Identity

I'd a dream last night of my boyhood's days,
And the scenes where my youth was spent;
And I roamed the old woods where the squirrel plays,
Full of frolicsome merriment.
And I walked by the brook, and its silvery tone,
Seemed to soothe me again as of yore;
And I stood by the cottage with moss overgrown
And the woodbine that trailed round the door.

No change could I see in the garden plot,
The flowers bloomed brightly around,
And one little bed of forget-me-not
In its own little corner I found.
The sky had a home-look, the breeze seemed to sigh,
In the strain I remembered so well,
And the little brown sparrows looked cunning and shy,
As though anxious some story to tell.

But as quietness reigned and a loneliness fell,
O'er the place that had onc...

I stood in the forest on HURON HILL
When the night was old and the world was still.

The Wind was a wizard who muttering strode
In a raven cloak on a haunted road.

The Sound of Water, a witch who crooned
Her spells to the rocks the rain had runed.

And the Gleam of the Dew on the fern's green tip
Was a sylvan passing with robe a-drip.

The Light of the Stars was a glimmering maid
Who stole, an elfin, from glade to glade.

The Scent of the Woods in the delicate air,
A wildflower shape with chilly hair.

And Silence, a spirit who sat alone
With a lifted finger and eyes of stone.

And it seemed to me these six were met
To greet a greater who came not yet.

And the speech they spoke, that I listened to,
Was the archety...

For mocking on men's faces
He only sees instead
The hidden, hundred traces
Of tears their eyes have shed.

Above their lips denying,
Through all their boasting dares,
He hears the anguished crying
Of old unanswered prayers.

And through the will's reliance
He only sees aright
A frightened child's defiance
Left lonely in the night.

    Last night I lay in an open field
    And looked at the stars with lips sealed;
    No noise moved the windless air,
    And I looked at the stars with steady stare.

    There were some that glittered and some that shone
    With a soft and equal glow, and one
    That queened it over the sprinkled round,
    Swaying the host with silent sound.

    "Calm things," I thought, "in your cavern blue,
    I will learn and hold and master you;
    I will yoke and scorn you as I can,
    For the pride of my heart is the pride of a man."

    Grass to my cheek in the dewy field,
    I lay quite still with lips sealed,
    And the pride of a man and his rigid gaze
    Stalked like swords on heaven's ways.

    But through a sudden gate there st...

The rage for writing has spread far and wide,
Letters on letters now are multiplied,
And every mortal, who can hold a pen,
Aspires in haste to teach his fellow men.
Paper in wasted reams, and seas of ink.
Prove how they write who never learned to think;
Some who have talents--some who have not sense;
Some who to decency make no pretence;
But, skilled in arts which better men deceive,
They spread the slander which they don't believe.
A township turned to scribblers is a sight!
Venting their malice all in black and white,
And with, apparently, no other aim
Than merely to be foaming out their shame.
--My own, my beautiful, my pride,
I must lament where strangers will deride,
O'er thy degenerate sons whose strife and hate
Will make thee as a desert desolate

(Written in collaboration with R. B. Hamilton.)


When Julius Caesar met his death,
    He muttered in his dying breath:
"It is not patriotism now
    Prompts you to break your friendship's vow."
Quoth Brutus, as he stabbed again
    The greatest of his countrymen:
    "You're in this fix
    Through politics."

As on his path Columbus sped,
    A sailor to the great man said:
"Without a break, without a bend,
    The broad Atlantic has no end."
And to the sailor at his side,
    'Tis rumored, that great man replied:
    "I guess I know.
    You go below."

The snow fell fast on Russia's soil,
    The soldiers, wearied with their toil,
Cried: "'Tis not possible that we
    Our native France again shall see."
Stern e...

The gyres! the gyres! Old Rocky Face, look forth;
Things thought too long can be no longer thought,
For beauty dies of beauty, worth of worth,
And ancient lineaments are blotted out.
Irrational streams of blood are staining earth;
Empedocles has thrown all things about;
Hector is dead and there's a light in Troy;
We that look on but laugh in tragic joy.
What matter though numb nightmare ride on top,
And blood and mire the sensitive body stain?
What matter? Heave no sigh, let no tear drop,
A-greater, a more gracious time has gone;
For painted forms or boxes of make-up
In ancient tombs I sighed, but not again;
What matter? Out of cavern comes a voice,
And all it knows is that one word "Rejoice!'
Conduct and work grow coarse, and coarse the soul,
What matter...

In a garb that was guiltless of colours
    She stood, with a dull, listless air -
A creature of dumps and of dolours,
    But most undeniably fair.

The folds of her garment fell round her,
    Revealing the curve of each limb;
Well proportioned and graceful I found her,
    Although quite alarmingly slim.

From the hem of her robe peeped one sandal -
    "High art" was she down to her feet;
And though I could not understand all
    She said, I could see she was sweet.

Impressed by her limpness and languor,
    I proffered a chair near at hand;
She looked back a mild sort of anger -
    Posed anew, and continued to stand.

Some praises I next tried to mutter
    Of the fan that she held to her face;
She said it was "utterly utte...

He eats (a moment's stoppage to his song)
The stolen turnip as he goes along;
And hops along and heeds with careless eye
The passing crowded stage coach reeling bye.
He talks to none but wends his silent way,
And finds a hovel at the close of day,
Or under any hedge his house is made.
He has no calling and he owns no trade.
An old smoaked blanket arches oer his head,
A whisp of straw or stubble makes his bed.
He knows a lawless law that claims no kin
But meet and plunder on and feel no sin--
No matter where they go or where they dwell
They dally with the winds and laugh at hell.

It snowed in spring on earth so dry and warm
The flakes could find no landing place to form.
Hordes spent themselves to make it wet and cold,
And still they failed of any lasting hold.
They made no white impression on the black.
They disappeared as if earth sent them back.
Not till from separate flakes they changed at night
To almost strips and tapes of ragged white
Did grass and garden ground confess it snowed,
And all go back to winter but the road.
Next day the scene was piled and puffed and dead.
The grass lay flattened under one great tread.
Borne down until the end almost took root,
The rangey bough anticipated fruit
With snowball cupped in every opening bud.
The road alone maintained itself in mud,
Whatever its secret was of greater heat
From inwar...

As I was carving images from clouds,
And tinting them with soft ethereal dyes
Pressed from the pulp of dreams, one comes, and cries:
"Forbear!" and all my heaven with gloom enshrouds.

"Forbear!" Thou hast no tools wherewith to essay
The delicate waves of that elusive grain:
Wouldst have due recompense of vulgar pain?
The potter's wheel for thee, and some coarse clay!

"So work, if work thou must, O humbly skilled!
Thou hast not known the Master; in thy soul
His spirit moves not with a sweet control;
Thou art outside, and art not of the guild."

Thereat I rose, and from his presence passed,
But, going, murmured: "To the God above,
Who holds my heart, and knows its store of love,
I turn from thee, thou proud iconoclast."

Then on the shore G...

No brigadier throughout the year
So civic as the jay.
A neighbor and a warrior too,
With shrill felicity

Pursuing winds that censure us
A February day,
The brother of the universe
Was never blown away.

The snow and he are intimate;
I 've often seen them play
When heaven looked upon us all
With such severity,

I felt apology were due
To an insulted sky,
Whose pompous frown was nutriment
To their temerity.

The pillow of this daring head
Is pungent evergreens;
His larder -- terse and militant --
Unknown, refreshing things;

His character a tonic,
His future a dispute;
Unfair an immortality
That leaves this neighbor out.

From the rainy hill-heads, where, in starts and in spasms,
Leaps wild the white torrent from chasms to chasms
From the home of bold echoes, whose voices of wonder
Fly out of blind caverns struck black by high thunder
Through gorges august, in whose nether recesses
Is heard the far psalm of unseen wildernesses
Like a dominant spirit, a strong-handed sharer
Of spoil with the tempest, comes down the Narrara.

Yea, where the great sword of the hurricane cleaveth
The forested fells that the dark never leaveth
By fierce-featured crags, in whose evil abysses
The clammy snake coils, and the flat adder hisses
Past lordly rock temples, where Silence is riven
By the anthems supreme of the four winds of heaven
It speeds, with the cry of the streams of the fountains
It cha...

To-night the west o'er-brims with warmest dyes;
Its chalice overflows
With pools of purple colouring the skies,
Aflood with gold and rose;
And some hot soul seems throbbing close to mine,
As sinks the sun within that world of wine.

I seem to hear a bar of music float
And swoon into the west;
My ear can scarcely catch the whispered note,
But something in my breast
Blends with that strain, till both accord in one,
As cloud and colour blend at set of sun.

And twilight comes with grey and restful eyes,
As ashes follow flame.
But O! I heard a voice from those rich skies
Call tenderly my name;
It was as if some priestly fingers stole
In benedictions o'er my lonely soul.

I know not why, but all my being longed
And leapt at that sweet ...

By W. W.

Behold! I am not one that goes to Lectures or the pow-wow of Professors.

The elementary laws never apologise: neither do I apologise.

I find letters from the Dean dropt on my table--and every one is signed by the Dean's name--

And I leave them where they are; for I know that as long as I stay up

Others will punctually come for ever and ever.

I am one who goes to the river,

I sit in the boat and think of 'life' and of 'time.'

How life is much, but time is more; and the beginning is everything,

But the end is something.

I loll in the Parks, I go to the wicket, I swipe.

I see twenty-two young men from Foster's watching me, and the trousers of the twenty-two young men,

I see the Balliol men en masse