Dreams

    Well, Emily Sparks, your prayers were not wasted,
    Your love was not all in vain.
    I owe whatever I was in life
    To your hope that would not give me up,
    To your love that saw me still as good.
    Dear Emily Sparks, let me tell you the story.
    I pass the effect of my father and mother;
    The milliner's daughter made me trouble
    And out I went in the world,
    Where I passed through every peril known
    Of wine and women and joy of life.
    One night, in a room in the Rue de Rivoli,
    I was drinking wine with a black-eyed cocotte,
    And the tears swam into my eyes.
    She though they were amorous tears and smiled
    For thought of her conquest over me.
    But my soul was three thousand miles away,
    In the days when you...

My green aquarium of phantom fish,
Goggling in on me through the misty panes;
My rotting leaves and fields spongy with rains;
My few clear quiet autumn days--I wish

I could leave all, clearness and mistiness;
Sodden or goldenly crystal, all too still.
Yes, and I too rot with the leaves that fill
The hollows in the woods; I am grown less

Than human, listless, aimless as the green
Idiot fishes of my aquarium,
Who loiter down their dim tunnels and come
And look at me and drift away, nought seen

Or understood, but only glazedly
Reflected. Upwards, upwards through the shadows,
Through the lush sponginess of deep-sea meadows
Where hare-lipped monsters batten, let me ply

Winged fins, bursting this matrix dark to find
Jewels and movement, ...

    At dawn of day the white land lay all gruesome-like and grim,
    When Bill Mc'Gee he says to me: "We've GOT to do it, Jim.
    We've got to make Fort Liard quick. I know the river's bad,
    But, oh! the little woman's sick . . . why! don't you savvy, lad?"
    And me! Well, yes, I must confess it wasn't hard to see
    Their little family group of two would soon be one of three.
    And so I answered, careless-like: "Why, Bill! you don't suppose
    I'm scared of that there 'babbling brook'? Whatever you say - goes."

    A real live man was Barb-wire Bill, with insides copper-lined;
    For "barb-wire" was the brand of "hooch" to which he most inclined.
    They knew him far; his igloos are on Kittiegazuit strand.
    They knew him well, the tribes who dwell within ...

Where the cocoa and cactus are neighbors,
Where the fig and the fir tree are one;
Where the brave corn is lifting bent sabres
And flashing them far in the sun;

Where maidens blush red in their tresses
Of night, and retreat to advance,
And the dark, sweeping eyelash expresses
Deep passion, half hush’d in a trance;

Where the fig is in leaf, where the blossom
Of orange is fragrant as fair,
Santa Barbara’s balm in the bosom,
Her sunny, soft winds in the hair;

Where the grape is most luscious; where laden
Long branches bend double with gold;
Los Angelos leans like a maiden,
Red, blushing, half shy, and half bold.

Where passion was born and where poets
Are deeper in silence than song,
A love knows a love, and may know its
Rewar...

English Translation below Original

Hymnus Matutinus


        Nox et tenebrae et nubila,
    confusa mundi et turbida,
    lux intrat, albescit polus,
    Christus venit, discedite.

        Caligo terrae scinditur
    percussa solis spiculo,
    rebusque iam color redit
    vultu nitentis sideris.

        Sic nostra mox obscuritas
    fraudisque pectus conscium
    ruptis retectum nubibus
    regnante pallescit Deo.

        Tunc non licebit claudere
    quod quisque fuscum cogitat,
    sed mane clarescent novo
    secreta mentis prodita.

        Fur ante lucem squalido
    inpune peccat tempore,
    sed lux dolis contraria
    latere furtum non sinit.

        Versuta fraus et callida

Astounded, to the guardian of my steps
I turn'd me, like the chill, who always runs
Thither for succour, where he trusteth most,
And she was like the mother, who her son
Beholding pale and breathless, with her voice
Soothes him, and he is cheer'd; for thus she spake,
Soothing me: "Know'st not thou, thou art in heav'n?
And know'st not thou, whatever is in heav'n,
Is holy, and that nothing there is done
But is done zealously and well? Deem now,
What change in thee the song, and what my smile
had wrought, since thus the shout had pow'r to move thee.
In which couldst thou have understood their prayers,
The vengeance were already known to thee,
Which thou must witness ere thy mortal hour,
The sword of heav'n is not in haste to smite,
Nor yet doth linger, save unto ...

When my mother died I was very young,
And my father sold me while yet my tongue
Could scarcely cry "Weep! weep! weep! weep!"
So your chimneys I sweep, and in soot I sleep.

There's little Tom Dacre, who cried when his head,
That curled like a lamb's back, was shaved; so I said,
"Hush, Tom! never mind it, for, when your head's bare,
You know that the soot cannot spoil your white hair."

And so he was quiet, and that very night,
As Tom was a-sleeping, he had such a sight!--
That thousands of sweepers, Dick, Joe, Ned, and Jack,
Were all of them locked up in coffins of black.

And by came an angel, who had a bright key,
And he opened the coffins, and let them all free;
Then down a green plain, leaping, laughing, they run,
And wash in a river, and shine i...

I' vidi in terra angelici costumi.

THE EFFECTS OF HER GRIEF.


    On earth reveal'd the beauties of the skies,
Angelic features, it was mine to hail;
Features, which wake my mingled joy and wail,
While all besides like dreams or shadows flies.
And fill'd with tears I saw those two bright eyes,
Which oft have turn'd the sun with envy pale;
And from those lips I heard--oh! such a tale,
As might awake brute Nature's sympathies!
Wit, pity, excellence, and grief, and love
With blended plaint so sweet a concert made,
As ne'er was given to mortal ear to prove:
And heaven itself such mute attention paid,
That not a breath disturb'd the listening grove--
Even æther's wildest gales the tuneful charm obey'd.

WRANGHAM.


    Ye...

Native moments! when you come upon me - Ah you are here now!
Give me now libidinous joys only!
Give me the drench of my passions!
Give me life coarse and rank! To-day,
I go consort with nature's darlings - to-night too;
I am for those who believe in loose delights - I share the midnight orgies of young men;
I dance with the dancers, and drink with the drinkers;
The echoes ring with our indecent calls;
I take for my love some prostitute - I pick out some low person for my dearest friend,
He shall be lawless, rude, illiterate - he shall be one condemn'd by others for deeds done;
I will play a part no longer - Why should I exile myself from my companions?
O you shunn'd persons! I at least do not shun you, I come forthwith in your midst - I will be your poet,
I will be more to you th...

Said the red-cloaked crone
In a whispered moan:

"The dead man was limp
When laid in his chest;
Yea, limp; and why
But to signify
That the grave will crimp
Ere next year's sun
Yet another one
Of those in that house -
It may be the best -
For its endless drowse!"

Said the brown-shawled dame
To confirm the same:

"And the slothful flies
On the rotting fruit
Have been seen to wear
While crawling there
Crape scarves, by eyes
That were quick and acute;
As did those that had pitched
On the cows by the pails,
And with flaps of their tails
Were far away switched."

Said the third in plaid,
Each word being weighed:

"And trotting does
In the park, in the lane,
And just outside
Th...

My father left a park to me,
But it is wild and barren,
A garden too with scarce a tree,
And waster than a warren:
Yet say the neighbours when they call,
It is not bad but good land,
And in it is the germ of all
That grows within the woodland.

O had I lived when song was great
In days of old Amphion,
And ta'en my fiddle to the gate,
Nor cared for seed or scion!
And had I lived when song was great,
And legs of trees were limber,
And ta'en my fiddle to the gate,
And fiddled in the timber!

'Tis said he had a tuneful tongue,
Such happy intonation,
Wherever he sat down and sung
He left a small plantation;
Wherever in a lonely grove
He set up his forlorn pipes,
The gouty oak began to move,
And flounder into hornpipes.

Vex not the Muse with idle prayers, -
She will not hear thy call;
She steals upon thee unawares,
Or seeks thee not at all.

Soft as the moonbeams when they sought
Endymion's fragrant bower,
She parts the whispering leaves of thought
To show her full-blown flower.

For thee her wooing hour has passed,
The singing birds have flown,
And winter comes with icy blast
To chill thy buds unblown.

Yet, though the woods no longer thrill
As once their arches rung,
Sweet echoes hover round thee still
Of songs thy summer sung.

Live in thy past; await no more
The rush of heaven-sent wings;
Earth still has music left in store
While Memory sighs and sings.

Go, sun, since go you must,
The dusky evening lowers above our sky,
Our sky which was so blue and sweetly fair;
Night is not terrible that we should sigh.
A little darkness we can surely bear;
Will there not be more sunshine--by and by?

Go, rose, since go you must,
Flowerless and chill the winter draweth nigh;
Closed are the blithe and fragrant lips which made
All summer long perpetual melody.
Cheerless we take our way, but not afraid:
Will there not be more roses--by and by?

Go, love, since go you must,
Out of our pain we bless you as you fly;
The momentary heaven the rainbow lit
Was worth whole days of black and stormy sky;
Shall we not see, as by the waves we sit,
Your bright sail winging shoreward--by and by?

Go, life, since go ...

It is the bell of death I hear,
Which tells me my own time is near,
When I must join those quiet souls
Where nothing lives but worms and moles;
And not come through the grass again,
Like worms and moles, for breath or rain;
Yet let none weep when my life's through,
For I myself have wept for few.

The only things that knew me well
Were children, dogs, and girls that fell;
I bought poor children cakes and sweets,
Dogs heard my voice and danced the streets;
And, gentle to a fallen lass,
I made her weep for what she was.
Good men and women know not me.
Nor love nor hate the mystery.

I, who went at nightfall, came again at dawn;
On Love's door again I knocked. Love was gone.

He who oft had bade me in, now would bid no more;
Silence sat within his house; barred its door.

When the slow door opened wide through it I could see
How the emptiness within stared at me.

Through the dreary chambers, long I sought and sighed,
But no answering footstep came; naught replied.

Then at last I entered, dim, a darkened room:
There a taper glimmered gray in the gloom.

And I saw one lying crowned with helichrys;
Never saw I face as fair as was his.

Like a wintry lily was his brow in hue;
And his cheeks were each a rose, wintry too.

Then my soul remembered all that made us part,
And what I had laughed at once broke my heart...

[1]


Strew me a fragrant bed of leaves,
Where lotus with the myrtle weaves;
And while in luxury's dream I sink,
Let me the balm of Bacchus drink!
In this sweet hour of revelry
Young Love shall my attendant be--
Drest for the task, with tunic round
His snowy neck and shoulders bound,
Himself shall hover by my side,
And minister the racy tide!

    Oh, swift as wheels that kindling roll,
Our life is hurrying to the goal;
A scanty dust, to feed the wind,
Is all the trace 'twill leave behind.
Then wherefore waste the rose's bloom
Upon the cold, insensate tomb?
Can flowery breeze, or odor's breath,
Affect the still, cold sense of death?
Oh no; I ask no balm to steep
With fragrant tears my bed of sleep:
But now, wh...

It nobbut luks like tother day,
Sin Jane an me first met;
Yet fifty years have rolled away,
But still aw dooant forget.
Th' Sundy schooil wor ovver,
An th' rain wor teemin daan
An shoo had nowt to cover
Her Sundy hat an gaan.
Aw had an umberella,
Quite big enuff for two,
Soa aw made bold to tell her,
Shoo'd be sewer to get weet throo,
Unless shoo'd share it wi' me.
Shoo blushed an sed, "Nay, Ben,
If they should see me wi' thi,
What wod yo're fowk say then?"
"Ne'er heed," says aw, "Tha need'nt care
What other fowk may say;
Ther's room for me an some to spare,
Soa let's start on us way."
Shoo tuk mi arm wi' modest grace,
We booath felt rayther shy;
But then aw'm sewer 'twor noa disgrace,
To keep her new clooas dry.
Aw trie...

Young Philiper Flash was a promising lad,
His intentions were good - but oh, how sad
    For a person to think
    How the veriest pink
And bloom of perfection may turn out bad.
Old Flash himself was a moral man,
And prided himself on a moral plan,
    Of a maxim as old
    As the calf of gold,
Of making that boy do what he was told.

And such a good mother had Philiper Flash;
Her voice was as soft as the creamy plash
    Of the milky wave
    With its musical lave
That gushed through the holes of her patent churn-dash; -
And the excellent woman loved Philiper so,
She could cry sometimes when he stumped his toe, -
    And she stroked his hair
    With such motherly care
When the dear little angel learned to swear.

Old Flash himse...