Family

    I.

    Night, with her power to silence day,
        Filled up my lonely room,
    Quenching all sounds but one that lay
        Beyond her passing doom,
    Where in his shed a workman gay
        Went on despite the gloom.

    I listened, and I knew the sound,
        And the trade that he was plying;
    For backwards, forwards, bound on bound,
        A shuttle was flying, flying--
    Weaving ever--till, all unwound,
        The weft go out a sighing.


    II.

    As hidden in thy chamber lowest
        As in the sky the lark,
    Thou, mystic thing, on working goest
        Without the poorest spark,
    And yet light's garment round me throwest,
        Who else, as thou, were dark.

    With bod...

The day and its delights are done;
So all delights and days expire:
Down in the dim, sad West the sun
Is dying like a dying fire.

The fiercest lances of his light
Are spent; I watch him droop and die
Like a great king who falls in fight;
None dared the duel of his eye

Living, but, now his eye is dim,
The eyes of all may stare at him.

How lovely in his strength at morn
He orbed along the burning blue!
The blown gold of his flying hair
Was tangled in green-tressèd trees,
And netted in the river sand
In gleaming links of amber clear;
But all his shining locks are shorn,
His brow of its bright crown is bare,
The golden sceptre leaves his hand,
And deeper, darker, grows the hue
Of the dim purple draperies
And cloudy banner...

BOBBY, aetat. 3½. JOHNNY, aetat. 4½.


BOBBY
DO you know why they’ve put us in that back room,
Up in the attic, close against the sky,
And made believe our nursery’s a cloak-room?
Do you know why?

JOHNNY
No more I don’t, nor why that Sammy’s mother,
What Ma thinks horrid, ’cause he bunged my eye,
Eats an ice cream, down there, like any other!
No more don’t I!

BOBBY
Do you know why Nurse says it isn’t manners
For you and me to ask folks twice for pie,
And no one hits that man with two bananas?
Do you know why?

JOHNNY
No more I don’t, nor why that girl, whose dress is
Off of her shoulders, don’t catch cold and die,
When you and me gets croup when we undresses!
No more don’t I!

BOBBY
Perhaps she ain’...

When I was born,
From all the seas of strength Fate filled a chalice,
Saying, 'This be thy portion, child; this chalice,
Less than a lily's, thou shalt daily draw
From my great arteries,--nor less, nor more.'
All substances the cunning chemist Time
Melts down into that liquor of my life,--
Friends, foes, joys, fortunes, beauty and disgust.
And whether I am angry or content,
Indebted or insulted, loved or hurt,
All he distils into sidereal wine
And brims my little cup; heedless, alas!
Of all he sheds how little it will hold,
How much runs over on the desert sands.
If a new Muse draw me with splendid ray,
And I uplift myself into its heaven,
The needs of the first sight absorb my blood,
And all the following hours of the day
Drag a ridiculous age.

"Is my team ploughing,
That I was used to drive
And hear the harness jingle
When I was man alive?"

Ay, the horses trample,
The harness jingles now;
No change though you lie under
The land you used to plough.

"Is football playing
Along the river shore,
With lads to chase the leather,
Now I stand up no more?"

Ay, the ball is flying,
The lads play heart and soul;
The goal stands up, the keeper
Stands up to keep the goal.

"Is my girl happy,
That I thought hard to leave,
And has she tired of weeping
As she lies down at eve?"

Ay, she lies down lightly,
She lies not down to weep:
Your girl is well contented.
Be still, my lad, and sleep.

"Is my friend hearty,
Now I am thin and pine,
...

He was all sunshine; in his face
The very soul of sweetness shone;
Fairest and gentlest of his race;
None like him we can call our own.

Something there was of one that died
In her fresh spring-time long ago,
Our first dear Mary, angel-eyed,
Whose smile it was a bliss to know.

Something of her whose love imparts
Such radiance to her day's decline,
We feel its twilight in our hearts
Bright as the earliest morning-shine.

Yet richer strains our eye could trace
That made our plainer mould more fair,
That curved the lip with happier grace,
That waved the soft and silken hair.

Dust unto dust! the lips are still
That only spoke to cheer and bless;
The folded hands lie white and chill
Unclasped from sorrow's last caress.

An hour ago when the wind blew high
    At my lady's window a red leaf beat.
Then dropped at her door, where, passing by,
    She carelessly trod it under her feet.

I have taken it out of the dust and dirt,
    With a tender pity but half defined.
Ah! poor bruised leaf, with your stain and hurt,
    'A fellow-feeling doth make us kind.'

On winds of passion my heart was blown,
    Like an autumn leaf one hapless day.
At my lady's window with tap and moan
    It burned and fluttered its life away.

Bright with the blood of its wasting tide
    It glowed in the sun of her laughing eyes.
What cared she though a stray heart died -
    What to her were its sobs and sighs.

The winds of passion were spent at last,
    And my heart like the ...

I.

A plague upon the people fell,
A famine after laid them low;
Then thorpe and byre arose in fire,
For on them brake the sudden foe;
So thick they died the people cried,
‘The Gods are moved against the land.’
The Priest in horror about his altar
To Thor and Odin lifted a hand:
‘Help us from famine
And plague and strife!
What would you have of us?
Human life?
Were it our nearest,
Were it our dearest,–
Answer, O answer!–
We give you his life.’


II.

But still the foeman spoil’d and burn’d,
And cattle died, and deer in wood,
And bird in air, and fishes turn’d
And whiten’d all the rolling flood;
And dead men lay all over the way,
Or down in a furrow scathed with flame;
And ever and aye the Priesthood m...

When a friend calls to me from the road
And slows his horse to a meaning walk,
I don't stand still and look around
On all the hills I haven't hoed,
And shout from where I am, 'What is it?'
No, not as there is a time talk.
I thrust my hoe in the mellow ground,
Blade-end up and five feet tall,
And plod: I go up to the stone wall
For a friendly visit.

Oh, the days were ever shiny
    When I ran to meet my love;
When I press'd her hand so tiny
    Through her tiny tiny glove.
Was I very deeply smitten?
    Oh, I loved like anything!
But my love she is a kitten,
    And my heart's a ball of string.

She was pleasingly poetic,
    And she loved my little rhymes;
For our tastes were sympathetic,
    In the old and happy times.
Oh, the ballads I have written,
    And have taught my love to sing!
But my love she is a kitten,
    And my heart's a ball of string.

Would she listen to my offer,
    On my knees I would impart
A sincere and ready proffer
    Of my hand and of my heart.
And below her dainty mitten
    I would fix a wedding ring,
But my love she is a kitten...

When I behold a forest spread
With silken trees upon thy head;
And when I see that other dress
Of flowers set in comeliness;
When I behold another grace
In the ascent of curious lace,
Which, like a pinnacle, doth shew
The top, and the top-gallant too;
Then, when I see thy tresses bound
Into an oval, square, or round,
And knit in knots far more than I.
Can tell by tongue, or True-love tie;
Next, when those lawny films I see
Play with a wild civility;
And all those airy silks to flow,
Alluring me, and tempting so,
I must confess, mine eye and heart
Dotes less on nature than on art.

Tell them, when you are home again,
    How warm the air was now;
How silent were the birds and leaves,
    And of the moon's full glow;
        And how we saw afar
        A falling star:
It was a tear of pure delight
Ran down the face of Heaven this happy night.

Our kisses are but love in flower,
    Until that greater time
When, gathering strength, those flowers take wing,
    And Love can reach his prime.
        And now, my heart's delight,
        Good night, good night;
Give me the last sweet kiss,
But do not breathe at home one word of this!

    My wife contrived a fleecy thing
    Her husband to infold,
    For 'tis the pride of woman still
    To cover from the cold:
    My daughter made it a new text
    For a sermon very old.

    The child came trotting to her side,
    Ready with bootless aid:
    "Lily make veckit for papa,"
    The tiny woman said:
    Her mother gave the means and ways,
    And a knot upon her thread.

    "Mamma, mamma!--it won't come through!"
    In meek dismay she cried.
    Her mother cut away the knot,
    And she was satisfied,
    Pulling the long thread through and through,
    In fabricating pride.

    Her mother told me this: I caught
    A glimpse of something more:
    Great meanings often hide behind
    The little wo...

Lieti flori e felici, e ben nate erbe.

HE ENVIES EVERY SPOT THAT SHE FREQUENTS.


    Gay, joyous blooms, and herbage glad with showers,
O'er which my pensive fair is wont to stray!
Thou plain, that listest her melodious lay,
As her fair feet imprint thy waste of flowers!
Ye shrubs so trim; ye green, unfolding bowers;
Ye violets clad in amorous, pale array;
Thou shadowy grove, gilded by beauty's ray,
Whose top made proud majestically towers!
O pleasant country! O translucent stream,
Bathing her lovely face, her eyes so clear,
And catching of their living light the beam!
I envy ye her actions chaste and dear:
No rock shall stud thy waters, but shall learn
Henceforth with passion strong as mine to burn.

NOTT.


    O b...

When I watch the living meet,
And the moving pageant file
Warm and breathing through the street
Where I lodge a little while,

If the heats of hate and lust
In the house of flesh are strong,
Let me mind the house of dust
Where my sojourn shall be long.

In the nation that is not
Nothing stands that stood before;
There revenges are forgot,
And the hater hates no more;

Lovers lying two and two
Ask not whom they sleep beside,
And the bridegroom all night through
Never turns him to the bride.

    A child was born in sin and shame,
    Wronged by his very birth,
    Without a home, without a name,
    One over in the earth.

    No wifely triumph he inspired,
    Allayed no husband's fear;
    Intruder bare, whom none desired,
    He had a welcome drear.

    Heaven's beggar, all but turned adrift
    For knocking at earth's gate,
    His mother, like an evil gift,
    Shunned him with sickly hate.

    And now the mistress on her knee
    The unloved baby bore,
    The while the servant sullenly
    Prepared to leave her door.

    Her eggs are dear to mother-dove,
    Her chickens to the hen;
    All young ones bring with them their love,
    Of sheep, or goats, or men!

    This one lone child shall no...

The world is full of gems to-day,
    The world is full of love;
The earth is strewn with star-gemmed flowers
    That fall from skies above.

The sunshine is a stream of gold
    That flows from flower to flower;
The shadows are but passing thoughts
    That mark each shining hour.

The pansy nods her purple head,
    And sings a silent song;
Her life is full of sunny hours--
    The days are never long.

The rose uplifts her sun-crowned head;
    She is the queen of love;
Her eyes behold the hidden stars
    That glow in skies above.

There is a fragrance in the air,
    A glory in the sky;
Oh, who would sigh for other days,
    Or grieve for things gone by?

Sir Walter Vivian all a summer's day
Gave his broad lawns until the set of sun
Up to the people: thither flocked at noon
His tenants, wife and child, and thither half
The neighbouring borough with their Institute
Of which he was the patron. I was there
From college, visiting the son,--the son
A Walter too,--with others of our set,
Five others: we were seven at Vivian-place.

And me that morning Walter showed the house,
Greek, set with busts: from vases in the hall
Flowers of all heavens, and lovelier than their names,
Grew side by side; and on the pavement lay
Carved stones of the Abbey-ruin in the park,
Huge Ammonites, and the first bones of Time;
And on the tables every clime and age
Jumbled together; celts and calumets,
Claymore and snowshoe, toys...