Life

    We rode, we rode against the wind.
    The countless lights along the town
    Made the town blacker for their fire,
    And you were always looking down.

    To 'scape the blustering breath of March,
    Or was it for your mind's disguise?
    Still I could shut my eyes and see
    The turquoise color of your eyes.

    Surely your ermine furs were warm,
    And warm your flowing cloak of red;
    Was it the wild wind kept you thus
    Pensive and with averted head?

    I scarcely spoke, my words were swept
    Like winged things in the wind's despite.
    We rode, and with what shadow speed
    Across the darkness of the night!

    Without a word, without a look.
    What was the charm and what the spell
    That made one...

When I am buried, all my thoughts and acts
Will be reduced to lists of dates and facts,
And long before this wandering flesh is rotten
The dates which made me will be all forgotten;
And none will know the gleam there used to be
About the feast days freshly kept by me,
But men will call the golden hour of bliss
'About this time,' or 'shortly after this.'

Men do not heed the rungs by which men climb
Those glittering steps, those milestones upon time,
Those tombstones of dead selves, those hours of birth,
Those moments of the soul in years of earth.
They mark the height achieved, the main result,
The power of freedom in the perished cult,
The power of boredom in the dead man's deeds
Not the bright moments of the sprinkled seeds.

By many waters and on ...

Let no man pray that he know not sorrow,
    Let no soul ask to be free from pain,
For the gall of to-day is the sweet of to-morrow,
    And the moment's loss is the lifetime's gain.

Through want of a thing does its worth redouble,
    Through hunger's pangs does the feast content,
And only the heart that has harbored trouble,
    Can fully rejoice when joy is sent.

Let no man shrink from the bitter tonics
    Of grief, and yearning, and need, and strife,
For the rarest chords in the soul's harmonies,
    Are found in the minor strains of life.

Forget thine anguish,
Vexed heart, again.
Why shouldst thou languish,
With earthly pain?
The husk shall slumber,
Bedded in clay
Silent and sombre,
Oblivion's prey!
But, Spirit immortal,
Thou at Death's portal,
Tremblest with fear.
If he caress thee,
Curse thee or bless thee,
Thou must draw near,
From him the worth of thy works to hear.


Why full of terror,
Compassed with error,
Trouble thy heart,
For thy mortal part?
The soul flies home -
The corpse is dumb.
Of all thou didst have,
Follows naught to the grave.
Thou fliest thy nest,
Swift as a bird to thy place of rest.


What avail grief and fasting,
Where nothing is lasting?
Pomp, domination,
Become tribulation.
In a health-...

There never was a valley without a faded flower,
There never was a heaven without some little cloud;
The face of day may flash with light in any morning hour,
But evening soon shall come with her shadow-woven shroud.

There never was a river without its mists of gray,
There never was a forest without its fallen leaf;
And joy may walk beside us down the windings of our way,
When, lo! there sounds a footstep, and we meet the face of grief.

There never was a seashore without its drifting wreck,
There never was an ocean without its moaning wave;
And the golden gleams of glory the summer sky that fleck,
Shine where dead stars are sleeping in their azure-mantled grave.

There never was a streamlet, however crystal clear,
Without a shadow resting in the ripples of i...

I have been lonely all my days on earth,
    Living a life within my secret soul,
With mine own springs of sorrow and of mirth,
            Beyond the world's control.

Though sometimes with vain longing I have sought
    To walk the paths where other mortals tread,
To wear the clothes for other mortals wrought,
            And eat the selfsame bread--

Yet have I ever found, when thus I strove
    To mould my life upon the common plan,
That I was furthest from all truth and love,
            And least a living man.

Truth frowned upon my poor hypocrisy,
    Life left my soul, and dwelt but in my sense;
No man could love me, for all men could see
            The hollow vain pretence.

Their clothes sat on me with outlandish air,
    Up...

The indications, and tally of time;
Perfect sanity shows the master among philosophs;
Time, always without flaw, indicates itself in parts;
What always indicates the poet, is the crowd of the pleasant company of singers, and their words;
The words of the singers are the hours or minutes of the light or dark but the words of the maker of poems are the general light and dark;
The maker of poems settles justice, reality, immortality,
His insight and power encircle things and the human race,
He is the glory and extract thus far, of things, and of the human race.

The singers do not beget only the POET begets;
The singers are welcom'd, understood, appear often enough but rare has the day been, likewise the spot, of the birth of the maker of poems, the Answerer,
(Not every century, or every...

The troubles of life are many,
The pleasures of life are few;
When we sat in the sunlight, Annie,
I dreamt that the skies were blue,
When we sat in the sunlight, Annie,
I dreamt that the earth was green;
There is little colour, if any,
’Neath the sunlight now to be seen.

Then the rays of the sunset glinted
Through the blackwoods’ emerald bough
On an emerald sward, rose-tinted,
And spangled, and gemm’d; and now
The rays of the sunset redden
With a sullen and lurid frown,
From the skies that are dark and leaden,
To earth that is dusk and brown.

To right and to left extended
The uplands are blank and drear,
And their neutral tints are blended
With the dead leaves sombre and sere;
The cold grey mist from the still side
Of the l...

To die be given us, or attain!
Fierce work it were, to do again.
So pilgrims, bound for Mecca, pray’d
At burning noon: so warriors said,
Scarf’d with the cross, who watch’d the miles
Of dust that wreath’d their struggling files
Down Lydian mountains: so, when snows
Round Alpine summits eddying rose,
The Goth, bound Rome-wards: so the Hun,
Crouch’d on his saddle, when the sun
Went lurid down o’er flooded plains
Through which the groaning Danube strains
To the drear Euxine: so pray all,
Whom labours, self-ordain’d, enthrall;
Because they to themselves propose
On this side the all-common close
A goal which, gain’d, may give repose.
So pray they: and to stand again
Where they stood once, to them were pain;
Pain to thread back and to renew
Past ...

    There is no soul of anguish or repining,
        That doubts and trembles in the shades of gloom,
    But love can lead where softest suns are shining
        And fill his days with beauty and its bloom.
            Live life with love!

    There is no bosom dark with lonely caring,
        That sadly sorrows in the nights of woe,
    But love can soothe his torture and despairing,
        And scatter gladness where his feet may go.
            Live life with love!

    There is no scene of misery or sorrow
        That droops and withers in the dark of night,
    But love can bring fond yearnings for the morrow
        And heap the heart with hope's unfading light.
            Live life with love!

    There is in all the world no sinful creatu...

Up! up! my Friend, and quit your books;
Or surely you'll grow double:
Up! up! my Friend, and clear your looks;
Why all this toil and trouble?
The sun above the mountain's head,
A freshening lustre mellow
Through all the long green fields has spread,
His first sweet evening yellow.
Books! 'tis a dull and endless strife:
Come, hear the woodland linnet,
How sweet his music! on my life,
There's more of wisdom in it.

And hark! how blithe the throstle sings!
He, too, is no mean preacher:
Come forth into the light of things,
Let Nature be your teacher.

She has a world of ready wealth,
Our minds and hearts to bless
Spontaneous wisdom breathed by health,
Truth breathed by cheerfulness.

One impulse from a vernal wood
May teach ...

    Thou whom chance may hither lead,
    Be thou clad in russet weed,
    Be thou deck'd in silken stole,
    Grave these counsels on thy soul.

    Life is but a day at most,
    Sprung from night, in darkness lost;
    Hope not sunshine ev'ry hour.
    Fear not clouds will always lour.
    As Youth and Love with sprightly dance
    Beneath thy morning star advance,
    Pleasure with her siren air
    May delude the thoughtless pair:
    Let Prudence bless enjoyment's cup,
    Then raptur'd sip, and sip it up.

    As thy day grows warm and high,
    Life's meridian flaming nigh,
    Dost thou spurn the humble vale?
    Life's proud summits would'st thou scale?
    Check thy climbing step, elate,
    Evils lurk in felon wait:
  ...

There are so many little things that make life beautiful.
I can recall a day in early youth when I was longing for happiness.
Toward the western hills I gazed, watching for its approach.
The hills lay between me and the setting sun, and over them led a highway.
When some traveller crossed the hill, always a fine grey dust rose cloudless against the sky.
The traveller I could not distinguish, but the dust-cloud I could see.

And the dust-cloud seemed formed of hopes and possibilities -each speck an embryo event.
At sunset, when the skies were fair, the dust-cloud grew radiant and shone with visions.
The happiness for which I waited came not to me adown that western slope,
But now I can recall the cloud of golden dust, the sunset, and the highway leading over the hill,
The wonderful hop...

Our vales are sweet with fern and rose,
Our hills are maple-crowned;
But not from them our fathers chose
The village burying-ground.

The dreariest spot in all the land
To Death they set apart;
With scanty grace from Nature’s hand,
And none from that of Art.

A winding wall of mossy stone,
Frost-flung and broken, lines
A lonesome acre thinly grown
With grass and wandering vines.

Without the wall a birch-tree shows
Its drooped and tasselled head;
Within, a stag-horned sumach grows,
Fern-leafed, with spikes of red.

There, sheep that graze the neighboring plain
Like white ghosts come and go,
The farm-horse drags his fetlock chain,
The cow-bell tinkles slow.

Low moans the river from its bed,
The distant pines re...

    The storm hath passed;
    I hear the birds rejoice; the hen,
    Returned into the road again,
    Her cheerful notes repeats. The sky serene
    Is, in the west, upon the mountain seen:
    The country smiles; bright runs the silver stream.
    Each heart is cheered; on every side revive
    The sounds, the labors of the busy hive.
    The workman gazes at the watery sky,
    As standing at the door he sings,
    His work in hand; the little wife goes forth,
    And in her pail the gathered rain-drops brings;
    The vendor of his wares, from lane to lane,
    Begins his daily cry again.
    The sun returns, and with his smile illumes
    The villas on the neighboring hills;
    Through open terraces and balconies,
    The genial light pervades the ...

Gay visions for thee 'neath hope's pencil have glowed,
Peace dwells in thy bosom, a guileless abode;
Thou hast seen the bright side of existence alone,
And believ'st every spirit as pure as thine own.
May'st thou never awake from these rapturous dreams,
To find that the world is not fair as it seems,
To feel that the few thou hast loved have deceived,
Have forsaken the heart that confided, believed,
And left it as leafless, as bloomless, and waste
As the rose-tree that's stript by the merciless blast.

When the warm sky of childhood was beaming for me,
My days were all joyous, my heart was all glee;
Affection's best ties round my bosom were spun;
No cloud dimmed the lustre of life's morning sun.
If I watched o'er my favorite rose-bud's decay,
And mourned that ...

Don't look for the flaws as you go through life;
    And even when you find them,
It is wise and kind to be somewhat blind,
    And look for the virtue behind them;
For the cloudiest night has a hint of light
    Somewhere in its shadows hiding;
It's better by far to hunt for a star,
    Than the spots on the sun abiding.

The current of life runs ever away
    To the bosom of God's great ocean.
Don't set your force 'gainst the river's course,
    And think to alter its motion.
Don't waste a curse on the universe,
    Remember, it lived before you;
Don't butt at the storm with your puny form,
    But bend and let it go o'er you.

The world will never adjust itself
    To suit your whims to the letter,
Some things must go wrong your whole li...

Tempora labuntur, tacitisque senescimus annis,
Et fugiunt freno non remorante dies.--OVID, Fastorum, Lib. vi.


"O Caesar, we who are about to die
Salute you!" was the gladiators' cry
In the arena, standing face to face
With death and with the Roman populace.

O ye familiar scenes,--ye groves of pine,
That once were mine and are no longer mine,--
Thou river, widening through the meadows green
To the vast sea, so near and yet unseen,--
Ye halls, in whose seclusion and repose
Phantoms of fame, like exhalations, rose
And vanished,--we who are about to die
Salute you; earth and air and sea and sky,
And the Imperial Sun that scatters down
His sovereign splendors upon grove and town.

Ye do not answer us! ye do not hear!
We are forgotten; an...