Deem not, sweet rose, that bloom’st’ midst many a thorn,
Thy friend, though to a cloister’s shade consign’d,
Can e’er forget the charms he left behind,
Or pass unheeded this auspicious morn!
In happier days to brighter prospects born,
O tell thy thoughtless sex, the virtuous mind,
Like thee, content in every state may find,
And look on Folly’s pageantry with scorn.
To steer with nicest art betwixt th’ extreme
Of idle mirth, and affectation coy;
To blend good sense with elegance and ease;
To bid Affliction’s eye no longer stream;
Is thine; best gift, the unfailing source of joy,
The guide to pleasures which can never cease!

“Tired with all these, for restful death I cry.”
- SHAKESPEARE: Sonnet 66



Weary of erring in this desert Life,
Weary of hoping hopes for ever vain,
Weary of struggling in all-sterile strife,
Weary of thought which maketh nothing plain,
I close my eyes and calm my panting breath,
And pray to Thee, O ever-quiet Death!
To come and soothe away my bitter pain.

The strong shall strive, may they be victors crowned;
The wise still seek, may they at length find Truth;
The young still hope, may purest love be found
To make their age more glorious than their youth.
For me; my brain is weak, my heart is cold,
My hope and faith long dead; my life but bold
In jest and laugh to parry hateful ruth.

Over me pass the days and months and year...

Little thinks, in the field, yon red-cloaked clown
Of thee from the hill-top looking down;
The heifer that lows in the upland farm,
Far-heard, lows not thine ear to charm;
The sexton, tolling his bell at noon,
Deems not that great Napoleon
Stops his horse, and lists with delight,
Whilst his files sweep round yon Alpine height;
Nor knowest thou what argument
Thy life to thy neighbor's creed has lent.
All are needed by each one;
Nothing is fair or good alone.
I thought the sparrow's note from heaven,
Singing at dawn on the alder bough;
I brought him home, in his nest, at even;
He sings the song, but it cheers not now,
For I did not bring home the river and sky;--
He sang to my ear,--they sang to my eye.
The delicate shells lay on the shore;
The bu...

Knight, a true sister-love
This heart retains;
Ask me no other love,
That way lie pains!

Calm must I view thee come,
Calm see thee go;
Tale-telling tears of thine
I must not know!

As they who watch by sick-beds find relief
Unwittingly from the great stress of grief
And anxious care, in fantasies outwrought
From the hearth’s embers flickering low, or caught
From whispering wind, or tread of passing feet,
Or vagrant memory calling up some sweet
Snatch of old song or romance, whence or why
They scarcely know or ask, so, thou and I,
Nursed in the faith that Truth alone is strong
In the endurance which outwearies Wrong,
With meek persistence baffling brutal force,
And trusting God against the universe,
We, doomed to watch a strife we may not share
With other weapons than the patriot’s prayer,
Yet owning, with full hearts and moistened eyes,
The awful beauty of self-sacrifice,
And wrung by keenest sympathy for all
Who give their loved on...

Dear Heart, this is my book of boyish song,
The changing story of the wandering quest
That found at last its ending in thy breast -
The love it sought and sang astray so long
With wild young heart and happy eager tongue.
Much meant it all to me to seek and sing,
Ah, Love, but how much more to-day to bring
This 'rhyme that first of all he made when young.'

Take it and love it, 'tis the prophecy
For whose poor silver thou hast given me gold;
Yea! those old faces for an hour seemed fair
Only because some hints of Thee they were:
Judge then, if I so loved weak types of old,
How good, dear Heart, the perfect gift of Thee.

With many a thousand kiss not yet content,

At length with One kiss I was forced to go;

After that bitter parting's depth of woe,
I deem'd the shore from which my steps I bent,

Its hills, streams, dwellings, mountains, as I went,

A pledge of joy, till daylight ceased to glow;

Then on my sight did blissful visions grow
In the dim-lighted, distant firmament,

And when at length the sea confined my gaze,

My ardent longing fill'd my heart once more;

What I had lost, unwillingly I sought.

Then Heaven appear'd to shed its kindly rays:

Methought that all I had possess'd of yore

Remain'd still mine that I was reft of nought.

    "All that I ask," says Love, "is just to stand
    And gaze, unchided, deep in thy dear eyes;
    For in their depths lies largest Paradise.
Yet, if perchance one pressure of thy hand
    Be granted me, then joy I thought complete
    Were still more sweet.

    "All that I ask," says Love, "all that I ask,
    Is just thy hand-clasp.    Could I brush thy cheek
    As zephyrs brush a rose leaf, words are weak
To tell the bliss in which my soul would bask.
    There is no language but would desecrate
    A joy so great.

    "All that I ask, is just one tender touch
    Of that soft cheek.    Thy pulsing palm in mine,
    Thy dark eyes lifted in a trust divine,
And those curled lips that tempt me overmuch
    Turned where I may not seize the supre...

Roll on, O shining sun,
    To the far seas!
Bring down, ye shades of eve,
    The soft, salt breeze!
Shine out, O stars, and light
My darling's pathway bright,
As through the summer night
    She comes to me.

No beam of any star
    Can match her eyes;
Her smile the bursting day
    In light outvies.
Her voice - the sweetest thing
Heard by the raptured spring
When waking wild-woods ring -
    She comes to me.

Ye stars, more swiftly wheel
    O'er earth's still breast;
More wildly plunge and reel
    In the dim west!
The earth is lone and lorn,
Till the glad day be born,
Till with the happy morn
    She comes to me.

By Sylvia if thy charming self be meant;
If friendship be thy virgin vows' extent,
O! let me in Aminta's praises join,
Hers my esteem shall be, my passion thine.
When for thy head the garland I prepare,
A second wreath shall bind Aminta's hair;
And when my choicest songs thy worth proclaim,
Alternate verse shall bless Aminta's name;
My heart shall own the justice of her cause,
And Love himself submit to Friendship's laws.

But if beneath thy numbers' soft disguise
Some favour'd swain, some true Alexis, lies;
If Amaryllis breathes thy secret pains,
And thy fond heart beats measure to thy strains,
May'st thou, howe'er I grieve, for ever find
The flame propitious and the lover kind;
May Venus long exert her happy power,
And make thy beauty like thy vers...

Low at my feet there lies to-night
    A crushed and withered rose;
Within its heart of fading red
    No crimson fire glows;
For o'er its leaves the frost of death
    Steals like an icy breath;
And soon 't will vanish from my sight,
    A thing of gloom and death.

Ah! beauteous flower, once thou wert
    My pleasure and my pride;
And now when thou art old and worn
    I will not turn aside;
But gently o'er thy faded leaves
    I'll shed one kindly tear;
That thou wilt know, though dead and gone,
    To memory thou art dear.

Before my gaze there lies to-night
    A rose-bud fresh and fair;
And like the breath of dewy morn
    Its fragrance scents the air.
This fragile flower I fain would pluck
    With hand most kind yet b...

Goddess the laughter-loving, Aphrodite, befriend!
Long have I served thine altars, serve me now at the end,
Let me have peace of thee, truce of thee, golden one, send.

Heart of my heart have I offered thee, pain of my pain,
Yielding my life for the love of thee into thy chain;
Lady and goddess be merciful, loose me again.

All things I had that were fairest, my dearest and best,
Fed the fierce flames on thine altar: ah, surely, my breast
Shrined thee alone among goddesses, spurning the rest.

Blossom of youth thou hast plucked of me, flower of my days;
Stinted I nought in thine honouring, walked in thy ways,
Song of my soul pouring out to thee, all in thy praise.

Fierce was the flame while it lasted, and strong was thy wine,
Meet for immortals that die ...

Oft have you seen a swan superbly frowning,
And with proud breast his own white shadow crowning;
He slants his neck beneath the waters bright
So silently, it seems a beam of light
Come from the galaxy: anon he sports,
With outspread wings the Naiad Zephyr courts,
Or ruffles all the surface of the lake
In striving from its crystal face to take
Some diamond water drops, and them to treasure
In milky nest, and sip them off at leisure.
But not a moment can he there insure them,
Nor to such downy rest can he allure them;
For down they rush as though they would be free,
And drop like hours into eternity.
Just like that bird am I in loss of time,
Whene'er I venture on the stream of rhyme;
With shatter'd boat, oar snapt, and canvass rent,
I slowly sail, scarce kn...

Sweet comes the morning
In Nature's adorning,
And bright shines the dew on the buds of the thorn,
Where Mary Ann rambles
Through the sloe trees and brambles;
She's sweeter than wild flowers that open at morn;
She's a rose in the dew;
She's pure and she's true;
She's as gay as the poppy that grows in the corn.

Her eyes they are bright,
Her bosom's snow white,
And her voice is like songs of the birds in the grove.
She's handsome and bonny,
And fairer than any,
And her person and actions are Nature's and love.
She has the bloom of all roses,
She's the breath of sweet posies,
She's as pure as the brood in the nest of the dove.

Of Earth's fairest daughters,
Voiced like falling waters,
She walks down the meadows, than blossoms more fa...

A lover whom duty called over the wave,
With himself communed: "Will my love be true
If left to herself? Had I better not sue
Some friend to watch over her, good and grave?
But my friend might fail in my need," he said,
"And I return to find love dead.
Since friendships fade like the flow'rs of June,
I will leave her in charge of the stable moon."

Then he said to the moon: "O dear old moon,
Who for years and years from thy thrown above
Hast nurtured and guarded young lovers and love,
My heart has but come to its waiting June,
And the promise time of the budding vine;
Oh, guard thee well this love of mine."
And he harked him then while all was still,
And the pale moon answered and said, "I will."

And he sailed in his ship o'er many seas,
And he...

We take from life one little share,
And say that this shall be
A space, redeemed from toil and care,
From tears and sadness free.

And, haply, Death unstrings his bow,
And Sorrow stands apart,
And, for a little while, we know
The sunshine of the heart.

Existence seems a summer eve,
Warm, soft, and full of peace,
Our free, unfettered feelings give
The soul its full release.

A moment, then, it takes the power
To call up thoughts that throw
Around that charmed and hallowed hour,
This life's divinest glow.

But Time, though viewlessly it flies,
And slowly, will not stay;
Alike, through clear and clouded skies,
It cleaves its silent way.

Alike the bitter cup of grief,
Alike the draught of bliss,
Its progress...

Until the day break, and the shadows flee away. Song of Solomon 4:6.


Gleaming softly, silvery-faint,
Heralded by chanticleer,
Merging from night's shadowy taint,
New day of the passing year!

Born to bless or born to blight,
Born for you and born for me,
Leaving, ere it take its flight,
Impress on eternity!

'Tis a gift from God's own hand.
On its pure unsullied page
Let us write at his command
What will bless our pilgrimage.

True repentance giveth joy
To the angels in the sky.
What could be more blest employ
Than to cheer the choirs on high?

Deeds of patience, deeds of love,
Banishing all hate and guile
These will steer toward heaven above,
These will make the angels smile.

May this child...

"Dumque virent genua
Et decet, obducta solvatur fonte senectus."

The muse of boyhood's fervid hour
Grows tame as skies get chill and hazy;
Where once she sought a passion-flower,
She only hopes to find a daisy.
Well, who the changing world bewails?
Who asks to have it stay unaltered?
Shall grown-up kittens chase their tails?
Shall colts be never shod or haltered?

Are we "The Boys" that used to make
The tables ring with noisy follies?
Whose deep-lunged laughter oft would shake
The ceiling with its thunder-volleys?
Are we the youths with lips unshorn,
At beauty's feet unwrinkled suitors,
Whose memories reach tradition's morn, -
The days of prehistoric tutors?

"The Boys" we knew, - but who are these
Whose heads might serve for Plu...