Your eyes are bright lands.
Your looks are little birds,
Handkerchiefs gently waving goodbye.
In your smile I rest as though in bobbing boats.
Your little stories are made of silk.
I must behold you always.

Fancy, who leads the pastimes of the glad,
Full oft is pleased a wayward dart to throw;
Sending sad shadows after things not sad,
Peopling the harmless fields with signs of woe:
Beneath her sway, a simple forest cry
Becomes an echo of man's misery.

Blithe ravens croak of death; and when the owl
Tries his two voices for a favourite strain
'Tu-whit, Tu-whoo!' the unsuspecting fowl
Forebodes mishap or seems but to complain;
Fancy, intent to harass and annoy,
Can thus pervert the evidence of joy.

Through border wilds where naked Indians stray,
Myriads of notes attest her subtle skill;
A feathered task-master cries, "Work away!"
And, in thy iteration, "Whip poor will!"
Is heard the spirit of a toil-worn slave,
Lashed out of life, not quiet in the g...

1.
Thou art fair, and few are fairer
Of the Nymphs of earth or ocean;
They are robes that fit the wearer -
Those soft limbs of thine, whose motion
Ever falls and shifts and glances
As the life within them dances.

2.
Thy deep eyes, a double Planet,
Gaze the wisest into madness
With soft clear fire, - the winds that fan it
Are those thoughts of tender gladness
Which, like zephyrs on the billow,
Make thy gentle soul their pillow.

3.
If, whatever face thou paintest
In those eyes, grows pale with pleasure,
If the fainting soul is faintest
When it hears thy harp's wild measure,
Wonder not that when thou speakest
Of the weak my heart is weakest.

4.
As dew beneath the wind of morning,
As the sea which whirlwinds wak...

They sleep well here whom Allah loved and kept
        And treasured in his vineyard fair and fine,
Most lustrous of the Orient pearls that shine,
        Which youth found where the waves of passion swept.
Here, where in peace perpetual they have slept,
        A turban beckons where the roses twine,
A banner flutters out in silken line,
        And sometimes here a Giaour's name is kept.

Oh! roses of this paradise of old,
        The eyes that loved not Allah saw you not,
Nor arms that prayed not eastward could enfold!
        But now a Christian treads this hallowed spot;
Wise Allah, curse not him who bows his head
        Amid the marble shrines of Allah's dead!

This was her home; one mossy gable thrust
Above the cedars and the locust trees:
This was her home, whose beauty now is dust,
A lonely memory for melodies
The wild birds sing, the wild birds and the bees.
Here every evening is a prayer: no boast
Or ruin of sunset makes the wan world wroth;
Here, through the twilight, like a pale flower's ghost,
A drowsy flutter, flies the tiger-moth;
And dusk spreads darkness like a dewy cloth.
In vagabond velvet, on the placid day,
A stain of crimson, lolls the butterfly;
The south wind sows with ripple and with ray
The pleasant waters; and the gentle sky
Looks on the homestead like a quiet eye.
Their melancholy quaver, lone and low,
When day is done, the gray tree-toads repeat:
The whippoorwills, far in the afterglow,

In every breast Affection fires, there dwells
    A secret consciousness to what degree
    They are themselves belov'd. - We hourly see
    Th' involuntary proof, that either quells,
Or ought to quell false hopes, - or sets us free
    From pain'd distrust; - but, O, the misery!
    Weak Self-Delusion timidly repels
    The lights obtrusive - shrinks from all that tells
Unwelcome truths, and vainly seeks repose
    For startled Fondness, in the opiate balm,
    Of kind profession, tho', perchance, it flows
To hush Complaint - O! in Belief's clear calm,
    Or 'mid the lurid clouds of Doubt, we find
    LOVE rise the Sun, or Comet of the Mind.

He lurks among the reeds, beside the marsh,
    Red oleanders twisted in His hair,
His eyes are haggard and His lips are harsh,
    Upon His breast the bones show gaunt and bare.

The green and stagnant waters lick His feet,
    And from their filmy, iridescent scum
Clouds of mosquitoes, gauzy in the heat,
    Rise with His gifts: Death and Delirium.

His messengers: They bear the deadly taint
    On spangled wings aloft and far away,
Making thin music, strident and yet faint,
    From golden eve to silver break of day.

The baffled sleeper hears th' incessant whine
    Through his tormented dreams, and finds no rest
The thirsty insects use his blood for wine,
    Probe his blue veins and pasture on his breast.

While far away He in the mar...

With each strong thought, with every earnest longing
    For aught thou deemest needful to thy soul,
Invisible vast forces are set thronging
    Between thee and that goal.

'Tis only when some hidden weakness alters
    And changes thy desire, or makes it less,
That this mysterious army ever falters
    Or stops short of success.

Thought is a magnet; and the longed-for pleasure
    Or boon, or aim, or object, is the steel;
And its attainment hangs but on the measure
    Of what thy soul can feel.

Having certain cares to drown,
To the sea I took them down:

And I threw them in the wave,
That engulfed them like a grave.

Swiftly then I plied the oar
With a light heart to the shore.

But behind me came my foes:
Like a nine-days’ corpse each rose,

And (a ghastly sight to see!)
Clutched the boat and grined at me!

With a heavy heart, alack,
To the land I bore them back.

Not in Water or in Wine
Can I drown these cares of mine.

But some day, for good and sure,
I shall bury them secure,

Where the soil is rich and brown,
With a stone to keep them down,

And to let their end be known,
Have my name carved on the stone;

So that passers-by may say,
“Here lie cares that had their day,”

I

What dream you in the night-time
    When you whisper to the moon?
What say you in the morning?
    What do you sing at noon?
When I hear your voice uplifting,
Like a breeze through branches sifting,
And your ripples softly drifting
    To the August airs a-tune.

II

Lend me your happy laughter,
    Ste. Marie, as you leap;
Your peace that follows after
    Where through the isles you creep.
Give to me your splendid dashing,
Give your sparkles and your splashing,
Your uphurling waves down crashing,
    Then, your aftermath of sleep.

The embers were blinking and clinking away,
The casement half open was thrown;
There was nothing but cloud on the skirts of the Day,
And I sat on the threshold alone!

And said to the river which flowed by my door
With its beautiful face to the hill,
“I have waited and waited, all wearied and sore,
But my love is a wanderer still!”

And said to the wind, as it paused in its flight
To look through the shivering pane,
“There are memories moaning and homeless to-night
That can never be tranquil again!”

And said to the woods, as their burdens were borne
With a flutter and sigh to the eaves,
“They are wrinkled and wasted, and tattered and torn,
And we too have our withering leaves.”

Did I hear a low echo of footfalls about,
Whilst watchin...

There are haunters of the silence, ghosts that hold the heart and brain:
I have sat with them and hearkened; I have talked with them in vain:
I have shuddered from their coming, yet have run to meet them there,
And have cursed them and have blessed them and have loved them to despair.

At my door I see their shadows; in my walks I meet their ghosts;
Where I often hear them weeping or sweep by in withered hosts:
Perished dreams, gone like the roses, crumbling by like autumn leaves;
Phantoms of old joys departed, that the spirit eye perceives.

Oft at night they sit beside me, fix their eyes upon my face,
Demon eyes that burn and hold me, in whose deeps my heart can trace
All the past; and where a passion, as in Hell the ghosts go by,
Turns an anguished face toward me with a l...

I

THE RETURN

He went, and he was gay to go:
And I smiled on him as he went.
My boy! 'Twas well he couldn't know
My darkest dread, or what it meant -

Just what it meant to smile and smile
And let my son go cheerily -
My son ... and wondering all the while
What stranger would come back to me.


II

THE DANCERS

All day beneath the hurtling shells
Before my burning eyes
Hover the dainty demoiselles -
The peacock dragon-flies.

Unceasingly they dart and glance
Above the stagnant stream -
And I am fighting here in France
As in a senseless dream.

A dream of shattering black shells
That hurtle overhead,
And dainty dancing demoiselles
Above the dreamless dead.


III

AN INDIAN TRADITION; VERSIFIED FROM SCHOOLCRAFT


It was a day of festive-mirth,
    And bright the Indian wigwams shone,
For 'twas a chieftain's bridal-day,
    And gladness dwelt in every tone;
But ere the glow of sunset hours
    Upon the western hills was shed,
Deep sadness rested on those bowers -
    The bride was numbered with the dead.

Days passed; and still beside her tomb
    The stricken lover bowed his head;
And-nightly, through the forest's gloom
    The stars beheld him with his dead.
In vain did grey-haired chieftains urge
    The youthful hunter to the chase; -
He heard, yet heeded not their words,
    For grief had chained him to the place.

They laid his war-club by his side,
    His bow and arrows, too, they br...

Can rules or tutors educate
The semigod whom we await?
He must be musical,
Tremulous, impressional,
Alive to gentle influence
Of landscape and of sky,
And tender to the spirit-touch
Of man's or maiden's eye:
But, to his native centre fast,
Shall into Future fuse the Past,
And the world's flowing fates in his own mould recast.

Deep in the West a berry-coloured bar
Of sunset gleams; against which one tall fir
Is outlined dark; above which - courier
Of dew and dreams - burns dusk's appointed star.
And flash on flash, as when the elves wage war
In Goblinland, the fireflies bombard
The stillness; and, like spirits, o'er the sward
The glimmering winds bring fragrance from afar.
And now withdrawn into the hill-wood belts
A whippoorwill; while, with attendant states
Of purple and silver, slow the great moon melts
Into the night - to show me where she waits, -
Like some slim moonbeam, - by the old beech-tree,
Who keeps her lips, fresh as a flower, for me.

Genesis 28:10-22.


The sun had set. He was alone;
Mid twilight shadows he would rest.
He laid his head upon a stone
To woo sweet slumber for his guest.

Perhaps within those midnight hours
His rugged bed was cold and chill,
But wrapped in Dreamland's mystic powers,
He knew no danger, felt no ill.

A vision in his dreams appeared!
Angels were stepping to and fro
Upon a ladder which, upreared,
Aided their ministry below.

And then God spake in words which said
What future ages would unfold,
The soil on which he made his bed
Was his, by prophecy foretold.

He further heard that holy voice
Predict that through his tribe would be
Blessings in which all should rejoice,
Blessings which all the world should see.
...

They come to ev'ry life -- sad, sunless days,
With not a light all o'er their clouded skies;
And thro' the dark we grope along our ways
With hearts fear-filled, and lips low-breathing sighs.

What is the dark? Why cometh it? and whence?
Why does it banish all the bright away?
How does it weave a spell o'er soul and sense?
Why falls the shadow where'er gleams the ray?

Hast felt it? I have felt it, and I know
How oft and suddenly the shadows roll
From out the depths of some dim realm of woe,
To wrap their darkness round the human soul.

Those days are darker than the very night;
For nights have stars, and sleep, and happy dreams;
But these days bring unto the spirit-sight
The mysteries of gloom, until it seems

The light is gone forever, and...