War

I've tramped across her endless miles of tundra,
I've rafted all her rapid flowing streams,
    She's kept me on the hummer,
    I've fought mosquits in summer
And "siwashed" neath Aurora's wintry beams,
    And still, I like Alaska.

I went a winter once on pay streak bacon,
I've gone a year on nothing much but beans,
    I've squandered all my time checks,
    The kind they give us roughnecks,
And haven't got a dollar in my jeans,
    And still, I like Alaska.

I got a stake one time and wandered Outside,
And I'm telling you I surely put on "dog,"
    But they got in between me and my poke
    They sure did clean me
And I hit for Dixon's Entrance, on the "hog,"
    And still, I like Alaska.

I don't suppose a man will live to beat it...

When youth was high, and life was new
And days sped musical and fleet,
She stood amid the morning dew,
And sang her earliest measures sweet, -
Sang as the lark sings, speeding fair
To touch and taste the purer air,
To gain a nearer view of Heaven;
'Twas then she sang "The Songs of Seven."

Now, farther on in womanhood,
With trainèd voice and ripened art,
She gently stands where once she stood,
And sings from out her deeper heart.
Sing on, dear Singer! sing again;
And we will listen to the strain,
Till soaring earth greets bending Heaven,
And seven-fold songs grow seventy-seven.

A Friendly Address To Mrs. Fry In Newgate.[1]

"Sermons in stones." - As You Like It.
"Out! out! damned spot!" - Macbeth.



I.

I like you, Mrs. Fry! I like your name!
It speaks the very warmth you feel in pressing
In daily act round Charity's great flame -
I like the crisp Browne way you have of dressing,
Good Mrs. Fry! I like the placid claim
You make to Christianity, - professing
Love, and good works - of course you buy of Barton,
Beside the young Fry's bookseller, Friend Darton!


II.

I like, good Mrs. Fry, your brethren mute -
Those serious, solemn gentlemen that sport -
I should have said, that wear, the sober suit
Shap'd like a court dress - but for hea...

What, can these dead bones live, whose sap is dried
By twenty scorching centuries of wrong?
Is this the House of Israel, whose pride
Is as a tale that's told, an ancient song?
Are these ignoble relics all that live
Of psalmist, priest, and prophet? Can the breath
Of very heaven bid these Bones revive,
Open the graves and clothe the ribs of death?


Yea, Prophesy, the Lord hath said. Again
Say to the wind, Come forth and breathe afresh,
Even that they may live upon these slain,
And bone to bone shall leap, and flesh to flesh.
The Spirit is not dead, proclaim the word,
Where lay dead bones, a host of armed men stand!
I ope your graves, my people, saith the Lord,
And I shall place you living in your land.

'Twas in a wee bit but-an'-ben
She bade when first I kent her,
Doon the side roadie by the kirk
Whaur Andra was precentor.

An' a' the week he keepit thrang
At's wark as village thatcher,
Whiles sairly fashed by women folk,
Wi' "Hurry up an' catch her!"

Nae books e'er ravel't Tibbie's harns,
Nae college lear had reached her,
An' a' she kent aboot her job
Her ain experience teached her.

To this cauld warld in fifty year
She'd fosh near auchteen hunner.
Losh keep's! When a' thing's said an' dune,
The cratur' was a won'er!

A' gate she'd traivelled day an' nicht,
A' kin' o' orra weather
Had seen her trampin' on the road,
Or trailin' through the heather.

But Time had set her pechin' sair,
As on his way he birled...

He sat with no more compunction
than an eel fish
big-faced, bloated,
the complexion of a beehive
-    a dragnet of emotions
crammed into a tumbler
upended in water.

His eyelids wore the effort
of horseblinders, a
spongy leather
masquerading as torpedoes
and I saw him
lonely at the crossroads
matted grass,
a strip of wire, cold current
chasing flecks about
his person, then lunging green
exploded into rapacity    -
caressed the awaiting fly strewn stick
with emerald mouth &
coffers of appetite.

And did those feet in ancient time
Walk upon England's mountains green?
And was the holy Lamb of God
On England's pleasant pastures seen?

And did the Countenance Divine
Shine forth upon our clouded hills?
And was Jerusalem builded here
Among these dark satanic mills?

Bring me my bow of burning gold!
Bring me my arrows of desire!
Bring me my spear! O clouds, unfold!
Bring me my chariot of fire!

I will not cease from mental fight,
Nor shall my sword sleep in my hand,
Till we have built Jerusalem
In England's green and pleasant land.

Oh! Kitty Malone--Mrs. Merdle 'tis now--
Was there ever on earth than this, greater folly?

Still gorging, while groaning, and swearing a vow,
That yours is a case of most sad melancholy.

With table that Croesus never had but might covet,
You live but to eat and to eat 'cause you love it;
And yet while you swallow great sirloins of meat
Complain like a beggar of nothing to eat.

Should some great angel say to me to-morrow,
    "Thou must re-tread thy pathway from the start,
But God will grant, in pity, for thy sorrow,
    Some one dear wish, the nearest to thy heart."

This were my wish! from my life's dim beginning
    Let be what has been! wisdom planned the whole;
My want, my woe, my errors, and my sinning,
    All, all were needed lessons for my soul.

("Comment, disaient-ils.")

[XXIII., July 18, 1838.]


How shall we flee sorrow - flee sorrow? said he.
How, how! How shall we flee sorrow - flee sorrow? said he.
How - how - how? answered she.

How shall we see pleasure - see pleasure? said he.
How, how! How shall we see pleasure - see pleasure? said he.
Dream - dream - dream! answered she.

How shall we be happy - be happy? said he.
How, how! How shall we be happy - be happy? said he.
Love - love - love! whispered she.

EVELYN JERROLD

My name is Tim O'Gallagher, - there's Oirish in that same;
My parients from the Imerald Oisle beyant the ocean came;
My father came from Donegal, my mother came from Clare;
But oi was born in Pontiac, besoide the Belle Rivière.
Oi spint my choildhood tamin' bears, and fellin' timber trays,
And catchin' salmon tin fate long - and doin' what oi plaze.
Oi got my iddication from the Riverind Father Blake;
He taught me Latin grammar, and he after taught me Grake,
Till oi could rade the classics in a distint sort of way -
'Twas the sadetoime of the harvist that oi'm rapin' ivery day.

My parients thought me monsthrous shmart - of thim 'twas awful koind,
And where oi'd go to college now was what perplixed their moind;
So they axed the Riverind Father Blake what varsity was bist

O let me love my love unto myself alone,
And know my knowledge to the world unknown;
No witness to my vision call,
Beholding, unbeheld of all;
And worship Thee, with Thee withdrawn apart,
Whoe’er, Whate’er Thou art,
Within the closest veil of mine own inmost heart.

What is it then to me
If others are inquisitive to see?
Why should I quit my place to go and ask
If other men are working at their task?
Leave my own buried roots to go
And see that brother plants shall grow;
And turn away from Thee, O Thou most Holy Light,
To look if other orbs their orbits keep aright,
Around their proper sun,
Deserting Thee, and being undone.

O let me love my love unto myself alone,
And know my knowledge to the world unknown;
And worship Thee, O hid One...

Down by the waters of the sea,
Reigns the King of Never-to-be.
His palace walls are black with night;
His torches star and moonès light,
And for his timepiece deep and grave
Beats on the green unhastening wave.

Windswept are his high corridors;
His pleasance the sea-mantled shores;
For sentinel a shadow stands
With hair in heaven, and cloudy hands;
And round his bed, king's guards to be,
Watch pines in iron solemnity.

His hound is mute; his steed at will
Roams pastures deep with asphodel;
His queen is to her slumber gone;
His courtiers mute lie, hewn in stone;
He hath forgot where he did hide
His sceptre in the mountain-side.

Grey-capped and muttering, mad is he -
The childless King of Never-to-be;
For all his people in th...

Henry, Henry, do you love me?
Do I love you, Mary?
Oh, can you mean to liken me
To the aspen tree.
Whose leaves do shake and vary,
From white to green
And back again,
Shifting and contrary?

Henry, Henry, do you love me,
Do you love me truly?
Oh, Mary, must I say again
My love's a pain,
A torment most unruly?
It tosses me
Like a ship at sea
When the storm rages fully.

Henry, Henry, why do you love me?
Mary, dear, have pity!
I swear, of all the girls there are
Both near and far,
In country or in city,
There's none like you,
So kind, so true,
So wise, so brave, so pretty.

You are at least a man, of men a king.
    You have a heart, and with that heart you love.
    The race you come from is not gendered of
The filthy sty whose latest litter cling
Round England's flesh-pots, gorged and gluttoning.
    No, but on flaming battle-fields, in courts
    Of honour and of danger old resorts,
The name of Hohen-Zollern clear doth ring.
O Father William, you, not falsely weak,
    Who never spared the rod to spoil the child,
Our mighty Germany, we only speak
    To bless you with a blessing sweet and mild,
Ere that near heaven your weary footsteps seek
    Where love with liberty is reconciled.

Beneath the surface of a shallow lake,
Where grasses rank and mammoth rushes grow,
And playful fish their bright fins nimbly shake,
Or madly chase each other to and fro,
The larva of the dragon-fly submerged,
In family large, had taken their abode,
And tho' the waves around them daily surged,
Upon the bending grass they safely rode.

Content were they with life as there enjoyed;
To brighter world they never had aspired,
Had they not felt unfilled an aching void,
And heard a whisper of a life attired
In sapphire robes, 'midst gleams of golden light,
Above their present world, so dank and chill,
Where all day long they wing their happy flight
From roses sweet to lovely daffodil.

But some essayed to doubt if it were so.
Who ever had returned to ma...

        It happened once in early spring,
            While there did float great thick ice cakes,
        That then a gale did quickly bring
            Them all down from the upper lakes.

        And from Buffalo to Lake Erie,
            Across the entrance to river,
        It was a scene of icebergs dreary,
            Those who saw will remember ever.

        Then gale blew up lake and river,
            And left Niagara almost dry,
        This a lady did discover
            As above the Falls she cast her eye.

        Such scene it had been witnessed never,
            Since Israelites crossed the Red Sea,
        When they had resolved forever
            From Pharaoh's bondage to flee.

        Lady she resolved to venture,

The Sheep adorns the landscape rural
And is both singular and plural,
It gives grammarians the creeps
To hear one say, “A flock of sheeps.”

The Sheep is gentle, meek and mild,
And led in herds by man or child,
Being less savage than the rabbit,
Sheep are gregarious by habit.

The Sheep grows wool and thus promotes
The making of vests, pants and coats,
Vests, pants and coats and woolen cloths
Provide good food for hungry moths.

With vegetables added to
The Sheep, we get our mutton stew,
Experiments long since revealed
The Sheep should first be killed and peeled.

Thus, with our debt to them so deep,
All men should cry “Praise be for Sheep!”
And, if we happen to be shepherds,
“Praise be they’re not as fierce as leopards!”