell of summer days,
Happier than hoarder in each evening's gain,
When evenings found me richer by one line,
One verse well turned, or serviceable phrase.

    Bye, baby bumpkin,
    Where's Tony Lumpkin?
    My lady's on her death-bed,
    With eating half a pumpkin.