Identity

Mæcenas, thou of royalty's descent,
Both my protector and dear ornament,
Among humanity's conditions are
Those who take pleasure in the flying car,
Whirling Olympian dust, as on they roll,
And shunning with the glowing wheel the goal;
While the ennobling palm, the prize of worth,
Exalts them to the gods, the lords of earth.

Here one is happy if the fickle crowd
His name the threefold honor has allowed;
And there another, if into his stores
Comes what is swept from Libyan threshing-floors.
He who delights to till his father's lands,
And grasps the delving-hoe with willing hands,
Can never to Attalic offers hark,
Or cut the Myrtoan Sea with Cyprian bark.
The merchant, timorous of Afric's breeze,
When fiercely struggling with Icarian seas
Praises ...

I've wisdom from the East and from the West,
That's subject to no academic rule:
You may find it in the jeering of a jest,
Or distil it from the folly of a fool.
I can teach you with a quip, if I've a mind!
I can trick you into learning with a laugh;
Oh, winnow all my folly, and you'll find
A grain or two of truth among the chaff!

I can set a braggart quailing with a quip,
The upstart I can wither with a whim;
He may wear a merry laugh upon his lip,
But his laughter has an echo that is grim.
When they're offered to the world in merry guise,
Unpleasant truths are swallowed with a will
For he who'd make his fellow creatures wise
Should always gild the philosophic pill!

When she had left us but a little while,
I still could hear the ringing of her voice,
Still see athwart the dusk her shy half-smile
And that sweet trust wherein I most rejoice.

Then in her self-same tones I heard, "Go thou,
Set to that work appointed thee to do,
Remembering I am with thee here and now,
Watchful as ever. See, my eyes shine true!"

I lookt, and saw the concourse of clear stars,
Steadfast, of limpid candour, and could discover
Her soul look on me thro' the prison-bars
Which slunk like sin from such an honest Lover:

And thro' the vigil-pauses of that night
She beam'd on me; and my soul felt her light.

A rose in my garden, the sweetest and fairest,
    Was hanging her head through the long golden hours;
And early one morning I saw her tears falling,
    And heard a low gossiping talk in the bowers.

The yellow Nasturtium, a spinster all faded,
    Was telling a Lily what ailed the poor Rose:
'That wild, roving Bee, who was hanging about her
    Has jilted her squarely, as every one knows.

'I knew when he came, with his singing and sighing,
    His airs and his speeches, so fine and so sweet,
Just how it would end; but no one would believe me,
    For all were quite ready to fall at his feet.'

'Indeed, you are wrong,' said the Lilybelle proudly,
    'I cared nothing for him.    He called on me once
And would have come often, no doubt, if I'd asked him....

Then did I live when I did see
Perilla smile on none but me.
But, ah! by stars malignant crossed,
The life I got I quickly lost;
But yet a way there doth remain
For me embalm'd to live again,
And that's to love me; in which state
I'll live as one regenerate.

    My soul looked down from a vague height with Death,
    As unremembering how I rose or why,
    And saw a sad land, weak with sweats of dearth,
    Gray, cratered like the moon with hollow woe,
    And fitted with great pocks and scabs of plaques.

    Across its beard, that horror of harsh wire,
    There moved thin caterpillars, slowly uncoiled.
    It seemed they pushed themselves to be as plugs
    Of ditches, where they writhed and shrivelled, killed.

    By them had slimy paths been trailed and scraped
    Round myriad warts that might be little hills.

    From gloom's last dregs these long-strung creatures crept,
    And vanished out of dawn down hidden holes.

    (And smell came up from those foul openings
    As out of mouths, or deep...

Last night she came unto me,
And kneeling by my side,
Laid her head upon my bosom,
My beautiful, my bride;
My lost one, with her soft dark eyes,
And waves of sunny hair.
I smoothed the shining tresses,
With tearful, fond caresses,
And words of thankful prayer.

And then a thrill of doubt and pain,
My jealous heart swept o'er;
We were parted - she was dwelling
Upon a far-off shore;
Yet He who made my sad heart, knew
I loved her more and more;
My love more true and perfect grew,
As each dark day passed o'er;
But she whose heart had been my own,
Who loved me tenderly,
Whose last low words I knelt to hear,
Were, "How can I leave thee?"

And "Death would seem as sweet as life,
Could we together be."
Now, though we two we...

There's a beautiful Artist abroad in the world,
        And her pencil is dipped in heaven, -
The gorgeous hues of Italian skies,
The radiant sunset's richest dyes,
The light of Aurora's laughing eyes,
        Are each to her pictures given.

As I walked abroad yestere'en, what time
        The sunset was fairest to see,
I saw where her wonderful brush had been
Over a maple tree - half of it green -
And the fairiest col'ring that ever was seen
        She had left on that maple tree.

There was red of every possible hue,
        There was yellow of every dye,
From the faintest straw-tint to orange bright,
Fluttering, waving, flashing in light,
With the delicate, green leaves still in sight,
        Peeping out at the sunset sky.

She h...

Lasso! ben so che dolorose prede.

THOUGH FOR FOURTEEN YEARS HE HAS STRUGGLED UNSUCCESSFULLY, HE STILL HOPES TO CONQUER HIS PASSION.


    Alas! well know I what sad havoc makes
Death of our kind, how Fate no mortal spares!
How soon the world whom once it loved forsakes,
How short the faith it to the friendless bears!
Much languishment, I see, small mercy wakes;
For the last day though now my heart prepares,
Love not a whit my cruel prison breaks,
And still my cheek grief's wonted tribute wears.
I mark the days, the moments, and the hours
Bear the full years along, nor find deceit,
Bow'd 'neath a greater force than magic spell.
For fourteen years have fought with varying powers
Desire and Reason: and the best shall beat;
If mortal spirits here...

And have I lost thee evermore?

Hast thou, oh fair one, from me flown?
Still in mine ear sounds, as of yore,

Thine ev'ry word, thine ev'ry tone.

As when at morn the wand'rer's eye

Attempts to pierce the air in vain,
When, hidden in the azure sky,

The lark high o'er him chaunts his strain:

So do I cast my troubled gaze

Through bush, through forest, o'er the lea;
Thou art invoked by all my lays;

Oh, come then, loved one, back to me!

Little chipmunk, do you know
All you mean to me? -
She and I and Long Ago,
And you there in the tree;
With that nut between your paws,
Half-way to your twittering jaws,
Jaunty with your stripèd coat,
Puffing out your furry throat,
Eyes like some big polished seed,
Plumed tail curved like half a lyre . . .

We pretended not to heed -
You, as though you would inquire
"Can I trust them?" . . . then a jerk,
And you'd skipped three branches higher,
Jaws again at work;
Like a little clock-work elf,
With all the forest to itself.

She was very fair to see,
She was all the world to me,
She has gone whole worlds away;
Yet it seems as though to-day,
Chipmunk, I can hear her say;
"Get that chipmunk, dear, for me - - "
Chipmunk...

Cara la vita, e dopo lei mi pare.

HONOUR TO BE PREFERRED TO LIFE.


    Methinks that life in lovely woman first,
And after life true honour should be dear;
Nay, wanting honour--of all wants the worst--
Friend! nought remains of loved or lovely here.
And who, alas! has honour's barrier burst,
Unsex'd and dead, though fair she yet appear,
Leads a vile life, in shame and torment curst,
A lingering death, where all is dark and drear.
To me no marvel was Lucretia's end,
Save that she needed, when that last disgrace
Alone sufficed to kill, a sword to die.
Sophists in vain the contrary defend:
Their arguments are feeble all and base,
And truth alone triumphant mounts on high!

MACGREGOR.

Calm is all nature as a resting wheel.
The kine are couched upon the dewy grass;
The horse alone, seen dimly as I pass,
Is cropping audibly his later meal:
Dark is the ground; a slumber seems to steal
O'er vale, and mountain, and the starless sky.
Now, in this blank of things, a harmony,
Home-felt, and home-created, comes to heal
That grief for which the senses still supply
Fresh food; for only then, when memory
Is hushed, am I at rest. My Friends! restrain
Those busy cares that would allay my pain;
Oh! leave me to myself, nor let me feel
The officious touch that makes me droop again.

        Only a few more years!
        Weary years!
        Only a few more tears!
        Bitter tears!
And then -- and then -- like other men,
I cease to wander, cease to weep,
Dim shadows o'er my way shall creep;
And out of the day and into the night,
Into the dark and out of the bright
I go, and Death shall veil my face,
The feet of the years shall fast efface
My very name, and every trace
I leave on earth; for the stern years tread --
Tread out the names of the gone and dead!
And then, ah! then, like other men,
I close my eyes and go to sleep,
Only a few, one hour, shall weep:
Ah! me, the grave is dark and deep!

        Alas!    Alas!
        How soon we pass!
        And ah! we go
        So far away;
When go we must,<...

    Looking like Raphael's Perugino, eyes
    So slightly, subtly aquiline, as brown
    As a buck-eye, amorous, flamed, but lightly dimmed
    Through thought of self while sitting for the artist;
    A nose well bridged with bone for will, the nostrils
    Distended as if sniffing diaphanous fire;
    A very bow for lips, the under lip
    Rich, kissable like a woman's; heavy cheeks
    Propped with a rounded tower of flesh for neck:
    Thus Perugino looked, says Raphael,
    And thus looked Father Whimsett at his desk,
    With vertical creases, where the nose and brow
    Together come, between the eye-brows slanting
    Unequally, half clown-wise, half Mephisto,
    With just a touch of that abandoned humor,
    And laughter at the world, the race of men,

A bee that was searching for sweets one day
Through the gate of a rose garden happened to stray.
In the heart of a rose he hid away,
And forgot in his bliss the light of day,
As sipping his honey he buzzed in song;
Though day was waning, he lingered long,
For the rose was sweet, so sweet.

A robin sits pluming his ruddy breast,
And a madrigal sings to his love in her nest:
"Oh, the skies they are blue, the fields are green,
And the birds in your nest will soon be seen!"
She hangs on his words with a thrill of love,
And chirps to him as he sits above
For the song is sweet, so sweet.

A maiden was out on a summer's day
With the winds and the waves and the flowers at play;
And she met with a youth of gentle air,
With the light of the sunshine on hi...

Ill strives the will, 'gainst will more wise that strives
His pleasure therefore to mine own preferr'd,
I drew the sponge yet thirsty from the wave.

Onward I mov'd: he also onward mov'd,
Who led me, coasting still, wherever place
Along the rock was vacant, as a man
Walks near the battlements on narrow wall.
For those on th' other part, who drop by drop
Wring out their all-infecting malady,
Too closely press the verge. Accurst be thou!
Inveterate wolf! whose gorge ingluts more prey,
Than every beast beside, yet is not fill'd!
So bottomless thy maw!--Ye spheres of heaven!
To whom there are, as seems, who attribute
All change in mortal state, when is the day
Of his appearing, for whom fate reserves
To chase her hence?--With wary steps and slow
We pass'...

If the stars fell; night's nameless dreams
Of bliss and blasphemy came true,
If skies were green and snow were gold,
And you loved me as I love you;

O long light hands and curled brown hair,
And eyes where sits a naked soul;
Dare I even then draw near and burn
My fingers in the aureole?

Yes, in the one wise foolish hour
God gives this strange strength to a man.
He can demand, though not deserve,
Where ask he cannot, seize he can.

But once the blood's wild wedding o'er,
Were not dread his, half dark desire,
To see the Christ-child in the cot,
The Virgin Mary by the fire?