Heartbreak

All of us play our very best game,
Any other time.
Golf or billiards, it's all the same,
Any other time.
Lose a match and you always say,
"Just ny luck! I was 'off' today!
I could have beaten him quite half-way,
Any other time!"

After a fiver you ought to go,
Any other time.
Every man that you ask says "Oh,
Any other time.
Lend you a fiver? I'd lend you two,
But I'm overdrawn and my bills are due,
Wish you'd ask me, now, mind you do,
Any other time!"
Fellows will ask you out to dine,
Any other time.
"Not tonight for we're twenty-nine,
Any other time.
Not tomorrow, for cook's on strike;
Not next day, I'll be out on the bike;
Just drop in whenever you like
Any other time!"

Seasick passengers like the sea,
...

I

Lady Lorgnette, of the lifted lash,
    The curling lip and the dainty nose,
The shell-like ear where the jewels flash,
    The arching brow and the languid pose,
The rare old lace and the subtle scents,
    The slender foot and the fingers frail, -
I may act till the world grows wild and tense,
    But never a flush on your features pale.
The footlights glimmer between us two, -
    You in the box and I on the boards, -
I am only an actor, Madame, to you,
    A mimic king 'mid his mimic lords,
For you are the belle of the smartest set,
        Lady Lorgnette.

II

Little Babette, with your eyes of jet,
    Your midnight hair and your piquant chin,
Your lips whose odours of violet
    Drive men to madness and saints to sin, -

I dreamed a Voice, of one God-authorised,
Cried loudly thro' the world, 'Disarm!    Disarm!'
And there was consternation in the camps;
And men who strutted under braid and lace
Beat on their medalled breasts, and wailed, 'Undone!'
The word was echoed from a thousand hills,
And shop and mill, and factory and forge,
Where throve the awful industries of death,
Hushed into silence.    Scrawled upon the doors,
The passer read, 'Peace bids her children starve.'
But foolish women clasped their little sons
And wept for joy, not reasoning like men.

Again the Voice commanded:    'Now go forth
And build a world for Progress and for Peace.
This work has waited since the earth was shaped;
But men were fighting, and they could not toil.
The needs of life outnumber nee...

(After The Norwegian Of Rosencrantz Johnsen)

Midnight, and through the blind the moonlight stealing
On silver feet across the sleeping room,
Ah, moonlight, what is this thou art revealing -
Her breast, a great sweet lily in the gloom.

It is their bed, white little isle of bliss
In the dark wilderness of midnight sea, -
Hush! 'tis their hearts still beating from the kiss,
The warm dark kiss that only night may see.

Their cheeks still burn, they close and nestle yet,
Ere, with faint breath, they falter out good-night,
Her hand in his upon the coverlet
Lies in the silver pathway of the light.

(LILLEHAMMER, August 22, 1892.)

Woodman, spare that tree!
Touch not a single bough!
In youth it sheltered me,
And I'll protect it now.
'Twas my forefather's hand
That placed it near his cot;
There, woodman, let it stand,
Thy axe shall harm it not.

That old familiar tree,
Whose glory and renown
Are spread o'er land and sea--
And wouldst thou hew it down?
Woodman, forebear thy stroke!
Cut not its earth-bound ties;
Oh, spare that aged oak,
Now towering to the skies!

When but an idle boy,
I sought its grateful shade;
In all their gushing joy
Here, too, my sisters played.
My mother kissed me here;
My father pressed my hand--
Forgive this foolish tear,
But let that old oak stand.

My heart-strings round thee cling,
Close as thy bark, ol...

Laughs the happy April morn
Thro' my grimy, little window,
And a shaft of sunshine pushes
Thro' the shadows in the square.

Dogs are tracing thro' the grass,
Crows are cawing round the chimneys,
In and out among the washing
Goes the West at hide-and-seek.

Loud and cheerful clangs the bell.
Here the nurses troop to breakfast.
Handsome, ugly, all are women . . .
O, the Spring - the Spring - the Spring!

Ere yet the warning chimes of midnight sound,
Set back the flaming index of the year,
Track the swift-shifting seasons in their round
Through fivescore circles of the swinging sphere!

Lo, in yon islet of the midland sea
That cleaves the storm-cloud with its snowy crest,
The embryo-heir of Empires yet to be,
A month-old babe upon his mother's breast.

Those little hands that soon shall grow so strong
In their rude grasp great thrones shall rock and fall,
Press her soft bosom, while a nursery song
Holds the world's master in its slender thrall.

Look! a new crescent bends its silver bow;
A new-lit star has fired the eastern sky;
Hark! by the river where the lindens blow
A waiting household hears an infant's cry.

This, too, a conqueror! His ...

Here reading how fond Adam was betray'd,
And how by sin Eve's blasted charms decay'd,
Our common loss unjustly you complain,
So small that part of it which you sustain.

You still, fair mother, in your offspring trace
The stock of beauty destined for the race;
Kind Nature forming them, the pattern took
From heaven's first work, and Eve's original look.

You, happy saint, the serpent's power control;
Scarce any actual guilt defiles your soul;
And hell does o'er that mind vain triumphs boast
Which gains does o'er that mind vain triumphs boast

With virtue strong as yours had Eve been arm'd,
In vain the fruit had blush'd, or serpent charm'd;
Nor had our bliss by penitence been bought,
Nor had frail Adam fall'n, nor Milton wrote.

My youth was passing, Sire, whilst you among
The cradle-wrappings slept; my morning-song
Sung o’er your pillow. Winds of heaven have thrown
Us both, since then, on heights apart and lone.
Heights! For misfortune drear, our destined land,
So thunder-scarred, a-nigh to heaven must stand!
The north and south are nearer than our ways
Are near to one another; and Fate lays
The purple round you, and has not withheld
Our France’s sceptre-dazzlements of eld.
I, crowned with silver hairs, say, praising you,
“Well done!” That man is to his manhood true
Who bravely, at his own behest, will do
High deeds of self -undoing; will forego
All, all, save immemorial Honour; though
She seem to earthlier eyes a phantom, more
Will follow her (as erst in Elsinore
One faithful h...