Nature

Here! sweep these foolish leaves away,
I will not crush my brains to-day!
Look! are the southern curtains drawn?
Fetch me a fan, and so begone!

Not that, - the palm-tree's rustling leaf
Brought from a parching coral-reef
Its breath is heated; - I would swing
The broad gray plumes, - the eagle's wing.

I hate these roses' feverish blood!
Pluck me a half-blown lily-bud,
A long-stemmed lily from the lake,
Cold as a coiling water-snake.

Rain me sweet odors on the air,
And wheel me up my Indian chair,
And spread some book not overwise
Flat out before my sleepy eyes.

Who knows it not, - this dead recoil
Of weary fibres stretched with toil, -
The pulse that flutters faint and low
When Summer's seething breezes blow!

O ...

The summer is just in its grandest prime,
    The earth is green and the skies are blue;
But where is the lilt of the olden time,
When life was a melody set to rhyme,
    And dreams were so real they all seemed true?

There is sun on the meadow, and blooms on the bushes,
    And never a bird but is mad with glee;
But the pulse that bounds, and the blood that rushes,
And the hope that soars, and the joy that gushes,
    Are lost for ever to you and me.

There are dawns of amber and amethyst;
    There are purple mountains, and pale pink seas
That flush to crimson where skies have kist;
But out of life there is something missed -
    Something better than all of these.

We miss the faces we used to know,
    The smiling lips and the eyes of truth....

        Let others sing their favourite lay,
        From early morn till close of day,
        More useful themes engage our pen,
        We sing the lay of our good hen.

        For she doth lay each morn an egg,
        And it is full and large and big,
        Abroad she doth never travel,
        Happy she when scratching gravel.

        And she loud cackles songs of praise
        Every morn when e'er she lays,
        Proud she is when she finds pickings
        For to feed her brood of chickens.

        It greatly puzzled her one day
        When she found white nest egg of clay,
        She knew some one did trick play her,
        For she was no brick layer.

        Vain and stately male bird stalks,
        Leading his h...

Ay! gloriously thou standest there,
Beautiful, boundles firmament!
That, swelling wide o'er earth and air,
And round the horizon bent,
With thy bright vault, and sapphire wall,
Dost overhang and circle all.

Far, far below thee, tall old trees
Arise, and piles built up of old,
And hills, whose ancient summits freeze
In the fierce light and cold.
The eagle soars his utmost height,
Yet far thou stretchest o'er his flight.

Thou hast thy frowns, with thee on high
The storm has made his airy seat,
Beyond that soft blue curtain lie
His stores of hail and sleet.
Thence the consuming lightnings break,
There the strong hurricanes awake.

Yet art thou prodigal of smiles,
Smiles, sweeter than thy frowns are stern:
Earth sends, from all...

Call on the present day and night for nought,
Save what by yesterday was brought.
-
THE sea is flowing ever,
The land retains it never.
-
BE stirring, man, while yet the day is clear;
The night when none can work fast Draweth near.
-
WHEN the heavy-laden sigh,
Deeming help and hope gone by,
Oft, with healing power is heard,
Comfort-fraught, a kindly word.
-
How vast is mine inheritance, how glorious and sublime!
For time mine own possession is, the land I till is time!
-
UNWARY saith, ne'er lived a man more true;
The deepest heart, the highest head he knew,
"In ev'ry place and time thou'lt find availing
Uprightness, judgment, kindliness unfailing."
-
THOUGH the bards whom the Orient sun bath bless'd
Are greater than we who dw...

What is song's eternity?
Come and see.
Can it noise and bustle be?
Come and see.
Praises sung or praises said
Can it be?
Wait awhile and these are dead--
Sigh, sigh;
Be they high or lowly bred    They die.

What is song's eternity?
Come and see.
Melodies of earth and sky,
Here they be.
Song once sung to Adam's ears
Can it be?
Ballads of six thousand years
Thrive, thrive;
Songs awaken with the spheres
Alive.

Mighty songs that miss decay,
What are they?
Crowds and cities pass away
Like a day.
Books are out and books are read;
What are they?
Years will lay them with the dead--
Sigh, sigh;
Trifles unto nothing wed,
They die.

Dreamers, mark the honey bee;
Mark the tree
Where...

The Desert sands are heated, parched and dreary,
    The tigers rend alive their quivering prey
In the near Jungle; here the kites rise, weary,
    Too gorged with living food to fly away.

All night the hungry jackals howl together
    Over the carrion in the river bed,
Or seize some small soft thing of fur or feather
    Whose dying shrieks on the night air are shed.

I hear from yonder Temple in the distance
    Whose roof with obscene carven Gods is piled,
Reiterated with a sad insistence
    Sobs of, perhaps, some immolated child.

Strange rites here, where the archway's shade is deeper,
    Are consummated in the river bed;
Parias steal the rotten railway sleeper
    To burn the bodies of their cholera dead.

But yet, their lust, thei...

Beautiful Mother, I have toiled all day;
        And I am wearied. And the day is done.
        Now, while the wild brooks run
Soft by the furrows--fading, gold to gray,
    Their laughters turned to musing--ah, let me
    Hide here my face at thine unheeding knee,
        Beautiful Mother; if I be thy son.

The birds fly low. Gulls, starlings, hoverers,
        Along the meadows and the paling foam,
        All wings of thine that roam
Fly down, fly down. One reedy murmur blurs
    The silence of the earth; and from the warm
    Face of the field the upward savors swarm
        Into the darkness. And the herds are home.

All they are stalled and folded for their rest,
        The creatures: cloud-fleece young that leap and veer;
        Mad-mane and...

I.

His eyes found nothing beautiful and bright,
Nor wealth nor, honour, glory nor delight,
Which he could grasp and keep with might and right.

Flowers bloomed for maidens, swords outflashed for boys,
The world’s big children had their various toys;
He could not feel their sorrows and their joys.

Hills held a secret they would not unfold,
In careless scorn of him the ocean rolled,
The stars were alien splendours high and cold.

He felt himself a king bereft of crown,
Defrauded from his birthright of renown,
Bred up in littleness with churl and clown.



II.

How could he vindicate himself? His eyes,
That found not anywhere their proper prize,
Looked through and through the specious earth and skies,

They prob...

    Gray goose and gander,
        Waft your wings together,
    And carry the good king's daughter
        Over the one strand river.

Methinks 'twere no unprecedented feat
Should some benignant Minister of air
Lift, and encircle with a cloudy chair,
The One for whom my heart shall ever beat
With tenderest love; or, if a safer seat
Atween his downy wings be furnished, there
Would lodge her, and the cherished burden bear
O'er hill and valley to this dim retreat!
Rough ways my steps have trod; too rough and long
For her companionship; here dwells soft ease:
With sweets that she partakes not some distaste
Mingles, and lurking consciousness of wrong;
Languish the flowers; the waters seem to waste
Their vocal charm; their sparklings cease to please.

The sun does arise,
And make happy the skies;
The merry bells ring
To welcome the Spring;
The skylark and thrush,
The birds of the bush,
Sing louder around
To the bells' cheerful sound;
While our sports shall be seen
On the echoing Green.

Old John, with white hair,
Does laugh away care,
Sitting under the oak,
Among the old folk.
They laugh at our play,
And soon they all say,
"Such, such were the joys
When we all--girls and boys--
In our youth-time were seen
On the echoing Green."

Till the little ones, weary,
No more can be merry:
The sun does descend,
And our sports have an end.
Round the laps of their mothers
Many sisters and brothers,
Like birds in their nest,
Are ready for rest,
And spo...

Aristonoë, the fading shepherdess,
Gathers the young girls round her in a ring,
Teaching them wisdom of love,
What to say, how to dress,
How frown, how smile,
How suitors to their dancing feet to bring,
How in mere walking to beguile,
What words cunningly said in what a way
Will draw man's busy fancy astray,
All the alphabet, grammar and syntax of love.

The garden smells are sweet,
Daisies spring in the turf under the high-heeled feet,
Dense, dark banks of laurel grow
Behind the wavering row
Of golden, flaxen, black, brown, auburn heads,
Behind the light and shimmering dresses
Of these unreal, modern shepherdesses;
And gaudy flowers in formal patterned beds
Vary the dim long vistas of the park,
Far as the eye can see,
Till at the fore...

Can I forget how, when you stood
'Mid orchards whence spring bloom had fled,
Stars made the orchards seem a-bud,
And weighed the sighing boughs o'erhead
With shining ghosts of blossoms dead!

Or when you bowed, a lily tall,
Above your August lilies slim,
Transparent pale, that by the wall
Like softest moonlight seemed to swim,
Brimmed with faint fragrance to the brim.

And in the cloud that lingered low -
A silent pallor in the West -
There stirred and beat a golden glow
Of some great heart that could not rest,
A heart of gold within its breast.

Your heart, your life was in the wild,
Your joy to hear the whip-poor-will
Lament its love, when wafted mild
The harvest drifted from the hill:
The deep, deep wildwood where had trod

Dedicated to the mountains of the San Juan district, Colorado, as seen from the summit of Mt. Wilson.


I stood at sunrise, on the topmost part
Of lofty mountain, massively sublime;
A pinnacle of trachyte, seamed and scarred
By countless generations' ceaseless war
And struggle with the restless elements;
A rugged point, which shot into the air,
As by ambition or desire impelled
To pierce the eternal precincts of the sky.

        Below, outspread,
A scene of such terrific grandeur lay
That reeled the brain at what the eyes beheld;
The hands would clench involuntarily
And clutch from intuition for support;
The eyes by instinct closed, nor dared to gaze
On such an awful and inspiring sight.

The sun arose with bright transcendent ray,
Up...

Birds that like vanishing visions go winging,
White, white in the flame of the sunset's burning,
Fly with the wild spray the billows are flinging,
Blend, blend with the nightfall, and fade, unreturning!

Fire of the heaven, whose splendor all-glowing
Soon, soon shall end, and in darkness must perish;
Sea-bird and flame-wreath and foam lightly blowing; -
Soon, soon tho' we lose you, your beauty we cherish.

Visions may vanish, the sweetest, the dearest;
Hush'd, hush'd be the voice of love's echo replying;
Spirits may leave us that clung to us nearest: -
Love, love, only love dwells with us undying!

    O freshness, living freshness of a day
    In June! Spring scarce has gotten out of sight,
    And not a stain of wear shows on the grass
    Beneath our feet, and not a dead leaf calls,
    "Our day of loveliness is past and gone!"
    I found the thick wood steeped in pleasant smells,
    The dainty ferns hid in their sheltered nooks;
    The wild-flowers found the sunlight where they stood,
    And some hid their white faces quite away,
    While others lifted up their starry eyes
    And seemed right glad to ruffle in the breeze.

In sober mornings do thou not rehearse
The holy incantation of a verse;
But when that men have both well drunk, and fed,
Let my enchantments then be sung, or read.
When laurel spurts i' th' fire, and when the hearth
Smiles to itself, and gilds the roof with mirth;
When up the thyrse is raised, and when the sound
Of sacred orgies flies: "A round, a round;"
When the rose reigns, and locks with ointments shine,
Let rigid Cato read these lines of mine.